Sarah Fister Gale was a wife of 27 years, a mother of two children, and the youngest of her parents’ five children. We didn’t know that, though, until she died. I can only guess, based on the quality of her work, that she excelled in all of those roles.

It came as a shock on Nov. 4 when we’d learned that Sarah, one of our key contributing editors, had suddenly passed. We’d been in touch with her days earlier, checking on how several assignments were coming along. We knew she had been dealing with COVID, but she assured us she was feeling better. We had extended her deadlines, and we waited.

Those assignments never came. Another email check-in, and this time her husband responded with the sad news. I can only imagine how he felt in writing it.

The convenience of being in a transactional business, of only depending on the content Sarah was producing, is that we don’t have to feel what Sarah’s husband and children feel. Still, the feeling of immediately having to worry about how to fill the holes in our editorial lineup instead is, nonetheless, a terrible one. Duty with a heaping side of selfishness.

We’re all in the business of selling something. And so, we’re engulfed in a never-ending tidal wave of having to get things done. We pay for services. We get paid for services. We make, hopefully, more money than we paid. What are we losing, though, in that pursuit?

Well, when everything is going according to plan, nothing of concern. It’s when things go wrong, though, that the relationships that you’ve made really begin to matter most.

Take the COVID-19 pandemic, and the supply chain disruptions it caused. The meat industry was perhaps at its most vulnerable state ever at that time. When you were short on people, short on animals, short on equipment or even short on cleaning supplies, how important did a relationship you’d invested in make a difference in alleviating those challenges? How relieved were you that you’d made more than regular visits with a customer or a partner, and that when you’d made those visits, you discussed things ultimately more important than business? Family, children, avocations, passions.

Conversely, when things went south, were there relationships you wished you’d made? And not just external relationships; how about those within your staff? And not just those in full-time positions; how about all those doing that behind-the-scenes but highly valuable contract work?

Knowing Sarah (one of our contract workers) more closely wouldn’t have prevented what we now know to have been her bout with leukemia, which her recurrence of COVID made untenable. It wouldn’t have saved her life. It’s an uncomfortable reminder, though, of the human emotional need for connection beyond our asking for the business services we need, and only when we need them. It’s a reminder of the importance of making meaningful connections, and more of them.

For all of us, that makes a better company, a better workforce and a better supply chain.

Sarah helped make our editorial offerings better. Our hearts go out to all those whose lives she made better.

Editor's note: This article ran as the Editorial in the December issue of Meatingplace.

Lost in transaction

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