The Recycled Meeting

'Ever go to a meeting that you swear you've been in before?

'Sat down with a dozen others, meeting leader began talking, other people began responding, back-and-forth, issues raised, objections voiced . . .

I was there last week.

Not deja vu. Not boring impression that "All meetings are alike."

No: this one had real issues - and the calendar said "today" - and, and

And I looked in my notebook and realized that we actually had this exact same meeting seven days earlier.

It was as if twelve people had done absolutely nothing between then and now - and no one was self-conscious about that, or apologetic, or acknowledged it. No one had thought about it during the interim, not a whsiper of a thought, an inkling of an idea. And, now, a collective amnesia.

I have been here before.