Monthly Archives: October 2015

Like a Champion

KC Royals Win the Pennant
KC Royals Win the Pennant

In 1985, I missed the magical baseball season of the Kansas City Royals. I entered the US Navy in June of that year, graduating recruit training in September. There was no television watching in boot camp, even if your baseball team was heading for the World Series. By the time October rolled around, I was still getting my bearings as a new USN sailor in training. I didn’t watch a game that year.

It’s not like we watched a lot of baseball on television growing up anyway. I mostly enjoyed listening secretly to Royals games on my transistor radio after bedtime. I remember having a Royals poster on my wall, way back in the earlier days of the franchise. It had players like Cookie Rojas, Darrell Porter and of course George Brett.

For much of my life, I haven’t really followed Major League Baseball. But several years ago, probably because of a lack of anything good on TV to watch, my wife Wendy got us started watching the Royals games. Not too long after we began following the team, they acquired a pair of rookies called Eric Hosmer and Mike Moustakas. You could tell by watching those two that this team was going to be something special.

Every year they played, they got better and the team got better. Last year they came close, oh so close, losing in the final game of the World Series to the San Francisco Giants. After an incredible season, the Royals will get another chance in the World Series this year. The thing that is most admirable about this team is that they never give up.

I think persistence is a character trait that is becoming less common. We live in a world of instant, easy access. At the click of a button, we can download digital items instantly. Even physical things can be delivered to our door overnight. Sometimes it seems as though we have lost our willingness to delay gratification and to stick to our goals for the long haul.

I know many times my students are inclined to give up when things get too tough. While it is always a temptation, it giving up isn’t how you accomplish great things. Most of the time, anything worth doing is going to take some time and some persistence. That’s why seeing the KC Royals returning to the World Series for the second year running is such a cool thing. It is like they have unfinished business to attend to from coming up short last year. Time will tell if they will be successful, or if they will have to keep on working.

Seeing those young men celebrate their victory last night after working so hard for so long reminded me of my own recent personal victory that I will share with you in another post. But I do wonder how often do we, as parents or teachers of young people, intentionally create achievable situations that can’t be finished without great effort and persistence for our kids?

I have a number of assignments that I give in classes that I teach that can’t be successfully completed in one sitting, such as a video term paper research project or even the pumpkin carving project we will be finishing up next week. These assignments have mile-marker achievements built in, so the students can know they are on track towards finishing a big project that they can look back on with satisfaction knowing they worked hard on something worthwhile.

Persistence is a good thing. It is a required ingredient of being successful. So what are we doing to encourage persistence for our youth in a world that tells us we shouldn’t ever have to wait or endure any obstacles to achieve our dreams?

Woman Without a Phone

This image from the Boston Globe is going viral because one woman in a crowd of onlookers is the only one actually watching and not recording the event.

Grandma No Phone
JOHN BLANDING/GLOBE STAFF

I do this all of the time. Sometimes I regret not having a picture because I only watched. But there are many more times that I did record an event with video or photographs that I don’t even recollect experiencing. I was recording, but I wasn’t there. This woman was there. And now I am there as well, when I choose to be.

This past weekend was a perfect example. I brought a camera along to Emily’s softball tournament. I took some (quite a few, actually) photos. But most of the time, I was watching the game, and not having a care in the world about whether or not I captured a perfect photo.  Because they played multiple games, I was able to both enjoy taking photographs, but also spend most of the time watching my daughter play ball. It was magnificent.

Be intentional people, not mindless in your use of technology. It is a better way to live.

PS – Here are some softball pics. Her team got 3rd place.

softball