August 28th is World Sauntering Day.  Webster’s English Dictionary labels a saunter as “a leisurely stroll, or walk.”  To me, with up to five children regularly in tow, the ability to saunter is a certain measure of discovered control in an otherwise action-filled life.  When (and if) I can simply walk in a wayward manner, without a care as to where I’m going or why, that day truly deserves holiday status.

It is a rare day when, out in public, I am not chasing our 6 year old, or answering questions from our 12 year old girls, or 14-year-old Autistic son. Or discussing the finer details of living with our oldest daughter, who is 21 and has Asperger’s Syndrome.  Oh, to enjoy a simple sauntering, having no reason for where I’m heading, or no hurry with regard to the pace.  To not have to cry out the name of one progeny or another, no bidding to even utter a consonant to another human being.  To simply turn my gaze to the clouds, to the store fronts, to the very sidewalk itself…

World Sauntering Day was founded in 1979 by William T. Rabe of Mackinac Island, Detroit, one of many publicity stunts Mr. Rabe created as Public Relations Director for the Grand Hotel.  Mr. Rabe wanted people to spend more time enjoying downtown Detroit, a city he was very proud of, and created the holiday as a reply to the rapidly growing health fad of jogging.

The idea of a Sauntering day took hold quickly, years later officially declared on the steps of the very hotel it was founded at. As the years progressed, other countries began to celebrate the holiday, giving Sauntering Day the additional “World” status.

Other unusual holidays promulgated by Mr. Rabe and celebrated on Mackinac Island annually are Snowman Burning Day, to celebrate the end of Winter, and Unicorn Questing Month, wherein people get together and hunt unicorns all around the island.

Sadly, William passed away on April 5, 1992.

If you find yourself out and about today,  in William Rabe’s memory, why not slow down for a bit, and simply enjoy the easy task of placing one foot in front of another?

Loneliness can be such a downer.  When introduced into a social network, loneliness has been shown to be downright contagious, according to a study done in 2009 by researchers Nicholas Christakis of Harvard University and James Fowler at the University of California, San Diego.  After reviewing data from a 60-year study of over 5,000 people in Framingham, Massachusetts, the researchers, along with psychologist John Cacioppo, found that you have a 50 percent high chance of feeling lonely if you connect with someone who is lonely.

Although the study was largely done on interpersonal networking in real life (or IRL as we online people like to refer to it,) the same rules hold true for interactions on online social networks.

As a form of social disease, researchers found that loneliness radiates outward from its emotional ground zero, to second-level relationships and beyond.  As your time with a lonely person infects you emotionally, you in turn infect others with the malaise through your words (or lack of them.)  At this second degree of separation, people around you have a 25 percent chance of feeling more lonely, and they in turn infect others at a rate of 15 percent.

With six degrees of separation to all of us, perhaps this is why we don’t see Kevin Bacon smiling as much as he ought to these days?

It wasn’t that long ago that we began to truly understand the spread of contagion, and how to stop it.  We developed vaccines (thank you Dr. Jonas Salk and many other virologists) to stave off the spread of bad bugs from person to person, and worked diligently to teach everyone about personal hygiene (thank you Sesame Street.)  Washing our hands and good bathing habits have done wonders toward keeping most of us alive for a lot longer.

But what about loneliness?  According to another study, bathing just might do the trick for that malaise, too.

Researchers at Yale University followed the daily habits of 400 individuals ages 18 – 65, and believe they’ve learned that a long, hot bath might suffice when one cannot enjoy the warmth of social acceptance.  Researches found that the lonelier those studied felt, the longer and hotter the bath needed to be to help overcome the feelings of isolation.

Does our need to feel a warmth from others derive from the time spent in the womb, nestled in and enjoying that steady heartbeat above our heads?  Nobody knows for sure, but consider the temperate language we use when discussing social interchanges with others.  We use phrases such as “cold shoulder,” “icy stare,” and “warm smile,” as pointed out in the study, without really considering the link between our daily social intimacies and our inner emotional climates.

July 11th is Cheer Up The Lonely Day, a day set aside to help out those people in our lives that have let us know, either through word or action, that they are feeling alone in the world.  Given the ability these days to spread this isolated feeling to so many others through social network sites such as Twitter, Facebook and Google+, perhaps it would be in all of our interests for you, as soon as you see Loneliness rear its ugly head, to recommend that person take a nice, hot bath.

Seriously, does Ernie look lonely?

This great article was first published as Feeling Lonely? Take A Bath! on Technorati. Feel free to go there and enjoy it again, along with other great offerings!

April 21st is National High Five Day. There are many different ways to properly deliver this most hallowed of public male demonstrations of acceptance. Let me take a bit of time to help you along with this one…

Safe, Tried and True

Standard High Five – Up high, very relaxed, as you pass each other by. Soft slaps desired.  Make it look like you don’t really care, but bring it home, Dude.

The Down Low – Below the waist line, rotating your arms in a downward arc, palms facing back. Soft slap, done while walking by each other.  Don’t hit each other in the butt, or the world will end.  It’s a fact.

Around the World – Standard high five above the head, continuing the downward arc into a down low as you continue walking by each other.  Accomplish this properly, and women will secretly want you.  Want you, I said.

For The High Five Challenged (You Know Who You Are)

Are you one of those kind of guys who simply can’t properly deliver a high five?  Few things are more embarrassing to a guy than missing a high five.  They don’t take your Man Card – they SHRED it.  You will have to build an engine from scratch to get it back.  In a dark room. With a wild, meat eating mammal. Before this happens to you, please try the High Five Etiquette website.

Only If You Are Under 10 Years of Age, or a Girl

The Blender – Spin around while giving down lows.

The Moose - high five then place hands, palms upen and facing front, behind the top of your head.

The Sea Turtle – high five then make a swimming sea turtle motion.

The Starfish – high five then squeeze their face with one hand and shout “Starfish!”  Now you understand why only children and girls can do these…

Don’t be a High Five Slut

These are the poor bastards who lack the High Five Limit Gene – they have to slap everyone, all of the time. Don’t be one. The Todd from NBC’s sitcom Scrubs demonstrates in the teaching video below…

You’ve seen them in classic movies;  ubiquitous Fedora adorning Clark Gable, casual Panama on Humphrey Bogart, happy-go-lucky Homburg atop the Godfather, high-class derby on Fred Astaire, or classy Borsalino on anyone starring with Lauren Bacall.

Indiana Jones donned a beat-up felt hat for each and every one of his adventures. In the 1940s to be seen outside without a hat was considered in poor taste, even a sign of loose morals.  The felt hat was more than a covering – it said a great number of things about you in those days…

History of Felt Hats

Hat making processes

Felt is considered to be one of the oldest textile materials, used for centuries in all manner of clothing items, and of course hats.  There are three basic types of felt used to make modern day hats – wool, fur (largely rabbit) and beaver.  Beaver was used to make hats as early as the 14^th Century, largely in Holland and Spain. Russia introduced beaver pelt as a trimming for coats, then sent the excess to Holland for use in felt-making.

In the mid-17^th Century North America began exporting animal skins to Holland for use in the felting process. The United States began to manufacture hats soon thereafter, only to have their exports banned by England in 1731 in an effort to control the industry, one of the many financial extremes leading to the American Revolution.

As with all industry, in the late 19^th Century small-time experienced hat makers were replaced by larger hat-making factories. Steam power and the ability to combine the felt-making and subsequent hat-making processes together contributed to this turnover. The felt hat became prominent in the wardrobe of Western nations, creating a sea of floating felt on every major city street.

Manufacture of Felt Hats

Too much time making his hat?

Beaver felt hats are produced by removing the coarser hairs from the beaver pelt and then brushing the remaining pelt with a hot mercury-based solution. The shorter, finer hairs then locked themselves together under the eye of the professional felter, in a process known as “carotting.”

During the 1920s through 1940s many poorly-ventilated factories led to the airborne mercury fumes causing brain damage slowly over time. Have you ever heard the term “mad as a hatter?”

The finely matted-together hairs are then cut from the pelt, and placed on a special bench called a “hurdle.” A large bow is suspended over the fibers, and vibrated by a craftsman. This unique musical spectacle evenly distributes the fibers into a loose mat, called a “batt.” The batts are then layered together and shaped into a cone, then boiled and rolled to create a dense felt material.  The hatter then shapes the felt as desired, by ironing flat or shaping on a wood block.

Rabbit fur felt hats are produced in a similar fashion, but with a bit of a vacuum created under the fine, soft fur fibers to help matt them together.

The wood of the American poplar tree is typically used as a hood shaping block by the hatter, as the wood has no grain on it, so no grain shows up in the shaping process. The flange or brim is shaped by being soaked, ironed flat, then cut to the correct shape, dried and pressed.

Shellac is typically applied to the brim, and the hood of wool felt hats. The assembled hats are sanded quite a bit, to smooth out the texture. Hats are then trimmed with inner and outer bands and silk linings.

Whatever happened to hats?

In the past few years, the felt hat has began a slow comeback into our closets; however, factories overseas have greatly increased the likelihood that any felt hat you purchase will come from an Eastern European or Chinese factory.  There just aren’t many hat-makers in the good ol’ USA anymore…

Should you choose to wear a hat, the conventions our grandparents followed in wearing headgear in public (taking it off inside, tipping your hat to each other in hello, pinning smaller hats to ones hair, etc.) are typically no longer followed. Of course, that doesn’t mean you can’t follow them anyway…

The American Felt hat, although making an appearance on a street near you, is now seen more as a fashion statement these days, rather than a considered necessity.

Are you a hat person?  If so, what type of hat do you prefer?  A big one, to hide your eyes (like the model above) or something smaller and more modern?  Let me know in the comments!