Up@dawn 2.0

Wednesday, December 9, 2015

The Man Who Cared (Jayson Nesbitt, #11 first and last post)

This is the story of someone who has made a indescribable impact in my life in only just a few months. He is the manager of the hotel that I work at here in Murfreesboro, Tennessee. I sat down with him on November twelfth, 2015 and asked him about his life and what brought him to the point he’s at right now. “Why?” he asked; “I’m just like you or anyone else”. But he’s not, and that he thinks this is part of the reason he fascinates me so much. 

Dan (which is not his real name by request) was born in a small suburban town in Saratoga, New York on July third, 1963. He grew up modest, without many possessions and very little to his family’s name. Dan graduated high school, but never attended a college or university. Where his gifts lie are in his incredible and pinpoint eye for detail. After working a few odd jobs in retail and restaurants, he was recruited to judge bodybuilding competitions for a local gym. This stands out because Dan has never trained to do any sort of bodybuilding in his life, but he has this uncanny ability to notice small and almost asinine details about bodybuilders themselves. This ability is all encompassing, being able to notice flaws in spray tans and makeup. But also in the composition of muscle groups that come from the use of performance enhancers, the small jerks the competitors make when moving, and even the differences in facial expressions that identify nervousness.

After a few years of doing this, Dan decided he wanted to get into hospitality, so he applied to the Hilton Hotel Group as a manager. After quickly rising through the ranks of the company, when Dan was thirty he was given his own hotel to manage in Jonesboro, Arkansas. This is when Dan’s ability of perception took on a new form. Dan understands his employees better than anyone that I personally have ever met. He is able to tell when someone is under performing stems from Dan’s genuine interest in their lives coupled with his gifts. The problem is that he takes the happiness of his employees almost too far. He cant help but notice when his employees are emotionally hurting, and projects that onto himself. “It’s almost like I physically feel injured when I see someone skulking around my hotel” Dan claims. So as an extension, Dan basically get his happiness from his employees happiness.


“It ruined my marriage” Dan confesses. “I’m constantly torn between my real family and the one I spend the majority of my time with [at work].” It is what fuels him to keep going every day. The root of this is why I admire Dan so much. He has since decided that he can’t simply leave his work family behind, being that there are more of them than there are his family at home. So Dan chose to focus his attention here at his hotel. “It definitely unhealthy. But the important part is that it makes me happy, and that’s what really matters to me.”

1 comment:

  1. Interesting. For some of us, not leaving work AT work would be a recipe for unhappiness. Too bad the small-scale, family-run hotel of yesteryear is no longer flourishing - it seems like it would be the perfect fit for someone like your boss, if in fact he values a domestic life in tandem with work.

    ReplyDelete

Note: Only a member of this blog may post a comment.