What the Head Thinks

Spring Break is springing toward us!  Greening trees…budding branches…yellow jonquils peeking up at us…robins and finches and wrens Oh My!

The beginning of spring is many people’s most favored time of the year…Rebirth, renewal, rejuvenation.  The world begins anew and we embrace the change and energy we feel all around us.

My cats, Socks and Lucky, also think spring is great stuff, even though as indoor cats their most direct encounter is through our living room’s big plate glass window.  They soak up the sun that pours through as though they were big cartons and the milky light was filling them up.

Spring sees cats and people — and robins and finches and wrens Oh My! — as one and the same.  Spring does not discriminate — it is for everyone: trees, flowers, cats, humans, birds, even rooftops and driveways and bowls of cat food.

I would like to be more like spring — even-tempered, cheerful, always looking at the bright side of virtually everything that has atoms and molecules.  I would like to run and jump and cover the world with new flowers, new buds, new energy.

Sometimes it seems the world around us is a little broken.  Too much war in the world…grim news in the headlines…sad children hungry for food or love or warmth.

Maybe the world gets a little better when we reflect on spring and spring break as times to remind us: the world is ultimately a great place!  Despite some things that are broken in the world, it is ultimately a whole and healthy place.

Spring and spring break should remind us that joy overtakes sorrow, that renewal overtakes dying, and that light will overtake the darkness.

We have to work at that sense of renewal.  Make spring break both energetic and quiet, both joyful and reflective, both fun and relaxing.  Remind those around you to watch the birds…pet the cats…laugh at a magic trick…take a nap…listen to the breeze…and make spring part of your daily prayers.

Every little good thing you do helps spring add up the good stuff in life.  Treat your family well…smile at someone who needs it…and remind yourself and others that spring springs at us every day — we have to be able to spring forward with it!

Happy Spring Break!

Recently I have been reading personal essays written by our 6th graders.  Many of them — no, all of them — express the author’s genuine desire to learn something powerful about themselves by way of an important experience.  Some of these writings are sad, but none are depressing — even confrontations with death are experiences our students are able to make sense of, and change into a lesson important to learn about life.

We have too little time, it seems, to slow down and reflect on those things that cause us pause in our lives.  But our students clearly took the time to think deeply, to ponder seriously, and to articulate beautifully.  I am very proud of each of them.

Without a chance to stare at the clouds, to muse over a silly joke, to take a walk in the neighborhood, to kick a rock up and down the street, to swing in a friend’s tire-swing, or to simply lie in the grass and wonder about the universe — without such moments we lose the poetry that our lives should be.

Our students’ writing has given me a chance to consider just how deep their own spirituality runs — they write about death, or loss, or pain.  And they learn just how connected they truly are despite the disconnections that occur to all of us at some time.

As much as I love my cats, and as much as it looks on the surface as though they are reflecting on my actions — I have a suspicion that they are not really conscious of the things that compose a meaningful human existence.  Our 6th graders’ writing, on the other hand, keeps me closely connected to the spirit that all humanity shares.  And I am grateful for the chance to reflect on that valuable lesson.

When the cold weather hits, and I realize it’s been weeks or months since last posting a comment to my blog — it seems right to be inside playing fetch with Socks the Cat.  Yes, Socks fetches.  She chases rubber bands.  I shoot it across the room and she zooms for it faster than an email goes to Bill Gates.  Then she picks it up in her teeth and brings it back to me, dropping it at my feet.  If I don’t pick it up and shoot it across the room yet again, she meows louder than speakers hooked up to Bill Gates’ computer.

I doubt too many cats in the world fetch as reliably and relentlessly as Socks the Cat.  Apparently she thinks this game is one I want to play as much as she does.  And that makes me think of wifi connections.  Why wifi?  Wi-not?  Increasingly I take my tablet pc with me when I go for coffee or to a bookstore.  My tablet pc is a little like Socks the Cat and I playing fetch: Socks doesn’t have as much fun with the rubber band without my shooting it.  And I don’t have as much fun going to Starbuck’s unless I have my tablet.

Doesn’t this make great sense?  Not actually, but it makes enough sense to me to say: cats don’t have to chase rubber bands but if they do and I like it too — isn’t that good stuff?  And if I prefer going for coffee with my tablet pc and connect wirelessly to the Internet just to be connected to the global world and see what Bill Gates puts in his coffee or his computer — isn’t that good stuff, too??

Well, okay, a cat chasing rubber bands and me drinking coffee with my tablet pc don’t have much in common with one another.  Still, I like coffee, I like my cats, I like my tablet, and, well, I like how learning for the pure sake of learning is what my life is all about.

So, Socks, let’s use this cold day to chase rubber bands, connect to the world, and see what happens!  I think Bill Gates would be proud.

Many, many years ago, it is told that a man on foot raced a steam engine train, to see whether man or technology was faster.  Though I don’t know how historically accurate the story is, nor do I know exactly who won this race — I am guessing that if the course had been over 100 miles long, it’s likely the man came in second.

What does this have to do with how fast cats can run, you ask?  I am imagining a similar race, but one brought more up to date: My cats racing against my tablet personal computer.  It’s very hard to picture, I know,  but think about this: Socks and Lucky vs. my tablet pc.  They are at the starting line, itching to take off!  The starting water pistol squirts (I don’t care so much for real hand guns) and the race begins!!

 The cats are racing from room to room at a furious pace!  They’ve circled from the living room to the dining room through the kitchen back to the living room through the dining hall and on and on.  It’s great!

 But by now, my tablet pc has already connected, via the Internet, to an ex-Olympic marathon runner in Lisbon.  He’s forwarded an email to a friend in Taiwan, who sends the message on to a guy running a small software company in northern California.  The millionnaire in California sends the message to me back in Atlanta.  Elapsed time?  33 seconds.  In 33 seconds, my cats have raced within the confines of my house 11 times.

So, who wins this absurd race?  The cats, or the tablet?  Actually — they both do!!  The email message travels around the world in less than a minute.  My cats have traveled around the house in the same time. 

But why do they both win??  Because the cats are running their race for fun, for craziness, and for my pure wild enjoyment.  And the tablet? Well, it gives me immense pleasure knowing I can communicate around the world.

 So, who ultimately wins?  I do, because  I love my cats, but in truth I can’t expect them to run around the world in 33 seconds.  And I love my tablet, but it doesn’t purr when I pet it, at least not yet.  So, in the race of felines vs high tech — everyone crosses each unique finish line first.  Yay!

I left my office yesterday a little tired, and ready for an easy drive home, by way of Barnes and Noble.  When I got to my car, however, I was greeted by a right front tire that was flatter than a dinner plate in Kansas.  It had been so long since I’d changed a tire that it took a minute to even remember where the spare was.  “In the trunk!” it finally came to me.

No sooner had I opened my trunk than another administrator with a heart larger than an elephant in Kansas stopped to help.  Only two minutes later, a Trinity dad drove by.  “Can I help?”  I had to admit, “Yes, please!”  And he immediately began to get the spare out and replaced it.  He had to get down and dirty to get it fixed, but he (and his Trinity daughter) had a holiday spirit bigger than a thousand-acre farm in Kansas.

I thanked everyone and headout out — and in less than five minutes my spare was flatter than a cold pancake on the hot wheat fields of Kansas.  The ka-lump-ka-lump was painful to hear.  I pulled off Northside Parkway and called AAA.  As soon as I hung up – another Trinity family stopped.  The mom called her service, loaned me her cell phone (mine was running out of juice), and did all kinds of things to help as her kids waited with immense patience.

Then, yet another Trinity mom and her daughter came and waited.  Then, my wife and three kids came by.  One family left and another came.  Then a Trinity dad pulled up and offered to help.  By then, even though an hour and a half had gone by — I had had more helpful and charming visitors than many people have in a year in Kansas.

Finally I got a new tire on the car, and pulled back into the Friday afternoon traffic.  It was getting dark, I was chilly, and I never got to Barnes and Noble.  But what I did get to was yet another tremendous realization about the warmth and care of this school community!!  I also know that all that holiday mood of helpfulness wasn’t just because of the holidays, or because of my role at the school.  It’s because our school is filled with hundreds of loving and caring and helpful people — parents, kids, teachers, administrators, trustees, grandparents, alums, and now, the guy from the road-side service.

As the holiday mood grows in my own spirit, I rest assured that the spirit every day is powerful for the people at Trinity.  And now that I have air in my tires, a song in my heart, and a holiday mood taller than the silos that hold all the wheat from the wheat fields in Kansas, I can concentrate on the next big thing I have to do: Find just that right Christmas present for Socks and Lucky!

CatsGiving is a holiday that I have been considering — it’s a time during which we would give thanks for our feline friends.  After all, cats are man’s best friend — I know that you probably think that it is the dog that is man’s best friend.  And I certainly respect that point of view.  But because I am a cat person, I think it is appropriate to start a new holiday with an animal I am most familiar with.  Besides, DogsGiving just sounds peculiar, doesn’t it??

I have yet to google CatsGiving, though I would imagine there are hundreds of thousands of websites dedicated to this.  Or maybe at least one.  CatsGiving would start with thawing a gigantic mouse for dinner, preparing mouse dressing, and ending with — of course! — mousekin pie.

Can you think of a bigger and more fitting feast?

Cats certainly work hard for us during the rest of the year — sunbathing on the carpet, taking paw baths every day, and scratching the furniture when we’re not in the house.  So shouldn’t we celebrate them at least once a year!?

I agree.  So, if you are interested in contributing to this new holiday, send one million dollars and a picture of your cat to me.  If you don’t have a picture, just send the one million dollars.  It would make a nice start toward my research on this holiday that I plan to undertake in Italy, France, Germany, Spain, England, Wales, Scotland……never mind.  Just pass the leftover cranberry sauce and forget everything I’ve said here….

 Happy ThanksGiving!!!

I can’t tell for sure, but it seems like my two cats are completely unaware that Thanksgiving is upon us.  With stores full of turkeys, shops full of cards, and pies full of pumpkin — you’d think Socks and Lucky would have a clue!

But then I think: Maybe it’s best they remain unaware of human holidays.  I’m sure my cats are grateful — for food, water, a clean place to live, frequent strokes, and the ability to curl up on a person who’s reading and fall asleep.

As I think about my cats, and wonder if they plan to use any of the holiday blogging their friends around the globe, it’s much better that I give thanks for them: their purring, that quiet cat demeanor, and how they really do expect almost nothing from me but a little good will, regular petting, and not dropping a book on their heads by accident.

So this Thanksgiving, instead of expecting my cats to blog me a big fat thank you —– I think I’ll just give silent thanks for all I have: friendship, great family, enough to eat, great people at work, and so many things I know are so important that even if I were a cat, I couldn’t purr long enough or loud enough about them!

Over the weekend, my cat Socks was twitching in front of the refrigerator.  I recognized the feline focus, and heard that gutteral uck-uck-uck cats display when stalking a prey. 

A mouse.  That’s what it had to be.  I had been working on my tablet pc when all this occurred, and returned to typing when a loud screech emanated from the kitchen.  I rushed back in, just as I saw Socks tossing a small gray mouse up in the air with great vigor and relish (actually, not like pickle relish, but relish like great enjoyment).

“Socks!” I cried with chagrin.  “Let that mousie go!”  Because I so startled my cat, she ran out of the room like a hockey player chasing a puck.

The mouse was just ready to hustle back under the refrigerator when I said, “Hey, wait, stop!  I have a question.”

Believe it or not, the mouse stopped.  Normally, most mice do not respond to human requests, unless a significant amount of cheese is involved.

“Yeah, mister, what is it?!” the ungrateful little rodent uttered.

“I just want to know, ungrateful little rodent — do mice regularly blog?”

“Do they what?” the thing said, with a look of bland curiosity on his ugly whiskered face.

“Blog, blog, blog,” I repeated.

“You sound sick, mister, your stomach hurt?” the mouse quipped.

“No, a blog is an Internet thing.  You’d love it!  There’s all kind of information on the Internet.  And if you blogged, you could engage other mice of your specious and genus in intense dialogue about how to stay away from cats,” I said helpfully.

“Blogging, huh?  Well, how do I start, because I like this idea of creating a community of like rodents who establish patterns of complex escape from the felines that pursue us with a vengeance normally reserved for old Westerns.”

“I’m glad you’re willing to give it a try.  I’ll talk to Willy about it tomorrow,” I responded.

“Thanks, mister.  But now I have to go — I smell your cat creeping back into the kitchen like a tunafish trying to crawl back into the can.”

 I didn’t get that part, but I could tell he was grateful.  Later, I saw a new blog as I was playing around on my tablet.  The name of it?  “How a Mouse Can Stay in the House But Keep the Cat on a Mat Near a Hat”  It wasn’t poetry.  But it must be working for him.

Earlier I wrote a few words about my cats, and their difficulty when it comes to their use of technology.  When I read them my blog post the other day, they appeared to register a lot of silent feline frustration.  Instead of curling in my lap and purring, for example, one bit my toe while the other one made “bunny ears” behind my head when I wasn’t looking.

Now, when I am confronted with this kind of silent anger, I feel it’s time to engage in a mature and adult dialogue.  So, we talked, my two cats and I.  Following are the results of that conversation, transcribed as best as I could manage it:

First, they objected to my posting a blog without first consulting with them.  I had to concede that one to them.

Second, Socks, our female, communicated that throughout history, even since ancient Egyptian times when cats were revered, felines have never followed techie trends.  I argued in reply that we don’t know that — but then, they are the cats, not me.  So I had to give them that one, too.

Third, and final: we talked for several hours about whether cats should even be expected to be engaged in the same endeavors that humans are.  It was a key question, because my cats are treated a little like people in our household — so shouldn’t they be expected to hold up their end of the tech/blog bargain??  They responded — yeah, so make me!

 At that point, I felt it was break time.  So, the three of us had a bowl of milk, a couple of mousie treats, and we agreed to meet again in the near future for further discussion.  I’m pretty sure one of them whispered on the way out the door, “Like, he thinks we’re going to reply to his email?!?”

I have begun Don  Tapscott’s book “Wikinomics,” and as I wander through his many global perspectives, I wonder if I’m already so far behind that I’ll never get ahead — or if I’m so far ahead that I’m already way behind.

Make sense?

I didn’t think so.  I’m sure I’m not the first to wonder about comparisons to Alice through the Looking Glass, Alice in Wonderland —- well, Alice is now in Wiki-Land, and along with the Red Queen there, she is running as fast as she can, just to keep up with what is rapidly disappearing behind her….

The answer?

We have to keep our feet on the ground, keep our ear to the world, keep our eyes focused, be open to change but value the core values.  While wikis are changing the way we think, we still have to keep asking big human questions: why we do what we do, and how we can make humanity better as a result of our technology.  SKennedy