Wednesday, September 28, 2005

My biggest fear is that I will have no impact.

Monday, September 26, 2005

Tragedies have a way of focusing individual dialogue on the meaning of life, particularly big ones like Hurricane Katrina and the tsunami... And inevitably, someone, or I should say, somemany begin to try and 'dialogue' about if we, as individuals, are doing "enough" to make the world a better place. The implication being something like, if you aren't volunteering, giving of time, money and/or resources then somehow you don't care or are, worse, useless and/or a malignant force in the universe.

It irks me. Not because I don't believe this isn't a valid line of questioning. But shouldn't we always be questioning what we are doing? I wonder what ever happened to being a good person? Why isn't being a good person contribution enough to society? And what do you tell a 3 year old is contribution enough to (his) world if being a good person isn't enough?

I think all line of reasoning should be simplified to a 3 year old level. If it doesn't make sense to a 3 year old then we are just making it too damn complicated, as we human beings are wont to do.

Here's my thinking. If you can't give money because you don't it; you can't give time because you don't have any to spare; if you can't give other resources because you have just enough for your own - are you automatically uncaring and not a good person? No! Duh! Because, its not just in hurricane zones where people have needs, its in all zones at all times. We all have a need to be respected, valued and cared about even if that doesn't include the sending of a care package. That's what good people do afterall, isn't it? Care at all times and do what they can to contribute always, even if it is a modest contribution like saying hello to the postal worker instead of just demanding stamps...

I know we are a 'do do do' society and the beef most people have at times like this is that it seems to translate into 'do for myself' often. It can seem like someone else has so much and you yourself have so little so why don't they give some of it up! And in the aftermath of a hurricane, I admit that I had more shampoo than many of the survivors did at first... But, that doesn't make my work, raising children, running a family and trying to get films made any less giving to society, does it?

And the whole talk of connecting, as long as we are talking about making connections with each other, with ourselved and not with our stuff, I suppose that is alright. But when making a connection, lending a hand, giving, is put in a way that elicits guilt, isn't that just as bad as being materialistic?

Clearly I am rambling... If I am making any sense responses welcome...

Thursday, September 22, 2005

Thanks to Anonymous who posts the following in response to the yearning for fame I mused about:

"Emotional and intellectual maturity should eventually kick in but for some reason this has not happened to far too many. Will the tide turn, will we learn what is important, did 9/11 give us a clue, Katrina show us how immune we've become to our fellow humans? Answers?"


Wondering if our national obsession with youth is coming back to bite us. When you sequester all your old people and ignore what they have to say, and believe that your parents are "like stupid" well into your 30s (because of course you have now people in their late 20s behaving like teens - because our country has such a lust for youth and all that is pretty), and most of what is "wowed" on TV is youth, beauty and wealth its pretty simple to lose perspective. Life is long and hard. We will all grow old if we are so lucky. Funnily enough, time and gravity works the same on everyone.

Question arises, is anyone growing old gracefully anymore?

When you spend alot of time alone, watching TV or going to movies, which I think a disproportionate number of Americans now do (I think it was my mom who noticed the statistic that now more than half of all Americans are single and live alone!!), you start to believe that the only interesting/important/worthy people are young and pretty and reeeeely reeely famous! No wonder all the old people tend to congregate together. Its probably less we shooed them away than that they just couldn't stand young people anymore. Which reminds me of the marker of adulthood I noticed I'd hit several years ago; You know you're old when 20-somethings start to irritate you.

So, what ever happened to Mike Douglas? (I don't mean him in particular, I mean his ilk.) What ever happened to talking to people who have actually accomplished something in their life, or have something interesting to say? Where are all the Nobel Prize winners being interviewed these days? Probably only in print, in small circulation magazines... because really who cares about science when
BritneeeSpeeers just had a baybeeeee! Uh mu God!

Monday, September 19, 2005

So, what do we think? Is blogging meant to say something of importance that has been burning within? Or really just to post pictures of your children so you can stop clogging up your relatives' and friends' emails? Or a mixture of both? Or maybe just a whine page... I think that mine will be for insomnia. I often wake up two or three times in the night... thinking. There are times when the brain beast can't be shut up... or sometimes its just the little one wanting nursed or me out of the way (yes, shocking, we sleep with our baby. People have done it for thousands of years, I can't understand why now its controversial... this is a whole other subject to be blogged about at some later date).

But I have been musing on why blog. And it occurs to me that it is just another way to feel important. OK, hackles down, I mean that in the best possible way. We all should feel important but doesn't it seems as if most of us may not anymore? Fifty years ago, how many really wanted to be famous? Now, doesn't everyone? Or seems like. Its no longer enough to be famous in your own life. No, for it really to count, one must be nationally recognized! On TV, in the paper is not even enough anymore!, in People Magazine! When did we all get so out of sorts on this issue? And what is ironic is that, most people, if they could really live the life of someone famous would probably not want it.

And it also occured to me, as I was thinking about this, that the only significant difference between being famous and now, say for instance for me, would be that there would be more insincere people in my life. If there was financial prosperity that went along with the fame I would be doing the exact same things, but in better clothes. I'd still have the same family, the same friends (I wouldn't trade the ones I got for none others!), the same kids, the same weight probably, the same face... and on and on... Same you, different stuff.

So, my only conclusion can be that in our individual lives we feel insignificant, a hole, that we feel fame - adulation from somewhere else - would fill. Its sad. Maybe we are too dispersed. I met James Howard Kunstler (http://www.kunstler.com/) when I was going to graduate school in SDSU, when I worked as the Speaker Coordinator on a conference held by the International Center for Communications housed on that campus. He was the keynote speaker and blew the audience away... not in the way they would have liked, 'they' being a bunch of conservative businessmen and women. James is the sort of anti-businessman. Not that he wants there not to be any, but that he doesn't believe the paradigm can last. We are too far afield from what is important. I certainly feel disjointed being so far away from most of my friends. But also things that we as humans cling to but may not quite consciously realize, like a Whole Foods, a park, a neighborhood street with houses you like to look at, a favorite burrito place. Life used to be encased in a little community and that was where you found your importance, your feelings of belonging and self-worth. Now that we are so seperated we cling to images and ideas that stir us, like Oh, wouldn't it be great to win the lottery and buy a big house. Could it just be possible that what we really all want, what we really all need, is a little company now and then?

Wednesday, September 14, 2005

OK. And now reading my own post I find that, in light of all the tragedy in the world, I sound quite whiny. Gross and apologies all around...
You ever feel like there must be a sea change coming and then it doesn't happen... here is my beef for the day. I am a big one for affirmations and taking personal responsibility for your actions and eating right and taking your vitamins and... but at some point, despite all the optimism you were able to generate out of thin air, you just need results!

I don't think I need to go into my myriad petty frustrations {INSERT COMPLAINT HERE}... you all can relate, anyone can relate. I just want to know when things are gonna start to happen!