Mayor?

I’ve made a decision.

I’m going to run for mayor of Greensboro.

And if your first reaction is, “John, have you completely lost your fucking mind?”

The answer is: probably.

But apparently losing your mind is how you find out what you actually give a damn about.

I’m 69 years old. I spent 42 years in business. I retired. I survived three cancers. I started a political movement. I started doing stand-up comedy. And then, because apparently none of that was stressful enough, I went out and interviewed more than 100 complete strangers.

And something happened that I didn’t expect.

I started meeting young people.

Gen Z.

And I’m standing there thinking, “What the hell is a 69-year-old guy doing hanging around with a bunch of 20-somethings?”

Then I started listening.

And I realized something.

We don’t have the same experiences. We don’t have the same music. We don’t use the same language. Half the time they say something and I have to go home and Google it.

But there’s something I recognize in them.

Impatience.

They look around and ask, “Why the hell are we doing it this way?”

And I understand that question.

Because I’ve reached an age where I look around and ask exactly the same damn thing.

I don’t want Gen Z to become more like me.

Good God, one of me is plenty.

I want them to bring their ideas, their technology, their creativity and their perspective.

And I’ll bring something they can’t possibly have yet:

time.

I’ve got 69 years of mistakes.

That’s my résumé.

I’ve made good decisions. I’ve made terrible decisions. I’ve built things. I’ve lost things. I’ve loved people. I’ve lost people. I’ve been knocked flat on my ass more times than I care to count.

And somehow I’m still here.

And after surviving cancer three times, I’ve discovered something else:

I’m not particularly scared anymore.

Failure doesn’t frighten me.

Looking stupid doesn’t frighten me.

Somebody telling me an idea is impossible doesn’t frighten me.

Hell, I’ve heard “impossible” before.

So when somebody says, “You can’t change Greensboro,” my first question is:

Why not?

Why can’t we make downtown a place where people can’t wait to go?

Why can’t we create beautiful pedestrian spaces filled with music, art, fountains, comedy and families?

Why can’t we rethink transportation?

Why can’t we attack homelessness and mental-health problems with something more imaginative than moving people from one block to another?

Why can’t Greensboro become known nationally as a city that experiments with good ideas?

Maybe some of my ideas won’t work.

Great.

Kill them.

Replace them with better ones.

That’s what I’ve learned from talking to more than 100 people.

You don’t learn by standing behind a podium.

You learn by shutting up.

That’s been quite an education for me because shutting up has never exactly been one of my superpowers.

But I went into parks.

I went to festivals.

I went to businesses.

I talked to young people and old people and everybody in between.

And the biggest lesson wasn’t that everybody agreed.

They didn’t.

The lesson was that when you actually sit across from somebody and listen to them, they’re a hell of a lot more interesting than whatever category you’ve put them in.

And that’s what I want this next chapter to be about.

Not John Eagleton arriving with the Ten Commandments of Greensboro.

I don’t have them.

I want ideas coming from neighborhoods, businesses, students, retirees, artists, cops, teachers, entrepreneurs, people struggling to pay rent, and people who’ve lived here their entire lives.

And especially young people.

Not because Gen Z has all the answers.

They don’t.

Neither do Boomers.

Trust me. We’ve had several decades to demonstrate that conclusively.

But imagine putting those generations together.

You bring the energy.

I’ll bring the scar tissue.

You bring the technology.

I’ll bring the Rolodex.

Actually, you probably don’t know what a Rolodex is.

See? We’re already learning from each other.

And there’s something important about the job itself.

Greensboro doesn’t have a mayor who wakes up in the morning and personally orders everybody around. We have a council-manager government. The mayor is part of a nine-member City Council that sets policy, while the professional city manager oversees day-to-day operations. (Greensboro NC)

That means getting anything meaningful accomplished requires something I’ve been practicing for months:

talking to people.

Listening.

Building relationships.

Finding common ground.

And occasionally being willing to say:

“You know what? Your idea is better than mine.”

That’s leadership I can understand.

I’m not running because I think I’m the smartest person in Greensboro.

I’m running because I’m curious about what the smartest people in Greensboro could accomplish if somebody got them working together.

And maybe the strangest part of this whole thing is that I’m 69 years old and I feel like I’m just getting started.

I don’t know exactly where this ends.

That’s what makes it exciting.

But I know where it starts.

It starts the same way my hundred-person experiment started.

With one person.

One conversation.

One question:

What would you change about Greensboro if somebody actually listened?

So that’s what I’m going to do.

I’m going to listen.

I’m going to ask questions.

I’m going to challenge assumptions.

I’m going to throw some crazy ideas onto the table.

Some will survive.

Some will get murdered before lunch.

That’s okay.

Because the goal isn’t to prove that John Eagleton is right.

The goal is to figure out what’s possible for Greensboro.

And apparently the guy volunteering to start asking the questions is a 69-year-old, three-time cancer survivor, retired millwork salesman, amateur comedian and professional knucklehead.

So…

this ought to be interesting.