An Athlete’s Father
December 16, 2014
My father died two years ago today. His life was filled with extraordinary success as an athlete and coach and was complimented with countless accolades as an administrator. But what he was best at was being a father.
He was especially adept – instinctively, not by any book of instruction – at being an athlete’s father.
The only unsolicited advice I can ever remember him offering me was to “stay tense through the whistle” on the football field, believing a player was most at risk of injury when letting down in anticipation that the play was ending.
Dad never critiqued my play or criticized the coach’s play-calling. If there was ever a parent who had earned the privilege of hovering, it was he; but he never did.
Dad understood that most people need praise more than a push, and approval more than advice. As an athlete’s father, he was perfect.
Tools of Thought
July 13, 2018
(This blog first appeared on MHSAA.com on May 11, 2012.)
I am famous at home and office for my lack of keyboarding skills. The only “C” grade I received in high school was a summer school course in what was then called “typing.” At Dartmouth I paid a woman who worked at the dining hall to type my college papers. In an early job at the University of Wisconsin I typed the play-by-play of Badger football and basketball games with a clumsy “hunt-and-peck” approach.
Today, with the same lack of style, I pound out dozens of emails daily, hammering the keys like my first manual typewriter required four decades ago.
But for any document of great length or importance, I do as I’ve always done: take up pencil (my software) and legal pad (my hardware). There is no question that, for me, the nature of the equipment I’m using for writing affects the nature of the thinking.
With his eyesight failing late in his life, Freidrich Nietzsche bought his first typewriter, changing from pen and paper to the new technology of the 1800s. According to a 2008 article in Atlantic Monthly by Nichols Carr, a friend wrote to Nietzsche in a letter that, since adapting to the telegraphic style, Nietzsche’s terse prose had become even tighter. To which Nietzsche replied: “You are right, our writing equipment takes part in the forming of our thoughts.”
Which makes one wonder where all today’s tweeting and texting may take us.