“The Call” has become the most difficult song to perform, yet it was the easiest song to write. The year it was written happened to be one of the most troubling years I’d had in a long time. It seemed to be one of those years when everything that could possibly go wrong went wrong.

In the spring of 2006, I was in my office one afternoon when one of my colleagues came in and took a seat at my desk. He was concerned about losing his job. He would often come to me to seek advice and encouragement. I was close to fifteen years his senior and had been with the company a lot longer then him.

“Russ, I believe I’m gonna get fired,” he stated. “Did you notice in the meeting this morning after Mrs. Washington said ‘some people might not be here if things continue the way they are going’ then she looked at me?”  “No, I didn’t notice that Jose. I think you’re just paranoid,” I smirked.  “Look, your numbers aren’t that great but don’t trip.  I have seen people with numbers much worse than yours that stay here for two or three years at a time.”

“What would you say if I told you, I just passed her in the hallway and she couldn’t even look at me?”  I laughed out loud. “Jose, you remind me of King Damocles.”  He smiled but with a serious look on his face, “Who is King Damocles?”  “He was a great King but couldn’t enjoy his riches and royalty because of his paranoia. Everyday he would be consumed with his fear that one day someone would attempt to take the throne. So one day he came up with an ingenious idea to always stay alert. He took the hair from his horse’s mane and tied it to his sword at one end and tied the other end to the ceiling.  He would sleep under this contraption in order to remind himself to stay aware of the dangers before him. Over time the strain on the hair was beginning to lose its strength. One day while under the sword he dosed off and the sword broke from the hair and chopped his head off.” The moral of the story is- If you continue thinking you’re going to get fired you probably will. You’ll become a victim of your own petulance. The more you put those vibes into your universe, it circles around in your mind and you can’t focus on what you need to do to change the situation.” I paused for a few seconds. “Understand?” I asked.  Jose sat back in the chair and laughed. “Am I that bad, you think?”  “You’re getting there,” I responded. “Russ, you just don’t know how bad I need this job. My wife is already talking about leaving if I lose this job. We are two months behind on our mortgage.  And, as you know my car is on its last leg and if that’s not bad enough, my son’s mother is trying to increase my child support payment.” “That is all the more reason to stay focused on what you need to do to keep your job. If you ask me, I believe the paranoia is coming across the phone to your clients as a sense of urgency or being desperate and that’s why it been hard for you to close on your deals.” “I think you’re right,” he said standing up from the chair. “I’m gonna stay a little longer this evening and contact some of my new leads.” He shook my hand and made his way to his office.

The next day before lunch I was on the phone, when I heard a loud thud against my door. I got up to open my door when I heard a few voices shout “Jose! Jose!”  Jose was walking back to his office from the copier room and fell face down suffering from a heart attack. The EMC’s finally arrived placing a nitrogen pill under his tongue before whisking him off to the nearest hospital. I was shook. When I finally went back into my office, I sat at my desk and replayed in my mind what I had just witnessed. It all seemed too close and too real for me.

Just twenty two years earlier, I suffered a similar incident as a result of job related stress. I decided that night I was going to pursue my Calling on a fulltime basis. Up to then I was pursuing my Calling on a part-time basis. “It’s now time to get really serious,” I said to myself. “If I’m gonna leave this earth on the count of too much stress, it’s gonna be as a result of the stress I place upon myself pursuing my calling.”

Two months later I turned in my resignation. Within five months, I found myself questioning my move while sitting at the end of my bed staring at the wall. I had no money, no job, rent was due in two days, gas was off and electricity was temporary. “God, I’m looking for some answers. I don’t know if this is a sign from you that I need to go back to Corporate America or continue to pursue my Calling.”

The phone rang interrupting my thoughts. It was my girlfriend. “What are you doing?”  “Just chillin’,” I said in a somber voice. “I thought I would swing by to get you and take you out to dinner. I thought it might pick up your spirits.”  My spirits were immediately lifted “Thank you, I would like that, I’m sure that would pick up my spirits.” “Only thing, I have to do is swing by my mother’s house to drop off some items of hers. So, I’ll be by to get you in a few minutes,” she said.
 
When we arrived at her mother’s house, I wasn’t my usual giddy self. I spoke and took a seat in a lounge chair in her living room while the two of them conducted their business. From the kitchen my girlfriend’s mother shouted, “Hey Russell, I found a Ralph Waldo Emerson book of poems in my box of books. I thought about you so I put it over on that table next to you.” I reached over, picked up the book and opened it. The book was so old and dry it broke in half. It was an antique, published in 1861. What was so amazing to me was the half in my right hand was a poem he had written called “The Call”. I began reading it:

“Each man has his own vocation.
The talent is the Call.
There is one direction in which all
space is open to him. He has faculties
silently inviting him thither to endless
exertion.

He is like a ship in a river; he runs against
obstruction on every side but one;
on that side, all obstruction is taken away,
and he sweeps serenely over a deepening
channel into an infinite sea.”

A tear slowly slid down my face. “I guess this is my answer,” I said to myself. After a lovely evening on the town I told my girl friend I had to be dropped off at home. With all the pressure lingering over me along with all that I’d been through up to that point, I think I cried two or three times writing this song. “The Call” was finished around 2:30am that night.