This has turned out to be a year of rebuilding for the Philadelphia Section. To be honest, all of the professional organizations are struggling. We have excellent membership, and demographics show that they are many of the very best and brightest plastics professionals in the Delaware Valley. But like many organizations, we are not attracting active members. The vitality, the value, and the spirit of the organization really requires activity.

Professional societies aren't the only ones struggling, so our churches, theaters, anything and anywhere people have to go to. The answer is probably not that complex. I just taught a class of Freshmen engineers, and they had the typical slump during the middle of the semester. However, they mostly weren't getting lost in their first taste of freedom and permissiveness. They were getting sucked into Facebook, You Tube, and AIM.

Fifty years ago families would go out on almost every weekend to a dinner, then a movie or a play or a concert, then for a snack, and after that maybe even a bar or a nightclub. I'm lucky to see the movie, and I don't have many friends that could afford to have a fancy dinner out every week for a family of four! And the culprit isn't work, either. Yes, we feel like we are working a lot more hours than we used to, but I have to think back about how much time my father used to spend at his work. He had a 40 hour work week on paper, but he worked a lot of late nights and 72 hour days at the end of every month, too.

What has really changed? I think we have been putting more time into TV, computers, talking on cell phones, buying stuff. We have sacrificed actual, real-life activity and accomplishment for a lot of things that make us feel as if we are doing something. Two line emails. A social life populated by TV and movie characters. Self reliance replaced by the constant reassurance of someone at the other end of the ear piece. Could we be tired because we miss being children, back when we visited our friends, went out exploring, and (perhaps against our will) learned new things at school, and were generally alive?

We could turn off the TV and play a game with our family or friends. We could take our family out to the park, or to a batting cage. We can make that commitment to spend one evening a week on our hobby, or social and business networking, or learning something new. We can make the commitment to have a small party once a month for our circle of friends for dinner and a game, or dinner and a rented movie. And we could throw out the email and actually write to those distant and lamented friends because we actually have something new in our lives to share, something worth putting on paper.

SPE Philadelphia section can help, too. Bundle up the family and come to the SPE Plastic Magic show, an educational science demonstration show appropriate for ages 10 and above. You are encouraged to come out and network for 2 hours every 2nd Thursday of the month, too, at our more traditional evenings. We are continuing to work on our program to provide you with growth and networking opportunities worthy of the time out.

Thomas Twardowski.
President, Philadelphia Section SPE