​Last week in this column we discussed our over-reliance on technology. Later in the week, I played golf about a 25-minute drive from our house. I love the course, very scenic, quiet, surrounded by various types of pine trees.
 
Twenty-five minutes is not long. I don’t use technology like GPS or Waze to get there because I’ve been driving to the course for so long. I find it in my sleep. I find it through muscle memory -- the old fashioned way.

Despite this, I found myself last week wanting to explore a new path. I use the word “explore” purposefully. Words matter.
 
I’d finished playing early, walking by myself. The rest of the day beckoned with nothing on the calendar. I’d said to myself (and my wife) several times that I was going to launch down a country road returning from the course one day. That day came.
 
Why do this? Why meander and see where you end up? Because you can. It’s an explorative journey.
 
Once you leave the course, the main road curves north and east. The side road, unlined, farms on both sides, looked like it headed due east. Apparently a more direct route to our home, but who knew? It was an untested road.
 
I’d played a solid round and felt good. If I got lost, I had to keep trying new roads heading east, then south, and sooner or later I’d come into recognizable terrain and recalibrate to return (“recalculating” as the directions app would state to you).
 
The speed limit slowed. I hit a stop sign. Then another. The road began to curve into some woods. Then it slowed further, to 25 mph for a sharp turn. The car headed up a hill. A neighborhood appeared on the right in the middle of nowhere.
 
Everything was okay. Generally speaking, the car continued in the right direction.
 
An elderly couple was out walking, and I gave them a wide berth and waved. They waved back. I smiled. The car was warm, and the outside air cold. I started getting drowsy, ready for the spectacular afternoon nap. First, I had to navigate back.
 
Very quickly, the shortcut came to an end. WTH? On the left was a tiny motel you see on the main road to the course. There’s no way I could come out here! Yes, there was.
 
Somehow, my exploratory meandering afternoon turned into a radical shortcut that saved seven minutes on the 25-minute drive. Astounding!
 
The shortcut had been found because I’d wanted to do the opposite and get lost and just drive around and figure out some way to get home over the back roads. So weird, so strange.
 
The experience was relaxing. It was enjoyable. It was just shorter than expected.
 
Leaving technology behind is a good thing for many reasons, particularly to get you back in touch with your sense of direction. You’re tested. You must navigate, not the app or software program.
 
I got home way sooner than expected, but that was good, too. My nap beckoned. I slept well.

​A little less than two months ago my golf watch quit on me. I should have seen it coming.
 
The previous three times I’d played with it, the battery died during the round. I kept thinking I hadn’t charged the battery enough to last 18 holes, but finally figured out it was on its last legs and it was time to get a new one.
 
Losing the golf watch advantages taught me a few things about our reliance on technology. Most of you who read my stuff regularly recognize that for the most part I’m a “late adaptor” of tech, not an “early adopter.” I use those two words on purpose. Slowly, I adapt. Those who are into technology adopt it quickly. There’s a difference.

Being old school, it was important for me to judge my yardage on my own when playing golf. You learn a lot by doing this – figuring out distances, needing to understand an elevation rise or drop, adding the wind into the mix to predict what the yardage to the pin “really” is, rather than just what the number says.
 
When the watch showed up (with an invite from me) to Christmas 6-7 years ago, it was welcome. I wanted it. I’d seen someone else using the watch and wanted one, knowing it would improve my game and that I could easily figure out all the buttons. It gives yardage to the pin, to the front of the green and the back of the green. It identifies the distance to hazards and what it takes to hit your ball over the hazards. That was pretty much all I needed.
 
Once past the first round or two with the golf watch, it embedded itself in my mindset. I looked at it before every shot. When playing with a friend, they would ask me for the distance, and I would proudly give them the EXACT distance to the pin. It was f….cking AWESOME!
 
I stopped judging distances. I didn’t have to. I was “told” with technology that was next to perfect.
 
As the watch wore out and I had to play several half-rounds without it, then finally when it dropped dead on the first hole, and I had to play an entire round without it, I realized how technology dependent I’d become. I had to judge distance again, find markers in the fairway that gave me rough estimates and then walk it off to my ball and figure out any yardage differences to reach a reasonable judgment on what club to select, how hard and far to hit the ball to reach the intended destination.

I was often slightly off by 10-20 yards. That speaks to a skill set I lost while wearing the watch, but also speaks to our judgments in anything we try to estimate, even if we have a lot of skill and experience in the activity. We can make our best decision, but it’s not always a reasonably informed one.
 
The watch dying made me think of a coworker who was addicted to the Waze app, which locks you into your intended destination while driving, identifying time, best routes, where police are watching, traffic slowdowns, accidents. He’s a much younger guy than me, and never tries to figure out where he’s going on his own. He left the parking lot one morning to go to a site we’d been to the previous day, and asked me as we exited, “Which way do I turn?” I couldn’t stop laughing.

Then the golf watch dies, and I fall into that technology-dependent category. My golf game suffers. I wholeheartedly believe the watch saves me 3-4 strokes for a round, which is darn helpful for those of you who are un-golf-initiated. I need a new one, but embrace my current suffering and weakened level of play. I’m sharper on the yardages, slowly redeveloping my skills. But, I’ve put it on Santa’s list for a replacement.
 
Hurry up, Christmas.

​Over the past 18 months or so, I’ve rediscovered the joys of our local library. It didn’t come and find me, but I went and reacquainted myself.

It’s odd how a relationship with the library can go south. You just forget it’s there. Your work gets busy. You do other things with your spare time rather than read. You focus on buying books rather than taking some out and returning them so others can enjoy.
 
All of those  apply to me. Foremost though was just plain forgetting the library was there as a resource.  And, I’m not really sure what drove me to reenter its doors with regularity.
 
A number of years back, my younger brother extolled the virtues of getting movies and audio books from the library. At the time, I picked up on his energy and took out several audio books to keep me occupied while driving long distances in my job. But, there wasn’t much that kept my interest in terms of plots in novels or subject matter for non-fiction books.
 
I waned in terms of visiting the library. I read a reasonable amount, but would buy those books, as I’ve long been a proponent in financially supporting the work of authors. If we don’t buy books by writers, it is harder for writers to support themselves. It’s that simple. I believe it is tremendously important to support writers, so I purchased them.
 
The changing point, as best I can put my finger on it, has been having more free time as my work world shrank the past 18 months or so. My career moved away from a path from full-time employment. That freed up more time to read. I’ve taken that opportunity to dig deeper into new genres and read more intently when I sit down and with greater frequency.
 
That could add up dollar-wise, if I continued to buy books. That led to great library usage, and slowly the vibe insinuated itself into my routine.
 
There’s something unique, quieting and contemplative entering the doors of the library. It’s always been a “thinking” place for me, whether that was in grade school or college. You are “supposed” to do work there – research, write, take notes, etc. – so you silently go about your business. Of course, someone could easily make you start giggling with fourth grade inanities, but you knew you were supposed to be doing schoolwork, so mostly that’s what you did.
 
Rediscovering the library visit this past year has reignited some of those long-ago memories and invigorated my reading list. Talking with the librarians, perusing the aisles, spending time at their special book displays all led me down new paths regarding the types of literature or non-fiction to check into next.
 
You find an author and may read three of her books in a row. You discover the mystery genre and it sticks with you as you shift from one recommended writer to another. You talk to someone who has a recommendation and follow that up to find a new world of interest.
 
Library nostalgia ignites library passion. You think back, remember, and start regularly visiting again. Your mind expands, you think new things, you find yourself contemplating subjects, ideas, thoughts, concepts, plots and characters you hadn’t considered. You feel good entering the door and know you’ve returned home.

​Colin Powell’s passing last week triggered something in me. It went beyond that a great man passed.
 
I looked up to Colin Powell, respected him and his judgment. I trusted what he did for us as U.S. citizens.
 
That fact that he died wasn’t what hit me so hard. What bothered me deeply was reading various accounts of what others thought of him. You may find this trivial, but I believe it speaks more deeply to all U.S. citizens at this stage in our history.
 
As I filtered through what others wrote about Powell, a statesman, diplomat and four-star general, struck me over and over. People wrote in support of him, yes. There were accolades upon accolades cited. Yet, and yet…..
 
Far too many of these “positive” messages started with the phrase, “Though I disagreed with General Powell on a number of things, I …..” Or, “General Powell made his share of mistakes, but I still…..”
 
The point of these posts diminished the man and his accomplishments. Who are all these Average American Joe’s and Mary’s to judge the actions of a man who worked his way diligently up through the ranks of the military, developing a world view that was compassionate and advanced our interests around the world?
 
The posts upset me. The posts illuminate how people who do not have the knowledge or experience to make monumental international decisions for the United States think that they do. Someone watches news on TV and presumes he has information and background to criticize a four-star general.

This is not new in our country, nor is this type of judgmental thinking about to end any time soon. This “I know best” perspective has been around for a long time, and accelerated with the advent of social media and the fracturing of news media into camps projecting a perspective rather than doing their best to “report” thoroughly from all sides on an issue. We are diminished as a country because of this.

The advent of citizen “experts” is but one sign of this. People rush to tell others what they think, without the credentials to back their “opinion” up. They know because they know. Okay, sure thing, buddy.
 
We also lose the true value of what an expert brings to the table. That individual who has served in the trenches year after year, learning the intricacies of the issues, is devalued. The know-it-all citizen disrespects someone who has earned a position of power and authority.
 
This type of “so and so was great, even though I disagreed with him on many things” attitude infects us on many levels. We all disagree with others, let’s not kid ourselves. Over the year, I’ve done a number of presentations on conflict resolution. I use marriage as an example.
 
I have pointedly asked the audience, “Do you agree with your spouse on everything?” Of course not (though I have met people who fervently state they’ve never had a disagreement with their spouse in their 40 years of marriage; I’d like to be a fly on their walls).
 
The marriage metaphor works on multiple levels. Any honest person has disagreed with their spouse way more than once if the marriage has lasted for any number of years. But that never diminishes the other person. Nor would we say upon a spouse passing, “Though I disagreed with my wife/husband a lot, s/he was still a great person.” Nope, we wouldn’t do that.

We would support our spouse, talk about the good times, relate stories on what they did to make the world better, funnier, smarter, more connected. Our support for General Colin Powell should go way beyond that. 

​I’m a dumbass. There are probably many other humans on this planet who fall into this category for the same reason I’m in it.
 
Mine is simple. I play the game “Words with Friends” on my smart phone. I have three “people” I play against. Nope.
 
Make that “one” person. The other two are bots.
 
Now, here’s the reason I’m a dumbass: I thought I was playing two other humans for well over a year. I should have known better.

Here’s why. When I played these two other “people,” they responded quickly. At first, I didn’t think much of that. I thought they were bored or worked in a call center, so they killed time by playing a lot of “Words with Friends.”

This went on for months and months, and slowly I came to understand and recognize that these two individuals responded INSTANTANEOUSLY EVERY TIME I played my round. No hesitation. Whammo, I had a response before I’d played three or four other moves.
 
I couldn’t figure this out. “Man, those two must be REALLY BORED to be up at 5 a.m. like I am,” was a frequent thought.
 
Or, “That’s really odd that they respond right away at 6:30 a.m., noon, 6:30 p.m. and 10 p.m. I wonder if this person ever sleeps, takes a dump, drinks or eats, or actually has any real friends?”
 
It didn’t occurr to my dense brain that a robotic response was possible and likely. Instead, I was seduced because the photo showed a human being. Mr. Naivity (me) assumed that meant a real person was behind the photo.

I labored on, playing back quickly, seeing if I could overwhelm the opponent with immediate responses myself. No dice. They handled me like the rookie I was.

These types of challenges on my part went on for many months. I kept assuming my opponent was a human being and would mention to my wife how odd it was that the person could respond any time of day, every day of the week. I presumed they both had jobs that required them to be up at all hours.

Then, slowly, I realized that no human being could live like that. No sleep. Answering on an app every single second of every single day. “Hmmmm, can’t be a human.”
 
As this registered deeper in my brain, and I was reading a book at the time about bots, I realized I’d been botted. “BOT ME!”
 
Those bastards. They got me.
 
I don’t understand what the purpose is of the bot on “Words with Friends.” Are they trying to steal my personal data? Do they just want to see if a human can consistently beat or lose to their bot? Because it’s a bot, we’ll never know.
 
Having finally figured out I’m playing two software programs performing  a repetitive task, I feel better when I cream them. But, I also feel really silly that I let this go on for so long without figuring out the basic activity taking place over and over.
 
Some years we’re just a little slow, I guess. Maybe chock it up to Covid. “I’m not thinking so straight these days.” Bot me.
​

 
Two weeks ago, I went to Costco to pick up a number of food items for a running race our family and friends were about to undertake. We needed massive quantities of nutritious and easily consumable items.
 
One product I planned to purchase was beef jerky. The store had four selections to choose from when it came to jerky in general. Two were eliminated quickly.
 
The third worked the best for us in terms of the quantity, but was packaged not only in an outer plastic, but each individual piece of jerky was also encased in plastic. I made an immediate decision and bought the other package.
 
Making a choice about a product based on packaging is not something I typically do. Yes, at times, I’ve weighed that as an option, and it influences me. In general, when I shop, I look to minimize any purchases of items packaged in plastic, and bring reusable canvas bags to put products in (not just at grocery stores, but also when shopping elsewhere).
 
It astounds and depresses me how much plastic is blowing around streets all over the world, congregating in waterways and trees. Given an option to do something to reduce plastic going into our collective wastestream worldwide, I choose not to add to the problem.
 
It also astounds and depresses me that more people don’t factor that consideration into their daily lives. It is not even remotely complicated to bring a reusable bag when you go into a store. You take it out of the back seat of your car, put it into your shopping cart, then use it to put any groceries or other items into it when you check out. You cannot use the excuse of, “It’s inconvenient,” or “It’s expensive.” It’s neither.
 
The only excuse you can use is, “I forgot.” That can happen. Until you make the reusable bag part of your regular routine, you’ll probably forget it multiple times. And, I can relate to being too lazy to go back to the car to get it. But, once you’ve worked it into your mental mindset, it’s unlikely you’ll forget to bring them (plural typically in terms of “bags” vs. “bag”), since you often need more than one reusable bag in the supermarket) into the store.
 
Choosing products in terms of reduced plastic packaging is a different story. You may have no options.
 
I remember reading an article a couple of years ago about a woman who NEVER bought a food item that had any packaging whatsoever. Quite frankly, I’m not sure how she did it. I could see if you solely existed on fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts and granola. You could bring all your own containers to fill up, and reuse them regularly. You have to assume she just didn’t buy yogurt, potato chips or frozen veggies.
 
When you have a choice to reduce or eliminate plastic packaging, exercise your choice. I did that at Costco. The decision was instantaneous. No hesitation. BAM, buy the jerky not encased in individual plastic bags.
 
What I found startling to myself was the rapidity of the decision. It was intuitive, cemented and the right thing to do to reduce plastic waste. And, there was an added bonus -- the lesser packaged jerky was cheaper. 

​Doesn’t it seem like for all the connectivity we have in the world and our communication devices, that somehow we don’t receive responsiveness?  Like your message goes into nothingness because you never receive a response. You’re left wondering if the recipient got the message, whether it was a voice mail, text, email or some other form of electronic communication.
 
It does seem to be the way of the world these days. You try to reach someone in multiple ways, and never hear back. Your communication could be to a friend, colleague, family member or a business. It doesn’t matter. Collectively, there’s a lack of “getting back to you” in a timely fashion.
 
A group of us are going to participate in a Ragnar run race this week. My wife has been communicating with the organizers on multiple fronts for several weeks. For the most part, they’ve gotten her all the information she needs.

Then, suddenly, as the runners are supposed to individually register and she was trying to get this information to our team, she couldn’t access that section of their web site. And she couldn’t raise anyone to help her. No phone number on the web site. While we did eventually get a response, it got quickly frustrating in the near term as she was working to finalize details so our runners could get their information properly registered for the race.
 
Though that is a mild example, there are many more most of us could come up with that inconvenience us as customers, partners, suppliers or any other relationships that bind us. And, many times it can be worse than just an inconvenience.

One of my pet peeves has always been companies that don’t include contact information on their web sites. Isn’t it pretty fundamental that if you run a business, you should make it simple for someone to contact you to ask a question or get a response? Perhaps your product doesn’t work properly. The customer needs to talk to an expert. Access should be easy.
 
Maybe you want to talk with a member of their communications department because you have an idea for a positive story, or you saw something they did in the local community that would make a good television story. Shouldn’t the contact information for that press contact be accessible in a click or a call? It should, but often isn’t.
 
You dig and you dig to come up with nothing. You check Facebook and LinkedIn. Same story. Twitter is worthless. You finally give up.
 
What’s left is frustrated customers and even do-gooders who want to help you out. Sure, companies kept the complainers off their backs by making it difficult to reach anybody with the company. But you know what? The complainers need to reach you, too. How else do you know when you screwed up?
 
The people (and companies) I appreciate the most are ones who acknowledge your communication in a timely fashion. It doesn’t have to be instantaneous. But, it does need to come to you in a reasonable timeframe given the circumstances.

​We all have missions in life. I’m a man on a mission to kill all the invasive buckthorn in our yard. That mission evolved the past few years, and now encompasses a corollary mission to diversify our woods as the changing climate attacks some of our trees in southeast Wisconsin.
 
It wasn’t until the past few weeks where I really added up all the bug, rot, mold, insect infestations and other issues affecting our trees, and tie it together into a grander picture. I have a close friend who lives in Marquette, MI, and he mentioned the band of earth where we live as a hot spot for where trees and other greenery, along with creatures as being affected more intimately by the ups and downs of heat and cold, flooding and drought.

You may think of those issues or not – the peaks and valleys of weather and how that changes the landscape in your area. Maybe you notice a few bushes dying in front of your house and are unsure why that’s happening.
 
We have some clear indicators of distress (mold killing many of the area’s oak trees and an infestation taking out river birches we’ve planted in the past five years). Slowly over the past few years, my wife and I (she took an early and big lead in terms of getting us moving in a direction to sustain our part of the earth and refurbish it in a way that puts in place plants, trees and shrubs that should thrive in this area as our 21st century unfolds) attacked some of the bad guys (buckthorn) and planted some good guys (maple and fir trees of different varieties).
 
Our plan and progress make me feel righteous. We plan ahead, considering things in a thoughtful way based on the knowledge of experts, and making decisions that will positively impact the fauna for decades to come.
 
We’re creating cover to improve our watershed. We’re adding diversity to the forest. We’re eliminating the invasive buckthorn, which chokes out so many other trees seeking water and sun.
 
I find myself motivated every morning to get outside and attack the buckthorn step by step. It’s nasty. It comes back when you least expect it. You have to stay on top of it, spraying its leaves and offshoots as it springs up. At first, the task was debilitating. But, then, when considering it as a daily meditative experience, my motivation rose exponentially.
 
I’d consider where to attack the next day. I’d contemplate the withering shoots, happy to see them collapsing, content in knowing progress (though slight) was taking place.
 
That became my motto for the year: “Work towards mild, incremental progress.” I’ve applied it elsewhere in my life and it helps keep things in perspective. It’s far too easy feeling you can do nothing. Take on something where you feel a sense of accomplishment and move forward from there.
 
My mission continues. I have less than two months left to demolish the buckthorn, and fully recognize that will not happen this year. I pick off a section here and a section there, content to crush the invader and free up space to diversify our land. The work in progress continues.

​Throughout life we must make transitions. Adapt to changing circumstances.

Sometimes it’s fun. Sometimes it’s depressing.

It might be about something you can no longer physically do. Or something you KNOW you shouldn’t do anymore, like lifting super heavy things or trying to sprint from a standing start after the age of 50.

If you live long enough, you have many examples of stuff you no longer do. Or, if you continue to take on a certain activity, you’re smart about it, and approach it in a slower fashion.
 
Recently, over a period of several months, while working on my desktop computer, I couldn’t understand why I was squinting and turning my head to read words. The screen seemed somehow blurry. Not bad, just a little off.
 
It didn’t occur to me quickly that perhaps my eyes were going through a new adjustment of older age. When I first needed reading glasses in my mid-40’s, I remember the nirvana moment when I figured it out.

At the time, Nuprin (with tennis great Jimmy Connors endorsing it with the phrase, “Nupe it with Nuprin”) was the ibuprofen drug of choice. We had a tiny bottle in our bedside table. Rarely using it, I remember pulling it out one night to look at how much to dose yourself.

I couldn’t read it. I moved the small cannister closer and found the print got blurrier. I squinted. That helped a bit. I shifted the container around. Finally, I moved it farther away from my face, holding it at arms’ length and was able to read it. WHOA.

Time for those reading glasses. I suddenly understood why my dad had those readers for the morning newspaper.
 
I started with 125’s and moved onto 150’s after 10 years or so. Fully understanding at some point there would likely be further deterioration and the need for greater magnification. But, the thought of having to get stronger lenses hadn’t occurred to me recently. You get used to your routine and everything’s okay.
 
I continued squinting at the desktop screen, moving my chair farther away. Then, it became apparent that reading the screen on my smart phone was getting more and more difficult. It dawned on my thick head that it was time for another change and to accommodate eyes that weren’t quite what they used to be.
 
Heading to Costco to pick up a 3-pack of 175-glasses, I felt slightly saddened at this new development. “Dammit, I have to put on glasses just to read the computer screen?”  I guess so.
 
Certainly, I could have continued down my merry path of squinting and shifting my chair, getting irritated, perhaps developing headaches. The smarter move was acknowledgement and moving on to the next step of life.

Sometimes we make small changes smoothly. Sometimes we fight them for years. Sometimes we stick to our old ways and make our lives more complicated and harder.
 
Print is clearer now. Work proceeds more quickly and easily. Reading anything online or on the phone is effortless with the glasses. Sometimes you wonder why you don’t change more quickly.

​Not many people would write a poem titled, “Ode to the Power Company.” We don’t think that way. We expect lights to be on, the air conditioning running. We don’t get excited and creative thinking about the generation and distribution of electricity.
 
At the same time, there is some poetry involved in the humanity of how companies come together to help EVERYONE in times of storms and duress. We will see this in the coming weeks as cleanup occurs after hurricane Ida hits Louisiana.
 
There will be tragedy. And there will warming stories of saving others. People will unite to overcome massive barriers to cleanup, salvage and start over. Lives will be wrecked as something new emerges.
 
Through it all, the electric companies soldier on. Their people prepare beforehand. Their families know they won’t see their mothers or fathers who work on the power lines, who drive the trucks, who respond immediately and overwhelmingly in numbers from all over the country to help their fellow brothers and sisters dig out. It’s an awesome display of unity and goodness to ensure the affected communities can fight their way back to some semblance of normalcy.

And, as we know from past experience, there is a “new normal.” Reconstruction doesn’t put things back the way they were. Trees disappear. Rivers reroute themselves. Houses wash away.
 
We replant and rebuild. But, the landscape is altered, never to be exactly the way it was before.
 
Recently we were hit by several power microburst storms near our house. During one of those wind and rain gusts, our power flickered twice. Whew, the lights stayed on. Then a few seconds later we lost all power.
 
It’s not like outages have never occurred before. We got out the flashlights, lit the candles, called our electric company to let them know what happened, and got their update on restoration of service.
 
It was hot and humid that night. Slowly, as the AC effects wore off and our house heated up, my wife and I peeled off covers, until it got too stuffy to sleep. Just as it started to become extremely uncomfortable, the power popped back on. Hurrah!
 
The wind hit 77 miles an hour that evening. We got blasted with over an inch of rain in an extremely short period of time. It was not surprising we lost power.

What surprised me was how quickly it was restored, and we were thankful for that. We reset the clocks, felt the AC cranking again to cool everything down inside. I thought a lot about writing a poem, “Ode to the Power Company.”
 
There is no perfection when it comes to some of our modern technologies. We think they’ll run continuously and get used to the convenience. When a major storm hits or there’s some other glitch, we wonder what went wrong, not really considering all the pieces of equipment that must interact and operate correctly to ensure the reliable delivery of electricity.
 
Major storms make us reconsider and remember how fortunate we are. Not only for electricity in general, but for the hard work so many people put into making sure we our homes and businesses reconnect after a disaster.