This is the title I chose for my personal blog, which is meant to give me an outlet for one of my favorite crafts – writing – plus to use an image from my favorite sport, golf.  Out of college, my first job was as a reporter for the Daily Astorian in Astoria, Oregon, and I went on from there to practice writing in all of my professional positions, including as press secretary in Washington, D.C. for a Democrat Congressman from Oregon (Les AuCoin), as an Oregon state government manager in Salem and Portland, as press secretary for Oregon’s last Republican governor (Vic Atiyeh), and as a private sector lobbyist.  This blog also allows me to link another favorite pastime – politics and the art of developing public policy – to what I write.  I could have called this blog “Middle Ground,” for that is what I long for in both politics and golf.  The middle ground is often where the best public policy decisions lie.  And it is where you want to be on a golf course.

If you were to talk to my four siblings and, without rehearsal, ask about one of our father’s favorite sayings, they would probably report the same thing.

What he said:  You don’t have to want to do it, just do it.

Of course, back in the day, he was not talking about a vaccine for anything.  He was telling us to take out the garbage, do the dishes, and the like.

But his admonition works today for the vaccine just as it worked many years ago when all of us were growing up with parents we adored.

We didn’t HAVE TO WANT TO DO SOMETHING, WE JUST HAD TO DO IT.

Now, for today, I would say the same thing to many of my friends and neighbors in regard to the Covid vaccine.  Of course, I have no idea if they are vaccinated or not, but if they are not, YOU DON’T HAVE TO WANT THE VACCINE…JUST GET IT.

There are a host of reasons why this makes sense.

• It represents an unselfish goal to work for the good of all people, not just yourself.  Those who refuse the vaccine don’t just hurt themselves; they risk infecting others.

• It represents a reliance on science, which the Food and Drug Administration and the Centers for Disease Control have used to verify that vaccines work to control Covid.  Just look at the evidence.

• It represents a reliance on something other than right-of-center politics.  There, folks are saying “don’t tell me what to do,” and they are mimicking a host of politicians these days who believe that individual rights always trump the collective good.  Not true.

This morning, I toyed with not writing again about the vaccine because there is not much more to say other than “get it.”  Then, I thought of my late father and couldn’t help but cite his instructions.

They worked back in the day – and they work today.