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Monday Nov. 9, 2015

Reaching out, connecting-frenzied lives, ever faster across street connections, or around the world, so simple, so quick, without hesitation we click effectively or mess up completely.

Confuses. Amuses. Or loses any resemblance to good communication, good relations or good feelings …

When we are witnesses we smugly sit back – privy to that calamity, in our safety and comfort of it not happened to us. This time. We’ve known that awkward feeling, in the middle of that. Cannot expect it won’t happen again. Only, that it will happen.

Reminiscent of passing notes in class, chances good something will go off-track. But we aren’t twelve, and it ain’t funny …

We’ve all (haven’t we?) incurred wrath. Somebody – without regard to whether they got the right message rightly or wrongly, it simply hit them the wrong way …

Or, had intentions otherwise – regardless underlying motivation – what seemed innocent enough, before everything unraveled because of one word left out, or in, message truncated or someone cc’d in that loop who, if left out, would never have known error, slight or insult.

I have my own stories on this – but I recently got to witness someone else’s mini-drama. When connection is unwanted, uninvited, unexpected are we unwilling, uncooperative and unhappy? Not necessarily. Why is it some people are prickly? Maybe they aren’t and their reaching out to us wasn’t intended to be prickly, but we gave them a prickly response?

When we get included in their ‘cc loop’ when someone replies ‘to all’, we become hitchhikers on their story, clingers-on to their string of intended unintended consequences – rather miscommunication. Funny to watch sometimes, excruciating, every time.


Mark Kolke

written / published from Calgary, AB

morning walk:  -1C/31F, blanket of snow to test Calgary drivers to see if they remember how to negotiate on slick sticky wet snow that polishes to ice so quickly (it’s a yay-day for autobody shop owners), Gusta loves it! … it’s that sticky-snowball-makin’ lovely snow – a bit of a trudge, but the fresh damp air is fantastic.

Reader feedback:

PERFECTION QUEST

Is there actually such a thing as perfect???, JLB, Canmore, AB



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