Having spent many days this year out in the tracking fields with our dogs & seeing Kate & her 11 yr old Corgi Flash earn their TDX yesterday got me thinking about tracking & its parallels to DWAA.
When a dog is "on the track" they tend to work with purpose. They move straight ahead, ignoring distractions like woodchuck holes or deer poop. They simply concentrate on doing the "right" thing & following the correct scent.
I think that right now, DWAA is a bit "off track". As an organization we have lost our orientation to provide camaraderie with fellow dog writers/artists/photographers. The people that make up any group are the heart and soul of that group - or in this case, the scent we should be following. The more members who feel welcome, who are involved and active, the stronger that scent we need to follow will be.
So, while I am NOT recommending that everyone forgo bathing to increase their scent, I am recommending that we all get involved and leave an easier track for future members to follow.
Deb E
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I usually keep far away from discussions about the political aspects of organizations but I have one thing that I feel is important to at least mention.
In this post you wrote, "The more members who feel welcome, who are involved and active, the stronger that scent we need to follow will be" ... I really agree with this. On that same track, we (DWAA) have a really great venue for getting members involved, to welcome the new, and to help provide our members with a great way of locating valuable resources and current news. I was just posting yet another item and noticed that the most recent items listed in the news category for example have had a maximum of 5 people who even bothered to check them out. We have a resource available for information and for sharing and discussing yet, for some strange reason, only a handful of people avail themselves of it.
Those of us who keep it going and do utilize it honestly do bathe and have sweet personal hygiene. It's a great resource and venue drastically underutilized.
I wouldn't consider this a rant but it sure does baffle me. I belong to two other organizations that have an identical forum system and it is utilized by nearly everyone (members) -- there would be a riot if it were ever not there anymore. Thanks for hearing my two bits on this.
I guess we're all creatures of habit, Diane. For my part, I do visit the DWAA Forum (to which I assume you're referring) almost daily, and notice how few people seem to visit or post there. I'm not sure why that's the case, because the Forum does indeed have the potential to be a good resource for all DWAA members.
That said, I do recall that some DWAA members had trouble accessing the Forum when it was first created. In addition, I know of at least one long-time DWAA member who, for some reason, cannot access anything on the Web; she can only do email.
I'm not sure what the answer to all this is, but I do hope that in *some* way we can all work together to increase member involvement and build up that scent -- even while continuing to maintain our personal hygiene!
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