Time to make my yearly post. I see that my last blog was about proofreading the Master Gardener Manual. Hmmm. I could put that down again except for the part about the Jerusalem cricket.

So, I just finished proofreading the abovenamed manual again, THIS year, so that we could incorporate the many changes that were needed (or desired). Yes, I've become way too attached to this book. It's consumed much of my working and non-working time over the past two years. But, unlike the last two years, the book was actually printed before the class began. Only an hour and half, but still that's BEFORE. Only one chapter had to wait. That's 360 pages of gardening fun, charts, information, history, instruction, review questions, etc.

On the first day of class the books were handed out with the caveat that if there were mistakes in it, we would surely want to know. This is not a good way to introduce a manual. Now everyone looks for errors instead of learning the material. We made it through Chapter 1 with no complaints, but with Chapter 2 we were off and running. What I wanted to hear was, "Wow, you did a great job on the new manual," but what I got was "There are so many errors in this chapter, starting with . . ."and then they were enumerated and shown to me with varying degrees of how awful they were.

Our new intern who has a Master's in biology has been really helpful in pointing everything out. Not just to me, which although it stung, was ok, because eventually I will be able to do something about it. (Like next summer when we revise this manual again for the new class). Unfortunately, she likes to tell everyone she meets about how terrible the manual is -- the guest instructors, the helpers she is training for the office, all the folks in the office both here and at Thanksgiving Point and the 85 people who take the class. She has announced that when things get quieter in the office, like during November and December, she is going to go through the whole thing and rewrite it. (I hope she talks to the original authors about this. . . I also hope that I will not be the one who has to "fix"everything.)This means that for the next two months I will get to hear complaints about the awful manual at least twice a week, if not every day.

Here's what I'm learning from this experience. I hope to be less critical of others. Being on the receiving end of these comments and hearing them made to others has helped me to realize how much it hurts. It doesn't help me to do better; it just makes me discouraged and mad. I am learning that (as Lisa often says) that we're all doing the best that we can. And I am hoping that this old dog can learn some new tricks, like being kinder and more supportive of people's efforts and less critical when things are less than perfect.