This is a hotel that has pretty much all the pieces to make for a good hotel, but they don’t quite fit. The hotel is terraced and wraps around a hillside, which gives all of its rooms good views, and the rooms are a nice size (time for some new TV’s though). But the terracing robs the hotel of a natural center of activity because the lobby is so far from the spa, pool and beach and associated restaurants as to require a shuttle or a lot of stairs.
The pool is huge and beautiful, but the water is too cold so in the week I stayed here I never saw more than a few scattered people in it. The beach is small but nice; the ocean bottom is too rocky (coral-y I guess) to comfortably walk into the water. There always seem to be enough lounge chairs available. There’s a lovely rooftop terrace that would be a nice place to sit if there were any chairs.
The food is pretty good, but the service is atrocious, and though the all-inclusive plan includes what they call 7 different restaurants, there are never more than 2 or 3 available, in part because one restaurant is called 3 different things. The reservations-only restaurant, Baci, had no busboys when we ate there, so the hostess would disappear for 5 minutes every time a table turned so she could clear and re-set it. It took a good 15 minutes for us to be seated at a table that had been empty since we’d arrived. When we ate at Manor House, the main restaurant, our waiter failed to tell us there were specials and disappeared for long periods of time. At breakfast, it was hard to find a waitress once we were seated. The one espresso machine in the place (not all-included) broke the day we arrived and never got fixed (Our favorite line: Q: When will the espresso machine be fixed? A: It only broke yesterday). As a result we ended up eating dinner out a couple of times.
A few more details: We chose the hotel in large part because of its spa. I didn’t use the spa myself but my family members who did said it was great as advertised. The workout room was nice and well-equipped. Vernill at the Tour Desk was wonderful.
The hotel is what they call “cat-friendly,” which means the outside areas are crawling with them. They’re cute and don’t bother you, but don’t come here if you hate cats.
The safe in our room malfunctioned twice. When we first arrived it was stuck open. More scarily, two hours before we were set to leave it locked itself and refused to open. A security worker finally got it to open an hour later and I carried our valuables with us for the rest of the time. The front desk then tried to charge me for the phone calls he made from the room trying to make the safe operational.
Make sure to join the Wyndham ByRequest before you go. It's the only way to get free wireless internet.
Friday, December 31, 2010
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
One of the really good ones is gone
A good friend of mine died last night. If you divide your friends up by how often you see them, Mike was not someone I saw often at all. It had been a couple of years at least. But if you divide friends by how close they are to your heart, he was right there with the best of them.
My friend Mike was the sweetest, gentlest, nicest man I've ever known. I know people sometimes say I'm nice but I couldn't touch Mike on my best day. I met him in 1975 (maybe a bit before but I don't remember for sure) when I worked with him on a summer job in our company's office in Brea, CA. He was the chief technician for that office and eventually the entire company and was about 10 years older than me. Mike was a geek before geekiness was cool. He was a tinkerer, an audio freak who loved music but loved the gear a little bit more and a ham radio operator, and he was brilliant around a circuit board. At that time he had 4 sons and a wife he would divorce shortly thereafter.
Mike was fun to hang out with. He had lots of interesting stories from his days in the military as a communications officer in Vietnam. But I loved him from the start because he was a contemplative, perceptive soul with a permanent smile, a mischievous streak and a love of good Scotch. When I had my first go-round working for my father, he was the one person who could settle me down when the family/business stuff started to close in on me. He was selfless and generous and boundlessly caring for those he loved.
I was lucky enough to be present when Mike met the love of his life, Louise, and got to spend many happy times with them during the early days of their romance. They were the cutest couple ever, just a shade over 10 feet tall between the two of them. I can still remember how their faces lit up when they talked about each other then, and even after 20 years.
Mike emailed me this summer and told me he had been diagnosed with leukemia. It didn't respond to treatment and it was a steady downhill path to yesterday. I haven't seen him much since we stopped working together, but I still feel a huge loss at his passing.
Rest in peace, my friend. I know you wouldn't want anyone to mourn, but I'll have to admit I did that a little. But I'll celebrate your life from now to New Years and beyond.
My friend Mike was the sweetest, gentlest, nicest man I've ever known. I know people sometimes say I'm nice but I couldn't touch Mike on my best day. I met him in 1975 (maybe a bit before but I don't remember for sure) when I worked with him on a summer job in our company's office in Brea, CA. He was the chief technician for that office and eventually the entire company and was about 10 years older than me. Mike was a geek before geekiness was cool. He was a tinkerer, an audio freak who loved music but loved the gear a little bit more and a ham radio operator, and he was brilliant around a circuit board. At that time he had 4 sons and a wife he would divorce shortly thereafter.
Mike was fun to hang out with. He had lots of interesting stories from his days in the military as a communications officer in Vietnam. But I loved him from the start because he was a contemplative, perceptive soul with a permanent smile, a mischievous streak and a love of good Scotch. When I had my first go-round working for my father, he was the one person who could settle me down when the family/business stuff started to close in on me. He was selfless and generous and boundlessly caring for those he loved.
I was lucky enough to be present when Mike met the love of his life, Louise, and got to spend many happy times with them during the early days of their romance. They were the cutest couple ever, just a shade over 10 feet tall between the two of them. I can still remember how their faces lit up when they talked about each other then, and even after 20 years.
Mike emailed me this summer and told me he had been diagnosed with leukemia. It didn't respond to treatment and it was a steady downhill path to yesterday. I haven't seen him much since we stopped working together, but I still feel a huge loss at his passing.
Rest in peace, my friend. I know you wouldn't want anyone to mourn, but I'll have to admit I did that a little. But I'll celebrate your life from now to New Years and beyond.
Monday, December 27, 2010
Scattered thoughts from vacation
I think the problem with this hotel is that it has no center. The closest thing to a hub is the pool area, but that's a couple of elevator rides and a hundred stairs down from our room. The lobby is a whole separate space, far from the pool. So there isn't any place for the guests to gather and feel like they're all someplace together.
And the food setup leaves a bit to be desired too. The breakfast is okay, though they run out of things by the end. Lunch and dinner is pretty scattered though. The first night we had a buffet which wasn't bad. Second night the kids were sunburned and unhappy and so we got pizza for the room. Tonight we went to the main restaurant for the resort and had a truly odd meal. First, there was Christmas music playing over the restaurant sound system, but at the same time there was a Jewish event of some sort going on in the private dining room, complete with a DJ and professional sound system and dancing. So for the first part of dinner, we had these two competing strains of music going simultaneously, but the Jewish music kept getting louder and louder until by the time they got to Oseh Shalom and Hava Negilah you really could hear very little else in the dining room, including conversation.
We didn't mind this that much, of course, it was just like any Bar Mitzvah. Not so sure about the Gentile contingent though. This weirdness was supplemented by as bad a waiter service as I've ever experienced. There wasn't anything laughably bad. It was just plain and simple bad. Slow, inattentive, didn't tell us about the specials, dropped a tray that thankfully (or not) didn't contain our meals. The food itself was mediocre and such small portions.
Part of the awkwardness/charm of going to these kinds of places is that there is such an obvious disconnect between the affluence and sensibility of the clientele and the staff. Life in the tropics is slow and easy, which is as much of an attraction sometimes as the weather. On the other hand, the people are poor and there sometimes seems to be some tension below the surface. I'm not sure if there are any islands around here where that is not the case.
I went for a walk yesterday, which made me the object of some curiosity, but I always go for walks, wherever we are. Here, there are no sidewalks and the roads are just wide enough to fit cars going in both directions, so walking along the road has a sense of excitement it might not have elsewhere. I never exactly had to jump out of the way of a car, but I did have to be strategic about where and how I walked. There was absolutely nothing to see on the walk, though I did eventually reach a nice little beach, and there was a very peculiar looking cemetery that looked kind of like a morgue set-up with a bunch of slots, some of which were covered up and with wreathes on them.
And the food setup leaves a bit to be desired too. The breakfast is okay, though they run out of things by the end. Lunch and dinner is pretty scattered though. The first night we had a buffet which wasn't bad. Second night the kids were sunburned and unhappy and so we got pizza for the room. Tonight we went to the main restaurant for the resort and had a truly odd meal. First, there was Christmas music playing over the restaurant sound system, but at the same time there was a Jewish event of some sort going on in the private dining room, complete with a DJ and professional sound system and dancing. So for the first part of dinner, we had these two competing strains of music going simultaneously, but the Jewish music kept getting louder and louder until by the time they got to Oseh Shalom and Hava Negilah you really could hear very little else in the dining room, including conversation.
We didn't mind this that much, of course, it was just like any Bar Mitzvah. Not so sure about the Gentile contingent though. This weirdness was supplemented by as bad a waiter service as I've ever experienced. There wasn't anything laughably bad. It was just plain and simple bad. Slow, inattentive, didn't tell us about the specials, dropped a tray that thankfully (or not) didn't contain our meals. The food itself was mediocre and such small portions.
Part of the awkwardness/charm of going to these kinds of places is that there is such an obvious disconnect between the affluence and sensibility of the clientele and the staff. Life in the tropics is slow and easy, which is as much of an attraction sometimes as the weather. On the other hand, the people are poor and there sometimes seems to be some tension below the surface. I'm not sure if there are any islands around here where that is not the case.
I went for a walk yesterday, which made me the object of some curiosity, but I always go for walks, wherever we are. Here, there are no sidewalks and the roads are just wide enough to fit cars going in both directions, so walking along the road has a sense of excitement it might not have elsewhere. I never exactly had to jump out of the way of a car, but I did have to be strategic about where and how I walked. There was absolutely nothing to see on the walk, though I did eventually reach a nice little beach, and there was a very peculiar looking cemetery that looked kind of like a morgue set-up with a bunch of slots, some of which were covered up and with wreathes on them.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
When I was a teenager/young adult, my family would go on these very nice vacations around the holidays. Once we got to whatever resort there was, I would pretty much see my parents at breakfast and dinner and that's about it. The rest of the time I'd find whatever group of younger people existed and hang out with them the whole time. This caused some occasional difficulties, like when we were supposed to leave for the airport and instead of packing I went with the other kids and drank several pina coladas instead of packing. That incident is now a family legend, but overall, it worked very nicely.
Needless to say, when my kids were younger I used to look forward to the days when they became teenagers and would go off by themselves when we were on vacation, leaving my wife and I to relax and spend some time together.
However, like everything else, this type of thing has been ruined by us baby boomers. Thanks to years of participating only in organized, parent-managed activities, my kids and all the other teenagers I've observed over the years stick with their families. I cannot think of a single instance where my kids, who are 16 and 19, have wandered off or just decided that they didn't want to hang out with their parents. Maybe my brain is muddled by the bright sunshine, but I seem to remember that back at home, our presence is considered more of an intrusion than a necessity.
What it comes down to for me is that if I want some quiet time, I either have to get up before everyone else or announce that I want to go do something that I know nobody else wants to do. The latter is harder than you'd think though, and I sometimes suspect if I said I wanted to go to Pick Up and Snuggle Disgusting Creature Land, that my kids would still rather do that than be left to their own devices.
I'm quite sure that the difference is generational, that because my play time when I was a kid consisted of walking outside, seeing if anyone else was there, and then knocking on doors if there wasn't anyone, I was ready to act in a similar fashion on vacation. Now, in the age of playdates and Mommy and Me, the idea of independently finding your own fun is foreign. I think that's a shame and it reminds me of a line from one of my favorite movies, State and Main. Discussing country living, one of the characters says that they make their own fun, because "If you don't make your own fun it's not fun, it's entertainment." Wise words, I think.
Needless to say, when my kids were younger I used to look forward to the days when they became teenagers and would go off by themselves when we were on vacation, leaving my wife and I to relax and spend some time together.
However, like everything else, this type of thing has been ruined by us baby boomers. Thanks to years of participating only in organized, parent-managed activities, my kids and all the other teenagers I've observed over the years stick with their families. I cannot think of a single instance where my kids, who are 16 and 19, have wandered off or just decided that they didn't want to hang out with their parents. Maybe my brain is muddled by the bright sunshine, but I seem to remember that back at home, our presence is considered more of an intrusion than a necessity.
What it comes down to for me is that if I want some quiet time, I either have to get up before everyone else or announce that I want to go do something that I know nobody else wants to do. The latter is harder than you'd think though, and I sometimes suspect if I said I wanted to go to Pick Up and Snuggle Disgusting Creature Land, that my kids would still rather do that than be left to their own devices.
I'm quite sure that the difference is generational, that because my play time when I was a kid consisted of walking outside, seeing if anyone else was there, and then knocking on doors if there wasn't anyone, I was ready to act in a similar fashion on vacation. Now, in the age of playdates and Mommy and Me, the idea of independently finding your own fun is foreign. I think that's a shame and it reminds me of a line from one of my favorite movies, State and Main. Discussing country living, one of the characters says that they make their own fun, because "If you don't make your own fun it's not fun, it's entertainment." Wise words, I think.
Friday, December 24, 2010
So let's talk about this hotel a little
I've stayed in a bunch of hotels. Hotels are funny things, full of what they call rooms that are unlike any other kind of room in any kind of house, unless you have a room with a teeny balcony, individual climate control, a bathroom, a TV housed in a dresser, and a small refrigerator full of drinks and snacks that you can purchase for an outrageous fee.
One of the nice things about traveling to places that are out of the way or in less populated areas is that they tend to be more idiosyncratic. Major chain hotels in big cities and suburbs tend to be remarkably the same. I remember that Stevie Wonder, the blind singer, always stayed in Holiday Inns because all the rooms are identical.
In the Caribbean, however, even the chain hotels have their oddities. We're staying at a Wyndham hotel. I don't know much about Wyndham hotels. It's pleasant to say and it has the kind of upscale sound one might come up with someone were trying to name a hotel, like Otis Spunkmeyer (which was made up by the owner's kid) or Mr. Clean, (one should note that Orville Redenbacher was a real person).
Okay, we just had an earthquake, but I will neither give credit nor blame that on the hotel, since I'm guessing people in other locales (like Puerto Rico, where it was centered).
I've stayed in a bunch of hotels. Hotels are funny things, full of what they call rooms that are unlike any other kind of room in any kind of house, unless you have a room with a teeny balcony, individual climate control, a bathroom, a TV housed in a dresser, and a small refrigerator full of drinks and snacks that you can purchase for an outrageous fee.
I've stayed in a bunch of hotels. Hotels are funny things, full of what they call rooms that are unlike any other kind of room in any kind of house, unless you have a room with a teeny balcony, individual climate control, a bathroom, a TV housed in a dresser, and a small refrigerator full of drinks and snacks that you can purchase for an outrageous fee.
One of the nice things about traveling to places that are out of the way or in less populated areas is that they tend to be more idiosyncratic. Major chain hotels in big cities and suburbs tend to be remarkably the same. I remember that Stevie Wonder, the blind singer, always stayed in Holiday Inns because all the rooms are identical.
In the Caribbean, however, even the chain hotels have their oddities. We're staying at a Wyndham hotel. I don't know much about Wyndham hotels. It's pleasant to say and it has the kind of upscale sound one might come up with someone were trying to name a hotel, like Otis Spunkmeyer (which was made up by the owner's kid) or Mr. Clean, (one should note that Orville Redenbacher was a real person).
Okay, we just had an earthquake, but I will neither give credit nor blame that on the hotel, since I'm guessing people in other locales (like Puerto Rico, where it was centered).
Walk around that level until you arrive at another elevator, which takes you down to the stairs (99 they say) that take you down to the beach.
Along the way, you may be struck by the large number of cats you see. Yes, cats. At one point there is a sign that says you are in a "cat-friendly" hotel and that they are spayed, fed and cared for. This doesn't really explain the one staring up at us as we ate dinner the other night, but okay. At least they're not eating the iguanas. I've gone back and looked at the hotel's description and there's nothing about cats mentioned. I'm guessing that if you were a hotel you wouldn't mention that there were a couple of dozen cats roaming the property, properly cared for or not.
This is what is called an "all-inclusive" hotel. This means that all of your food and drinks are included, except for whatever isn't (lobsters, lattes, laxatives). It also means that you're given incentive not to eat out. I don't love eating out so that's not a huge deal. But how much buffet food can one eat, even if it's not bad.
And I'm very upset because I missed coconut bowling yesterday.
Thursday, December 23, 2010
I feel like I’ve written about airports and traveling so many times that there’s nothing left to say. There’s two basic kinds of airport experiences- when you’re in a hurry and when you’re not. When you’re not in a hurry, airports are usually boring, vaguely unpleasant places with too many places to buy bad food and not enough chairs. When you’re running late, airports are exciting and magically grow larger at a rate inversely proportional to how much time you have to get to the gate. Of late, I seem to pick the time to arrive at the airport when nobody else is there. Today is December 23, one of the busiest travel days of the year, and we arrived at the airport to find exactly zero people on line at the curbside check-in. This, of course left us with well over an hour before our flight boards. We then strategically planned out time usage so that we could ultimately end up rushing to board at the last minute.
The big discovery I made this morning was that my USAirways credit card, for which I pay what I consider to be an exorbitant amount, qualifies me to not have to pay to check luggage. I did not know this. I typically either fly Southwest or do carry-on only, but traveling with 3 females makes this completely impractical. Let’s just say that there is no a direct correlation between the size of the person and the size of their bag. But the free baggage checking more than covers the cost of the credit card.
Next, of course, came the security thing. We stood in line, debating whether to get scanned or felt up. Since I get patted down every time I go to a ballgame (though exactly what they’re looking for and how they can tell if I have it by touching my pants for a second I’m not sure), I enthusiastically voted in favor of the feel.
I should note that I think this whole thing is stupid. They’re doing this stuff now because that was what the last would-be terrorist did. Hopefully, next time the perpetrators will hide stuff in their hair because I don’t have enough hair to make a scalp search necessary. For the moment, though, I’m willing to bet on their being only a tiny percentage of TSA folks who are doing the patdowns because they enjoy them. Plus, I don’t get the big deal. Is it degrading? I guess if it makes you feel degraded then it’s degrading, but I’m not convinced that there are many inherently degrading things, and this doesn’t strike me as one of them.
But ultimately, the only person called out was my 16 year-old daughter who was wearing one of those oversized sweatshirts that look cute on teenage girls and nobody else. Somebody called out “enhanced!” and they quickly penned her up between some of those fabric row dividers like they use to make you shuttle back and forth on line. A small woman came over and checked around the sweatshirt in a not sketchy way, joking with my completely unfazed daughter the whole time.
We then walked to the gate. I’m not wearing a pedometer, though I bet there’s an app on my phone for it, but it must have been a half mile from security to the gate. This was because USAirways makes you check in in one terminal, even if the flight’s gate is in another terminal. Plus, we were in the international terminal, where they have to space things out to make room for those passageways that make you feel like cattle when you arrive from a foreign destination.
We made the usual futile attempts to find decent food, only to discover that they were boarding the flight 15 minutes early. So of course we had to go rushing to the gate.
My favorite news story of the year is now the NY Jets foot fetish story, where the coach has these videos of his wife’s feet or something like that. To be honest, when this started, I thought they were still talking about the coach who tripped a player during a game because that was sort of about feet too. But now I see NY Post headlines like “Distressed Jets Coach Bares His Sole!” I don’t personally care about feet one way or another. As long as my own feet don’t hurt, that’s about all I think of them. On other people, I guess nice looking feet are nice, but not necessarily any more so than nice looking anything else. Others may feel differently.
Flight update: One of the bathrooms in the coach compartment is broken. Presuming the flight is full, this leaves one bathroom for 162 people on a 3 1/2 hour flight. Our seats are right next to the bathroom and I’m sitting on the aisle, so the area right in front of my seat is probably the most action-packed place on the plane. There’s been a line ranging from 2 to 6 people here for an hour and a half, including one guy who’s about 6’ 7” whose been here twice and seems to stay in there for a really long time. I wonder if it takes longer for him to pee because he’s further up.
In my capacity of logistics manager for our trips, it’s my job to worry about whether everything is going okay. Now that we’re on the plane, the worrying shifts to what the hotel will be like. If we were someplace larger, I’d be worried about getting to the hotel, but St. Thomas is small and we have rolling bags so I’m guessing we could walk to the hotel by nightfall if we had to. Really, what I’m waiting for is the reaction from my kids when they realize that the guest rooms don’t have wireless Internet.
The big discovery I made this morning was that my USAirways credit card, for which I pay what I consider to be an exorbitant amount, qualifies me to not have to pay to check luggage. I did not know this. I typically either fly Southwest or do carry-on only, but traveling with 3 females makes this completely impractical. Let’s just say that there is no a direct correlation between the size of the person and the size of their bag. But the free baggage checking more than covers the cost of the credit card.
Next, of course, came the security thing. We stood in line, debating whether to get scanned or felt up. Since I get patted down every time I go to a ballgame (though exactly what they’re looking for and how they can tell if I have it by touching my pants for a second I’m not sure), I enthusiastically voted in favor of the feel.
I should note that I think this whole thing is stupid. They’re doing this stuff now because that was what the last would-be terrorist did. Hopefully, next time the perpetrators will hide stuff in their hair because I don’t have enough hair to make a scalp search necessary. For the moment, though, I’m willing to bet on their being only a tiny percentage of TSA folks who are doing the patdowns because they enjoy them. Plus, I don’t get the big deal. Is it degrading? I guess if it makes you feel degraded then it’s degrading, but I’m not convinced that there are many inherently degrading things, and this doesn’t strike me as one of them.
But ultimately, the only person called out was my 16 year-old daughter who was wearing one of those oversized sweatshirts that look cute on teenage girls and nobody else. Somebody called out “enhanced!” and they quickly penned her up between some of those fabric row dividers like they use to make you shuttle back and forth on line. A small woman came over and checked around the sweatshirt in a not sketchy way, joking with my completely unfazed daughter the whole time.
We then walked to the gate. I’m not wearing a pedometer, though I bet there’s an app on my phone for it, but it must have been a half mile from security to the gate. This was because USAirways makes you check in in one terminal, even if the flight’s gate is in another terminal. Plus, we were in the international terminal, where they have to space things out to make room for those passageways that make you feel like cattle when you arrive from a foreign destination.
We made the usual futile attempts to find decent food, only to discover that they were boarding the flight 15 minutes early. So of course we had to go rushing to the gate.
My favorite news story of the year is now the NY Jets foot fetish story, where the coach has these videos of his wife’s feet or something like that. To be honest, when this started, I thought they were still talking about the coach who tripped a player during a game because that was sort of about feet too. But now I see NY Post headlines like “Distressed Jets Coach Bares His Sole!” I don’t personally care about feet one way or another. As long as my own feet don’t hurt, that’s about all I think of them. On other people, I guess nice looking feet are nice, but not necessarily any more so than nice looking anything else. Others may feel differently.
Flight update: One of the bathrooms in the coach compartment is broken. Presuming the flight is full, this leaves one bathroom for 162 people on a 3 1/2 hour flight. Our seats are right next to the bathroom and I’m sitting on the aisle, so the area right in front of my seat is probably the most action-packed place on the plane. There’s been a line ranging from 2 to 6 people here for an hour and a half, including one guy who’s about 6’ 7” whose been here twice and seems to stay in there for a really long time. I wonder if it takes longer for him to pee because he’s further up.
In my capacity of logistics manager for our trips, it’s my job to worry about whether everything is going okay. Now that we’re on the plane, the worrying shifts to what the hotel will be like. If we were someplace larger, I’d be worried about getting to the hotel, but St. Thomas is small and we have rolling bags so I’m guessing we could walk to the hotel by nightfall if we had to. Really, what I’m waiting for is the reaction from my kids when they realize that the guest rooms don’t have wireless Internet.
Monday, December 20, 2010
Strategic planning
I was out walking my dog this evening. We've had this dog ofr 12 years. She's a Welsh Corgi and very cute. She does enough annoying stuff (mostly barking and occasionally peeing indoors) that I don't LOOOVVVEEE her, but she's okay, and it's dawned on me that the only time I really see my neighbors is when I walk the dog. In fact, when we had our neighborhood Hanukkah party, I said to someone, "It's nice to see you indoors."
So tonight I'm out walking her and my next door neighbor is out with his dog. And he asks me if I'm going to watch the eclipse of the moon. Now I'm crazy about eclipses. Last time there was one I watched almost the whole thing. They're almost as much fun as meteor showers and much less frequent. So I say that I'd like to but it's at 3:00 in the morning, so I'm not sure if I should set my alarm or if I should just hope I get up. And he says he figures if he gets up to go to the bathroom around that time that he'll come outside.
I really don't want to go outside and see my neighbor going to the bathroom, but I'm not sure that's what he means. He may mean that he'll go to the bathroom in the bathroom and then go outside. So I started thinking, maybe I'll just drink lots and lots of water before I go to bed and then maybe Mother Nature's alarm clock will get me up at the right time. I wonder if that will work? Worth a try, I suppose.
So tonight I'm out walking her and my next door neighbor is out with his dog. And he asks me if I'm going to watch the eclipse of the moon. Now I'm crazy about eclipses. Last time there was one I watched almost the whole thing. They're almost as much fun as meteor showers and much less frequent. So I say that I'd like to but it's at 3:00 in the morning, so I'm not sure if I should set my alarm or if I should just hope I get up. And he says he figures if he gets up to go to the bathroom around that time that he'll come outside.
I really don't want to go outside and see my neighbor going to the bathroom, but I'm not sure that's what he means. He may mean that he'll go to the bathroom in the bathroom and then go outside. So I started thinking, maybe I'll just drink lots and lots of water before I go to bed and then maybe Mother Nature's alarm clock will get me up at the right time. I wonder if that will work? Worth a try, I suppose.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
As a Phillies fan, there's a lot to like about getting Cliff Lee back. As a baseball fan, perhaps the best part is the chaos it causes. Lee was to be the big prize for either the Yankees or the Rangers, but they both knew that one of them would lose out, so I'm sure each of them had a Plan B. But I'm pretty sure they never expected to both have to use their Plan B. There's a cascading effect that will ripple through every team's offseason in unexpected way, which will absolutely make it all more fun to watch.
I always find this kind of thing appealing. One of the reasons I like teaching is the potential for chaos. I know that in a formal lecture situation, you can plan down to the minute what you want to say and present. This has no appeal to me. I love the give and take about ideas, mathematical or otherwise. And who better to provide chaos than a bunch of teenagers? And finding the sweet spot where order and entropy are in perfect balance is always my goal.
Chaos makes you think on your feet, to be ready to react, respond, and advance based on whatever just happened. It's a lot like improvisation. In improv, the first rule is that whatever somebody says or does is a gift and that you accept it and give something in return. You never reject it, even if it's funny. So in a math class, if somebody calls out 7 when the answer should be the square root of 11, the proper response is never "No," it's "So how did you get that?" One is a dead end. The other is a journey. And the best part of journeys is the unexpected stuff you run into along the way.
One of the most fun parts of my last cross country drives was when my wife and I were driving through west Texas, which is very big and very flat. It was getting dusky and we decided to cut a corner on a back road. We were cruising along when suddenly, up ahead, we saw a cow standing perfectly in the middle of the road. We were at least 25 miles down this road, there were muddy ditches on both side of the road and nothing else around, and there was no way I was going to try to squeeze the minivan around the cow, so we stopped. We honked the horn a couple of times, as if a cow would know what that means. I love cows but they are unbelievably stupid, especially about motor vehicle courtesy.
So we got out of the car. It was getting dark and a full moon was rising. It was quiet and desolate and beautiful in a barren sort of way (which is an exquisite sort of beauty if you're open to it). Just us, the car, the moon and the cow. And after about 15 minutes, the cow moved. I was going to write, 'decided to move,' but I'm pretty sure that cows never decide anything. They just do. And we were on our way, and I still remember it 25 years later.
Maybe a math class isn't as memorable as that, but when I walk out of the room at the end of the period, what I'm thinking about is never the planned part of the lesson, it's the unplanned parts and all the discussions that sprung from them.
I always find this kind of thing appealing. One of the reasons I like teaching is the potential for chaos. I know that in a formal lecture situation, you can plan down to the minute what you want to say and present. This has no appeal to me. I love the give and take about ideas, mathematical or otherwise. And who better to provide chaos than a bunch of teenagers? And finding the sweet spot where order and entropy are in perfect balance is always my goal.
Chaos makes you think on your feet, to be ready to react, respond, and advance based on whatever just happened. It's a lot like improvisation. In improv, the first rule is that whatever somebody says or does is a gift and that you accept it and give something in return. You never reject it, even if it's funny. So in a math class, if somebody calls out 7 when the answer should be the square root of 11, the proper response is never "No," it's "So how did you get that?" One is a dead end. The other is a journey. And the best part of journeys is the unexpected stuff you run into along the way.
One of the most fun parts of my last cross country drives was when my wife and I were driving through west Texas, which is very big and very flat. It was getting dusky and we decided to cut a corner on a back road. We were cruising along when suddenly, up ahead, we saw a cow standing perfectly in the middle of the road. We were at least 25 miles down this road, there were muddy ditches on both side of the road and nothing else around, and there was no way I was going to try to squeeze the minivan around the cow, so we stopped. We honked the horn a couple of times, as if a cow would know what that means. I love cows but they are unbelievably stupid, especially about motor vehicle courtesy.
So we got out of the car. It was getting dark and a full moon was rising. It was quiet and desolate and beautiful in a barren sort of way (which is an exquisite sort of beauty if you're open to it). Just us, the car, the moon and the cow. And after about 15 minutes, the cow moved. I was going to write, 'decided to move,' but I'm pretty sure that cows never decide anything. They just do. And we were on our way, and I still remember it 25 years later.
Maybe a math class isn't as memorable as that, but when I walk out of the room at the end of the period, what I'm thinking about is never the planned part of the lesson, it's the unplanned parts and all the discussions that sprung from them.
Sunday, December 12, 2010
Simpler ain't always better
This is going to be an interesting couple of years, politically. The Tea Party movement, which is fueled by nothing more than anger at things that range from vague to nonexistent, is now faced with something it never really wanted to do, that being governing. There are many avenues of stupidity to explore in the tea party "platform," if you can call it that, but I'd like to focus for a moment on what is the central point of their so-called "governing philosophy" (I'm already tired of using quotation marks, so excuse any format weirdness to come). That is to CUT TAXES.
Clearly, nobody likes taxes. They take money out of your pocket for, well, who knows what? The thing is, though, that taxes pay for stuff you want. Roads, airports and public transit, police, sewer, garbage disposal, schools (I am purposely leaving national defense aside, but that too). Public services. Things that are paid for and used by the public at large. This is by and large the kind of stuff you pay for when you pay taxes. But these are generalized things, things that you have no ownership feelings toward, as opposed to your money, which is, well, YOUR MONEY!
So the debate, if one is going about it in a logical and truthful fashion, as opposed to what the current Teapublican Party is doing, is between taxes and services. It's always been about taxes and services because that what taxes pay for. And at least in the current environment, it's cutting taxes versus maintaining or improving services. This is a debate that cutting taxes usually wins in the public forum. Why? Because it's a better argument? Absolutely not. Because it's a simpler argument.
Taxes are money directly away from you. Services are shared, and nobody uses all of them. People take services for granted. You use them when you need them. This makes it way too easy for tax cutters to give a laundry list of services, none of which could possibly apply to any one person or small group. So those people can conclude that services are wasteful and needless, because every such laundry list contains many services that they don't personally need at that moment. It's not technically lying, but it's not truthful either.
It's pretty much impossible for anyone to quantify the value of the services that they receive for their tax dollars, both because there are so many of them and because they're not stuff you can go out and buy. Taxes are easily quantified. Argument over, because the other side of it is too complicated to analyze on TV. I worked in marketing long enough to trust the consumer to make choices that are the best for them, But that's assuming that they have the information they need to make a proper decision. That's simply not the case here, where tax cut shouting drowns out everything else.
It's pretty frustrating for someone who is trying to look at this in a thoughtful manner. The first sign of the ramifications of tax cuts as a core policy is taking place in Nassau County, NY, where the newly elected tea partier in charge cut taxes, in spite of a budget deficit, sending the county to the brink of bankruptcy. And it's only a month after the election. And he's only doing what he promised to do.
So how long before people understand the consequences of what they're doing and learn to properly value the services they expect and want? That's what'll have to happen before people start making wise choices at the ballot box. I'm not holding my breath.
Clearly, nobody likes taxes. They take money out of your pocket for, well, who knows what? The thing is, though, that taxes pay for stuff you want. Roads, airports and public transit, police, sewer, garbage disposal, schools (I am purposely leaving national defense aside, but that too). Public services. Things that are paid for and used by the public at large. This is by and large the kind of stuff you pay for when you pay taxes. But these are generalized things, things that you have no ownership feelings toward, as opposed to your money, which is, well, YOUR MONEY!
So the debate, if one is going about it in a logical and truthful fashion, as opposed to what the current Teapublican Party is doing, is between taxes and services. It's always been about taxes and services because that what taxes pay for. And at least in the current environment, it's cutting taxes versus maintaining or improving services. This is a debate that cutting taxes usually wins in the public forum. Why? Because it's a better argument? Absolutely not. Because it's a simpler argument.
Taxes are money directly away from you. Services are shared, and nobody uses all of them. People take services for granted. You use them when you need them. This makes it way too easy for tax cutters to give a laundry list of services, none of which could possibly apply to any one person or small group. So those people can conclude that services are wasteful and needless, because every such laundry list contains many services that they don't personally need at that moment. It's not technically lying, but it's not truthful either.
It's pretty much impossible for anyone to quantify the value of the services that they receive for their tax dollars, both because there are so many of them and because they're not stuff you can go out and buy. Taxes are easily quantified. Argument over, because the other side of it is too complicated to analyze on TV. I worked in marketing long enough to trust the consumer to make choices that are the best for them, But that's assuming that they have the information they need to make a proper decision. That's simply not the case here, where tax cut shouting drowns out everything else.
It's pretty frustrating for someone who is trying to look at this in a thoughtful manner. The first sign of the ramifications of tax cuts as a core policy is taking place in Nassau County, NY, where the newly elected tea partier in charge cut taxes, in spite of a budget deficit, sending the county to the brink of bankruptcy. And it's only a month after the election. And he's only doing what he promised to do.
So how long before people understand the consequences of what they're doing and learn to properly value the services they expect and want? That's what'll have to happen before people start making wise choices at the ballot box. I'm not holding my breath.
Saturday, December 11, 2010
My holiday resolution!
Just to show my general enthusiasm for the holiday season, I will be using lots of exclamation points in everything I write!
In the past week, several people have described me to my face as being laid back. I know they mean it as a compliment but they wouldn't say that if they knew what was going on inside my head. I always kind of have two trains of thought going at the same time, one of which is focused on whatever I'm doing at the time, and the other in the background constantly asking, "What the hell is going on?" That second train tends to mute my immediate reactions a bit, because there's always some figuring out of what really is going on.
Since I'm apparently sending out incorrect signals, I will be using exclamation points to denote enthusiasm. Hopefully, this will let people know that I really do have strong reactions, even if they're not obvious. This assumes, of course, that I'm using them honestly and not faking enthusiasm because I have found that it's easier to fake it with an exclamation point than with actual emotions.
In the past week, several people have described me to my face as being laid back. I know they mean it as a compliment but they wouldn't say that if they knew what was going on inside my head. I always kind of have two trains of thought going at the same time, one of which is focused on whatever I'm doing at the time, and the other in the background constantly asking, "What the hell is going on?" That second train tends to mute my immediate reactions a bit, because there's always some figuring out of what really is going on.
Since I'm apparently sending out incorrect signals, I will be using exclamation points to denote enthusiasm. Hopefully, this will let people know that I really do have strong reactions, even if they're not obvious. This assumes, of course, that I'm using them honestly and not faking enthusiasm because I have found that it's easier to fake it with an exclamation point than with actual emotions.
I took a little vacation yesterday. I needed it after these past couple of weeks. I was on my way to a meeting in Connecticut this morning, after which I was planning to stop by my daughter's school in New York and drop off her winter coat and bring home some summer clothes. I was halfway up the Jersey Turnpike when my sister called and told me that the meeting was cancelled. I was already pretty far from home and my daughter needed the coat and I wasn't going to just turn around so I continued on into New York.
Once I got up there I did a couple of shopping errands I'd originally planned to do in Connecticut and then it was still a couple of hours before I was supposed to meet my daughter, so what was I going to do? My first thought was to go down to midtown and watch people scurry. This is usually pretty entertaining, especially during the christmas shopping season. But I just wasn't in the mood.
For some reason, it popped into my mind that I wanted to go to the Frick. The Frick, for those not familiar, is a small museum a few blocks south of the so-called Museum Mile, where the Met and Guggenheim reign. It has a small but by all accounts spectacular collection of paintings, including several by that most elusive of artists, Jan Vermeer. There are only around 35 Vermeer paintings in existence, and they are all exquisite. Three of these are at the Frick, along with some other Dutch painters like Rembrandt, Hals, Van Dyck and Holbein, along with a nice collection of Turner paintings. I had never been there, even having lived in New York for close to 30 years. I'm not really what you'd call an "art lover," and I have no education in art or art history. But I've learned over the years that anything truly great is worth taking time to appreciate, even if it isn't really your thing, because it enriches you in ways that you can't anticipate.
The museum is very small, and seems to be in the rooms of what had been a mansion (I'm too lazy to do the research to find out of that's actually what it was) and there are masterpieces in every room and two of the Vermeers are in the hallway. Even there, Vermeer's unparalleled use of light to reproduce depth and texture comes flying off the canvas. There isn't even a mediocre piece in the entire collection and most of the paintings are knock-your-socks-off great. I spent an hour or so in there, with a few dozen other people, and was totally transported. I left with a huge smile on my face. I had been in a totally different universe during that time.
Then I stepped out on the street and realized I was hungry, so I used Yelp to find me a nondescript little pizza place a block away that had terrific pizza. It was time to get over to meet my daughter, so I attempted to walk across Central Park, but was so enchanted by the Rambles that I forgot to keep track of my direction and ended up going in a big circle. So I ended up taking the bus over instead of walking, but it was a marvelous couple of hours.
Once I got up there I did a couple of shopping errands I'd originally planned to do in Connecticut and then it was still a couple of hours before I was supposed to meet my daughter, so what was I going to do? My first thought was to go down to midtown and watch people scurry. This is usually pretty entertaining, especially during the christmas shopping season. But I just wasn't in the mood.
For some reason, it popped into my mind that I wanted to go to the Frick. The Frick, for those not familiar, is a small museum a few blocks south of the so-called Museum Mile, where the Met and Guggenheim reign. It has a small but by all accounts spectacular collection of paintings, including several by that most elusive of artists, Jan Vermeer. There are only around 35 Vermeer paintings in existence, and they are all exquisite. Three of these are at the Frick, along with some other Dutch painters like Rembrandt, Hals, Van Dyck and Holbein, along with a nice collection of Turner paintings. I had never been there, even having lived in New York for close to 30 years. I'm not really what you'd call an "art lover," and I have no education in art or art history. But I've learned over the years that anything truly great is worth taking time to appreciate, even if it isn't really your thing, because it enriches you in ways that you can't anticipate.
The museum is very small, and seems to be in the rooms of what had been a mansion (I'm too lazy to do the research to find out of that's actually what it was) and there are masterpieces in every room and two of the Vermeers are in the hallway. Even there, Vermeer's unparalleled use of light to reproduce depth and texture comes flying off the canvas. There isn't even a mediocre piece in the entire collection and most of the paintings are knock-your-socks-off great. I spent an hour or so in there, with a few dozen other people, and was totally transported. I left with a huge smile on my face. I had been in a totally different universe during that time.
Then I stepped out on the street and realized I was hungry, so I used Yelp to find me a nondescript little pizza place a block away that had terrific pizza. It was time to get over to meet my daughter, so I attempted to walk across Central Park, but was so enchanted by the Rambles that I forgot to keep track of my direction and ended up going in a big circle. So I ended up taking the bus over instead of walking, but it was a marvelous couple of hours.
Wednesday, December 08, 2010
I remember when I lost my innocence
No, not that kind of innocence...Your minds are all in the gutter.
When I was around 8 I joined the Cub Scouts. I wasn't a great scout. I had no facility for tying knots, which was a big part of the skill set required for advanced scouts. But I went to the meetings and got a couple of badges and certainly wasn't the worst scout in the pack. And occasionally we'd go on an interesting field trip.
The most interesting field trip was to be part of a local New York game show called "Just For Fun." It was broadcast on Saturday mornings from 9 to 11. I loved that show. It was a game show for kids. There were two teams- Blue and Gold (Cub Scout Official Colors!). I always rooted for the Blue team. There were bleachers for each team with about 75 kids per team and some kids would get selected to do what they called "stunts" in competition. They were mostly exaggerated party games- toss this through that, climb something, do something with a blindfold on. Your team got points if you won, and winners got prizes and even losers got decent prizes.
Actually, the best thing was the blindfolded egg walk, which I'd never seen before. They covered the studio floor with plastic and put a couple of hundred eggs scattered around the floor. They picked 2 kids from each team and had them take off their shoes and blindfolded them. They then instructed the kids to walk across the studio, and that their teams would call to them to guide them across the floor. Whoever broke the fewest eggs won. And while they were explaining this, the stagehands were removing all the eggs. So you have these kids, tiptoeing across the floor, trying to avoid eggs that weren't there. Hilarious. But not the point of this.
The rule for being on Just For Fun was that you needed to be 10 years old to participate. I was almost 10, but still 9, as were several of my pack-mates. So on the bus, the Pack Leader, our paragon of honor, told us that if we were 9 and they asked us how old we were to tell them we were 10. He told us to lie. My Pack Leader told us to lie. Life would never be the same. I almost expected him to then tell us to cheat to win.
So we walk in and some woman comes over and asks me how old I am. I say "Ten." And she picks me to be in the ultimate Just For Fun event, the treasure chest. At the beginning of the show, one kid from each team would be given brought to a locked treasure chest with a bucket of 1000 keys, only one of which opened the lock. The kids would work throughout the show, trying to unlock the chest. If you succeeded, your team got a lot of points and you got a load of prizes, including a new 10-speed bicycle. There wasn't always a winner in this stunt. There's no way to get through trying 1000 keys in a lock in 2 hours.
And with about 30 minutes to go in the show, my key opened the lock. I couldn't believe it. I got all the cool prizes and my team won because of me so everyone on my team got prizes too. And all because I lied. I was not exactly wracked with guilt over this, but I clearly never forgot.
When I was around 8 I joined the Cub Scouts. I wasn't a great scout. I had no facility for tying knots, which was a big part of the skill set required for advanced scouts. But I went to the meetings and got a couple of badges and certainly wasn't the worst scout in the pack. And occasionally we'd go on an interesting field trip.
The most interesting field trip was to be part of a local New York game show called "Just For Fun." It was broadcast on Saturday mornings from 9 to 11. I loved that show. It was a game show for kids. There were two teams- Blue and Gold (Cub Scout Official Colors!). I always rooted for the Blue team. There were bleachers for each team with about 75 kids per team and some kids would get selected to do what they called "stunts" in competition. They were mostly exaggerated party games- toss this through that, climb something, do something with a blindfold on. Your team got points if you won, and winners got prizes and even losers got decent prizes.
Actually, the best thing was the blindfolded egg walk, which I'd never seen before. They covered the studio floor with plastic and put a couple of hundred eggs scattered around the floor. They picked 2 kids from each team and had them take off their shoes and blindfolded them. They then instructed the kids to walk across the studio, and that their teams would call to them to guide them across the floor. Whoever broke the fewest eggs won. And while they were explaining this, the stagehands were removing all the eggs. So you have these kids, tiptoeing across the floor, trying to avoid eggs that weren't there. Hilarious. But not the point of this.
The rule for being on Just For Fun was that you needed to be 10 years old to participate. I was almost 10, but still 9, as were several of my pack-mates. So on the bus, the Pack Leader, our paragon of honor, told us that if we were 9 and they asked us how old we were to tell them we were 10. He told us to lie. My Pack Leader told us to lie. Life would never be the same. I almost expected him to then tell us to cheat to win.
So we walk in and some woman comes over and asks me how old I am. I say "Ten." And she picks me to be in the ultimate Just For Fun event, the treasure chest. At the beginning of the show, one kid from each team would be given brought to a locked treasure chest with a bucket of 1000 keys, only one of which opened the lock. The kids would work throughout the show, trying to unlock the chest. If you succeeded, your team got a lot of points and you got a load of prizes, including a new 10-speed bicycle. There wasn't always a winner in this stunt. There's no way to get through trying 1000 keys in a lock in 2 hours.
And with about 30 minutes to go in the show, my key opened the lock. I couldn't believe it. I got all the cool prizes and my team won because of me so everyone on my team got prizes too. And all because I lied. I was not exactly wracked with guilt over this, but I clearly never forgot.
Rhythm and Blues
Most human endeavors fall into some kind of rhythms. Businesses have slow periods and busy periods that are relatively predictable, and there's always some time where you need to set the next year's budget and everyone has to work long hours to completely analyze what everything costs. I remember well my one budget season at my first ad agency. It was two 7AM to 10 PM 7-day weeks, culminating with an all-nighter. My part of the process was analyzing sales data for the top 50 markets in the US (# 50 is Honolulu, FYI, with 375,000 people). I worked my butt off on that analysis and learned absolutely nothing useful. But I was very knowledgable when they asked me questions about Coast Soap's market share in Louisville. And I did all my calculations on a calculator with paper tape (we were still about 5 years pre-PC) and never tore the tape, so I had 2 rolls worth of calculator tape unspooled, covered with weighted averages calculated, completely filling the side of my desk on which I did not sit.
School rhythms revolve around tests. Nobody really likes tests. Students certainly don't, and as far as I know, teachers don't really care for them either. They're extra work and stressful work at that and less fun than actually teaching. But the value of being forced to immerse yourself in something can't be underestimated. I think it's especially true now, when people's attentions are so scattered by the countless distractions. There's no way I can make students integrate a bunch of chapters of material into a coherent whole without forcing them to use all of the material at the same time. Literature essays work the same way- without an assigned paper on an entire book, students would consume it in chunks depending on what's due the next day, rather than thinking about a book as a whole. This by the way, is part of why college is so much better than high school, because you actually have the time to learn things in an integrated fashion. Coming from any elite high school (and especially the one where I teach) this is a marvelous, freeing experience.
Even my paper-tape-filled all-nighter wasn't a complete waste of time. Once I got some sleep, I really did find myself with a better perspective on the business, not to mention a couple of cases of product samples that I gradually snuck out with over those 2 weeks.
School rhythms revolve around tests. Nobody really likes tests. Students certainly don't, and as far as I know, teachers don't really care for them either. They're extra work and stressful work at that and less fun than actually teaching. But the value of being forced to immerse yourself in something can't be underestimated. I think it's especially true now, when people's attentions are so scattered by the countless distractions. There's no way I can make students integrate a bunch of chapters of material into a coherent whole without forcing them to use all of the material at the same time. Literature essays work the same way- without an assigned paper on an entire book, students would consume it in chunks depending on what's due the next day, rather than thinking about a book as a whole. This by the way, is part of why college is so much better than high school, because you actually have the time to learn things in an integrated fashion. Coming from any elite high school (and especially the one where I teach) this is a marvelous, freeing experience.
Even my paper-tape-filled all-nighter wasn't a complete waste of time. Once I got some sleep, I really did find myself with a better perspective on the business, not to mention a couple of cases of product samples that I gradually snuck out with over those 2 weeks.
Wednesday, December 01, 2010
Blah blah blah
I was reading about a show called "Men Of A Certain Age." I think it's about 3 middle-aged guys talking about how disappointing their life has been, or something. That's what it looks like but I always mute the commercials. I'm not sure who would watch a show like that, but that isn't really the point because if people watch people who can't dance dancing, why not watch living men not really living? The article's point was that adults express themselves more freely than younger people because they've given up most if not all of their hopes and dreams, and therefore feel that there are no consequences to being open and honest.
I don't think that everything about that is false, but the thought is so depressing that I refuse to buy into it. I'm someone who has become a lot more open in the last 15 years or so. This has happened for a number of reasons, including 24 years of marriage, kids, therapy, just growing up and pretty much everything except for self-help books, because even the people who write those things think they're stupid. I haven't had any hopes dashed or dreams crushed. I've got problems like everyone else, but I'm pretty happy. So I'm not more open because I don't care any more; I'm more honest because that's the way you really become part of your world, and what could be a better goal than to be fully immersed in your own life.
And I do think there are consequences to opening yourself up. There are just far more positive consequences than negative ones. And if part of what elders are supposed to do is guide youngers (?), then showing them that it's okay to really be yourself is part of being a good role model. Teenagers and young adults are notoriously insecure, and for a good reason- they generally don't have a clue as to what the hell they're doing or what's going on around them. All I can tell you from my certain age, is that you'll figure it all out a lot faster if you don't spend so much time and effort speaking and acting differently from how you're genuinely feeling.
I think one of the biggest problems people face is disassociation, more now than in the past. We're bombarded with so much information that trying to choose a course of action based on outside sources is almost impossible. The array of choice is paralyzing and I see far too many people teetering on the edge of paralysis. The only way around it is to follow your heart, to say what you mean and mean what you say. I know this sounds like overly earnest blah blah blah, but I don't think a little earnestness ever hurt anyone.
I don't think that everything about that is false, but the thought is so depressing that I refuse to buy into it. I'm someone who has become a lot more open in the last 15 years or so. This has happened for a number of reasons, including 24 years of marriage, kids, therapy, just growing up and pretty much everything except for self-help books, because even the people who write those things think they're stupid. I haven't had any hopes dashed or dreams crushed. I've got problems like everyone else, but I'm pretty happy. So I'm not more open because I don't care any more; I'm more honest because that's the way you really become part of your world, and what could be a better goal than to be fully immersed in your own life.
And I do think there are consequences to opening yourself up. There are just far more positive consequences than negative ones. And if part of what elders are supposed to do is guide youngers (?), then showing them that it's okay to really be yourself is part of being a good role model. Teenagers and young adults are notoriously insecure, and for a good reason- they generally don't have a clue as to what the hell they're doing or what's going on around them. All I can tell you from my certain age, is that you'll figure it all out a lot faster if you don't spend so much time and effort speaking and acting differently from how you're genuinely feeling.
I think one of the biggest problems people face is disassociation, more now than in the past. We're bombarded with so much information that trying to choose a course of action based on outside sources is almost impossible. The array of choice is paralyzing and I see far too many people teetering on the edge of paralysis. The only way around it is to follow your heart, to say what you mean and mean what you say. I know this sounds like overly earnest blah blah blah, but I don't think a little earnestness ever hurt anyone.
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