• Baby Boomers,  Speaking as a Parent

    Not the Best Grandmother

    April 9, 2017

    The one who was born on 10/07
    The ones who were born on 10/07

    I always give all of myself to whatever it is that I am doing.  It is who I am.  I make my choices very carefully, after all I cannot give myself wholly to what I do not care for?

    There is this misunderstanding in my family, well actually, a couple of misunderstandings.  One is that my kids believe that my agenda for their kids should be the same as it was for themselves.  Not even close.  My agenda for my kids was an intense laser focus that is not duplicated with grandchildren.  With my grandchildren, I am completely in love and the best way to describe this love is relaxed.  Gone is the need to impose perfection.  Gone is the need to demand performance.  Gone is my own ego.  By this time in my life: I am not feeling responsible for anyone.  I realize that my child’s life is not my fault, therefore my need for the child to make me proud is gone.

    My grandchildren are people who like to play (much more fun than their parents).  My grandchildren are beautiful to me.  I don’t care who agrees.

    My definition of human success has changed dramatically.  I once thought that my kids all had to have formal education and high paying jobs, I no longer define success in that way.

    Success:  the ability to form meaningful relationships, the ability to maintain those relationships without using money as a weapon of control.  A deep and abiding concern for another human being, the ability to be introspective, the ability to care, nurture and love one’s self; these are definitions of success.

    So it is, that in this sense, I cannot be the grandmother that my kids want me to be.  I am however, the grandmother that I want to be.

     

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  • Baby Boomers,  Love and Relationships,  Management

    So Now, He is Dead and Gone

    March 27, 2017

    They met in the mid 90s when it was still cool to be a hippy.  The classical bohemian vibe meant intelligence and caring.  They met at the midtown methadone clinic that she managed, crumbling and falling, you could hear the rats running through the eaves and the attic.

    He was pushing 50 and she was barely 35, always married with kids.  He was in the association that helped addicts access treatment for heroin addiction.  His passion for his cause was palpable.  He wanted to open a clinic in Ft. Myers and carried around pictures of people suffering because of their addiction.  He talked her into going to meetings.  They met monthly somewhere in the state and helped to make clear decisions that were empathetic and caring.  He didn’t like the for-profit treatment centers (his organization was non-profit) because he thought that they “sucked” money from their patients only to give it to shareholders without concern for “real” treatment.

    They had friends in the state legislature and were able to get things done.  In 1999, she moved away and that was that.

    About a year later, she decided to return to the work of addiction medicine.  It was a hard decision, but she realized it was still her purpose, even though she had walked away once.  She applied and applied and applied for work.  One day over the intercom at her job, she was being paged to the phone.  She rushed to pick up the phone and there he was saying, “I have this job, right down the street from your new home.”  She could hardly believe it.

    For a long time, they were able to get things done.  His power (brawn) and her brain, along with his trust in her, made their work unstoppable and progressively successful.  He loved systems engineering and so did she.  No task was too small to be acknowledged.

    But, Later;

    Him “You have to own that.”

    Her  “No I don’t, you put me in an untenable situation with a personality disordered nursing supervisor.  No matter what super-human effort I made, it was going to fail under those circumstances.”

    Later;

    Him “I think I made the mistake of my life, I should have asked you to marry me.  Is it too late?”

    Her  “Yes, you’re drunk again, goodbye.”

    Later;

    Him “You made the biggest mistake, you should have gone on that fishing trip with us.”

    Her “Ugh.”

    Later;

    Him “Go see him, Marc needs you, let him know that you care.”

    Her “Ok.”

    Later;

    Him “I’ll promote you later, when there has been more time.”

    Her “Ugh.”

    Later;

    Him “I have to fire her, look what she did!”

    Her “She did nothing wrong, but if you want to fire her, go ahead, you have the power, so use it, but I won’t agree with you, she did nothing wrong.”

    Later;

    Him “I wish I could talk with you before you leave.  I want to say good-by and let you know how much you have meant to me.”

    Her “Ugh. Liar”

    Still, she cries.

    All through the “scared years” he was there.  Ugly and mean, but he was there.

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  • Baby Boomers,  Womens Issues

    Stop Telling Me How and What to Eat

    March 25, 2017

    I don’t know everything about food and nutrition.  But there is no way that you know more than I do. I am 58 years old, I am fairly intelligent and I love good food.  I have spent my entire life in the kitchen, that is 50, count them, fifty years.  I am also engaged.  I listen, I read.  I know enough to know that gluten free is a fad unless you have celiacs disease, do you?   How old are you, 24?  You have not been alive as long as I have been cooking.  You are presumptuous, you are ignorant enough to think you have the answer, even though you have asked no questions of me?  You know nothing of me.

    Who are you to tell me that cauliflower is better for me than potato, you put butter on them and they become the same?

    The fact of the matter is that women my age need 400 less calories per DAY, not week, not month, but day, every day.  That’s right, because older women need less calories, we often gain weight.  Do you know why women my age need less calories?  Because for the last million years older women have sacrificed their own needs for others eventually responding to “survival of the fittest” we made our bodies work on less.  We just don’t need as much as men or as the young.  We get by, we thrive, we live on less.

    Now, in this day and this age, women my age don’t need to eat less, because there is more food in this world.  We just need more patience to put up with people who give advice without knowledge.

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  • Economic Equality (A Goal),  It is What it is...,  World Affairs

    Lying, Truth and Covert Activity

    March 6, 2017

    Flexible lying, alternative truth, these terms are laughable. Philosophy is arguable, but the concept of truth is not. Your truth may be different from mine in matters of thinking and in matters of the heart, but “the” truth is universal.
    I don’t speak of philosophy here. I speak of the objective observable universe that surrounds us.
    In the “breaking news” parlance, a wiretap is a wiretap, an earthquake is an earthquake and the ocean current moves in an easterly direction, not a westerly direction. Five inches of snow is not one inch of snow and rain falls to the ground.
    If you do not “like” something ~ that is your truth, it is not “the” truth. People in power have used their power to force others to adopt their own truth. So it is; if a person in power does not “like” something or someone, that person will also insist that all people who are subordinate to them adopt the same version of their own truth.
    Forcing others to adopt your truth does not make a concept into “the” truth. Too often, managers and controllers do not understand this fact. Indeed, corporate culture is evidence to this. Anyone who does not buy into the boss’s idea of reality (personal truth) soon finds themselves without employment.
    The next logical step is covert activity. When those in power insist that, we agree with them, our choices can be limited. Often team members will keep their own truth to themselves because of the power position of other team members.
    However, the most common use of covertness is to trick others and use this trickery to take their choices away from them. The point of cheating on your spouse is to take your spouse’s choice away. If your spouse does not know that you have cheated, then they will not file for a divorce.
    Such is the way of briberies to elected officials. Congressmen and women do not want anyone to know who is paying bribes to them. These bribes are paid in order to control the congressional votes. Congress put a law into effect allowing slush funds (PACs) so that they could legally collect bribes and do the work of the wealthy. An example of this is that the average American does not know that wealthy business owners have paid millions and millions in bribes to keep the minimum wage artificially low. We are not informed about which millionaires paid the bribes, nor do we know which congress-people voted against living wages for full time work. (We can draw this clear line with information available, but have not.) This is covertness at its best. Americans don’t know who to be angry with, they just know that they are being cheated in many and varied different ways.
    Americans know that health care is ridiculously expensive and cannot be provided to anyone without insurance, but whom should we be angry with? Congress-people who have allowed drug companies to rape the American economy and Medicare? On the other hand, do they blame doctors for charging ridiculous fees for very simple procedures? Should Americans blame insurance companies, who cherry-pick the healthy, leaving the aged and poor to taxpayers for healthcare?
    Covert activities that hide the truth: take our ability to choose, away from us in a very big way.
    The internet has given us powerful tools to fight against economic oppression. The most useful tool to combat oppression is truth and transparency. With truth, we know who to communicate with, we know who is at fault and we know what to choose. Our reactions can be specific and guided. This is the kind of America that I want to be a part of: I want to live in a place where if others are doing bad things (lying, stealing and cheating) that there is a way to discover the truth, then act on the truth, and do so in a reliable and honest way. I do not want to be part of a culture that encourages lying and cheating because of wealth and money. I do not want to be part of a culture that keeps harsh secrets that benefit the few, but not you. I do not want to be part of a culture that condemns truth, just because that truth is damning.

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  • Spirituality,  Wise Words,  World Affairs

    Psychopath

    March 2, 2017

    There is so much on the internet about the sociopath and/or psychopath.  Yesterday, I read another article about how to manage psychopathic behavior in your life.  This article was about “Psychopathic bosses”, how to recognize them as psychopathic and then how to manage the behavior.  The more I read the description of behavior, the more I think that it is “spoiled brat” behavior.  I don’t want to generalize; I just want to point something out to make some distinctions.  Selfish “me-focused” behavior is becoming more and more prevalent in our culture.

    People who are only concerned with themselves and who will take negative action against others in order to have personal gain are more and more common in our culture.  It is our own doing, because we have clearly aggrandized the successfully greedy.  We have made people who do nothing and yet earn millions the most popular and “followed” celebrities.  It is clear in our admiration that we will follow those with money, even if they are greedy and mean, victimizing people in order to put money in their own pockets.

    For the most part, we won’t even find out what kind of person we are admiring.  Papa John, who makes pizza, lives in a 40,000 square foot house, but pays his staff $8.00 per hour.  He is a thief of human well-being and uses capitalism as defense for his crimes.  Papa John is followed for his business acumen, but his formula is very easy.  Use your superior position to take advantage of others, as much and as long as you can.  Use your money to legislate in your favor, pay senators and congressmen to ensure that minimum wage is not increased.  Make it impossible for people to get health care, it is very expensive and as an American business man you will pay for nothing that is not for yourself or your own family.

    On a therapist’s sofa the American business man would be diagnosed as sociopaths who engage in psychopathic behavior.

    It is no surprise that spoiled brats run amuck in our culture.  Our role models are incredibly horrible examples of humanity.

     

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  • Wise Words,  World Affairs

    Dear Mr. Trump

    March 1, 2017

    I’ve been writing this blog for eight years and I have never repeated myself, but this article bears repeating:

    11/3/14

    If, indeed, our purpose is to find ways to live together productively and peacefully then I am sure that my job is to write.  I am positive that I have the right way to attain a productive and peaceful coexistence with anyone and everyone.  I am also sure that I can articulate it.

    We must realize that hierarchical social systems are the antithesis of egalitarian living.  Some argue that hierarchical social systems are necessary because of the number of humans on the planet.  I do not agree with this argument.  I also do not believe that leaders should be static.  Situational leadership demands that either the situation changes to fit the leader, or the leadership must change to fit the situation.

    Our various hierarchical societies are a punishing way to construct humanity.  The current construct demands that those on the top of hierarchies be greedy, anti-social or both.  This is not to say that each and all wealthy and/or powerful humans are greedy, it is to say that the structure of hierarchy breeds greed.  Often, in order to get to the top of the hierarchy, one must engage in behavior that is antithetical to humanity.  Pushing to the “top” is sometimes a terrible game of cruelty that leaves many victimized and demoralized.

    The American culture which began so full of hope for equality for all humans, came to idolize wealth instead of humanitarian ideals and thus lost the initial impetus for effective social change for equality and an egalitarian way of life for humans of the Earth.

    This is unfortunate, as it is a delay that has cost us many years and many lives.  The American culture encourages elitism and champions those who fight to the “top” of our various social systems and cultures.  We have therefore bred a group of leaders who proudly look only to their own good, who overtly attempt control of different social systems and who hoard money in any way possible in order to further their own ends.  This group of leaders feels that it is their right, by virtue of the fact that they sit on top of the elite social structure, to have more and better just for them and no one else.  As the governor’s campaign says “Power for the few, but not for you.”

    How do we change this?  How do we make it better, different, important, once again, as a human ideal?  First we must acknowledge that equality is a value that we wish to place above other qualities.  We must also acknowledge that on the slippery slope of making money, we forgot that human beings and their lives are more important than any amount of money.  As others have said “You cannot have a war, if no one comes.”  If we want our sons and daughters to live into old age, we will not send them into battlefields where American millionaires find more and more ways to keep money that they have not earned.  If we were sincere about this, we would reverse the legislation of the Reagans and Bushes and make it illegal (immoral, of course) to make money from a war – no matter the cause of the war.

    3.1.17

    It is hard to believe, that once again, we beg our politicians to stop making war and to stop treating humans like refuse.  Why is this even a thing?  Why aren’t we beyond war and greed as a way of life?

     

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  • Wise Words,  Womens Issues

    Letters to My Granddaughters

    January 30, 2017

    Letters to my Granddaughters;

    1. Understand that there is billions of dollars in advertising aimed at you *to get you* to believe certain things that the marketing industry is selling: Here I state the opposite of those commercials.
      1. You do NOT need expensive shampoo to get clean hair.
      2. You do NOT need an expensive hair color to feel “worth it”.
      3. You do NOT need to buy $231.00 of make up to “feel pretty”.
      4. You do NOT need to wear size 2 in order to be sexy, or pretty.
    2. You are being virtually bombarded with untrue images of women on a minute-by-minute basis.
    3. Use this information to gain what you want, not to be what “they” want.
    4. Do not believe that your life is about sex and sexuality: it is not. Sex is an important part of life, yet it is only a part.
    5. What you look like and who you are is separate, it is not the same.

    Listen, listen to your body.  Again, the advertising industry wants you to believe that you need, or you must purchase something in order to have good health or perfect digestion.  Your body will tell you what you need.  Read research on appropriate self care, and then listen to your body.  Your body will tell you what kind of vitamins you need and when.  I did in-depth research about why I was craving chocolate before my menstrual cycle.  I found out that I was missing a crucial dose of magnesium.  I began taking magnesium for a week each month and I was able to get chocolate cravings under control.

    Listen, listen to your intuition.  Your own intuition will never steer you wrong.  You know when you are making a mistake, when that voice in the back of your head starts screaming “Stop!”, listen to the voice, it is your own voice, it never steers you wrong.

    Be proud of who you are.  I was 13 years old when I became aware of ‘Jordache’ jeans.  I remember thinking “I don’t want someone else’s name on my behind.”  There is no designer who is as good about your looks as you are and you can be proud of that.

    This is letter number one, there is more, so much more to being a woman.

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  • Economic Equality (A Goal),  World Affairs

    I’m Not Sure What People are Thinking

    January 25, 2017

    But, does no one remember the French revolution, nor the reason for Bastille Day?    Wikipedia says the famous phrase “let them eat cake” means: “Let them eat cake” is the traditional translation of the French phrase “Qu’ils mangent de la brioche”, supposedly spoken by “a great princess” upon learning that the peasants had no bread. Since brioche was a luxury bread enriched with butter and eggs, the quote would reflect the princess’s disregard for the peasants, or at least a complete lack of understanding that the absence of basic food staples was due to poverty rather than a lack of supply.

    These things happened in history and we pay no attention to them.  When the wealthy have a disregard for the common person; when the common person does not eat; bad things can and will happen to the wealthy.

    We have no royalty here in America and yet we hold to the tradition of royalty by allowing capitalism to rule all decisions.  Those who are wealthy are treated like royalty.  They make laws and they rape the common person at every opportunity.  High taxes for the common person, no taxes for the wealthy.

    What is happening now with Donald Trump is unrecognizable by many, yet the truth comes toward us and has probably been coming towards us for many decades.  Take away the ability for a common person to make bread for their families and you endanger the safety of those who withhold those foods.

    We now have a president who plays games with words and with the press.  His values are diametrically opposed to American values.  He is dishonest; he uses his money and position to harm women and probably men also.  He is against equality in all of its forms and particularly against economic equality.  Donald Trump is a racist, and is supported by numerous white men, including a majority of the Republican oligarchy.

    I am worried for America because we are a fresh and new country and do not have experience with how to manage these issues.  Many people have stated that Trump is supposed to fix all that is wrong with America, but instead, he fixes nothing and instead moves forward the white male capitalistic agenda.  All of the common people who do not gain improvement and who are punished by voting for Trump will increase as time goes by.

    When they (Trump’s Administration) normalize violence against civilians by going forward with the Dakota Access Pipe Line (DAPL) and using American troops against Native Americans, this country is open to violent civil disobedience.  This is a very bad sign for the status of our country.  Americans cannot turn their heads away from these crimes against humanity.  Starvation of the common people, advocating for violence against women and then the use of American troops against Native Americans; where does it end?  We haven’t even addressed all of those Americans who will die as a result of the Trump’s administration removal of the Affordable Care Act.

    None of this is good and bodes poorly for our future as Americans.

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