What I've Learned So Far...: September 2009

New Perils of Technology

Brenna & Mike What I've Learned So Far...

I received a pretty unique voice mail the other day. According to the caller ID it was from a friend who likes to talk almost as much as I do, so I was not all that surprised to see that her message was more than fifteen minutes long.

As I listened to it, though, I was kind of puzzled. She did not speak, but I could hear faint sounds of shuffling silverware and stacking dishes. I could hear my friend's voice, ghostly and distant, singing in the background. After a few minutes of this I heard keys jangling, a car door slamming, and then a radio playing - with more of that weird, haunting, far-away singing.

I mean "weird" in the best possible way, Leah. Really I do.

Read On...

If you enjoy What I've Learned So Far... and would like to see it in your local paper, just send the editor an impassioned plea and this link to my Web site.

Also, chase all your friends on over to my Web site to sign up, so they can enjoy it too! They'll thank you, and so will I.

- mike

Mike Ball

Author of What I've Learned So Far...
Winner of the 2003 Erma Bombeck Award

Web: whativelearnedsofar.com
E-mail: mike@whativelearnedsofar.com

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A Few Words about Ernie Harwell

Brenna & Mike What I've Learned So Far...

Ernie

I moved to Southeast Michigan on a blind date in the Spring of 1975. When I arrived I was a White Sox fan, mostly because I had spent my formative high school years within easy obscenity-shouting distance of Chicago. Back in those days, probably the best thing about our pathetic Sox was a broadcaster named Harry Caray, who was known for saying "Holy Cow!" Harry used this as a fairly transparent substitute for shouting obscenities.

As that first summer unfolded, two amazing things happened more or less reshaped my life. First, Nan and I decided that the blind date was going well enough to get married, which is bound to make a summer stick in your mind, just about any way you cut it.

Second, I discovered the Detroit Tigers and a baseball play-by-play man named Ernie Harwell.

Read On...

If you enjoy What I've Learned So Far... and would like to see it in your local paper, just send the editor an impassioned plea and this link to my syndicate, North Star Writers Group.

Also, chase all your friends on over to my Web site to sign up, so they can enjoy it too! They'll thank you, and so will I.

- mike

Mike Ball

Author of What I've Learned So Far...
Winner of the 2003 Erma Bombeck Award

Web: whativelearnedsofar.com
E-mail: mike@whativelearnedsofar.com

You may automatically unsubscribe from this list at any time by visiting the following URL:

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Starting Out

Brenna & Mike What I've Learned So Far...

Starting Out

My son is going to get married in a little less than a month. For Nan and I this is the coolest thing ever, since we are crazy about his fiance, her parents, her brother, her friends - and her taste in guys. As the weeks go by, all the wedding plans are proceeding more or less normally for the kids, with nervousness over all the details spiraling steadily up past anxiety and into flat-out hysteria.

All this elaborate wedding plan stuff is a little bit foreign to Nan and me. Thirty-four years ago when we got married, we had a quick service in a tiny stone church (she wore a peasant dress, and I splurged for a sport coat) followed by a really fun potluck at a friend's house. With a pool.

Yes, the groom did go swimming with all the other kids.

Read On...

If you enjoy What I've Learned So Far... and would like to see it in your local paper, just send the editor an impassioned plea and this link to my syndicate, North Star Writers Group.

Also, chase all your friends on over to my Web site to sign up, so they can enjoy it too! They'll thank you, and so will I.

- mike

Mike Ball

Author of What I've Learned So Far...
Winner of the 2003 Erma Bombeck Award

Web: whativelearnedsofar.com
E-mail: mike@whativelearnedsofar.com

You may automatically unsubscribe from this list at any time by visiting the following URL:

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Learnedsofar Eddie's Choice

Brenna & Mike What I've Learned So Far...

Eddie's Choice

"So what's on your minds, guys?" It was a really open-ended question to ask a group of incarcerated teenage boys, and the range of answers I got pretty much lived up to my expectations;

"Eatin' Pizza;" "Girls;" "Eatin' Pizza with girls!" There were a few other topics that I am probably better off leaving to your imagination.

Josh White, Jr. and I were working our way through the first session of a new idea we were developing, helping severely troubled young people explore some of their deepest feelings by writing and performing folk and blues songs. At the time we were calling the program "Project Roots," referring to the fact that traditional folk and blues, or "roots music," forms the foundation on which all other American music is built.

On that day we were not really sure where to start, because nobody else had ever tried to do exactly what we were doing. I had been running creative writing workshops at this facility for nearly two years and some of these boys had been in at least one of my groups. They all knew me. This was a big advantage, since I had already had a chance to earn their trust - and trust is something that never comes easy for these kids.

Read On...

If you enjoy What I've Learned So Far... and would like to see it in your local paper, just send the editor an impassioned plea and this link to my syndicate, North Star Writers Group.

Also, chase all your friends on over to my Web site to sign up, so they can enjoy it too! They'll thank you, and so will I.

- mike

Mike Ball

Author of What I've Learned So Far...
Winner of the 2003 Erma Bombeck Award

Web: whativelearnedsofar.com
E-mail: mike@whativelearnedsofar.com

You may automatically unsubscribe from this list at any time by visiting the following URL:

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Learnedsofar A Bad Seed?

Brenna & Mike What I've Learned So Far...

A Bad Seed?

Who'd have thought good crops
Could come from a bad seed?

It was a pretty good line in a really good poem, entitled "Look At Me," by a seventeen year old African-American poet named Donald. This young man was theoretically every bit as dangerous as he was gifted; he was incarcerated in the WJ Maxey Boys Training School as a violent offender.

I was working with Donald on a documentary called "Young Poet Incarcerated," helping him polish some of his work and rehearse it before we rolled the camera. We had been given some money by the National Endowment for the Arts through the Michigan Humanities Council and the Michigan Council for Arts and Cultural Affairs to cover some of the costs of making our movie.

The idea of the film was to let Donald use his poetry to give the world a glimpse into how a kid gets himself locked up before he's old enough to vote.

Read On...

If you enjoy What I've Learned So Far... and would like to see it in your local paper, just send the editor an impassioned plea and this link to my syndicate, North Star Writers Group.

Also, chase all your friends on over to my Web site to sign up, so they can enjoy it too! They'll thank you, and so will I.

- mike

Mike Ball

Author of What I've Learned So Far...
Winner of the 2003 Erma Bombeck Award

Web: whativelearnedsofar.com
E-mail: mike@whativelearnedsofar.com