Tag: #bloganuary

Posted in communication

Can we talk?

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Bloganuary writing prompt
In what ways do you communicate online?
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Photo by Christian Wiediger on Unsplash

Carefully

I carefully choose my words. How many times has my online communication been misunderstood? Recipients hear emotions in my texts that I never intended. A missing exclamation point means I’m not excited. A delayed response is interpreted as disinterest. One cannot be too careful when communicating online.

Inefficiently

Everyone has a preferred means of online communication. Some send texts. Others use Messenger. Many turn to email. A few respond immediately on Telegram or Google Chat. Still others are only found on social media. Ironically, with so many ways to communicate, it is harder than ever to contact someone. If you want to reach a lot of people, you’ve got to be on a lot of different platforms.

Ineffectively

“Did you get my text?”

“No.” Or, “I did, but forgot to reply.” Or, “I did but thought it was spam.” Or, “No, my phone was dead.”

When I was working, I sent out a email newsletter opened by less than half of the recipients. Important weekly updates were lost in sea of spam.

Less frequently

More and more, I call. Online communication has lost it’s appeal.

Posted in dogs

A pile of puppies

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Bloganuary writing prompt
Think back on your most memorable road trip.
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Photo by Garrett Karoski on Unsplash

We were dog-less for the first time ever. That spring, we put both of our Labrador retrievers to sleep. Gabriel was fifteen and simply aged out. Rachel, age ten, started limping with a tumor in her rear leg the vet said was most likely a cancer you could treat but not cure.

A few months later, my wife blindfolded me and took me and our two children for a drive through Iowa farmland. About an hour west of Des Moines, we stopped, I took off the blindfold, and found myself on a typical Iowa farm. What was not typical was the sound of many barking dogs. My wife had brought me here to pick out a Labrador retriever puppy for my birthday.

So I sat down in a big box of eight-week old chocolate puppies to decide which one to take home. There are few things more fun than sitting under a pile of furry, wiggling, wagging, yipping, whining, licking, and sniffing Lab puppies. I picked a male that wasn’t the shyest nor the most aggressive, and we drove home with Michael. While he wasn’t shy or aggressive, Michael turned out to be a wild ball of energy.

That was a memorable road trip!

Posted in memories

Strat-O-Matic baseball

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Daily writing prompt
Describe an item you were incredibly attached to as a youth. What became of it?
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There weren’t many items I remember being attached to, but one that comes to mind is my Strat-O-Matic baseball game.

Strat-O-Matic baseball is a dice game played with decks of team player cards. Each player chooses a team, sets a line-up, and the game begins. After each dice roll, you look up a result. Just like the real game, your player would ground out, fly out, strikeout, get on base or hit a home run. The game is simple, but it kept my brother and I and a neighbor friend occupied year-round in the 1970s.

I discovered the game when a classmate brought his Strat-O-Matic to school in sixth grade to play on indoor recess days. When I finally had enough money to buy my own game, I think I bought the 1969 edition, which included card decks for all the MLB teams that year. I’m really stretching my memory, but I’m pretty sure I had the Mets and Orioles from that year, who faced off in the World Series.

Later on, I bought a few classic teams from the past, like the 1927 New York Yankees, with Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig. Or the 1931 A’s with Jimmie Foxx, my dad’s favorite player. And the 1950 Philadelphia Phillies, who could have won it all, but folded at the end of the season.

We would set up leagues and seasons seasons and play game after game after game. We kept score with pencil and paper, and typed up statistics on my mom’s manual typewriter. While it’s a two person game, you can also play it alone. We spent a lot of time playing Strat-O-Matic baseball.

I left the game behind when I started college in 1975. But my younger brother and a close friend from a few houses away kept playing and playing and playing.

I have no idea what happened to the game. Either my brother has it packed away in a box of memorabilia somewhere, or it got tossed when we sold and emptied out dad’s house. There’s never been another game I spent so much time playing.

Posted in Life

I can do anything differently. But I probably won’t.

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Daily writing prompt
What could you do differently?
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Photo by Mulyadi on Unsplash

For a whole year, people have asked me the opposite question: “What can you do the same?” In other words, what habits and systems will you establish to relieve stress, increase productivity, and make incremental improvements? This comes from successful folks who share their morning rituals with me so that I can have a better life. They discipline themselves to wake up at the same time, dress the same way, eat the same meals, and take the same route to work in order to clear their minds for more important tasks. Those folks would advocate that the one thing I could do differently is to do the same thing every day.

But Jerry Seinfeld challenged George Costanza, “If every instinct you have is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right.” George tries it and immediately connects with a woman who had been looking in his direction. Doing things differently changes his life, at least for one episode.

So I can do anything and everything differently. The possibilities are endless. Multiple options are within my grasp. However, I know I’m probably not going to do much differently. I am a creature of habit.

But what I can do differently isn’t actually different. It’s just “one more” or “one percent more” of what I’ve been doing. It’s reading one more page or running one more minute. It’s writing one more paragraph or practicing a line of music one more time. It’s saying one more prayer or drinking one more sip of water. Over time, I run faster, feel healthier, and sound better. And I didn’t do anything differently.

Posted in Life

My billboard: “Choose joy”

Posted on by William Douthwaite
Daily writing prompt
If you had a freeway billboard, what would it say?
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I drive by billboards every day. The local ones I remember are those that make me chuckle. Like

  • “Zero wait time ER.” I recommend bringing a book to read.
  • “Number one hospital in the county.” Oh, by the way, it’s the only hospital in the county.
  • “The lawyer got me four million dollars!” Good luck seeing any of that. The other guy had no insurance.

My billboard would be short, sweet, and to the point:

“Choose joy.”

Plenty of drivers on the highway choose to be impatient, rude, speedy, irritable, oblivious, distracted, selfish, and irresponable. You know who I’m talking about.

Along with “Be generous,” “Pursue grace,” and “Be positive,” I’ve written “Choose joy” in the front of my journal, a daily reminder of that option. That billboard will remind me – as I drive by with all those drivers I mentioned above – that joy is within reach.

I find that gratitude leads to joy. I’m thankful for places to go, a car, fuel, and highways to get me there, people to visit, rays of sun from behind the clouds, a cup of coffee in the center console, music to listen to, and those in the car with me. It might take longer than I thought, I might have to go a different way, I may have to slow down because of the rain, and a truck may be right there on my tail. None of those things can steal my joy. Joy comes from within, able to overcome the frustrations, delays, and disappointments.

Those words always get me thinking. Maybe they’ll move someone else to make a similar choice. More joy, even a little bit, would be welcome out on the road.