H: Harvey Honsinger: 1934-2012

A cowboy is man with guts and a horse. -- will james.

  The first time I met Harvey Honsinger was in a writing workshop.  I'd submitted a murder mystery for critique.  After lengthy discussion with Harvey regarding guns the killer decided he'd use a knife instead. Harvey didn't ever let you slide on details, especially when it came to firearms.
 "What happened? Nobody died." Any time I'd submit a story that didn't involve murder and mayhem--which wasn't often--Harvey would have that at the top of the page. To me it said he really read my work and considered his comments.
When trying to think of an H word to use for professionalism, Harvey kept coming  to mind.  I thought I would blog about him and he'd read it and get a good laugh.  But, three days before the challenge started Harvey passed away from cancer. So this post becomes as much of a tribute as a part of the challenge. 
When you talked to Harvey you could tell he enjoyed everything he'd done in life. He had a particular fondness for justice and fair play.  Maybe this was why he liked westerns.  Or maybe his love for the West, especially his home in Texas, gave him those ideals.  He applied them to everything he did, including work and writing.

Speak your mind, but ride a fast horse. --Cowboy saying.

Harvey made the Old West come alive with interesting characters in difficult situations. For over twenty years he wrote, always sending out his manuscripts and consistently being denied.  So, he finally took matters in his own hands and self-published. In 2011 Firehair became available on amazon.com.
Harvey reminds me that you can't lose your sense of fair play--in work, in writing, in life. When he critiqued stories, no matter how bad the writing, he always found something positive.  And it was always about the work, not the author. 
He also reminds me not to be discouraged in my writing.  It took him years to get his book published.  In the mean time he was doing other things:  law enforcement, the media, publishing articles and short stories.  He didn't stop living and he didn't take no as the answer.

Never miss a good chance to shut up.

Another H word for Harvey is Hope.  Never give up on the things you're most passionate about.
In workshops and in the Bayou Writer's Group Harvey will be missed.  He was a true cowboy in every sense of the word.

If you get to thinking you’re a person of some influence, try ordering somebody else’s dog around.

Firehair can be found at www.amazon.com

G: Gamble--go for the nuggets

Wahoo, we talked about fun, now we’re going to gamble.  Where I live we have two casinos within 10 minutes…

No, no, no…not gambling money.  Taking a chance.  In a way, though, it is gambling money—if it works, profits go up.  If it doesn’t you’ve lost time and productivity, which is translates to money.  This in addition to whatever monetary investment was made.

                Wow, sounds scary!  Why should I gamble at work?

                Think about chicken nuggets.  I’ve said before that I wish I’d invented chicken nuggets.  Someone took a chance on mashing parts of a bird (sometimes what bird is up for question) together and called them edible.  Look where it got him.

           In writing we take chances.  Just doing this AtoZ challenge is a risk.  What if nobody reads your posts?  What if they're no good?  If we listen to all the what ifs we won't finish...or even start to begin with.  But, think of everything we gain when we take the chance on putting our writing out there. Even rejections are a good experience. 

In health care chances are taken all the time.  It’s how new discoveries are made.  But it isn’t like a crap shoot in Vegas.  It’s calculated, based on ideas, research, and planning.  It starts with knowledge and then thinks how can this be improved? Without taking chances in medicine penicillin would still be mold on bread.  Dr. Michael DeBakey pioneered heart surgeries we take for granted now, one of which saved his own life.  Taking chances are risky, but in health care they not only improve quality, but also save lives.
Creativity says “what if we did it this way?”  Taking a gamble says “let’s try it.” What's the worst that can happen?  You fail?  In those cases you go back and try again.

                          If you stay with status quo, you’re assured of the outcome.  Color inside the lines you get a lovely picture, but one that looks like all the rest.  Take a chance, and you might have the next penicillin or chicken nuggets.
  
Success is not final.  Failure is not fatal.  It is the courage to continue that counts.
                Winston Churchill

For more on Chicken Nuggets check here: http://cornellsun.com/node/44152
For more on Penicillin check here: http://www.history.com/topics/penicillin
For more on Michael DeBakey check here: http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,381245,00.html

               

F: Fun--the work of play

Why wait for Halloween to be Batman?

Pediatric health care can be a serious business, but kids won’t put up with that for long. They make the best patients because the work of children is play. Their job is to grow and learn how to be semi-normal  somewhat responsible adults.

How do they do it? Through interacting with their world by playing. They want the adults around them to be fun too. You can’t just look at their ears. You have to find dinosaurs or Spiderman. They’re more cooperative when you let them blow on their brother instead of just taking a deep breath. Be careful asking them to blow out birthday candles, unless you have time for the story of their birthday party at Chuck-E-Cheese.

            Now I know all this won’t necessarily translate to grown up things—I mean, who wants their gyn looking for SpongeBob, right?—but children remind us that life is fun and even work can be play. They’re resilient, not jaded by life experiences. Even those who go through the worst of times will play when given the chance.

Why spend thousands of dollars and invest a lot of time in something you won’t enjoy? Even if you did, why stay doing it if it makes you miserable? And yet we still think of work as a four letter word. When did we forget the playing part of work?  

Fun isn’t playing around all day, though. It can be overdone, especially in the practical joke realm. There are times when a more serious attitude is called for. I have to say, the best jokes at work came at the unexpected times.  

            How can you be more fun without being unprofessional?

1. Think about the jokes and make them meaningful. If a co-worker has to come in everyday and fix their desk then it stops being funny.

2. Post funny cartoons.

3. Send random notes or cards to people, especially those that fit a situation at work. Send them anonymously and let them figure out who it came from.

4. Laugh when things are funny, especially if it happens to you. Weird stuff happens.

5.  Have an Easter egg hunt--our office has enjoyed it this week!

The number one thing you can do to have fun at work is be passionate about what you do. You won’t always like it and sometimes work is hard, but if you believe in it, you’ll enjoy what you do. On most days, you’ll have fun doing it.

What do you do to have fun at work?