Powerful Alliances

I love the story of George and Alice in the TED Talk below. She was determined to solve a tough problem and he was determined to help her. These two very different individuals formed a powerful alliance, with world-changing results. As Heffernan says, "the truth won't set us free until we develop the skills and the habit and the talent and the moral courage to use it."



Heffernan: "I wonder how many of us have -- or dare to have -- such collaborators." I wonder this, too.

I wonder when in Heffernan's other story Joe began to recognize his allies, and how.

I wonder how we distinguish between allies and enemies.

I wonder if you have had someone help you like George helped Alice.

I wonder what the word conflict looks like, sounds like, feels like for you.

I wonder how you reacted to Heffernan's description of such collaboration as a kind of love.

I wonder what problems you have to solve.

I wonder who you might invite to help you by disagreeing with you.

I wonder how we can best enjoy the benefits of those who think similarly while also guarding against forming echo chambers.

I wonder how often I prioritize my own comfort above what truly matters by avoiding what has the potential to be productive conflict.

And I am grateful for the "Alices" and "Georges" and "Joes" in my life -- individuals who intentionally engage, who bring their whole selves to our interactions, who are attentive enough to recognize our differences, loving enough to speak authentically, intentional enough to communicate effectively, and trusting our relationship enough to disagree.

Achievements

I have a Ticket to Ride app, a.k.a. "the train game." The computerized players aren't too bad but are generally pretty beatable, so it's nice to have "achievements" to shoot for, too -- usually something about staying within specific, stricter limits, which tends to require adjusting one's approach to win.

Hey, look!  I achieved something!

This concept of achievements is a common theme in game app development. The word suggests meeting a challenge and calls the player to something beyond the usual.

A different game I've played incorporates "missions," which seems to be their attempt at the same idea. The implementation in that one is mediocre, though. A few of the "missions" call for actual skills, but most read merely like a to-do list (e.g., construct eight four-letter words), and a few are blatantly non-challenging (e.g., request hints). Ugh. Why did the programmers even bother creating such goals?

The thing is, even without being well-designed, this tactic manages to increase player engagement and keep people playing longer than they would otherwise. We more readily squander time as the game renames our efforts in terms of "mission," as if we were doing something important.

As much as I'd like for all of this to be about game design, it's not. It is much more about human drives to find meaning and significance, meet challenges, do something extra, go beyond the ordinary. When channeled appropriately, such drives are a great gift. Unfortunately, it is easy to instead become distracted toward focusing on "achievements" and "missions" and "badges" -- externally defined goals completed for some lesser purpose -- at the expense of those things which truly matter most.

Setting aside my to-do list for awhile earlier in the year was a worthwhile experience, and continues to shape my thoughts each day. I'm still learning to persistently measure my moments based on what matters rather than being drawn back to the black hole of The List. I do enjoy when I have a bunch of tasks completed at the end of a day. Still, the truest joy and satisfaction come when I can look back and genuinely know I've lived the day well, approaching it the best I know how while persistently attentive and prepared to change course when God prompts to do so.

Making Time

While planning a trip, I contacted friends who live in the area where I'd be traveling. I wasn't going to be there long, and they're busy too, but I hoped to at least stop in for a quick hello, even if just a few minutes and a hug. "We'll make time," they said, and that's what we all did. In the end, it wasn't quite what we'd planned, and that was okay. I was grateful for opportunity to see them and catch up a little with the unfolding story of their lives.

"We'll make time." What beautiful words! We've been heading into "the holiday season" for a few weeks now, and the next five weeks tend to be busy ones within the culture where I live. It is easy to get caught up in that and lose sight not just of the story of Jesus, but also his nature. I've been learning, though, and prioritizing better. Our house will be decorated simply, our meals uncomplicated, and my task list adjusted. I look forward with anticipation to the coming weeks, and especially to time spent with others -- in cheerful celebrations, mournful moments, conflicts and struggles and whatever else this time brings. Jesus was not just physically present during his time on earth; he was thoroughly present. That's the model I want to follow.

I saw this post yesterday-ish and have been thinking about my priorities in the upcoming weeks. Watching The Muppet Christmas Carol is on the list, and maybe even The Hobbit. We'll decorate our home with a nativity set and Christmas tree. I'm aiming to do some baking with friends, look at Christmas lights with Mark, and play games. A couple of gatherings on the schedule will be good for catching up with folks I don't get to see much, and others for closer friends. I'll spend time with some more personally, too, in homes and coffee shops and probably hospitals. I love the whole Advent season at church, and especially look forward to the Christmas Eve service.

I am reminded of this statement from Dallas Willard:

"We can learn how to act quickly without hurrying.

Quickness is an attribute of action.

Hurry is an attribute of the spirit."

(article here)

Yeah, this will be a busy season, and I am learning how to respond in the busyness without rushing, to prioritize, to create regular space for silence and prayer, to re-orient my soul.

Conversation-Miles

I read this yesterday:
"I have much to write you, but I do not want to do so with pen and ink.  I hope to see you soon, and we will talk face to face." (3 John 13-14a).

It was written long before automobiles, long before airplanes, long before video calls. To "talk face to face" was no quick and easy task, and John's decision to engage more personally rather than by simply adding more words to the letter points to something significant.

...

Constellation Orion

Light moves fast -- somewhere around 700 million miles per hour.  Numbers like that certainly sound big, but so big that their bigness seem to lose meaning.  After all, what is 700 million miles?  So instead, we tend to express the speed of light as a more understandable unit: 186,000 miles per second.  Still hard to imagine, but at least it's in range of something mildly familiar.  In other words, light travels fast enough to go the entire distance around the earth about seven times in one second.  (Yeah, I know the earth isn't flat and isn't a vacuum.)


Measuring distance in light-years feels a bit like measuring weight in gallons -- there is a logic to it, but not necessarily the usual logic.  One light-year is the distance light can travel through a vacuum in one year (therefore around 5,880,000,000,000 miles).  In comparison, the sun is around 8.3 light-minutes from the earth (therefore around 1/63,000th of one light-year).  The next-nearest star is over four light-years away.  That is, even traveling 186,000 miles per second, light would take over four years to reach the next-nearest star after the sun.  So -- light moves fast, but space is big, so the magnitude of light-years makes more sense.

...

Going back to John, I've learned to "measure" significant conversations in terms of distance: How far am I willing to go to approach this conversation in person?  Maybe I'll call it "conversation-miles." Some interactions are just best done face to face, and are worth the investment.

I don't know what John anticipated talking about face to face, but whatever it was, I love that he made the distinction and made it clearly, and I love that it mattered enough for him to show up in person.

Defining Important

My computer's "Support Assistant" interrupted my work to tell me -- in bold red letters -- of Important Actions Needed. And what kind of important? "Take immediate action to help maintain your computer's stability or security." There was something about protecting the hard drive and improving access to driver updates.

Oh, and Netflix.

Since it knew I'd already allowed myself to be interrupted by the Important Actions Needed, the Support Assistant also used that interruption to suggest a few other little adjustments that are recommended but clearly less important, like a BIOS update and something it described as determining whether the system is functional enough to use the operating system.

It had seemed previously like the Support Assistant had been aiming to help me keep a stable system on my laptop. It was plausible, anyway. There is clear business reasoning for helping customers stay happy with their products, one of those things where their goals may correlate to my goals in mutually agreeable, mutually supporting ways. But it looks like maybe they're going in a different direction now, blurring the line between "we want to help you" and "we want to conquer the world with you in it."

There's something to be learned here about priorities and communication, because sometime, somewhere, somehow, someone made the decision to categorize Netflix in the high-priority get-it-fixed group, and the whole system lost credibility in the process.

Focusing Curiosity

One day as a child, I was obediently vacuuming my room when I came to the under-the-bed part. We had one of those canister vacs that could reach really well into such spaces, and thoroughness was expected in our chores. I lifted the little bed skirt to slurp up whatever dust bunnies may have been breeding beneath and saw a book, open face-down to keep my place from the night before. Not wanting to lose my place, I turned it upright to glance at the page number before moving it.

...and I got distracted by the words.

I don't know how long, but apparently long enough for Mom to come check on me. By that time, I was leaning against the bed (which, at my size then, looked an awful lot like sitting on the bed), book in one hand and still-noisy vacuum in the other. Mom quite reasonably concluded that I was trying to be sneaky, pretending to vacuum while actually goofing off.

For the record, that wasn't true. I just hadn't noticed that I'd begun reading and had completely forgotten that I was in the middle of vacuuming.

Thirty years later, stuff like that still trips me up sometimes. It's not usually that I'm disinterested in whatever it is that I'm doing, but rather that so many other things are interesting, too. I could spend all day online looking at blogs and Facebook and everything else, attention pulled this way and that by information and ideas that aren't inherently bad -- except that they draw me away from what is more important. It is tempting to lose myself at work in gathering data and drawing up detailed plans, and some of that is certainly useful -- unless it hinders doing the work and engaging with others. It would be easy to enroll in an M.Div. program, an immersion Spanish class, music lessons, freefall instruction, swimming, and a psych degree -- easy, but not the right course of action. And, of course, entire shelves of written words still call to me.

Joshua Becker posted recently on the benefits of limited curiosity. "Our information age has made unbridled curiosity a constantly available distraction... [and] we lose all track of the immediate, beautiful world right in front of us." While respecting and enjoying a God-given desire to learn, I still want to keep growing beyond where I was as that kid, focusing my curiosity enough to develop it as a productive strength rather than a significant distraction.

People Pyramid

I think it was Miss Jouper who introduced me to the concept of the food pyramid. I was excited that cheese has calcium and other important nutrients because I loved cheese. It was even better to realize that pie and other desserts contain important nutrients, too. We didn't have pie at home, but we had cheese, and I loved cheese. I could eat cheese! Lots of cheese! Every day! Because it's good for me! But then Miss Jouper clarified that different foods provide different nutrients, so eating cheese (or pie, sadly) for every snack and meal is not healthy. Even good things can become fatal in excess.

Fast-forward thirty years...

http://thedoghousediaries.com/4636 (used with permission)

I enjoy keeping up with friends and family through Google+ and Facebook. We share news, send messages, show photos, express what matters to us. Email and text are usually personally addressed, which is a start. Phone conversations help with communication through tone and real-time interaction. G+ Hangouts and Skype share more of the nonverbals, which can be wonderful, or (especially in conflict) at least wonderfully helpful. Physical presence adds another dimension, both literally and figuratively.

It seems you and I show up to each other more when more of us actually shows up, which in turn allows for a much more solid foundation upon which to build. Like pie or cheese, Facebook and texting provide nourishment for relationships in pleasant ways. And, also like pie and cheese, such media can take up space in the interpersonal diet that really needs to be filled by something different, more substantial, even more real.

I'm looking forward to three-dimensional time this evening having dinner and conversation with people I love.

Not Quite NaBloPoMo

Breakfast is the best meal of the day!

I spent an early October weekend with about three hundred other women at a retreat in Cascade, Idaho. We woke early and stayed up late. We sang, listened to speakers, enjoyed meals that didn't require us to cook or do dishes after, played games, talked. Saturday afternoon held free time options like riding the zipline, attending a Bible class, learning to fish, getting a massage, doing a craft project, hiking, and napping. It was lovely.

And, in the back of my mind was the thought: I'm blogging this month. Every day through October. And this is an October day, so I'll blog something.

And then I didn't.

It was a short retreat and I'm glad I could be there. Not just there in body, but fully present. It was good to be with others awhile, to engage together in fun and learning and some of the deeper conversations that tend to happen only when we make space for them.

There will be time for blogging and such later. And if there isn't? Well, that's okay too.

Meanwhile, once the perfect streak of daily blogging had been broken for this month, return to "perfection" became impossible. The plan remains; the self-imposed expectation does not. There is a kind of freedom and joy in this.

The daily challenge of NaBloPoMo still draws me, and I may try again next month. But for now? For now I know that in recent weeks I've been drawn often from my scheduled path toward "burning bushes" (Exodus 3:1-4) instead, and I am grateful.

Sunrise at Trinity Pines

Not Having It All

One particular day, perhaps thirty years ago, I decided to make a snack. A sandwich fit the bill. My thought process went something like this...

Sandwich = peanut butter and jelly.

But I like cheese. Yeah, a cheese sandwich sounds good.

Cheese sandwiches are so much better when the cheese melts. Am I allowed to use the griddle?

Waitaminute. I hate cleaning the griddle.

What about the toaster? Cinnamon toast is sweet like jelly and warm like a grilled cheese sandwich, but without the griddle. I could have toast.

But I like cheese. Mmm.

The logical-to-me conclusion was to spread butter on bread, then a thick layer of peanut butter, a wobbly pile of grape jelly and a slice of Velveeta cheese, sprinkled finally with cinnamon. I was starting to realize that was a lot of stuff for a sandwich, so I figured I'd even things out by skipping the top slice of bread. I popped the whole open-faced mess in the microwave and increased the cooking time. I didn't want to wait all those extra seconds for my fabulous creation, but figured it would be worth the wait.

Yeah, I was wrong.

One of the valuable lessons I began to learn that day was that even if I can "have it all," I don't want it all. Not at the same time, anyway.

I'm still learning, and it's a good journey.

This Isn't Me

In my world, a thought really isn't a full thought until it is written down somewhere. Doesn't have to be legible, nor filed away somewhere, nor even read ever again. It just has to be written down. As a result, I periodically happen upon little nests of scratch paper, as if they have gathered for an impromptu Convention of Random Ideas in some out-of-the-way corner of our house. The notes are almost always brief and entirely without context.

Here's one I stumbled upon recently:

You write your own story as you watch the movie...

What is the spine of your FB story?

This note was scrawled in fall 2011 during a great workshop on media, and the "spine" refers to the thread of the story -- not events or other facts, but rather the message we hear in our hearts. This thought gave words to something I've been wrestling with. Like directors of our own dramas, we naturally filter what is presented and how it appears. By definition, this presents a very incomplete picture, and it always -- if unintentionally -- introduces distortion by omission. This certainly isn't limited to social media, but such means of communication seem particularly affected.

Facebook has been telling me for awhile that my account will soon be "upgraded" to Timeline, which has designated space at the top for a large cover photo. I've thought about what to put there -- perhaps a photo of me and Mark, or a nature picture, or something symbolic. I've also thought about uploading an image there of bold-fonted words that loudly proclaim:

"This isn't really me!"

My Facebook profile is mostly just an assortment of pictures, links, and comics -- the generally-surface-level stuff I'd be adequately comfortable sharing with a crowd of faces, and not just in those deeper, more personal interactions upon which strong friendships are built. Best I can tell, each part of it is true... but taken together, it does not represent the whole, because that which is close to my heart generally shows up only in generalities or similarly veiled forms.

I am reminded of a friendly acquaintance with whom I hadn't had much recent contact, and with whom those contacts were limited almost entirely to interactions around a very frustrating set of circumstances. As a result, all I'd seen in this person for months was anger, anger, anger, and I began to realize that my limited sample had gradually distorted my mental image of this complex and talented individual until the anger was just about the only aspect I could see. It seemed to be mutual, too, as if our former relationship were being replaced by two caricatures considering each other from afar.

And I wonder -- as my Facebook profile does not really reflect me, and that is really all that many of my Facebook friends see, how much do I create a caricature of myself in the minds of others?

I'm not quite ready to quit Facebook; it is currently too thoroughly integrated into our culture of how we share information with each other. Still, I can't help but think that in its mission to "make the world more open and connected," we've allowed it to become a cheap substitute, replacing deeper, more personal interactions.

I know there is something better, and I am going to go explore it.

Leaving Things Undone

"Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials." (Lin Yutang)

It is only in recent years that I've engaged in the season of Lent, or have even really learned much about it. It has become a significant time for me each year, much more than I'd expected.

One of the Lenten traditions is to give something up for these weeks between Ash Wednesday and Easter -- sweets, coffee, soda, one meal per day, fiction books, car radio, computer games, television, movies, Facebook, or whatever.

A few years ago, I committed to what might be considered an anti-fast, in which I had an actual lunch every day, usually fixing it myself, and ate it while not working on anything else. (Yeah, this was a definite adjustment.) It didn't look like the traditional practices of Lent, but this discipline was an act of intentional slowing and reflection, a sacrifice of time -- challenging and influential in that time of my life.

Joshua Becker shaped my considerations this year in his post on The Opportunity of Lent, and especially his description of choosing "one controlling influence" to abstain from for forty days. I pondered that, recognizing truth and wisdom for me in those words.

It took a few days to reach this conclusion, but the "one controlling influence" to step back from for a time this year? My to-do list. Not the roles or responsibilities, but the list which had begun to rule my days. It was distracting during times of engagement and lurked in the corners during times of rest. Somewhere along the way, The List had ceased to be a tool and had integrated itself into my very being.

It's been a week now, and I'm still a little concerned about missing an important deadline. The world has continued to spin, though, which bodes well for the next five weeks. Perhaps the List of Important Things... wasn't.

More importantly, I have found myself free to be more fully present this past week with people I love. This is a very good thing.

"Besides the noble art of getting things done, there is the noble art of leaving things undone. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials." (Lin Yutang)

As with previous Lenten fasts, I think I've got a pretty good understanding of some of the ways I will be shaped during these six weeks. And also, as with previous Lenten fasts, I trust I'll be surprised in the process, too.

On Lent and a Traffic Accident

There was an accident on the freeway several years ago which wasn't fatal, nor even (it seemed) very injurious, but it certainly did muck up traffic. Best I could tell, a truck hauling a trailer filled with port-a-potties was the primary involved, and the ensuing spread of chemicals required hazardous materials cleanup. The freeway was completely closed -- every lane -- for hours. Added to that, the accident took place north of where I-215 splits from I-15, and Legacy wasn't in place yet, so the closure effectively eliminated the only significant road from Davis County into Salt Lake, and it happened near the start of morning commute, which made things exponentially worse.

I happened to be driving north on I-15 around 10am that day. Cars had been stopped on the freeway for a very, very long time -- literally parked, bumper-to-bumper, from North Salt Lake to somewhere around Farmington. Drivers had long since quit idling their engines and were milling about on the freeway.

I turned on the radio and listened to a station which does traffic updates. Probably their reports of "yep, traffic is still stopped" had gotten old, so they decided to be creative. They asked folks on the freeway to look in their cars and see what odd things they could find, and to call in with the results. There were many calls and much laughter.

Two things I noticed that day: First, a bit of creativity and a sense of fun made a bad situation a little better. Second, people drive around with some really random stuff in their cars.

And what brought this story to mind these years later?

I've been working to declutter our house. (Influential thoughts here, by the way.) When actually stopping to look at the things we own, to hold them in my hands, I have thought several times recently, "why on earth do we still have this?" It's not that the stuff is bad; I'm not embarrassed so much as confused. It's been a good confusion, though, and a good process.

The season of Lent is one of introspection, remembrance, humility, and growth. It is a time to examine the various aspects of our lives, evaluating and making changes where needed. It is ripe for cleaning out the literal and figurative closets so we can move forward with greater clarity.

By the time Easter comes around, I intend to have a little bit of organizing done and a lot of de-owning -- in our home and in my soul. It's a challenging process, and I am already grateful for what God is doing along the way.

It's a Start

I could write pages. Many, many pages. And I might (despite the potential for irony) do just that, but not today. Instead, I'll start with this:

"Minimalism is the intentional promotion of the things we most value and the removal of anything that distracts us from it." (Joshua Becker -- brief story here)

This statement has taken root in my soul during the past couple of months, and new life has begun to sprout across the landscape of my soul.

Over Time, and By My Own Free Will

Anne Jackson writes about the "everyday, ordinary cell phone" she had early on. It was the kind designed for phone calls and nothing else. Things changed, though. "Over time, and by my own free will, I've upgraded to the superphone. It emails. It sends texts. It checks the score of the Dallas Mavericks games. It wakes me up at 5:30 every morning and lets me snooze twice for ten minutes at a time. It keeps my calendar and gives me directions."

I've got a phone like that. It's a great little device. And I can relate to what Jackson writes next about gradual shift in power -- from owning a cell phone to being owned by one. Her example of the phone is really just an example, or more accurately a symptom, of larger issues. The part of her description which captures me today is this:

Over time, and by my own free will...

When I stop and really think about it, the musts and shoulds which cause me the most stress are usually the ones which are not for me to own. When I stop and really think about it, I sometimes discover that the tight spots I find myself in are largely of my own making, growing from a long series of small decisions made individually over time -- usually from creating faulty expectations of myself or choosing to accept faulty expectations of others, rather than intentionally seeking out and following the path God places in front of me.

It reminds me again of Hummel's "Tyranny of the Urgent." Over time, and by my own free will, I can become distracted from my purpose, my values, my intent. Yet over time, and by my own free will, I can also choose to reorient back toward my intended purpose, values, intent. I want the "little" decisions to reflect that latter, better orientation.

Today has been quiet and refreshing. I feel like my soul has been catching up to my body today, and I am looking forward to tomorrow.

Box o' Memories

I was in our storage room today looking for Christmas stuff when I saw this:

I was suddenly intrigued by it. It's my box, presumably with my memories, right? But I haven't seen the inside of that box since... um... I don't know when. I have no idea what is in there, and I wonder what my filtering process was in choosing those items. I wonder, too, what I would put in a similarly-sized box if I were to create one from within my current stage in life.

Of course, the obvious solution to some of my questions is to open the box and see... but not today. Too much is going on right now, and if this is a good Box o' Memories, I don't want to be rushed through it.

I'm awfully curious, though.

Muppet Movie

We saw The Muppets movie with a whole bunch of friends this evening. Lots of themes -- significance of memories and stories, honoring the past while moving forward, priorities, identity, risk and reward, interplay between individuality and community, uniqueness and value of each individual, purpose and meaning, and overcoming adversity. Perhaps the thread I saw most strongly throughout was considering "relevance" in modern culture, with the end result of more intentionally choosing which characteristics of the culture to keep and which to fight.

And, of course, there were Muppets :D

Many Little Things

I injured myself a bit a few weeks back -- torqued my back while picking up a piece of paper. This was not heavy paper, mind you, nor large and awkwardly shaped. The motion just threw me off somehow.

My backpack is more clearly in the "lift with your legs, not with your back" category. I was surprised this afternoon by how light it felt as I pulled it from my car. In fact, I immediately thought I'd left my computer at home, so I opened up the bag to see. Everything was there except the assortment of papers I'd removed this morning.

A standard piece of paper is a small thing, not likely to be noticed when added to a good-sized pack. So, as I am leaving the house, I frequently add whatever documents are current. A few pages at a time through the recent weeks, those lightweight items had added up and I hadn't noticed how much they were weighing me down until the burden was lifted.

Life can be like that. Little tasks, small responsibilities, minor stresses -- each easy to carry on its own. When joined with others, though, they add up. Even a "lightweight" addition is enough to upset the balance. Today was a good reminder to "clean out my pack" -- to prioritize and focus rather than "carrying" too many things around in my head and heart.

Beyond Fun

I meandered through a shop in the airport recently, and found this happy little mug:

"Friends Make Everything More Fun"

It's cute and cheerful, like sparkly unicorns and fuzzy puppies dancing among rainbows. I don't like it.

It's not that I am opposed to unicorns and puppies and rainbows. I just think more highly of my friends.

Yes, friends bring joy, and often laughter. But some things simply are not fun, and no amount of cheerful cuteness will change that. And sometimes, true friends even take the risk of squashing fun when something more important requires attention.

I am grateful for fun times with friends, and I am grateful for friends who make space for un-fun times, too.

Camping: Differently Practical

We went camping recently with a group. Temperatures varied quite a bit, and it rained briefly on Saturday. A small tent was our primary shelter, furnished by sleeping bags and thin mats. The dog was out of sorts in the unfamiliar environment. The whole trip took extra time and energy and planning. We returned dirty and smelling like we hadn't showered for 2 1/2 days of camping.

Why do we do such things? It doesn't make "practical" sense.

The sky turning dark

Yet we were intentional in going, confident the experience would be worth it.

Much of my reason was to be with the others. Yeah, we could have all gotten together at someone's house and spent two days there but, for whatever reasons, we don't do that. So we all went camping instead. It took us away from our individual homes to more neutral space which "belonged" simultaneously to all of us and to none of us, where we shared space far more than when living in our geographically dispersed homes and, in the process, shared a little more of our selves.

A few of our camp-mates

There is something else about camping, too -- not being there simply in spite of the discomforts of nature, but also, in a way, because of them. When we go camping in the mountains, we place ourselves more directly in the path of nature. In the process, I can see more clearly the bigger picture beyond myself, beyond my relatively small corner of the world. Such experiences remind me there are many things we cannot control and should not try; sometimes our role is to just anticipate appropriately and to respond flexibly as needed in new situations.

Setting up a tarp shelter over the fire

The camping trip was not "practical" in the realms of finance and comfort, but it was important in a less tangible way, by shaping me a little more into the kind of person I want to become. It was a good weekend. I'm glad we went.

View from our site

NaBloPoMo

NaNoWriMo is National Novel Writing Month. The idea seems to be that pretty much anyone's first novel is going to be bad, so you might as well write it and get it over with by giving yourself permission to write "laughably awful yet lengthy prose." Making it a shared event is a lot more fun, too. So a bunch of people (there were 200,000 in 2010) sign up with their intention to write at least a 50,000 word novel during the month of November. That averages out to around 1700 words per day, which is perfectly doable for those with words to spare and a willingness to unite with others in foregoing perfection.

I love the idea. My husband is the one who introduced me to it, and he encouraged me to join in. He forgot something, though -- I don't have a novel to write or the desire to do so. Fiction is also beyond me, it seems, especially sustaining even a semi-coherent plot for that long.

And so, persistent and encouraging fellow that he is, my husband introduced me later to NaBloPoMo -- National Blog Posting Month. Like its novel-writing cousin, NaBloPoMo emphasizes consistency above quality. Fiction or nonfiction, short or long, sustained plot or completely disjointed, and all with a commitment of posting daily for just one month -- that I can do. I decided to try it. Yesterday marked one full month of posts, and I plan to continue through Wednesday to mark a calendar month, too. (That's like posting for two months, right?)

This discipline has pushed me to put words to experiences, and that has been good. Questions have come to mind along the way. Why do I blog? Where does this intersect with other writing, and where is it best to keep some separation? What is worth writing? And how much am I simply adding to the excessive digital noise of our culture? The questions themselves are good to ponder, too.

This paragraph is where I would put a conclusion, something to offer a satisfying conclusion to what has been written already. That's part of good writing, right? But I haven't reached a conclusion in much of this; there are still plenty of thoughts in process. Even more, I've got places to go and people to see, and that is a higher priority right now. And so, happily aligned with the philosophy of imperfect daily posting, I will declare this point to be...
The End.