One of the next 3

Today was one of those rare days in July that didn't mimic the dog days of summer being in the 100s.  It was an anomaly in the weather, only 78 degrees, 22 degrees below what normally happens.  In statistics these anomalies are called outliers because they lie outside the averages, the trendlines, the areas where 90% of other items unlike them lie.

I think our lives are lived in much the same way. We count on most of our events to lie along a trendline, to be an average day, or to fall close to where 90% of them fall.  The word special is another word for anomaly, a much more common word. It's a word I don't hear in abundance, nor should I since it is saved for occasions that are not normal.

Anomalies like this one in July come about every 7 years or so in a weather cycle.  One has to wait a while for them, but they're nice when they happen.  If weather cycles also hold true for life cycles, I should be due one of those special years sometime in the next 3 years.  I love being around when the weather cycle doesn't follow the dog days of summer routine.  And I am going to love one of the next three years when one of them turns special.

Bring fresh perspectives

The mind is designed to work off of predictions that it makes from available information.  It will receive a certain amount of stimuli and project how to fill out the rest of the information that is going to be received.  When the information is received, the mind converts that information into what is expected whether or not that information matches what is actual.  Steven Pinker aptly demonstrates this in his book How the Mind Works by talking about how the eye takes in stimuli for the brain to convert to the right colors and shapes.  The brain will analyze a more or less checkerboard scan of the stimuli and interpret what has been seen based on a projection of what was seen rather than what was actually seen.  That's why people have wrecks sometimes.  They look in a certain direction not expecting to see anything.  A car is coming, but since the brain didn't expect to see it, it tells the interpreter that nothing is coming.  A wreck occurs.

Language operates in much the same fashion.  People use words in predictable pattern sets much of the time.  So, people become accustomed to hearing certain sets of words together.  When a word out of the norm is used, many times people fill in the out of norm word with the word they were expecting.  If the word is too different from what the original speaker said, the original speaker will correct the listener's word, and an argument ensues on what word was used.  This happens a great number of times between people who have been friends a long time or who have been married or together a long time.

I have a high appreciation of those who bring fresh perspectives of life to me.  They fill in life in such a different way than the way I have come to expect life to happen.  We all have a habit of seeing life like we want it and predict it to be.  Different perspectives are needed to jolt us into a new way of seeing things sometimes.  I relish the moments of being in the company of people who offer that different perspective to me.  They stretch me and make my life so much more enriched than it would otherwise have been.

You might want to hedge your bet

In case you thought the previous blog was an idea from never never land...

Yeah,  Facebook, Twitter, Playlists, GPS, and warnings of collision that speak to you as you drive.  A transparent, holographic-like speedometer above the steering wheel.  It's on the car lot right now.  If I were a betting man on what value reading and writing have, I would begin to bet on what is and what is coming, not on what used to be.

A spoof about reality

It is unclear exactly to what extent cell phone communication will change the modes of communication, particularly written communication.  Weird Al Yankovic created a spoof on some of the extent writing has been affected.  But, the more sophisticated the cell phones become, the more written communication will be affected.  I see signs along the highways all the time about the hazard of texting and driving.  No problem.  I simply touch the microphone symbol on my phone and speak into it.  Text immediately appears on the screen.  All I have to do is press send.  Now will that have an affect on writing?  At what point will speaking become the preferred method of delivery, not writing.  Probably when someone contacts you and you hear their voice in real time and you can see their symbol or their holograph.  And that is not 25 years away.  It's happening noncommercially already.  The reason Yankovic's spoof is funny at all is that writing has already been affected, albeit not so much as to make people think the affectation is here to stay.

But it is.  Yankovic's next video could be about writing crimes, not merely word crimes.

That exuberant spirit

This is a big day for one little girl.  She has won my heart.  She is so full of confidence in her abilities, so exuberant in her conversations.  Every picture you ever see of her contains her trademark smile denoting her carefree spirit and love of life.  Her positive perspective on life is such a mirror image of her mother that it is hard to see one without seeing the other.

Six is a big number for young ones.  It is the year doors start to swing open, the beginning of independence.  First grade starts, circle of friends increase, formal learning begins to incubate in receptive children.  No one is more receptive than this little lady who has won my heart.  Welcome to this big world you are now becoming aware of.  Have a fantastic birthday today!!!

Walks with the little one

Whenever I go walking with my two-year-old granddaughter, we have no plan about where we are going to walk.  Sometimes she wants to go around the block to look at houses and their attendant shrubs and flowers.  Sometimes she just wants to be outside for a while and not walk out of the cul-de-sac.  And sometimes, she wants to walk in the nature area, throw rocks in the creek, watch ducks in the nearby pond, or walk the length of the creek to the point it crosses a major road.  It's different each time.  She picks wild buttercups or dandelions along the way and gives them to me.  She stops to look more closely at potato bugs, ants, dragonflies, and grasshoppers.  She has learned the sounds of frogs croaking and owls hooting.  She likes to try to find them when she hears them, usually without success, though.

She loves going walking, and I love going with her.  It's a new adventure each time.  Even though it is the same scenery that we walk in, we see it differently each time.  We take different routes, we find new logs or dams that kids have made in the creek.  We'll wait different intervals to go on our walks, stay different lengths of time, or go at different times of day.  But we always enjoy our walking time.

I have been around a person for two years now that likes to have A LOT of structure in her life.  She needs and relies on rules to regulate her days.  She has to know where all the boundaries and limits are and is rather judgmental about others who don't follow the rules she keeps or the structures she has put in place.  It's not fun to be around her.  I can feel the straightjacket being put on the minute I am in her presence.  It's so unlike the imaginative, exploratory walks with my granddaughter that I cringe to put the two experiences in juxtaposition to each other.  Any time, any day, I would stroll the neighborhood or nature area seeing again what is in my environment than to enter the world of the regulated life.

I know there are rules in life.  They keep order on the boundaries between people.  But when it comes to enjoying life, I want to see the possibilities, follow the rabbit trails, see what's behind bushes, watch little waterfalls, pursue interests requiring rigor and interests requiring only presence, and note beauty wherever it occurs.

Differently, subtly

Strata is an English word that shows how meanings change over the years.  Romans used the word (in Latin, of course) to mean blankets or materials to cover yourself with when sleeping.  Both the derivative Spanish word and English word changed the idea of blanket somewhere around the year 1600 into a layer of something - skin, plant life, and below the surface of the earth. However, the derivative language French multiplied the meaning of the word.  Latin was still in ecclesiastical use in the 1600s in France, Spain, and England, so it was still being used dynamically as a language.

Over time, words become unstable and begin to change. So, strata, meaning blanket, lost the semantic domain of keeping something or someone warm as a cover.  In France it came to  mean a coating on an object and some place soft to lay a baby.  In England and Spain strata was left with merely the size and shape of a blanket, but not its function, which allowed people to use it as a layer of something.  And, where do you find layers of things?  Why, yes, in your body, on the ground, and under the ground.

I had an interesting conversation with my mother not long ago.  She was noting some of the great changes that had taken place in my life.  While she was lamenting them as unnecessary, I was allowing for the changes as a dynamic part of growth in my life.  To me, words like strata have a lot in common with humans as they become older.  Both are allowed to take on a life of their own by adapting to the world around them.  Sometimes they add more to themselves, sometimes they shed their original essence, but rarely do they stay the same. Maybe there were those who lamented the change in the word strata.  But, I rather think the change happened subtly and gradually - without note - and differently, depending on the language.  While there is merit to consistency in life, some values mature and become altered with that maturity.

Investing in your actions

The story is told of William Waldorf Astor about a time when he was traveling around Philadelphia, couldn't make it into the city and couldn't find a hotel to stay in between smaller towns.  Finally, he entered a decent sized town and chanced upon a hotel. He had been traveling with his wife, it was 1 in the morning, and rain, lightning, and thunder had followed them for most of the night.

The young man at the desk informed Astor, who was just an elderly man to him since he didn't know Waldorf, that three conventions were in town and there were no rooms available.  Then, the young man said, "But I live in the hotel and you can stay with me in my room.  It's not a suite or anything, but I don't think you and your wife should have to go back out into the rain at 1 in the morning."  Astor declined and turned to go when the young man said, "Don't worry about me. You can have my room."  Astor replied, "You are exactly the kind of man that should run a hotel for me."  The two had a laugh, the Astors stayed the night in the young man's room and left the next morning.

Two years later, the young man received a letter in the mail inviting him to New York to meet the elderly man he had helped in the storm.  Enclosed were round-trip tickets.  When the two met on 5th Avenue and 36th street, the older man introduced himself, pointed to a brand new building, and said, "I have built this building for you."  Of course, the young man thought the older man was joking because he didn't recognize the name of William Waldorf Astor until he looked on the top of the building and saw the hotel's name Waldorf Astoria and on the door saw his name as General Manager.  George Boldt from that moment on was the best operator of the best hotel in New York City.

An ancient Hebrew teacher/philosopher taught, "Cast your bread upon the waters and it will return to you."

George Boldt would agree 1000 times over.  I suspect every living adult has this story to tell in one fashion or another.  It's a very trustworthy saying, true in thought and in experience.