Shuffled – “Here’s Looking at You Kid”

A couple of days ago, I noticed that a reader had liked one of my posts from February.  Now that’s a great thing because it wasn’t one of the stories that was “pinned” to my home page then.  Generally speaking, our older posts drift backward in time and out of the spotlight as we write new ones.  So the reader had to take a little time to hunt this one down.  Or maybe they just stumbled upon it.  Either way, I was happy they found it.

And then I noticed that this particular piece, Coffee, had one of the highest number of likes of all of my posts.

All the Buzz at Work

As you know, I love words and phrases and the way people construct ideas.  Sometimes it’s extremely creative, and other times, well, it gives me a nice laugh.

And, I’m back with another set of buzzwords for the workplace.

So, the new terms for today are “Micromoves,” Productive Distraction,” and “Arrival Fallacy.”

A Moment of Reflection – WTF!

In the past couple of years or so, a small cohort of friends and I have entered into our retirement phases.  Retirement from careers, that is, not life.  In fact, one might say life begins anew at this time.

We suddenly have time to do the things we want.  Of course, we have to figure what those are.

And I was having a discussion with one of those friends yesterday about this very topic because he asked me to read over a article he had written about his experiences and how he is now free of the toxic environment in which he worked.  It’s a good piece and I hope he publishes it somewhere.

If you’re a Facebook friend you will have already seen this, but here is the reply I sent him after reading his piece.  With a couple of minor edits and spacing added for flow  . . .

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Bullshit – Take 2 – Being “Woke” – Part 2

Ok, so yesterday I talked about how I had attempted to write a story about the use of the slang word “Woke,” and how I didn’t quite land on the mark with that first draft.  The post I was working on is part of a series I’ve waded into about the fray between gender roles, well, maybe gender behavior says it better.  See my previous posts, “Query” and “Tse’itsi’nako – Thought Woman ‘Being Woke’ – Part 1.”

So, here’s take two – on the Bullshit post. 😊

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Thank You and Come Again

A while back I wrote a piece called Experimental Writing.  I have taken that post down with about a hundred others, but the point of the piece was that everything we write and put out here for the world to see is a bit of an experiment.

We learn through trial and error what works and what doesn’t. What people like to read, and how they like to read it.

And while my background has me well trained in technical writing, and formalized legal writing, my academic training did little for teaching me what I think is truly important – the art of storytelling.  That’s one of those things I’ve been learning on my own.

The feedback from the WP community is great.

So yesterday I attempted to write what was supposed to be part two of a short series I started playing with about current societal gender roles and the concept of being “conscious” in those roles.  And because of my fascination with word usage and origin, I was poking a little fun at the evolution of the slang word “woke.”

To tackle the controversy surrounding this single-syllable, yes, believe it or not there are folks fighting over ownership rights to a slang word, I had to discuss the concept of “cultural appropriation.” Something that I think has become a bit distorted. Grossly distorted, in fact.

What I ended up with looked a little bit like a cross between editorializing and a legal brief, and I’m not sure anyone would have gotten the type of humor I tried to infuse it with, as I respectfully called Bullshit on it all. 😊

It was a lump of coal.  And as a dear heart once told me, intelligence only goes so far.

She’s right of course.

Realizing that this was probably not my only failure at composing, I thought I should take a moment to thank all my followers out here in WP land.  I greatly appreciate your visits, you trying to digest the meanderings through my mind, and your insightful comments.

You give me courage.  You give me strength.  You give me the will to get back on the horse and throw something out there for the world to see.  Accepting the risk of whether it will fly or falter.

So, thank you all for being here, and please come visit again.  You help me to grow as a writer, and I’m eternally grateful for that.

In Metta

Photo: Back in the saddle, somewhere in time and space.

Neurocognitive Scaffolding

Disclaimer:  Beware – today I dive into a more technical piece of work versus my more poetic stuff 🙂

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I always love it when new terms of art are coined.  The coupling of words and formation of short phrases to describe something, a concept, possibly already known or possibly a new formulation.  It seems to be the perpetual motion of researchers, politicians, and wordsmiths alike, to boil a concept down into a few short syllables to describe something of monumental proportions.

Why?

Well once the label or buzzword or soundbite is created, no one has any need to reference the material supporting it, or even read and digest it for that matter.  It sort of becomes a “given.”  It is a self-explanatory definition that generally becomes universally accepted.

It is the same philosophy journalists use when they try to tell the whole story in just the headline.  Reading the story becomes superfluous, and with lowering attention spans many readers don’t make it past those headlines.

You might even compare this practice to that of our ancient ancestors drawing pictograms and petroglyphs on cave walls.  Reducing an idea to its most elementary form in an attempt to communicate.

Actually, I think images may even be more powerful than words in the sense that they convey detail that encompasses all of the senses that can cross language barriers.  Some days, I would prefer petroglyphs to the written and spoken language 😊

But, should simple or even complex phraseology be given such deference?

I’m not sure.  Such practices have the potential to oversimplify.  And in the case of journalists, many times their stories don’t match their headlines – not even close.

So where am I going with this?  Well, I stumbled upon a new term this week involving our aging brains.  “Neurocognitive Scaffolding.”

First Camp

There is a sort of calm that takes over as twilight turns to night sky.

As the sun sets, the nuclear fuel driving the shifting breezes subsides.  The towering tree branches no longer swaying back and forth.  Releasing their grips with neighboring limbs.  As if some inaudible song had reached the outro of its final chorus and the dancers now return to their seats.  Resting their mighty legs for tomorrows gyrations.

Debabelization – Our Webs of Words

Is writing about writing, writing?

Strange question perhaps, but I think I’ve mentioned somewhere before in a post that writing about the techniques of writing is not the same as “storytelling.”  And I really do love storytelling.

Soulmass

Lately I’ve read some interesting blogs pointing out just how insignificant we, as humans, are.  And I’ve read others about just how meaningful life is.  I guess opposites attract 😊

Frankly, I’m torn, because these thought experiments bring me back to another interrelated concept and that is “purpose.”

Just what purpose are we supposed to fulfill?  Or, stated another way, why are we here?

Serpents and Milkweeds

I was out of breath as I reached the top of the bluff.  But it was worth the hike.  I now had a falcon’s-eye view out over the South Fork of the Snake River.  Absolutely beautiful.

The sprawling flood plain to the East was fully plowed and planted.  Potatoes, wheat, and alfalfa.  And maybe a few specialty crops lay low in the distance.  Broccoli, cauliflower, rhubarb, and cabbage.  Casting different hues of green.  Forest green to fern, to mantis, to dark pastel, to castelton.

The Star Beneath Our Feet

The wind picked up as I hit the fourth mile mark.  The warm breeze wrapped around my face and lifted upward and to the East.

It had been a cool fifty degrees when I started my trek an hour and a half earlier, but once the sun crested thirty degrees above the horizon the temperature had been in a steady climb and was fueling the wind gusts that reminded you that the invisible vapor we breath is a powerful force.  One not to misjudge.  It is tornado season after all.

Beauty – Adaptive or Arbitrary

A number of days past, I made a post titled Wildflowers where I pondered the evolutionary adaptations of plants.  How their beauty, shape, and the perfume of their flowers attract certain pollinators to ensure the propagation of their species.

Naturally, I simply enjoy their beauty, regardless of how it came to be. 😊

Then yesterday, I stumbled upon an article discussing the theories of “adaptive adornment” versus “arbitrary beauty.”*  And I must admit, those terms are much more scientific and deliberately descriptive than my own ponderings.

It seems that Darwin had a second theory apart from natural selection – sexual selection.

Hawthorn

It’s that time of year.  The flowering trees have started to bloom.  It usually begins with Wild Cherry and Plumb.   Then come the Redbuds and Magnolias.  Then Dogwoods, Catalpas, Buckeyes, and Mimosas.

There are a lot of trees in my area with small, white flowers.  Probably too many to know all of them.  But the other day, when I was out on the trail,  I spied this little beauty laying in the grass.  It only took a second to realize that it wasn’t a ground flower.  There was an entire blanket of these blooms lying under a tree.  The Hawthorn Tree.

This was the first time I took a close look at this particular blossom.  And it was quite a gift for the day 🙂

The center sort of looks like a creature with unfolding tentacles.  Perhaps a Sea Anemone.  Take in its beauty and use your imagination.  What do you see?