The Absent Uncle: Errors

By: 
D.C. Schultz, guest columnist

I love errors. They make us human They make us humble and imperfect. And not a one of us is perfect.  

To put it in perspective; the errors I am talking about don’t hurt people, don’t cost anything but a bit of pride, and certainly the type that “just happen”. Innocent.

Just think; if we never made an error, or misspoke, or forgot an important event or date. We would have to be perfect. Way too much pressure. 

I so much enjoyed an error that I saw a week or so ago. The perpetrator of the error was innocent. Just trusting an app to do an edit that really didn’t understand the sentences or get the true meaning of what has been written. And then the error, and then didn’t do the final eyeball check. 

And that comes back to writing, rewriting, and slaving over the written word. You have to have time, the care to make sure what has been written is what you are actually expressing. And sometimes the avoidable oops just slips out.

So, let’s go back to errors. It happens. Remember, a .300 hitter in baseball is an all-star and that signifies being successful only 3 of 10 times at bat. And if a fielder misses a play that the official scorer judges should have been made, they are credited with an error, but not the end of their career or even completion of the game. And we expect more?   

So, we forgive baseball players, athletes, and other public figures but not our peers? C’mon. Errors are sometimes the result of real people doing things; doing things we don’t do (or even try to do!)   

A friend of mine suggested ending this article with the statement that doing nothing is the only way to be error-free.

Doing things can result in an error. It’s only human.

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