The Problem with Being Nice
I sat in an athletic department office (years ago) as a head coach I was working for sketched plans on a white board and explained how each convoluted detail was essential to his basketball program. The coach was young, inexperienced and very eager to have a winning season. I didn’trealize it at the time, but most of his ideas were dead wrong. The glaring problem of the hour’s lecture was the fifty odd years of collective coaching experience in the room: the seasoned...
The Monster in the Closet (Choosing to Trust)
I had a big closet at school. It was the kind of closet that drew co-workers to come and store stuff all times of the day. Traffic was so frequent to the closet that one might have suspected it was a coffee bar or held a keg in one of its ancient cabinets. The closet also contained materials so old it could have functioned as the high school’s time-capsule if the New-Madrid fault ever gave way and buried southwest Ohio. Its cave-like qualities coupled with the wild-life...
Is Facebook a lifeline to Community or an escape from it?
It was well after the Academy Awards that I sat down to watch The Social Network. The movie portrayed computer programming genius Mark Zuckerberg as a rather unlikable character that was driven by his longing for acceptance to create this new online platform for connection. It is remarkable to think about the powerful role his offering has played in shaping the fate of the revolution in Egypt and social change in other parts of the world…by aninvention born out of loneliness....
Mockingbird Monday – Boo Radley and the Potency of Questions
“The more we told Dill about the Radleys, the more he wanted to know, the longer he would stand hugging the light-pole on the corner, the more he would wonder. ‘Wonder what he does in there,’ he would murmur. ‘Looks like he’d just stick his head out the door…’” “Wonder what he looks like?” said Dill (Chapter 1). I was speaking at my alma mater recently. I met my wife on campus there – so visiting is quite nostalgic. It makes...
