Needed: An inner circle

It occurred to me tonight that I do not have an inner circle.

We know from watching the TV news and reading the newspaper that presidents have inner circles and governors have them. When network television broke the news that President Obama would soon be on television with the news that Osama bin Laden was dead, the reporters referred frequently to bin Laden’s inner circle.

Gee, I grumped. Bad guys have an inner circle, but I don’t. I spent eight months serving on the Ventura County Board of Education, an important political office, but even that experience failed to net me an inner circle. Obviously, I need one.

I began taking steps to correct this terrible failure on my part. I asked my wife if she would join my inner circle. She answered, “Huh?” Bad start. Members of my inner circle must do a better job of anticipating my thinking than giving me a blank look and asking, ‘Huh?’

“My inner circle,” I answered. “Presidents have one, bin Laden had one. I don’t.”

“Does this have something to do with that blog thing? Do I have to join something?” I assured her that, no, she need not join anything except the inner circle itself. She agreed.

Excellent. I was on my way. I’m sure my mother will want to be a member of my inner circle and maybe my sister, too. I’ll ask them. Not too sure about our kids, since both moved 2,500 miles away from us within the last few years. They probably do not want to join their Dad’s inner circle. They’d live closer if they did. So I’ll make up a list for myself (which is something I’d like my inner circle to do for me in the future) and then I’ll go over the names on the list.

I also need to figure out what I want my inner circle to do. Never had one before, don’t know what they do (except that they make up lists). I’m too cheap to let someone else manage our money and too stubborn to let others make decisions for me. So that stuff is out.

I guess we’ll have meetings. We’ll sit around the kitchen table and discuss matters important to me. We don’t have a table in our kitchen and I seldom attend meetings, but we’ll work something out. I’ve read that presidents have something called a ‘kitchen cabinet,’ which is another term for ‘inner circle.’ Obviously we have kitchen cabinets, but they are very small. The cabinets we have are just big enough to hold our dishes and would never be big enough to hold an inner circle meeting.

Maybe we can meet by teleconference or on Skype. I’m sure my inner circle will operate smoothly using very modern methods, although I’m an old-school kind of guy. I guess we could meet via text, instant message or in a private chat room. My computer, I think, would fit in the kitchen cabinet.

Maybe I can sell sponsorship for my inner circle in order to pay for all these meetings. The travel will probably be expensive. I know one thing; Lee Elder Public Relations will be the Official Publicist of Lee Elder’s Inner Circle.

No need to make a list for that.

Thanks for reading. Let me know if you have an inner circle.