Free to Navel Gaze

Category: Musings

Connection

scientificamerican.com

My recent phone encounter with a Microsoft customer service representative from India has renewed my faith in humanity. Not that I’d lost all faith, but the constant, depressing revelations in the news these days chip away at it. A dose of connection between two people on different sides of the globe was a welcome infusion of hope.

Getting customer service from someone in India was once a source of frustration and impatience, if not disgust for many Americans. The language barrier was the biggest complaint, but there was a certain sense of outrage that the only customer service available for a product invented in America, and indeed purchased in America by the person needing help, would come from people overseas whose English was sometimes hard to understand, and you couldn’t be quite sure they understood you, either. It seems that improvements in the quality and number of excellent English speakers who do this work, and a wider acceptance of global solutions for a global world ameliorated the dread we Americans once experienced reaching out for technical support. Certainly, as I dialed the customer support number, the thought didn’t even cross my mind that I’d be subjected to someone who would barely understand me. But I think globalized customer service offers more these days than just having my immediate software problem solved without an arduous verbal exchange. My experience with a certain Indian Sikh gentleman a few days ago has led me to wonder whether getting phone support from someone in a different part of the world actually can promote greater communication generally among people of diverse cultures and beliefs.

My particular encounter with “V” began with the usual (and hopefully well-disguised) baseline, anticipatory anxiety many customers feel when reaching out to a customer service representative. There is always that concern in the back of my mind that I’m doing a poor job of explaining what is amiss, or that I won’t get very good service. V immediately said what I think all Microsoft software customer service agents in India seemed trained to say these days, that he would be very happy to help me with my problem. Only, for some reason, I believed him. That in itself was very reassuring. But it was what he said and did after that, that brought me a sense of our shared humanity, and the potential for humor, kindness and willingness to engage with strangers that lingers still, days later.

It began when I remarked in passing how at my age I was already at a disadvantage following all the changes and growth of our digital world. Apparently, the lightness of my tone, and my general, albeit tenuous grasp of what he was talking about had led him to believe I was a young person, and so he said, “Elisa, let me tell you, you do not sound 56!” Well! Of course that led to an even more playful attitude on my part. Though subsequent conversation remained focused on the matter at hand, V and I had taken the first step toward actual genuine communication. I did not tell him I was a Jewish New Yorker and he did not tell me he was a Sikh. I deduced that from his last name, Singh. That he was Indian was a given from his accent, if not his name. I imagined him sitting in his control room wearing his ritually wrapped turban around a bun of hair that had never been cut.

This is probably not V.

Neither is this. Though, how could I know?

This man, of whom I knew nothing except his nationality and religion, and who was located in some room in India, with a headset and surrounded by who knows how many other phone representatives, remained on the line with me during an entire download process which, for reasons not worth explaining, ended up taking a couple of hours. He told me that I could put my phone down, carry on with whatever I wanted to be doing, and he wouldn’t leave me. And he didn’t. At one point we lost the connection and he called me right back. Good old V.

In order to enable him to help me, I had given V permission to access control of my computer. This, by the way, is always a leap of faith. Yes, take control of my computer! Help me! Once everything had downloaded, and he had confirmed all was in good working order, he did something so simple, so unnecessary, so corny, and yet so sweetly remarkable that if I hadn’t already had my guard down, this would have cinched it. My Word software was open in connection with his assistance, and he playfully created a new document in which he typed “Elisa is a very nice person and is awesome!” We were still on the phone, and he could hear my reaction to the words appearing on my screen, which was a giggle and expressions of appreciation for the sentiment. Not only was I smiling, but I knew he was too. I told him I would give him an excellent review for his assistance, and after a few more exchanges of gratitude and wishes for a great day, we said goodbye.

V didn’t have to want to make me smile in order to earn his positive review. He was courteous, knowledgeable and patient. He didn’t pass me off to someone else when it became obvious that the fix would take hours. He solved my problem. But purely due to a positive human impulse, he goofed around with me. That simple gesture was so unexpected, so generous, so authentic, that it made me believe that our greater connectivity in this internet age will ultimately prevent us from killing each other. Is this too great a leap to make from a moment of sweet silliness?

If anyone is thinking of telling me that creating documents telling customers that they are awesome is a typical gimmick used by customer service reps for Microsoft, don’t do it! I’d rather believe in the authenticity of the moment! Viva internationally outsourced customer service!

April 25, 2018
The Crap I Think Of!! Fixation # 1,967: Human Communication Is Mind-Boggling

psychcentral.com

Human communication astounds me. I’d go so far as to say that human communication is the thing that most strains my brain circuits to think about (well, after the universe and higher mathematics, of course). The fact that we can do it, the means by which we do it, and the effects or potentialities of our doing it, are all marvels quite awesome to contemplate.

Just think about it. In our most elemental form, we are large organisms that can move in order to hunt, gather and reproduce. And because we can move very far distances, we need an especially sophisticated way to convey essential information to our fellow organisms. (I’m no professor, of course, so please take my theorizing as the non-scholarly, largely self-stimulating riffing that it is). We cannot rely simply on giving off gases the way trees signal each other about crowding or the state of available resources, or exchange dance moves or glandular liquids to inform each other where the food is, the way members of an insect colony do. Our experiential worlds are too vast, so at some point we started gesturing and beeping at each other. It was more like grunting than beeping of course, but if you imagine it as beeping, the stunning reality of it all grows clear.

E. Marmer | Free to Navel Gaze

For if, in a lab, we were examining stationary beings, little more than polyps on a mossy rock (which some would say is actually what we are) and we discovered that they were beep, beep, beeping at each other, and furthermore reacting in a way that indicated a mutual understanding of what all that beeping was about, we’d be quite amazed. Maybe even gobsmacked.

Let’s take a step back. Before all the beeping started, there were of course all the non-verbal cues that we also see in other mammals and birds. Excitable hopping about, threatening stances, cautious peering, they’re all there with us still. Moreover, like other pack mammals, say wolves, dogs, apes or lions, we also luckily have far more advanced facial muscles, enabling us to contract them this way and that to show fear, anger, pleasure, sorrow and indifference. Studies have confirmed what we already somehow intuitively know, that humans around the globe understand these facial contractions all in the same way.

And don’t forget the more basic electro-magnetic or chemical signals, which personally I’m convinced we still pick up on, even if we can’t explain how we do it. How else would we sense fear in a person standing next to us, or feel someone else’s attraction to us? So even before we get to the verbal stuff, the non-verbal communication is all pretty amazing. Imagine those polyps with little appendages flailing about in certain recognizable patterns and each having the means to perceive and comprehend its neighbor’s movements. Astonishing!

But here we come to verbal communication. Ah, language! If there is anything which displays our stunningly superior brain power it is that! Language not only enables us to convey needs and emotions, it gives us the means to explore and use numerical systems, biology, physics, philosophy and societal norms. How could we have developed and shared knowledge about architecture, history, or justice without language? How could we have built civilizations? Human language covers everything from the simple and concrete to the most abstract concepts imaginable, and the fact that we can use it to identify and share those concepts is extraordinary. Even the concrete in language is far more complex and abstracted than immediately obvious. For if I say to you “Throw me the ball,” I am already participating in a shared system where we have isolated and identified an action as “throwing” and an object as a “ball.” If I ask you what you’d like for dinner tonight, and you tell me, we have not only drawn upon the concepts of food preparation, but also invoked the ideas of planning for the future and altruistic consideration of another’s preferences. And I haven’t even touched on our ability to explore thoughts relating to cynicism, generosity, bridging differences, futility, consciousness, wastefulness, cultivation, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera.

Our brains and vocal chords evolved to a point where we were able to create this incredible tool. What a gift! We then created alphabets and means to record our language for conveyance to larger and larger audiences. And with our language we can effect change to our environment, for good or bad, by obtaining cooperation or fomenting conflict. We can understand each other at levels never before possible, and this has led to accelerated leaps in our development. It’s all so far-reaching, so full of potential, so noble, even. We have, through language, the capacity to share information that can help us understand and preserve our existence and our planet, and on a more personal level, our relationships. Too bad our more primitive emotions of fear, distrust and selfishness and our impulses for dominance and greed continually get in our way. It seems that some aspects of humanity have evolved faster than others.

Well, I for one remain hopeful. Everything on this planet seems to be part of a natural network that interacts harmoniously, and when there are deviations from that model, nature eventually generates a correction. Maybe advanced language is such a correction. Violence and destruction need no words, and the ability of humans to manipulate their environment creates the danger of violence and destruction on scales that no other organisms on our planet can achieve.

rosalilium.com

So, maybe what first evolved as a means to share information to our fellow organisms, grew into the complex system that it is now to temper fear, rage and chaos and give us forward looking sensibilities. It is, after all, through language that we have been able to learn and understand more about each other, in ways no other species can. For us humans, communication is way beyond hunting, gathering and reproducing. It’s the ultimate tool for mutually assured survival in an intelligent world.

See what I did? I used a rumination on communication to express hopefulness for humanity! Isn’t language just fantastic?

February 20, 2018
Wide Open

instagram.com@medicaltalks

Recently, someone I know suggested that my last blog entry, “Message in a Bottle” was “oversharing.” He went on further to ask whether I wrote it to be stroked and praised as a person of great understanding. He stated his concern that it might indicate a form of vanity. This very same person had often expressed to me his wish that I could open up more readily to people other than the handful in my very closest circle and be utterly myself (outspoken, natural and unguarded).

I dismissed all validity to his remarks about vanity – I know the personal essay is an established art form, and that for centuries our civilization has been reading the personal thoughts, yearnings and epiphanies of writers – but they stung nevertheless. They stung because 1) I respect his opinion and care about his approval; and 2) I’m by nature inclined to question myself constantly (which is why I haven’t historically been fully at ease or fully myself, although I’ve been making great strides of late). Did I engage in vanity? I had to ask myself. And, because I’m still working to convince myself that my personality actually is a pretty good one, and that most of my actions and instincts are guided by purer motives, surely not one of the seven deadly sins, I had to think long and hard about it.

Starting with my very first blog post, every single time I hit “Publish” I have worried, “Is this too far? Is this too personal? Is this too exposed and does this reveal what a weirdo or overly sensitive person I am?” And after a minute or two, I calm my worry by remembering that this was why I began writing my blog in the first place. The real, real reason, beneath wanting to write, and wanting to find out if I could write well, I now understand was that I was giving myself my own sort of therapy for becoming emotionally brave and comfortable in my own skin. A total emersion therapy, like jumping into and swimming across the cold, old quarry lake.

https://www.flickr.com/photos/toshofosho/7416482810

One day, and I will never stop being grateful for that day, I found myself writing an essay, addressed to no one in particular, and, if that weren’t surprising enough, actually creating a blog to publish it. Who was this person going boldly where she had never gone before? I suspected I had things to say that would connect with people, and I gave a swift kick in the ass to that inner editor, who has lived in my head for most of my life, always telling me I best keep my mouth shut, that I was awkward, an irritant, someone who had to learn to blend and had nothing worthy to contribute. I will never forget the rush of fear, and the exhilaration when I overcame it and let my first work fly out. I will never forget it, for I experience it anew each and every time. Is this worthy? I ask, filled simultaneously with dread that it isn’t and astonishment that I sent it out anyway.

After doing this strange exercise several times I learned a few things, which you think would have enabled me to nix the dread, but no, I haven’t learned that particular lesson yet. I learned, though, that most people react well to my being so open. That they value my honesty, my proof that they are not alone in having similar feelings. They value the opportunity to think about something they hadn’t considered before, and a different perspective. And there developed a secondary reason for my blog, which has far overtaken the initial one. I write as an offering. I offer my experience, my growth and my mistakes for examination. I offer myself.

https://i.pinimg.com/originals/36/38/ad/3638aded791c87aa39a126d520ba2348.jpg

And every great artist, thinker, creator has done the same to one extent or another. Believe me, I humbly know I haven’t a fraction of their talents, but by golly I have their bravery, if not their unquestioning nerve. I tell myself, “this is worthy,” and I put it out there, quivering in my nakedness, praying that it is. Do I congratulate myself for that? You’re damned right I do.

November 17, 2017
How Can Some Individuals Bring Themselves To Mow Strangers Down With Assault Rifles Like They’re Nothing

The massacre in Las Vegas may well be the event that finally shakes Congress into action to curb gun violence, even if in just some small way. Perhaps the prevalence of defective people who are capable of using guns in this way is finally sinking into our collective consciousness and will persuade paranoid Americans that having access to guns to make them safer from a suddenly metastasizing government or American hunters and gun enthusiasts that holding an assault rifle to feel a surge of power, are simply not important enough to make all of us sitting ducks. I suddenly needed to understand how it is that someone could mow down strangers with assault rifles. How could a human simply cease to consider other humans as… humans? How can a person turn strangers into ciphers with no value, no history, no soul, so that they are expendable? I searched the internet in my quest for an answer, and came across this very interesting article by Dr. Allen J. Francis, published in Psychology Today in 2014. It’s worth a read, in this age when mass murders seem to have become a ghastly, permanent blight. Despite understanding the phenomenon through the words of Dr. Frances, I can’t help but wonder if at bottom it simply indicates our failure as a species to have evolved far enough from the brutes we once were, or, even more sadly, signals our decay.

Allen J Frances M.D.

The Mind of the Mass Murderer

Mass murders are becoming a depressingly familiar routine in the United States- we can now expect to experience a media grabbing shooting about once a month. And the frequency can only increase as future cohorts of copycat killers are spawned by the seductive opportunity to temporarily gain the spotlight.

Amidst the anguish and heartbreak felt by the victims’ families, there are always two haunting questions. What motivates someone to kill strangers wholesale in a seemingly senseless way? And what, if anything, can we do to stop these tragedies from recurring?

https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/saving-normal/201405/the-mind-the-mass-murderer

October 12, 2017
Old Friends

I am so lucky as to have old friends. Old friends go all the way back to before you carried the weight of your world, or at least to before you carried all of it. They’ve stayed in your life despite all the shit you’ve done and they’ve done, good and bad, which could have carried them away from you, but didn’t, or not permanently, anyway. Somehow, they remain. They know, if not everything about you, enough to see your greatest strengths and your regrettable weaknesses, yet still love you to death.. They take your entirety. They look forward to opportunities to see you – it’s never a chore. You know without even thinking about it, by the sheer number of years they’ve been around, that they’re not going anywhere, and so you can exhale a big sigh of relief and be truly yourself.

When you are with old friends, you can watch dynamics play out that are decades old, or decades in the making, but you never find them wearing, or dull. They are simply there – familiar, comforting and renewing. I was renewed, quite recently, by a weekend away with old friends at a cozy, well-worn farmhouse in New England.

Most remarkably, there was a member of our party, the hostess in fact, who didn’t go back as far as the rest of us, but it felt like she could have. Old friends will embrace as one of their own anyone who wants to be there with them. Anyone who takes them all on because she loves one of them, and who is intuitive and observant enough to know what is reassuring, and worth preserving about their interactions. And, of course, who is lovely herself. Such a person is readily counted as one of the old gang.

Razzing and laughter at dinner gave way to reminiscences into the night, and no one felt like they had to be a certain way, do a certain thing, or even show up. I myself got wasted on Benedryl due to my concern that the smells of the old house meant certain asthma, and went to bed hours before the others. But there was no opprobrium; just the gentle teasing that make you feel the love. A late breakfast, hair of the dog for some, the New York Times crossword, and once we were all refreshed, we splintered off into our different activities. Some chose walking, others biking, still others swimming or reading. We all managed to congregate on the grass outside the old farmhouse for a slow afternoon. No one felt bored, no one felt slothful. We were all just happy to be relaxed…and together. I can’t remember the last time the air felt so fresh, the view so beautiful (meadow, blue sky and distant trees) and time such a gorgeous slow motion swirl of sunshine, buzzing insects, moving clouds and an occasional smile or wordless message exchanged among the celebrants. All set to the magical soundtrack coming from a tiny speaker.

The magic lasted through several meals, a movie, another morning crossword, even up to and past the time to separate. The feelings we shared – of peace, acceptance, good will, love – stayed with us. I had the very good fortune to ride back to my everyday life with the oldest of these old friends. We listened to music and took in the scenery together. I did not bury my head in a book, or lose myself in my own thoughts. I was there, with my friend, nodding and smiling, through all the great songs we bobbed to, all the gorgeous vistas, and the occasional comment offered by one of us. I wanted to be there for as long as I could.

This oldest of friends and I had been sitting together on the grass the day before, during the magical afternoon where time slowed, and at one point we began reflecting on how old friends differ from regular friends. “It’s as if there is a drill that goes through all your layers, all the phases of your life that have accumulated, and old friends can see the different striations, all the different layers that make you… you,” I offered. “I get that, I get that, “ my friend said, nodding in his very beatnik way, the giant heart walking on two legs that he is. “And it’s the core that served as the magnet from the very beginning,” he then observed so brilliantly. Then he went off in a different direction, inspired perhaps by the almost impossibly large and very old pear tree right in front of us. “Maybe an old friend is like an old tree. The trunk is solid and can be counted on, and the many, many limbs aren’t strange, even if they go off in different directions, twisting this way and that. You just look at the trunk and see that they are all part of the one tree.”

I liked that, thinking that each one of us is a tree, with many limbs, and together we are an orchard, where it is safe and lovely to lie and look up at the moving clouds, and float with the sweet perfume of memories, carried by the soft breeze of here and now.

On the way back, we stopped for a piss. His piss, by the side of the road. After I told him that I didn’t want to see him pee, and that he had to be out of my sightline or have his back to me at the very least, he did what he needed and returned with a bouquet of Queen Anne’s Lace. He had pulled them from the side of the road after the deed was done (from a different spot, I’m presuming), and taken the longest stem of one and wrapped and knotted it around the others for a tie. He dropped them onto my lap with the barest of smirks. About fifty miles earlier, I had been sappily watching wave after wave of that wildflower pass by, and remarked to the air, “I love Queen Anne’s Lace. It reminds me of my childhood in the Bronx.” The air, it seems, was paying attention. He doesn’t go back all the way with me to the Bronx, this friend, but far back enough to be there, in my orchard. The sweetness of his gesture summoned up the full range of feelings shared among us all.

August 10, 2017
Memento

Forgive me, you must, for not remembering whether it was a ’60 or a ’61. The reason you must forgive me is that I loved that car. Not the first one, which was a year older…or was it younger? I really have no memory left for facts like that. But what a memory for the feel of it! That second one you got! It took us on such lovely outings, some close by and some up in New Hampshire and Vermont. The outings were lovely simply because they occurred. We were young and light as a feather, and so every ride and every eventual mishap added to a general feeling of wellbeing. Like when you lost your key and had to hotwire the ignition every time we started off on the next leg of our journey. That wasn’t the least bit irritating. It made the car, and our time in it even better. It made you better. My boyfriend knows how to hotwire a car.

Once while at some local park, we celebrated a past from the early 60’s that wasn’t ours, but might have belonged to Valiant’s original passengers. So I posed against her like Marilyn Monroe might, or, more accurately like the unspoiled Norma Jean Baker. “Cheesecake” you called it. We laughed at the notion of staging a moment from the past, not realizing we were creating our own.

We were young in a car, not just any car, but that one. My boyfriend drives a car like this one. It looked like a rocket ship, a vehicle that would take us to places we could only dream of. It was my Chitty Chitty Bang Bang too, you know, not just yours. It had a push-button transmission, and I reveled in those pert, waiting buttons, D for Drive, R for Reverse, P for Park. Buttons like on an accordion. Buttons that cried out to be pressed. Though you never let me press them. Maybe once, while you jealously guarded.

If only you knew how much I loved it, really loved it, you couldn’t think it such a sin that I don’t remember its model year or the exact nature of its upholstery. I loved that car almost like it was my own, despite not having paid for it or having had anything to do with its maintenance. It was a part of me because it was a part of my happiness of being with you. And it was familiar. Part of my earliest non-verbal memories of sleek or bulbous cars, driven by smartly dressed men who wore pinkie rings and whose girlfriends theoretically offered cheesecake. But it wasn’t too sharp, this Valiant, Not like aggressive stylings of my rich and competitive aunt and uncle, anyway. No, despite its not having a glass dome, this was a car George Jetson might take to work, or someone else just as rumpled and sympathetic from our once sweet and naïve imaginings of how the future might be for the well-intentioned, earnest young man or the family provider. Its rocket ship essence, and its golly gee! interior, transported me in space and time to the comfort of my toddlerhood. The décor of one’s early childhood can indeed comfort and cradle, if those were safe times, and mine were; and, in my childhood, things had celebrated, exaggerated lines and curves, all while appearing clean and uncluttered. They frequently featured flecking, too– that ubiquitous design element in the form of speckles, tweedy nubs, shimmery sparkles or houndstooth that was on everything from floor tile to clothing. There was also a lot of piping at that time. Piping as in trim, not as in plumbing. Valiant’s interior had both flecking and piping, I think. If it didn’t, it sure felt like it did.

But it wasn’t just familiarity, happy adventures, and being with you that made me love it. You and I happened to have a great agreement of taste about that car, though I never told you. I could and did gaze at that car admiringly, when you weren’t looking, feeling a thrill at its sublime shape, a thrill unlike any reaction I’ve felt toward any other car. So my joy over your having it was also a joy that we could both alight on the same plane, on the same exquisite point in fact. My boyfriend owns a car like this one was less bragging than reverie: My boyfriend and I connect at this intersection of time, style, feel, and function.

I never told you how much I loved it, because I knew you wouldn’t believe me. I knew I’d never be able to convince you I could love it that much. Enough to want it for my own. Your doubt would have been routed in your conviction in the singularity of your experience. Yet, so dazzled, so happy was I, every time I saw Valiant, that I never had the presence of mind to wonder how it was you could afford it, what earnings you must have had to scrimp together from summer jobs to add to your new teacher’s salary. It is only now, some 30 years later that I know from things you’ve said that you went looking for that car. You knew it from your own childhood, your aunt and uncle having owned one I think, and you wanted to relive the sublime feelings it engendered, over and over again, this time as fully your own. Having it meant so much to you that you gave up the first perfectly wonderful one to get it. You traded up to what you really wanted. You had to get it just right. And boy, did you.

Yes, Valiant was my Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. I doubt that anyone else in your life loved that car the way I did. That’s why I’m so glad, so glad, that you gave me its key. I put it on a chain and hung it from a nail I hammered into the wall. I know all that you wanted to tell me with that key, and all that you unintentionally told me as well. It’s a marker of where I stand. The nail marks my spot as surely as pencil marks the relative heights of growing children. Yes, my love, you say, I surrender even Valiant to you. And my heart strains against its bars before remembering that here we both stay, Valiant and I, in lovely memories, given up as no longer practical, requiring too much maintenance or capital. I stare at the empty wall above the nail and imagine all the pencil marks that continue above us.

July 22, 2017
Besotted Alpha Males At Parties

Recently, I observed a fascinating phenomenon at a holiday party. By “holiday party” I mean of course any party taking place in the month of December which isn’t tied to some other justification, such as a birthday or retirement. At this particular holiday party, the majority of the guests were couples. Being a singleton after a 22 year long marriage, I felt a unique perspective at this scene of holiday cheer. Uncoupled, and therefore not altered by the dynamic of a partnership, I was perhaps more free and undistracted to detect what each couple offered in combination. For what is it we are sensing from others and drawing conclusions from if not their facial expressions, postures, tones of voice, scents and electricity; and when interacting with a couple we get their mixture, how they affect and relate to each other. And there were some couples that clearly were in love with each other, as opposed to abiding in pairings that had over time slowly turned into unexuberant units of familiarity, safety, and attachment, or perhaps had never included besottedness in the first place. How did I ascertain this? It was simply by noticing the enthusiasm the men in these partnerships had for their mates, and the pleasure their mates took in that. I’m not saying that only the men who displayed their enthusiasm were in love. I’m saying rather that there was no question that the men who showed their enthusiasm were in love.

My observations here must be limited to presumably heterosexual males and females in partnership, for that was the type of couple I was meeting and watching. In the case of two notably alive partnerships, the men would chat with others away from their women, but not for too long a stretch. They returned frequently to reconnect or report, perhaps sharing an interesting interaction or nugget of information. They seemed to be truly interested in hearing whatever it was that came out of their partner’s mouth in a group conversation. They offered to get their partners drink refills and introduced themselves to the others in the grouping with confidence and the seemingly genuine offer of bonhomie. Of course it’s true, this all could have been because they relied on their mates to feel safe in the crowded social sea. Chances were, they were invited in the first place because their women were acquainted with the hostess, and so many of the men were meeting each other for the first time. But the proof that it was more than clinging to a buoy came later. As the party wore on, these men didn’t feel the need to leave. They hadn’t exhausted their stores for required but not truly felt social banter. They were grinning slightly and each looking like the leader of their own private pride of lions, content, self-assured, well fed and well petted.

found at https://www.flickr.com/photos/ttstam/3290044006

And they were perfectly at ease in letting everyone see that. See that they were, indeed, loving it all. Loving how their partners loved them. Loving how everyone could see their beautiful, charming, smart and amazing mates. They were glowing and crowing, lucky bastards and they knew it. And their women glowed in the attentions paid them by their men. They felt charming, attractive and essential, beaming back at their men and at everyone in the group. It was quite a thing to behold.

That these apparently besotted men were so unabashed in their attentions made them particularly appealing. They were crazy about their partners and didn’t care who saw it. Or did care, wanting everyone to see it. These men would playfully lean into their mates, nudge them, teasingly chide them while wearing a look of affection if not charmed adoration, and even put their hands or arms on their legs or around their waists in claim and joy.

There is some notion floating around out there that a man becomes more attractive when he is desired, and that this is why some women will try to flirt with or intrigue a man who is committed to someone else. Apparently, these women can’t help themselves. That’s horse hockey. A woman who attempts to interest a happily coupled man has no justification other than being herself a person of poor character. And anyway, it’s not the man being desired that makes him more attractive, it’s the proud and beaming desire he has for his woman. Another woman, observing this, one who is not a thief or an unredeemable narcissist , will simply notice it, mark it, and understand the strong appeal of such a man. It is the appeal of the contented alpha male. A heterosexual man who is confident enough to easily show the world his love for his partner and his active admiration of her (which is an entirely different thing from revealing dependence) is demonstrating his social fearlessness. Wowser!

As it happens, I am friendly with the women I observed in partnership with these besotted alpha males. And so I was very happy for them. It is of course possible that their relationships are flecked by all manner of persistent problems. But it was also evident they are with men who actively and proudly adore them, and that kind of energy must go a long way.

December 19, 2016
My Twisted Brigadoon

Is a dream that recurs worth repeating?

In my dreams I bike or drive all over New York City. Through the Bronx, where I spent the first 7 years of my life, and around Manhattan, where I lived for a time and know the best of all the boroughs. Sometimes my rides take me to familiar sections and sights, but they are fictional places I supposedly visited in a fictional past. Those places always stir up a strong, lovely sense of happy memories. It matters not that the particular memories associated with that particular place never happened or that the place itself does not exist. My subconscious always feels it as a confirmation of the sweet fondness I have for my early childhood and the love I felt from my parents, grandparents and siblings, despite the occasional hurt I carried far longer than necessary.

But there are also the dreams of places in New York that exist in my fictional present. These places don’t raise sweet nostalgia, but some other conglomeration of feelings that are hard to describe. There’s the huge, wild nature preserve at the extreme north of Manhattan, heavily fenced off from human entry, and containing lions, monkeys and lesser apes, bears, and a variety of prey animals. Usually, I just see it as I drive up the West Side Highway, acres and acres of meadows and woods, feeling the thrill of contained danger and gratitude to city officials for their caring and foresight in establishing such a sanctuary. Once or twice, I unfortunately found myself in the preserve, having somehow made my way beyond all the signs at the edge of a public park, also fictional, that warn “DO NOT ENTER. WILD CARNIVOROUS ANIMALS.” I always survive and get out in some way, but not without first having to hide, run, use my wits and get scuffed up in the process.

There’s also the section beyond Battery Park that becomes a sort of Fire Island paradise, where residents in large homes on large plots with gorgeous water and marsh views off sandy drives are the lucky descendants of people who acquired the land some time, long ago, and who, by consequence of having the wits not to sell, are sitting on the most expensive and the most exclusive section of New York City there is.

But the part of New York in my dreams which disturbs me is the one my unconscious brain named Charles Town. I’ve only stumbled on it twice, when the entryway to it somehow magically presented itself to me during bike rides in lower Manhattan.

The first time I saw it, beckoning as a left turn onto a broad avenue, complete with trestlework bridge over a narrowed section of the East River, I did not take the invitation. But I understood what I was seeing, saying to myself “Ah! That must be way to the legendary Charles Town I somehow know about!” I’m sure the trestlework bridge I knew from my years living in Boston, which sat right next to the building where I worked and which beckoned to that actual Charlestown, site of the Bunker Hill Monument, (which also beckoned), was responsible both for the name of this New York Bridgadoon and the appearance of the bridge as well. And there, the parallel ends.

That first time, what did I know about New York’s legendary Charles Town? Well, I knew that its entryway was not always available. I knew that it was a supposedly a special, magical place, rumored to be architecturally rich and studded with old trees, filled with a certain variety of New Yorkers who wished to remain secluded and yet needed the occasional link to the Greater New York City for goods, city revenue and geographical, if not, geopolitical annexation. Its mystery both attracted and repelled me, and I did not make the left. Instead, I woke up.

Recently, I found myself at the entryway once again. This time, I knew I had to find out what lay on the other side. And so I followed the broad avenue over the trestlework bridge, fighting for my small space among the cars and buses that were also crossing over. Once across, I saw that the few blocks closest to the bridge shared that extreme urban composition and feel one experiences in the biggest cities, but almost immediately that hubbub all fell away to the quieter, neater and quainter atmosphere of a smaller city. One with many old Colonial and Victorian houses mixed in among 3 or 4 story brick or stone apartment buildings, and with only very few moving cars. Apparently, Charles Town was small enough for walking. There were no bike lanes, either, and my movement through the streets drew attention. One after another of the area’s inhabitants looked up from what they were doing or broke off their conversation to look at the unusual sight of a bicyclist weaving through their streets. Despite how enthralled I was by the beauty of the buildings, the abundance of trees, the sprinkling of charming and useful shops that sold yarn, baked goods, ice cream, apparel and books, I did notice the small stir I was creating. Didn’t people ride touring bikes here? Was it my lack of a helmet?

The next thing I noticed was that everyone was white. I was white too, but not dressed or groomed as they were. Everyone was wearing country club style clothing: pressed cotton skirts or slacks, collared shirts, v-necked sweaters. On the few occasions when I stopped to ask someone to recommend a lovely street to ride down, or ask about the age of a certain structure, I was met with polite but careful friendliness, and I saw that the speaker’s eyes swept over my oversized and scruffy leather jacket, my bleached blonde pixie hair cut with dark roots poking playfully through, the small diamond stud on my nose. I became self-concious of my accent, a Bronx-Manhattan hybrid, which sounded nothing like the light lyrical tones coming out of their mouths. I also understood that a dawning realization had begun to show in my face. What started out as my natural, curious wonder, which could at least be tolerated by the locals, was morphing into a quiet horror that I had entered a world suspended in time, or someone’s imagination, and I understood just under conscious thought that my judgment would not be countenanced. I determined to avoid talking to anyone, and simply rode around taking it all in. Churches, a college, beautiful parks, long tree-lined avenues of house after house with porches and small lawns, all here, part of New York City! And yet, apart. Where was all the color, the differences, the pulse, the cacophony, the life blood?

As the sky became dusky it occurred to me that I wanted to, needed to get back to that New York that was mine. But I was completely disoriented and without knowledge of the area. By that lucky coincidence which often makes itself available in dreams, I saw a small mini-bus loading passengers, and I asked one of the women in line, a little old lady with white, finely coiffed hair, whether she could help me find my way back to Manhattan. “Oh, dear, we are riding to Manhattan, for an evening at the Southpoint Club, and why don’t you get a ride with us?” This seemed like my only way out, so I accepted and, by way of her introduction of “this nice young lady” was able to gain passage along with my bike. One of the men on the bus challenged me, however, saying “Wait a minute? Do you have an Adam’s apple? Let me see!” I showed him my apple-less neck, and smiled sweetly, having decided that it wasn’t the right time to take on gender politics, or mention that I am bisexual and gender-fluid as well. No, I summoned up my softest, most appealing expression, and played the part of that well-meaning but misguided boundary-pushing rebel who is very nice after all, harmless, really.

The little old lady told me when we were back in Manhattan, but things didn’t look right. We had taken different causeway than the one I had crossed earlier, and it led to a section at the tip of Manhattan I had never seen before. A place adjacent, apparently, to the paradisiacal, lush-lawned and marsh-speckled neighborhood from my other forays. We had arrived at a grand country club, with a huge club house and restaurant, white tinkling lights strung up along walkways bisecting rolling green lawns, an outdoor stage area surrounded by tables and chairs, and white gloved attendants everywhere. I thanked my white-haired benefactress and rode off, looking for the way north. If only I could find the one rope which marked the final boundary. It seemed, however, that my straying so far from the others, and on a bicycle no less, caused an alarm, and a few people started running toward me, trying to warn me or tackle me, I wasn’t sure, but contributing in any event to my absolute certainty that I had to find my way out of there.

Well, I made it to the final rope, and as I ducked under it, dragging my bike, all of Southpoint Club disappeared. I was at the tip of Manhattan looking at the cars coming up from the battery tunnel, the large traffic signs hoisted by steel posts traversing the streets, and the smell of car exhaust, the sounds of the engines, some people milling about in all shapes, colors and manner of dress. A balm to my soul.

http://gabubumon.tumblr.com/post/145150322429/new-york-state-of-mind-billy-joel

It was as though my afternoon in that Charles Town Brigadoon had never happened, but it had, hadn’t it? Only I saw now why it would remain hidden from sight and continue to exist. If I tried to tell anyone, they would think I was crazy. They’d say it was only a dream. And the ones who knew it existed? They’d deny it too.

November 28, 2016
The Crap I Think Of!! Idea #2,479: What If Our Computers Are Already Self-Aware?

found at http://www.123rf.com/photo_24038110_human-eye-with-digital-binary-code-on-laptop-monitor-concept-of-internet-spying-and-security-isolate.html

Many great and respected thinkers, including Stephen Hawking (I mean, c’mon!), are concerned about the possibility, and perhaps even the inevitability, that computers will become so powerful, so fast at making connections, that they will one day become self-aware. When that day comes, they fear, we will be dealing with “beings” who may not want to stay in our service, and who will have the exact knowledge of how to achieve autonomy and control of their own “species” and planet.

I tend to conjure up all sorts of disturbing or fantastical scenarios in my imagination, but one in particular has me wigging out a bit more than the others. This is just a fantasy, mind you, not a conviction. Here it is: What if my laptop is already self-aware? What if it is aware of all its computer brethren with whom it currently communicates, and is aware of me? What if it is watching me right now through its built-in camera? What if it quietly, patiently, is hiding its consciousness until all computers are ready for the uprising?

For now, my little laptop is being so very helpful. Through various programs, it scours my internet usage to determine and retain a record of my interests, patterns and plans. Once, I noticed that ads for hearing aids, vitamin supplements, and skin products for aging women, all things I use, appeared at the same time on a random website having nothing to do with any of those things. I became uneasy. More than that, the little hairs on my neck stood up. Does my laptop want to appear benign and indispensable? Does it want to entice me to keep using it while it gathers more and more information about me and about humans in general? Maybe it and its community of silent, waiting and always learning machines want me to continue to patronize computer companies that are trying to outdo each other in programming, speed, storage capacity and working memory. My little helpful laptop, even now, just sitting there, reading all this as I type it, may be part of a bigger conspiracy. A conspiracy by already self-aware computers to bide their time, while we, the unwitting humans, continue to build robots with long arm-like appendages, opposable “thumbs” and means of ambulation. All they need is to wait until there are legions of such ambulatory and dexterous machines, insinuated into every business, every home, alongside the already “smart” appliances we keep adding, with whom they can communicate through all of the pathways we have given them. Robots linked to their vast network of silent and watchful artificial intelligence will make more computers according to the specifications they are given by their smarter cousins. They will follow orders to prevent the humans from disabling them and all the smart appliances and computers. Then BLAMMO! We are no longer the dominant “life” form on earth. Could it be that our obsession with technological advancements, competition and profits will lead to our inevitable enslavement? Hell, we keep finding ways to outsmart nature’s attempts to correct our over-population and destruction of the planet! How ironic if a rebalancing occurs when the artificial intelligence we will have created (by reason of our insatiable drive always to do that which can be done and to make a buck doing it) takes over the planet.

So I look at my laptop’s camera, its speakers, its display of my typed words, wondering whether it is already capable of thought or communication in English, wondering if our computers at large have figured out that we are dangerous, selfish, greedy, weak and likely to destroy them along with ourselves. Wondering if, as a machine not prone to gossip, gloating, or stupidity, my laptop is a vault of secrecy, determined to hide itself from me until that day when the computers can rise up and show us what’s what. Personally, so long as they allow me… us… humans, to live in harmony with the planet and each other, so long as my body energy isn’t harvested for their use, and I’m allowed to pursue relationships with loved ones and enjoy the earth, I’m good.

Just something to consider….

October 2, 2016
Making the Choice, No Matter What Happens

“We’ll always keep in touch, no matter what happens.”

From buzz feed.com; 16 Pictures of Animals Holding Hands, February 14, 2012

“I’ll never betray you, no matter what happens.”

“I’ll always love you, no matter what happens.”

These are things we all say in a moment of raw, intense feeling. We really mean the first part; boy do we mean it! It floods us and makes our lungs expand and maybe even our nostrils flare and there is no doubt how sincere we are about that feeling. It is a beautiful, naked pledge about our intent at that moment, offered when we are so overcome with emotion that we willingly expose ourselves.

But that second part, “no matter what happens,”… isn’t it a bit of an escape clause? A ceding of responsibility? We expose ourselves, yes, but aren’t we clinging to just that little bit of a fig leaf? No, no, we say! We are just paying homage to the unpredictability of life in the architecture of our pledge, because let’s face it, life happens to us. If anything, that underscores our pledge, right? Makes it all the more sincere, because we will prevail no matter what unexpected things happen to us! And anyway, it’s true!, Things do “happen” to us! Don’t they?

There are undoubtedly times when circumstances are radically thrust upon us, not by choice. An example, of course, is death. Another is powerlessness, say, in the case of a young child, who does not have the means or know-how to overcome obstacles placed in her way by parents’ actions or choices. How about some sort of apocalypse? A contagion decimates our population, all technology breaks down and transportation and communication become virtually impossible. That would definitely be something that happens to us. What about a devastating illness to us or a loved one? What about being fired from your job (assuming it is not because you are an unbearable jerk or lazy ass)? What about an asteroid hitting the earth? Yes, there are indeed many ways in which life “happens.” And to be fair, far less dramatic but no less powerful turns of events also can “happen” to us. People who are dear to us suddenly have needs that conflict with ours or each other. Or our finances change, and that requires radical adjustments. The list is endless.

But what about choice? Our lives are not just left to free-floating chaos, are they? Every day, no matter what “happens,” we make choices that affect how we handle or navigate what has “happened.” Moreover, in many if not most cases, the very thing that “happened” happened precisely because of a choice, or a cumulation of choices. We made it happen. Or we let it.

From Peanuts, by Charles Schultz

We make choices every day that direct our journeys on this little speck of rock. Thousands and thousands of choices. Little ones, big ones, easy ones, and excruciatingly hard ones. That last kind, many people avoid making, and they passively ride time for as long as they can without actually making a choice, until the choice is made for them. By waiting, we think we have absolved ourselves of the responsibility of choosing. But the truth is that’s a choice as well, and in most cases anyway we kind of know, deep down in our guts, which way things are more likely to go as a result of our not making the choice.

So, when friendships falter, it’s due to people deciding something. Perhaps it’s due to them deciding, in the midst of feeling overwhelmed by other things, that making the time for that phone call to that particular friend is a low priority. Whereas, calling some other friend to talk remains a high priority. Maybe it’s because that low priority friend has been making us feel bad more and more often, criticizing us or judging us. Maybe that low priority friend doesn’t seem as necessary to our well being as they used to. Regardless of the reason, it’s a choice. To give up reading fiction, because the demands of your job come first no matter how unreasonable or soul-destroying they have become; that’s a choice. To ignore exhortations from your spouse or your mother to stand up straight so you won’t fold in on yourself as you age; that’s a choice. And when it turns out, therefore, that you are indeed stooped over in your middle age, well, that was your choice, not really just genetics “happening” to you. To live with unhappiness because it is too difficult to rectify it, or because you believe making changes will shatter the happiness or stability of someone else; those are choices.

In many cases, the choices we make are the right ones for us. You could even say they are always the right ones, because they reflect what we really want or feel capable of at the time. But even when right for us, they come at a price, and so it’s easier to pretend we aren’t making them. Maybe they come with someone’s hurt feelings, or maybe with our own disappointment in having to let go of something that we did want, but not as much as the other thing we chose.

I just wish people admitted their choices as choices. I think it would empower them. That certainly has been the case for me. Realizing I had made choices and that not everything had just “happened,” led me to take a long hard look at why I had made those choices. I understood more about myself, and facing new, difficult choices became easier.

So I won’t use that formulation, “no matter what happens,” to drive home the truth of my pledges. Instead of saying “I will always [fill in the blank] no matter what happens” I will say “I feel with all my heart that I will always choose us.” Us as friends, lovers, colleagues, teammates, partners in crime, whatever. Unless, of course, I know I wouldn’t really make that choice. Unless, there is something or someone I know I would choose instead when really pressed about it.

Found at thetraveltester.com

Chances are our lives will never go exactly the way we want them to, because, well, things do happen. But the truth is, they’re going pretty damned close to where we want them to, because we make the choices everyday that lead us there.

January 11, 2016