What is there to learn here?

I clearly see the controversy surrounding Michael Jackson, the rainbow of his music vs the shadow of his pedophilia and drug abuse. I think there is something we need to confront here. Does the fact that he created beautiful music and gave charitably excuse the victimization of the innocent? Does, by his own admission, the fact that he was an abused child excuse abusing other children? Does wrestling with his conscience, or celebrity loneliness and isolation, excuse his abuse of drugs? I hear the "Pollyannas" and apologists scream for his crimes to be glossed over and not brought to light but I believe that does not serve us, or him. When we refuse to task and acknowledge his trespasses we endorse those trespasses, I believe. Would any who would grant abandoning the discovery and discussion of those trespasses like their children to follow his path or would have been glad to have their children participate in sleepovers at Neverland? If the answer is "yes" I beg them introspect over their parenting philosophies and criteria.

Heroes are (according to Dictionary.com) "...a person who, in the opinion of others, has heroic qualities or has performed a heroic act and is regarded as a model or ideal..." Was Michael Jackson a hero by that definition? He created some beautiful music but the world can go on, and even improve, without music, can the same be said with abusing children and drugs held as an idealic quality? I say "tragedy". "Tragedy" that those around him, including his family, let him get to the condition he was in when he died. "Tragedy" that we are faced with playing "Yeah, but..." with someone who meant so much to so many. "Tragedy" that art, once again, is sacrificed on the alter of human indulgence. Best, possibly, to do what Gandhi counseled "Hate the sin, love the sinner." But I don't think we can ignor the sin, excuse the sin, or do a full discovery about the sin. Sad, so damn sad... (This entry was also posted on CNN)

Outside "owing to no one..."

Consider the individual who really doesn't have anything/anyone else that matters more than the immediate choice. They are intelligent, creative, resourceful, physically fit and agile, good looking, and (of course) confident (nearly to the point of arrogance). They are certain that there is no situation, in "normal" life that they would be unable to cope with effectively. When I say "normal" I am excluding war, kidnapping, assault, and the like which I would call "extraordinary"... they have, however, reasonably handled marriage which I would probably add to the "extraordinary" column. "Reasonably" because they have married someone who is their clone (of the opposite gender) so the marriage is actually an arrangement of interactive independence because they don't really "need" anything from each other in order to have their lives work. Sex is convenient, and safe ("safe" is real important in this scenario), but could be had without the marriage, and intimacy could be had in a superficial (and therefore less "messy") relationship or series of relationships so "sex" and "intimacy" aren't needed from the marriage. Are you getting the characterization here? Maybe this is what is meant by "metrosexual"... I don't have a personal experience or "picture" of what that word means. Anyway...

Suddenly, BOOM, pregnancy occurs. It isn't accidental (although you might suspect so from the characterizations above) but it there is all of the standard stupidity regarding the implications and magnitude that pregnancy involves for all rational people who leap into that cauldron. ("Pregnancy" would also be a word, with "marriage", that I would put into the "extraordinary" column with the word "war", being a survivor of all three.) There is few more insidious conditions than "pregnancy" (likewise "war" and "marriage") in terms of never being able to be prepared for the totality of the experience in terms of wear and tear on the physical, mental, and emotional states of the inflicted and those intimately linked with said inflicted; full-out and unlimited nuclear, biological, and chemical warfare... So into this "valley of the shadow of..." walks these two married metrosexuals...

Now uprooting (read "running") is not possible for the inflicted or the husband (we'll call him the "inflicter") without tremendous collateral consequences. Because the pregnancy was elected there is not going to be an abortion so there is no running for the inflicted. Because "competent" and "together" are important character descriptors of the inflicter and because he love her, there is no running for him. So the die is cast: dig in and endure for the next nine months. But what an ordeal - chemical and emotional changes occur that ravage the inflicted and run-ragged the inflicter. A deepening of the relationship occurs because it is truly these two against the unknown and uncontrollable situation and developing circumstances and dependency results from "need" rather than "choice". The inflicted is physically, at times, unable to take care of herself and the inflicter finds himself drawn, albeit voluntarily and willingly, into the role of defender and protector. The relationship grows together mightily and the inflicted grows more dependent and the inflicter begins to feel the insecurities of self-questioning "Am I enough for two over the long haul?"

Suddenly, BOOM, the baby is born. Both inflicted and inflicter are now number two and three, respectively, in this (now) "family" not in terms of relative, animal-world, terms of survival, but in terms of "need" and "vulnerability". Baby is totally defenseless and dependent upon mom for food to stay alive. Mom is tied to the baby in terms of choices of activity, sleep, and physio-chemical balance. Dad gets to provide for total security in all of the physical realities as well as be the counter-balance and leveler of all the emotional hysterics that surround a hijacking of a metrosexual one-on-one marriage. Dad also begins to have nigglings of "How am I going to teach the baby, raise the baby, protect the baby..." and on and on and on. Everything comes up for review; career, lifestyle, religion, politics, heritage, genetics...

Isn't it great that there are people these folks can turn to and find support in sorting things out?

Boxed, Trapped, Stuck, and Brass Rings

This entry isn't about Carousels but it is about Brass Rings and if you want to know how the two tie in together (which is the contextual framework of this entry) do some work on Wikipedia. This entry is also about boxed, trapped, and stuck; Boxed-In, Caught-In-A-Trap, and Stuck-In-The-Mud. Let's see if I can unravel how those scenarios and Brass Rings fit together.

There's a couple of people (perhaps hundreds) in my life who don't like the prime mechanism they've created to put food on the table, clothes on their back, gas in their car, and answer to the #1 cocktail chatter question; "What do you do?" They don't like their jobs. That isn't to say that they never liked their job, one of them I know did, but they don't like them now. Perhaps I am over- simplifying but saying they don't like their jobs. One of them likes their job just not the current arena and environment that he does his job. The other just would rather be doing another job. So maybe the most accurate way to describe the situation is that their is some discomfort in their jobness. I'm not talking about the kind of discomfort that ebbs and flows in all jobnesses, I'm talking about a real attitude that something else should be happening in the knocking-down-buffalo aspect of their life.

Their both making pretty good incomes so there are reasons for gratitude, especially looking at the economy du' jour but they're spending 35 - 50% of the peak hours of their life doing something that they would rather not do - if they had their rathers. But they don't have their rathers, they're stuck; in the box, in the trap, in the mud. They are both good-looking guys, plenty of personality (a little on the quirky side), and even appear to have above-average intelligence. You might ask why I say "appear to have above-average intelligence" if they spend such a huge amount of primetime life doing something they don't want to be doing. My answer to that "why" is my answer to all "why's" - "YES"!

My take on "why" they spend their life doing something they don't want to do is because they are afraid to breakthrough their life. They are afraid to go for the Brass Ring. See, the long-term reward for getting the Brass Ring is that you get another, free, ride on the Merry-Go-Round. The immediate gratification is "GOING FOR IT"; leaning way right of safety, putting "it" all on the line, being the initiator; moving to increase (and growth), and setting the course instead of following the course. I say "afraid to breakthrough their life" because I believe these gentlemen are convinced that "things could be worse" and to "rock the boat" could result in drowning (if they can't, or don't want to, swim). What grieves me is their apparent belief that "things couldn't be better", at least enough belief to find out. To add "overwhelming" to the tragedy of their not going for it, is the fact that both of these gentlemen have much more than half of their lives left to rebuild, should that be necessary, when in actuality they could just turn and go back to what they're doing now if they left to seek their dreams. Seems then that it just comes down to comfort and convenience; it's much more comfortable and convenient to be miserable than to set a new course. Go figure.

I really don't believe that the best thing to do is to throw all caution and rationality to the wind as a matter of course. I have a pretty strong addiction to yearning for feelings of security and if I ever found them I might possibly hold on to those feelings with both hands. What I have learned is that through the number of times that I have "put 'it' on the line" and succeeded that I have developed a self-trust that proves to be an incredible ally. I know that I can get through adversity, upset, and setbacks and am up to handling whatever life serves up for me. There have been times when I didn't believe it could get worse and times that I felt deep sorrow over the grief, pain, and discomfort I have caused others. I've experienced guilt, regret, and embarrassment for some of the things that I've done. The bad news, and the good news, about life is that there is no guarantees other than someday you are going to die and everything in between is an absolute "Do-It-Yourself" project in terms of happiness and sadness. If I was into advice, which, of course I'm not, I'd say follow The Eagles admonishment and "Take It To The Limit".

Why grow up?

Occasionally I'll get bounced with "What do I do with my kid, they won't get accountable about their life?" Being more honest, I get bounced just as often with "What do I do about my boyfriend/significant other, they won't get accountable about their life?" Both issues are different sides of the same coin which appears to be "they" won't get committed to having better results in their life. Let's leave aside, for now, the question begging to be asked, "According to who or what criteria?" and go with clarifying the basic premise. "They" are accountable for their life whether they choose to own that accountability or not; they're going to live it (or not) and they're going to lose it (for sure). Anything anyone other than themselves who does anything which substantially alters the course, weave, or ebb and flow of that life doesn't change the "owners" accountability for their life. It's a gravity issue, man, it's their life as long as the blood pumps and the clock ticks toward the end of that life. Gender, race, ethnicity, religious preference, sexual orientation, or whether or not they like garlic has nothing to do with the accountability for that life. Okay, so maybe they are an infant born in a white-intolerant society and within moments of that birth they are thrown against the wall by the delivering individual, or slain before they are eight years old; then, perhaps, they are not accountable for their short life... Other than those and other similarly bizarre circumstances, the individual gets complete accountability for everything in that life. Nothing anyone else does can compel folks to own accountability if they don't want to but, like I said, it's a gravity issue. (What's a "gravity issue"? When I fall down and hurt my butt I absolutely HATE gravity, but it doesn't matter that I hate it nor does my hate change anything. Get it?)

Now if we're talking about "responsibility" that is a little different, you see, "responsibility" is an active word whereas "accountability" is a passive word. Any action you take can have everything to do with responsibility for your life whereas any action you take has nothing to doing with accountability for your life. I've gotta run now, I'll get back to this in awhile.

"Everybody's doing it..."

I'm not going to rant about computer dating because I don't know anything about it. Truth be known, given that I met Dorothy when we were fourteen and have been married forty-one years, I don't know anything about any kind of dating... What I do have some pretty good experience about is human "socionomics" (made this word up just now to cover the amount of "true", "essential", and "honest" self people spend in interaction with other humans; please don't throw it around until I can write a book with the title "Human Socionomics - Budgetting Our Investment in Human Interactions", okay?)

What I've experienced is that what you "see" in an individual, with very, very, very few exceptions, is NOT what you get. For example; If a guy has a serious pornography problem he is probably not going to list that on his profile for eHarmony, do you think? The same would probably be true for pedophilia, necrophilia, methamphetamine addiction, alcoholism, sado-masochism (well, maybe that one...), bulimia, exhibitionism, kleptomania, or any of the thousands of other pathological "tender mercies" with which we humans personalize our lives. So how would you know that Ted Bundy-types were Ted Bundy-types until you met them in person and hung out with them? It has been my experience that the "quirk-challenged" go to extreme lengths to cover up, camouflage, or outright deny their "quirkiness d' jour" and it requires prescience to flush them out into the light of day. THAT only brings them to light, dealing with them is another matter (better thou were Job, huh?), and ending them is light years more complicated than that. Truth be known, most of the "quirko-extremes" listed above lead more to compromises than resolutions.

Given this scenario, then, when would the lucky computer-dating relationship lottery winner learn about the quirkiness d' jour and how long would it take to flush it into the light, and how long would it take to flush it into the light of day, and then how much longer to effect the compromise or solution? It seems that computer-dating is convenience oriented anyway, isn't it, so wouldn't the "fox-and-hound routine" pretty much leave only the "con" in convenience? I fully understand it is much easier to sit in front of one's computer and fantasize about finding Prince or Princess Charming at eHarmony than it is to get dressed and go out into the world and participate in life, doing something that edifies one's soul, and see who you meet at that function also edifying their soul. Either way, it seems, you are rolling the dice and it comes down to whether or not what comes up on the die is real anyway. It seems that if one is going to have to do the "human contact" aspect anyway why not just jump right into it? Would appear that the netherworld of "Cyber" would afford the terminally quirky to perfect their mask whereas the "running into people" at events brings spontaneity into the equation and my experience is that the kind of quirkiness we're discussing here is frustrated (or flushed out) by spontaneity...

But anyway, what do I know, right, I've been married forever and the only dating I did was hanging out in Dorothy's back yard until she agreed to marry me.

Next; "Commitment" is not about the time you spend, it's a line you cross!

Cyberlife

One of my major disgruntlements is the omnipresence of the cyberworld. Matchmaking, relationship supplement (sublimation), fortune telling, scheduling, shopping, schooling (reading, writing, and arithmetic), socializing, and the list goes on. What aspect of life cannot be found and fulfilled from your desktop or laptop oracle? Like everything, of course, it's a double-edged sword, there is good news and there is bad news. The good news is the amount of information that is available with a few keystrokes and at the speed of light. The bad news is the amount of de-humanizing and de-personalizing that results from being able to live in, essentially, a parallel world. The key, of course, is balance; does one spend as much time living in the "real" world as they do living in the "cyber" world?

As in everything that has to do with one's self-esteem and self-image a periodic regimen of self-assessment is necessary and a large measure of "honesty" is germane to that regimen. One as got to check for the balance in their life in terms of BOTH time spent and the focus of the time. Eight to ten hours spent at work is not the equivalent of eight to ten hours spent at an amusement park, shopping mall, or sightseeing with family members. Viewing a travelogue of Guatemala on one's computer is not the same as visiting Guatemala. Chatting online is not the same as chatting across a table, and so on. Looking at photographs of a handsome man or beautiful woman is not the same as engaging in face to face conversation with one. I suggest that one of these situations is not "as good as" the other. "Inconvenient", I'm afraid, has become synonymous with "impossible" and "convenience" has become synonymous with "commitment". "Hard" sets up a lot of internal dialogue centered around "worth it", "likelihood", and one's history of success or failure. Any way I look at it, however, such internal dialogues are more instances of convenience-seeking. It does require an unusual amount of self-honesty for one to tell the truth about how they spend their time and the quality of that expenditure.

I didn't grow up around computers and even television was something that was only sparsely viewed and then mostly just for a short period of time before bedtime or early Saturday morning cartoons over a bowl of Cheerios. During waking hours in winter and summer, and the shoulder seasons, I spent most of my time outside or engaged in interaction with friends or family; not The Disney Channel, The Baby Channel, Nintendo DS, Playstation 3, a cell phone, or the computer. Extended car travel meant sightseeing, games, arguments, or reading; not DVD players. My family and friends worked, played, lived, and interacted with each other. It is true that technology differences between then and now were significant but I believe that to blame our choices for how we spend our time on the availability of technology is another sign of de-humanization. The mountains are still there, the parks are still there, the ball fields are still there, the amusement parks are still there, the trails are still there, and the playgrounds are still there. Certainly more vigilance is required, but why has awareness become a catastrophic hardship? I'm not suggesting that we throw out all of the technology, I would be lost without it! What I am suggesting is balance through a little more commitment to getting to those outdoor social activities and perhaps being the sentinels who make the playgrounds, parks, and trails safe.

Discussing with my daughters the amount of time they allow their children to be on the computer doing Webkinz and Disney or playing with Playstation and Nintendo they respond, "What am I supposed to let them do?" They point out that they, from the time they were four years old, had the run of the neighborhood could go where they wanted, play with who they wanted, and never had to worry about their safety, and neither did their parents. They point out that they cannot let their children have the run of the neighborhood because of the bad guys that now prowl the playgrounds and neighborhoods. They can't even let one of them go into a public, or restaurant, restroom alone unless they are watching the door and have a stopwatch on the activity.

The great news about my daughters is that they interact with their children as they play in their electronic playworlds. They have a knowledge of what they are involved in, what they are up to, and the content of the sites they visit. They have even expressed some misgivings, and rightfully so as I see it, about some of the content and "values" that are beginning to appear on Disney-related media. Oh, if Walt could have just lived forever... When the kids slip into the world of Playstation, Nintendo DS, Xbox 360, and Wii is where the reins seem to get a little bit jerked out of hand; Lions and Tigers, and Commandos, oh no!

Next: "Everybody's doing it..." and War Games begets War.