{"id":532,"date":"2019-09-01T14:15:45","date_gmt":"2019-09-01T19:15:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/?p=532"},"modified":"2020-06-26T10:40:59","modified_gmt":"2020-06-26T15:40:59","slug":"being-open-to-stories","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/?p=532","title":{"rendered":"Being Open to Stories"},"content":{"rendered":"

I love stories. Humans of New York<\/a> is one of my favorite sites. Maria Papova\u2019s Brain Pickings<\/a> is a tribute to longer form nonfiction \u201cstorytelling\u201d and is one of my weekly reads on Sundays. Storytelling, whether fiction or nonfiction, \u00a0is a wonderful way to think on the page and then decide whether we want to share beyond our personal journals. I keep a small journal in my purse and a larger version at home where it moves with me from office, to kitchen table, to bedroom. I don\u2019t write in them every day \u2014 but when I do, it\u2019s to capture an idea that I might act on later, to create a remembrance of an event, to write a quote from a book or article… random, for sure. What I have learned, is that when I am on vacation \u2014 taking a break from the routine of work, taking a walk, or wondering in a book store, or enjoying the luxury of an artist\u2019s date<\/a>\u00a0\u2014 I am open to hearing stories, writing them down, and sometimes sharing them.<\/p>\n

Today was one of those days when I heard a story that is worth sharing. We are staying at the Saranac Hotel<\/a> and I headed down early to get a cup of the complimentary coffee. I was joined at the urns by a gentlemen \u2014 a simple smile opened the door to a conversation. Randy Agnes opened a winery on Keuka Lake four years ago. He is self-taught and has achieved some notable success in producing wines that are getting press and gaining traction in upstate New York. Steve, my husband, and I make a trip to the Keuka Lake area wineries every year \u2014 Bully Hill, Pleasant Valley … I told my new acquaintance that we would make it a point to visit him next year \u2014- Agnes\u2019 Wine Cellars <\/a><\/p>\n

But our conversation did not end there …. and now it gets even more interesting. I asked how he decided to try his hand at winemaking \u2014 the story he shared doesn\u2019t really answer the question, but it sure was a great story. He shared that he was a chemist, and his first job fresh out of college was at a company on Long Island. His new boss handed him some tiles produced by Corning that were used on the exterior of the space shuttle. The tiles were falling off the shuttle when they were subjected to high levels of heat in space. His boss asked him to review the situation and give some feedback on how the problem might be solved. This was quite a problem to drop in the lap of newly minted graduate with a BS in chemistry, but the new hire was, as often is the case when you don\u2019t know too much, undaunted and began studying the chemistry associated with those tiles. He had an idea \u2014 the makeup of the tiles were causing too many chemical reactions to occur (and I am putting this in my own words here) \u2014 he believed the problem could be addressed by simplifying the chemical makeup of the tiles. Well \u2014 he was right \u2014 and the company he was working for got a partial contract to test out the theory \u2014 which proved accurate. At the same time, they had to share the risk around the testing and use of the new formulation with companies that were better positioned to assume that \u201crisk.\u201d And so I headed back to my room with my coffee and a great story. The End.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I love stories. Humans of New York is one of my favorite sites. Maria Papova\u2019s Brain Pickings is a tribute to longer form nonfiction \u201cstorytelling\u201d and is one of my weekly reads on Sundays. Storytelling, whether fiction or nonfiction, \u00a0is a wonderful way to think on the page and thenRead More →<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["entry","author-sachauncey","post-532","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=532"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":582,"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/532\/revisions\/582"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=532"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=532"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.informationconnections.com\/wordpress\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=532"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}