Talking to Ourselves

Not long ago, I read a column on www.miceage.com in which Kevin Yee speculated that if Walt Disney had been playing with an iPhone instead of watching his daughter on a small merry-go-round, Disneyland might not have been created. Busy texting or playing a game, Disney’s mind would not have been free to imagine a place where he could go on rides with his child.

Every post in this blog has been about outward communication. Yee’s column asked me to consider the conversations we have with ourselves and the movies that play in our mind. We label it imagination or, when we are feeling uncharitable, we call it daydreaming, inattentiveness, or even ADD. We worry if we talk to ourselves, even if it is silently. Are we going crazy?

How tragic that we feel we have to be busy all the time. Why are we afraid to let our minds wander? What’s wrong with sitting on a park bench and imagining that things can be different? What would our world would be like if DaVinci had not stared at cracks in the wall, if Einstein hadn’t stared out the window or Disney had not sat on a park bench? What if they all had been busy playing Tetris on an iPhone instead of turning their minds loose?

We claim to support “thinking outside the box.” That can only happen if we give ourselves a chance to do it. We must communicate internally, turn thoughts over, and reap the rewards of the creative energy we all posses. It’s OK to be doing “nothing.” It’s even OK to talk to yourself – just don’t let your lips move.

I cannot imagine the losses our society suffers because we are so busy doing that we no longer do nothing.

I am so thankful that Walt Disney did not have an iPhone.

Military Service - Talk About It

Memorial Day is tomorrow.  Many of us will go to picnics and enjoy a day away from our jobs.  Some of us might go to a parade and may even give a brief moment of thought to those who served in the military.

My father never talked much about his time in the Army Air Corps because he didn't think he did anything special. He went, he did his duty, and then he came home. When the base where he was discharged closed, I finally got Dad to tell me a bit. He spent only one day at that base but he will never forget passing through it because he was heading home. He also won't forget the heat of New Mexico where he was stationed for the latter part of WWII.

Yes, in 1945, Dad was serving at Alamogordo, New Mexico.  Do I need to tell you what was happening in New Mexico at that time?  He remembers how the sky lit up like it was daylight, even though that first atomic blast was 60 miles away. He said he could have easily read the newspaper in light that has been compared to that of several suns. 

After describing the events of July 16, 1945, Dad mentioned that he belonged to a flight crew that spent several months in Colorado for secret training.  The flight crew of the Enola Gay was not the only one in training for the mission.  

It made perfect sense.  There had to be more than one crew in case anything happened.  This had never occurred to me nor would I have associated my father with this historic event.

Our fathers and grandfathers are rapidly leaving this world.  They all have tales to tell that are part of our heritage.  If you don't know what your relative did in military service, find out.  Then pass that along to your children.  In communicating our own history, we honor those who went before us and tie the generations together.

God bless all those who serve and those who wait for them to come home.

They Want to Communicate

The local middle school holds a career day for its students every spring.  Because I have some of the same kids year after year, I try to come up with a new viewpoint for each presentation.  This year, I focused on writers who are making a good living but whose names are not in the public spotlight.  It turns out, that was a good move.  Only one student mentioned JK Rowling.  Last year, she was the role model for at least ten of them.

I put six names on the board – three men and three women.  They included a screenplay writer, the head writer for a video game, a lyricist, and the writer of a famous ad campaign.  I talked about all the ways a person can make a career from writing. 

The kids had not considered this.  In their minds, writers do one of two things: writers are journalists or writers are novelists. 

From conversations with coworkers, I know that writing is not a focal point of modern education.  Students do not spend a semester diagramming sentences or learning about past participles.  The lack of understanding about how their own language works is causing problems.  What surprised me was that the kids said as much.  They told me that they are sometimes confused by their friends’ Facebook postings or things they read in class.  They complained about poorly constructed sentences and words that don’t mean what the writer intended.

And guess what – most of the kids wished they liked to read and had the opportunity to do more of it.  They realize that reading is as important to their futures as writing. 

These kids want to communicate effectively.  We do them a terrible disservice if we assume that writing skills are no longer useful.  It falls to us to provide them with the tools they require to lead fulfilling lives.  Will the kids moan and complain?  Sure they will.  That’s part of growing up.  But it is our job to push them and prepare them for their futures.  Let’s make sure they get what they need – and obviously want.