On left side, note Mama's vertical play: "Hyphae"
Noticed Mama was making upgrades in her game on Words With Friends. More sophisticated plays. Big points. Bingos. Some folks might think their opponent was cheating in this case, but not me. Mama’s never cheated on anything.
She’s the one who will run back into the store if she discovers the clerk has given her a dime too much change. And even if she wanted to cheat she wouldn’t know how.
“You’re getting a lot better,” I wrote her through the chat feature, “what happened?” Shocked by her play: HYPHAE.
“I decided you were going to get bored playing with me if I didn’t get better.”
Laughed out loud at that one. She just decides to get better. And she does.
But I’ve been playing better too. Playing more with Trissie and with Matt, big challenges, the both of them. Super proud of an occasional win.
Am sure the extra challenge is motivating, but also noticed a bit ago, that I’m seeing anagrams more easily. Sometimes they just jump out at me, like magic. First couple times it happened it was like when I first understood German…whoa, what is happening here? And then I relaxed a bit and it seemed natural and easier.
And then I remembered Malcolm Gladwell. He writes in Outliers, about the idea that it takes 10,000 hours to get really good at something. People talk about ambition and effort, but in many things there’s huge benefits in just putting in the time. Making that connection gave me huge pause.
Could I possibly have spent 10,000 hours playing Words With Friends?
Could Mama?
and how bout Tai Chi fluency. Only 997 hours to go and there I’ll be moving like an elegant Chinese elder under a tree. Gladly that isn’t the goal. Doing it is. Better practice.