Rain, Sleet, Shine or Power Outage

Today's meaningless fact: E-mail is a real path to friendship with me.

The reason it's a meaningless fact is that there's no worldly importance to the word "e-mail" in there, it's just a harmless personal reality. For others, and very appropriately so, it could have been "conversation," or "birthday cards," or "broccoli." And "conversation" would suit me too. On the other hand, if it were "broccoli," then you'd have to substitute "path" with "death."

My first e-mail was in 1994, the year I graduated college and was given access at my job. I met Dena in 1995. The first computer I owned was in 1998, the summer after we got married. This is all to say that Dena and I never once exchanged an e-mail until we'd been wed, which is why I consider myself jaw-droppingly lucky that she is a perfect e-fit for me. Her writing is intelligent, spunky, witty, caring and sensitive all at once. And she responds FAST. This deserves its own paragraph.

(Side note: While some of our funniest e-mails have happened while sitting ten feet apart, we mostly exchange between work and home. Like I said, conversation's a darn good path too!)

(Side note to side note: For anyone from work who reads that side note, I hereby certify according to our Code of Conduct that my use of company assets is primarily for business purposes. By a long, long, long way!)

Volunteer organizations are littered with unresponsive e-mailers. And why not? Writing lags face-to-face as an effective communication form. It's slower (one-on-one, anyway), tougher to convey tone, tougher to convey meaning. It involves grammar and punctuation (at least, in theory). And yet, failure to reply to e-mail is a life-sucker for these relationships. If you're standing in an elevator with someone and dish out a cheerful hello, and nothing is said... then the person might be unfriendly. Or deaf. I can't always know for sure, so it's not fair to judge well or harshly. But either way, after a while you just accept it as a sign that it's time to disengage and move on to something healthier.

This morning I sent an e-mail to my duet (and retired) partner Evelyn at 12:18. She replied at 12:30. Coach Goldman is cut from the same cloth. So is Dona, so is Tyson. And Jan, the secretary of our association board. And as the gene pool would suggest, Mom and Jack. And my fellow thespian Darren Plattner. I'm more likely to be struck by lightning than to receive more than a day's worth of silence. No ambiguity here - it's clear that we matter to each other. The feedback energizes me. So that's where I spend my time. There's just not much value in watering concrete.

Since you didn't ask, here's a bonus:

- Answer every question asked. What could be merrier than waiting a week to get a response, which answers only two of the three questions, thereby ushering in another week of waiting? It's like realizing you're on the wrong expressway an instant after passing an exit ramp, and the next one's ten miles away.