This is not an autobiographical post. Instead, it is about my nephew Lon Kieffer.

Lon is my oldest brother’s son, who was also named Lon. In this photo from his own website, nephew Lon looks a lot like his dad. My nephew wondered about me for years after I visited his family in Baltimore, Maryland on my way to Germany in June 1973. During the visit Lon had a Little League baseball game. When the regular umpires did not show up, his dad and I volunteered to umpire the game. Lon’s dad called the balls and strikes, and I umpired the bases. During one of his trips to the plate, nephew Lon hit a ball a country mile to right-center field – an easy home run even if the guy had been on crutches. However, in my judgment he failed to touch first base while rounding the bases. The other team appealed, and I had no choice but to call my nephew out. I heard about that call for a while! There was no "instant replay" option to set the record straight. Well, after all these years Lon has gotten over it.

My nephew Lon is a successful health care professional – a licensed nursing home administrator in addition to being a licensed RN and having an MBA. But Lon’s specialty is his work as a motivational speaker. Next week he is speaking (on his birthday, no less!) before the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (around 2000 people, all in HR), and his presentation is going to be simulcast on the web. Lon "Kieffer the Speaker" publishes his own free email newsletter, with a current mailing list of 10,000 people. Here is a sample of his motivational speaking on the subject of dealing with changes. Enjoy!

Comment from Lon Kieffer:

The ground rules on that field are that my home run was automatic. Was I still required to touch ’em all?

Answer from Paul Kieffer:

Well, I guess that is the kind of question you ask when you have an out-of-town umpire.