Today is my parents' 58th wedding anniversary. I'm thinking about them today.
I've previously written about the fact that my mom got married twice to her first husband. We recently discovered that she'd also married my dad twice.
("What is it with Mom and having two weddings?" my sister said.)
We've always known the date and place of my parents' wedding. We teased them about taking the wedding to the guests instead of the guests to the wedding, since they were married in the church my uncle and aunt attended. "That's not how you're supposed to do it," we'd say. "Yes, well, that's how we did it," Mom would say.
I figured that choice was a combination of not wanting a big fuss, but wanting a formal ceremony. Mom was very practical, and I can imagine Dad wanting a ceremony that rivaled the one with her first husband. Neither of my parents were members of any congregation, so they didn't have their own church to consider. So, the 90 minute drive each way made sense. (It still does.)
After my mom passed away (Dad's been gone for years), I found the certificate from their wedding. It is an ornate piece of parchment, with flowers and filigree and the writing hand done in calligraphy. It's tied by silk tassels, in a leather folder. Very showy, very fancy; it looks regal. It had all the information I was used to - date, place, my aunt and uncle as witnesses.
The problem was, on either my FamilySearch account or on my Ancestry.com account, the two geneological programs that I use, I could not find an online record of it. Neither could my sister. Oh, well, I thought. We know that it happened. New documents are being scanned or info uploaded every day; sooner or later, it'll be online. I don't need another record of it so badly that I needed to drive across four counties to get a copy.
But then, we came across another record online, a record showing that they got married more than a month after the first wedding, by a Justice of the Peace in another, closer, neighboring county. What was that about? Lots of people, myself and my husband included, have a civil ceremony first, and later, a religious ceremony. But why do it the other way round? And why so close together?
My parents are gone. My uncle and aunt are gone. I'm willing to bet that the minister (and Justice) are gone, even if he remembered them. Some of my cousins are gone; my oldest brother is nearing 70, and all of my children are grown. We're reaching the age at which we are the older generation. There's no one with first hand knowledge around to ask.
There are, however, stories and records from years gone by to help us extrapolate. There's the fact that many religions are very strict about how they will, and won't, perform ceremonies.
As nearly as we can figure, the minister from my uncle's church found out that my mother was divorced after he'd already performed the ceremony, and he then refused to file the paperwork with the state, so the marriage wasn't considered legal. "My mother couldn't have told the church that she'd been divorced when she married my dad. Otherwise, they wouldn't have let them get married in the church," one of my cousins told me. It used to be uncommon to find a church that would perform ceremonies for divorced folks.
So, my parents drove to the next town over in order to make it legal; but, they continued to celebrate the day they actually chose to be married, the day they first said vows. That's very typical of my parents. "This is my anniversary."
That makes sense. We celebrate the day of our first wedding. By the time of our second wedding, the religious ceremony, we'd been married for years, and had two children. That's a different day than the day we chose to get married.
I am a religious person; I stand behind the idea of religions acting in accordance with their beliefs. And yet this story tickles me. It amuses me. I stand behind my parents and their choice to celebrate their non-legal wedding day. Call it like you see it, Mom and Dad. Don't back down.
I come by my stubbornness honestly.
Tuesday, February 6, 2018
Sunday, February 4, 2018
The Mouths of Babes
One of my dad's favorite stories from my childhood was not my favorite - not because it was embarrassing, but, well, because he got it wrong.
When I was 8, we took an epic road trip, including camping at Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. I loved pretty much everything about that trip - the places, the animals we saw, using the brand new camera that my brother gave me, the keychains that my mom let me buy in gift shops.
One day, we drove by the carcass of a roadkill coyote alongside the highway. "Oh, that's poor old Wile E." my dad said, referring to the Warner Brothers cartoon character.
"No, it's not!" I said, outraged. I was eight years old, after all, and I could not believe that my dad thought that I was too little to realize that a cartoon character was fictional. Did he really think that I couldn't tell the difference between a cartoon that walked on two legs and mail ordered ridiculous weapons and a real live, very familiar animal? Our dog was half coyote! As the youngest child, I was very sensitive to any reference to me being "too young" to understand something. I tried very hard to keep up with the big kids.
My dad misunderstood my outrage. "Oh, no, you're right. I'll bet Wile E. is too smart to get hit. He's just fine," my dad said, fairly bubbling with mirth. He went on to talk to my mom, as if I wasn't right there in the back seat, about how adorable it was that I worried about Wile E. being safe.
Even at 8 (and younger), I knew that it was useless to correct him. He wouldn't believe me, for one thing, and he'd be offended at being challenged. So I rolled my eyes and let him chuckle.
It was just my luck that he was so tickled by this story that he told it over and over. Great, I thought. Now his friends and my relatives think that I'm a baby, with no grasp on reality. Fantastic. Prepare to be patronized. (I hated being patronized.) I did mention how it annoyed me to my mother, but she confirmed, "It's best to just let him enjoy the story, accurate or not." He died when I was 22, still telling the story. He loved that story, thought it was so cute. I never did try to set the record straight.
So, as a child, I knew that misunderstanding isn't always on one side, parent or child.
As a parent, I sometimes wondered what people were thinking when my kids said something that sounded ridiculous, but I knew was true. Sometimes, people would argue, even if the kids got it right. For instance, when my kids would say, "Santa doesn't come to our house," people assumed that we didn't celebrate Christmas, or that we'd had a severe financial hardship, or that my kids didn't think they'd been "good enough" to get any presents. What they actually meant was that Santa brought their presents to the family party, usually at my aunt's house.
Another time my kid got it right, but it sounded loopy, was after a theater company picnic. To celebrate the end of the summer season, the company always had a family picnic at a nearby lake. It's about an hour's drive away, but most of that hour is straight up into the Sierras.
One year, on the way to the picnic, we came across our friend's Volkswagen stopped on the side of the highway with its engine compartment open. We stopped and talked to Kahele, the bug's owner, and she said that the car was acting like it was out of gas, but it had half a tank.
"I'll bet it's vapor locking," my husband said, describing what happens when part of the engine is so hot that the gas evaporates before it can be utilized. The car was weighted down with passengers and several large, full ice chests. The combination of the climb and the load left the car struggling. My husband took the largest chest out and put it in our van, then scooped handfuls of ice onto the engine. "Try it now," he said.
The bug roared to life, and we followed it the rest of the way to the lake. It had no more problems.
A couple of weeks later, we went to a pool party for the same theater company. My sister's kids were visiting, so they got to come along. As we pulled up and parked behind the Volkswagen, my kindergartner announced to her cousins, "That's Kahele's ladybug. It had too much weight in it, and Daddy fixed it with an ice cube."
Well, pretty close! It still sounded like gibberish, but aside from the amount of ice, it was pretty spot on.
My son got lots of extra sympathy as an injured toddler, due to his linguistics. He rolled out of his toddler bed and broke his collarbone, at an age when he described everything that happened in the past as being "yesterday." Wearing his little sling with pictures of Snoopy on it, whenever anyone asked when he hurt himself, he'd say, "Yesterday," and they'd say, "OOOOHHH!" and fuss over him.
Of course, every person remembers and processes things differently, but occasionally, the way my child(ren) remembered something rendered the event unrecognizable.
When my sister got married for the second time, my 8 and 9 year old daughters hoped that they'd get to be flower girls. They were disappointed that even the bride's own daughters weren't getting to be in the wedding party, because they weren't having any attendants.
My sister and her fiance wanted a small wedding, and decided, after months of weighing options, to do a quick ceremony with a justice of the peace, and dinner at a hotel on the coast to celebrate. No invitations, no new clothes, no fuss. We all got phone calls - "I know you won't be able to make it, but we're getting married on Wednesday." As in, the coming Wednesday; as in, less than a week.
If we were to drive straight there (as our other sister did), it would take seven and a half hours. My husband was working 12 hour shifts, 3 am to 3 pm; he couldn't take time off on short notice unless it was an emergency. If we were to drive, it would mean three days - a drive day, the wedding day, a drive day home - and we didn't want to take the girls out of school for that long. Flying on short notice was expensive, but if only I went, it was doable. My eight month old could fly for free if he sat on my lap. So, my mother and I decided to fly; she rarely took any time off from work, but a single day off to see her daughter get married was worth it.
Since I was a stay at home parent, I'd have to figure out child care for the older children. If I could have flown straight there, it would be about 90 minutes each way, but the airport near my sister is a small, rural airport, and there were no direct flights from home. We'd have to fly for an hour plus to a large airport, have a layover, then fly for another hour plus to the small airport, which was still about 30 minutes from my sister's house, where we'd meet before driving to the courthouse. The flight I found that would get me (and my mother and son) there on time left at 6 am; we'd have to be at the airport by 5. With my husband at work at 3, that left my kids alone, which was unacceptable. I couldn't imagine asking someone to get to my house by 4 so that I could leave at 4:30.
My inlaws lived nearby, so I asked my mother in law if she could take the girls overnight, then get them to school in the morning. She had a spare room with twin beds, and was about 15 minutes away from their school. She agreed to take the girls, asking us to get them to her house by dinner time, so that by bedtime they'd be ready to settle in. Since they got out of school at the same time my husband left work 15 miles away, instead of having them walk home to an empty house, she'd pick them up from school, and my husband would come and get them from her house. "It's probably be easier if they just all have dinner here again, instead of Danny having to go home and throw something together on short notice," she said. After getting home, he'd then stay up past his own bedtime in order to tuck them in at their normal bedtime. We thanked her profusely for making the trip possible, and bought tickets.
It was a long day for us - up at 4, at the airport by 5, and we didn't arrive back home until almost midnight. Still, my mother and I got to be with my sister on her wedding day, I got to take photos, and my children were safe while I was gone.
A couple of weeks later, I was saying something about how stressful it was that the photo processor temporarily lost my sister's wedding photos - this was the days of film, and if the film was lost, they were gone forever. My daughter exclaimed, "You never told us that Aunt Lynne got married!"
"Of course I did. Remember wanting to be a flower girl?"
"No, you told us she was going to get married! You never said it already happened!"
"You knew when it happened. That was why you guys spent the night at Grandma Donna's - so I could go to the wedding."
"You WENT?"
"Yes. You knew that. That's why you stayed overnight at Grandma Donna's."
"We've never stayed overnight at Grandma Donna's!"
What? It had only been two weeks - how could she have forgotten? I assumed that her sister would set her straight. But one of the things that amazes and puzzles me to this day was the ability of these girls who bickered constantly to also think in lock step. One was convinced of her own infallibility, and one was anxiety ridden, so it was a fairly common thing for the force of one personality to overwhelm the other, but I'd never seen it to this extent before. Her sister took up the complaint - "You never told us! We never stayed at Grandma Donna's!"
That's weird, I thought, but I waited it out, knowing that one of them should eventually recall the event, if only to one-up her sister. We - the baby and I - had been gone for two nights worth of dinners and bedtimes. Grandma Donna had dropped them off AND picked them up from school. It just seemed impossible that they'd forget almost two entire days, even if they'd forgotten WHY I was gone.
Instead, as time went on, they embellished their tale of woe. They started telling people that I had dropped them at school, driven to the airport, flown to the wedding, attended the wedding - and, somehow, also dinner - but flown back in time to pick them up from school as if I'd never gone anywhere. They were convinced that I'd then tried to keep this a secret, and that they'd only found out by accident. Both of them were deeply convinced of this exact scenario. "And she won't even admit that it happened!"
At first, it was merely irritating, but then I started to panic. I know that people often repress traumatic memories - had something deeply horrible occurred at their grandparents' house, so terrible that neither girl wanted to remember it? And how could I ask my inlaws without being accusatory and offending them? I freaked out a little bit.
My husband brought it up in a roundabout way with his mother. "The girls don't even remember staying overnight at your house." She laughed, assured him that children's memories are notoriously unreliable, and remembered that they'd had a great time with her.
I still worried a bit, but I had to chalk it up to my kids just preferring the more dramatic story, and feeding off of each other.
I think they were teens when I finally insisted that they stop telling their version of this story. "It looked silly when you were little, but it looks sillier now." Not only could their dad, both of their grandmothers (who didn't agree on much), their grandfather, and both of my my sisters and their families confirm my version of events, and I had ticket stubs with times on them, the mere math was impossible. The time we spent in the air was close to three hours. The layover was an hour and a half. Add that to the hour, each way, that we had to be at the airports before the flights, and we were already at 6 1/2 hours, and their school day was 6 hours long. The flights alone were impossible to do in the length of a school day, to say nothing of drive time, wedding time and dinner time.
The kids were both incredibly puzzled by this fact, when I laid out the timeline, again. (When they were younger, they were sure that I was just misrepresenting how long things took.) "I was sure that (me being gone during school hours only) was how it happened." "I don't remember it that way." And each sister's absolute certainty had been bolstered by their sibling's absolute certainty.
"I know you don't. But that's how it happened." Sometimes, I think that they never did really realize that they'd gotten it wrong; they just stopped complaining about it around their parents.
I think of moments like this sometimes when I'm online reading. I was recently reading an online discussion/argument among friends of mine and flat Earth proponents. One of the flat Earth arguments was, "Why do astronauts' accounts of what it's like to be in space differ from each other? Why do they describe the sky using different adjectives?" Are they kidding?
Think about any event - that Thanksgiving when Uncle Joe passed out in the potatoes, the birth of your children, or even last year's garden or last night's dinner. Do the people who were there describe it the same way? Do they always even remember it? How many times does the average person say, "That's not how it happened"?
In actuality, everyone having identical stories is usually a sign that they've all rehearsed what to say.
Really, considering differing opinions or accounts to be the sign of a huge conspiracy is just outrageous.
"But people who say (X) are so sincere and convinced! And they should know!" people say to me. I'm sure they are. And yet, they could be wrong.
I never confused a live coyote with a cartoon one.
When I was 8, we took an epic road trip, including camping at Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. I loved pretty much everything about that trip - the places, the animals we saw, using the brand new camera that my brother gave me, the keychains that my mom let me buy in gift shops.
One day, we drove by the carcass of a roadkill coyote alongside the highway. "Oh, that's poor old Wile E." my dad said, referring to the Warner Brothers cartoon character.
"No, it's not!" I said, outraged. I was eight years old, after all, and I could not believe that my dad thought that I was too little to realize that a cartoon character was fictional. Did he really think that I couldn't tell the difference between a cartoon that walked on two legs and mail ordered ridiculous weapons and a real live, very familiar animal? Our dog was half coyote! As the youngest child, I was very sensitive to any reference to me being "too young" to understand something. I tried very hard to keep up with the big kids.
My dad misunderstood my outrage. "Oh, no, you're right. I'll bet Wile E. is too smart to get hit. He's just fine," my dad said, fairly bubbling with mirth. He went on to talk to my mom, as if I wasn't right there in the back seat, about how adorable it was that I worried about Wile E. being safe.
Even at 8 (and younger), I knew that it was useless to correct him. He wouldn't believe me, for one thing, and he'd be offended at being challenged. So I rolled my eyes and let him chuckle.
It was just my luck that he was so tickled by this story that he told it over and over. Great, I thought. Now his friends and my relatives think that I'm a baby, with no grasp on reality. Fantastic. Prepare to be patronized. (I hated being patronized.) I did mention how it annoyed me to my mother, but she confirmed, "It's best to just let him enjoy the story, accurate or not." He died when I was 22, still telling the story. He loved that story, thought it was so cute. I never did try to set the record straight.
So, as a child, I knew that misunderstanding isn't always on one side, parent or child.
As a parent, I sometimes wondered what people were thinking when my kids said something that sounded ridiculous, but I knew was true. Sometimes, people would argue, even if the kids got it right. For instance, when my kids would say, "Santa doesn't come to our house," people assumed that we didn't celebrate Christmas, or that we'd had a severe financial hardship, or that my kids didn't think they'd been "good enough" to get any presents. What they actually meant was that Santa brought their presents to the family party, usually at my aunt's house.
Another time my kid got it right, but it sounded loopy, was after a theater company picnic. To celebrate the end of the summer season, the company always had a family picnic at a nearby lake. It's about an hour's drive away, but most of that hour is straight up into the Sierras.
One year, on the way to the picnic, we came across our friend's Volkswagen stopped on the side of the highway with its engine compartment open. We stopped and talked to Kahele, the bug's owner, and she said that the car was acting like it was out of gas, but it had half a tank.
"I'll bet it's vapor locking," my husband said, describing what happens when part of the engine is so hot that the gas evaporates before it can be utilized. The car was weighted down with passengers and several large, full ice chests. The combination of the climb and the load left the car struggling. My husband took the largest chest out and put it in our van, then scooped handfuls of ice onto the engine. "Try it now," he said.
The bug roared to life, and we followed it the rest of the way to the lake. It had no more problems.
A couple of weeks later, we went to a pool party for the same theater company. My sister's kids were visiting, so they got to come along. As we pulled up and parked behind the Volkswagen, my kindergartner announced to her cousins, "That's Kahele's ladybug. It had too much weight in it, and Daddy fixed it with an ice cube."
Well, pretty close! It still sounded like gibberish, but aside from the amount of ice, it was pretty spot on.
My son got lots of extra sympathy as an injured toddler, due to his linguistics. He rolled out of his toddler bed and broke his collarbone, at an age when he described everything that happened in the past as being "yesterday." Wearing his little sling with pictures of Snoopy on it, whenever anyone asked when he hurt himself, he'd say, "Yesterday," and they'd say, "OOOOHHH!" and fuss over him.
Of course, every person remembers and processes things differently, but occasionally, the way my child(ren) remembered something rendered the event unrecognizable.
When my sister got married for the second time, my 8 and 9 year old daughters hoped that they'd get to be flower girls. They were disappointed that even the bride's own daughters weren't getting to be in the wedding party, because they weren't having any attendants.
My sister and her fiance wanted a small wedding, and decided, after months of weighing options, to do a quick ceremony with a justice of the peace, and dinner at a hotel on the coast to celebrate. No invitations, no new clothes, no fuss. We all got phone calls - "I know you won't be able to make it, but we're getting married on Wednesday." As in, the coming Wednesday; as in, less than a week.
If we were to drive straight there (as our other sister did), it would take seven and a half hours. My husband was working 12 hour shifts, 3 am to 3 pm; he couldn't take time off on short notice unless it was an emergency. If we were to drive, it would mean three days - a drive day, the wedding day, a drive day home - and we didn't want to take the girls out of school for that long. Flying on short notice was expensive, but if only I went, it was doable. My eight month old could fly for free if he sat on my lap. So, my mother and I decided to fly; she rarely took any time off from work, but a single day off to see her daughter get married was worth it.
Since I was a stay at home parent, I'd have to figure out child care for the older children. If I could have flown straight there, it would be about 90 minutes each way, but the airport near my sister is a small, rural airport, and there were no direct flights from home. We'd have to fly for an hour plus to a large airport, have a layover, then fly for another hour plus to the small airport, which was still about 30 minutes from my sister's house, where we'd meet before driving to the courthouse. The flight I found that would get me (and my mother and son) there on time left at 6 am; we'd have to be at the airport by 5. With my husband at work at 3, that left my kids alone, which was unacceptable. I couldn't imagine asking someone to get to my house by 4 so that I could leave at 4:30.
My inlaws lived nearby, so I asked my mother in law if she could take the girls overnight, then get them to school in the morning. She had a spare room with twin beds, and was about 15 minutes away from their school. She agreed to take the girls, asking us to get them to her house by dinner time, so that by bedtime they'd be ready to settle in. Since they got out of school at the same time my husband left work 15 miles away, instead of having them walk home to an empty house, she'd pick them up from school, and my husband would come and get them from her house. "It's probably be easier if they just all have dinner here again, instead of Danny having to go home and throw something together on short notice," she said. After getting home, he'd then stay up past his own bedtime in order to tuck them in at their normal bedtime. We thanked her profusely for making the trip possible, and bought tickets.
It was a long day for us - up at 4, at the airport by 5, and we didn't arrive back home until almost midnight. Still, my mother and I got to be with my sister on her wedding day, I got to take photos, and my children were safe while I was gone.
A couple of weeks later, I was saying something about how stressful it was that the photo processor temporarily lost my sister's wedding photos - this was the days of film, and if the film was lost, they were gone forever. My daughter exclaimed, "You never told us that Aunt Lynne got married!"
"Of course I did. Remember wanting to be a flower girl?"
"No, you told us she was going to get married! You never said it already happened!"
"You knew when it happened. That was why you guys spent the night at Grandma Donna's - so I could go to the wedding."
"You WENT?"
"Yes. You knew that. That's why you stayed overnight at Grandma Donna's."
"We've never stayed overnight at Grandma Donna's!"
What? It had only been two weeks - how could she have forgotten? I assumed that her sister would set her straight. But one of the things that amazes and puzzles me to this day was the ability of these girls who bickered constantly to also think in lock step. One was convinced of her own infallibility, and one was anxiety ridden, so it was a fairly common thing for the force of one personality to overwhelm the other, but I'd never seen it to this extent before. Her sister took up the complaint - "You never told us! We never stayed at Grandma Donna's!"
That's weird, I thought, but I waited it out, knowing that one of them should eventually recall the event, if only to one-up her sister. We - the baby and I - had been gone for two nights worth of dinners and bedtimes. Grandma Donna had dropped them off AND picked them up from school. It just seemed impossible that they'd forget almost two entire days, even if they'd forgotten WHY I was gone.
Instead, as time went on, they embellished their tale of woe. They started telling people that I had dropped them at school, driven to the airport, flown to the wedding, attended the wedding - and, somehow, also dinner - but flown back in time to pick them up from school as if I'd never gone anywhere. They were convinced that I'd then tried to keep this a secret, and that they'd only found out by accident. Both of them were deeply convinced of this exact scenario. "And she won't even admit that it happened!"
At first, it was merely irritating, but then I started to panic. I know that people often repress traumatic memories - had something deeply horrible occurred at their grandparents' house, so terrible that neither girl wanted to remember it? And how could I ask my inlaws without being accusatory and offending them? I freaked out a little bit.
My husband brought it up in a roundabout way with his mother. "The girls don't even remember staying overnight at your house." She laughed, assured him that children's memories are notoriously unreliable, and remembered that they'd had a great time with her.
I still worried a bit, but I had to chalk it up to my kids just preferring the more dramatic story, and feeding off of each other.
I think they were teens when I finally insisted that they stop telling their version of this story. "It looked silly when you were little, but it looks sillier now." Not only could their dad, both of their grandmothers (who didn't agree on much), their grandfather, and both of my my sisters and their families confirm my version of events, and I had ticket stubs with times on them, the mere math was impossible. The time we spent in the air was close to three hours. The layover was an hour and a half. Add that to the hour, each way, that we had to be at the airports before the flights, and we were already at 6 1/2 hours, and their school day was 6 hours long. The flights alone were impossible to do in the length of a school day, to say nothing of drive time, wedding time and dinner time.
The kids were both incredibly puzzled by this fact, when I laid out the timeline, again. (When they were younger, they were sure that I was just misrepresenting how long things took.) "I was sure that (me being gone during school hours only) was how it happened." "I don't remember it that way." And each sister's absolute certainty had been bolstered by their sibling's absolute certainty.
"I know you don't. But that's how it happened." Sometimes, I think that they never did really realize that they'd gotten it wrong; they just stopped complaining about it around their parents.
I think of moments like this sometimes when I'm online reading. I was recently reading an online discussion/argument among friends of mine and flat Earth proponents. One of the flat Earth arguments was, "Why do astronauts' accounts of what it's like to be in space differ from each other? Why do they describe the sky using different adjectives?" Are they kidding?
Think about any event - that Thanksgiving when Uncle Joe passed out in the potatoes, the birth of your children, or even last year's garden or last night's dinner. Do the people who were there describe it the same way? Do they always even remember it? How many times does the average person say, "That's not how it happened"?
In actuality, everyone having identical stories is usually a sign that they've all rehearsed what to say.
Really, considering differing opinions or accounts to be the sign of a huge conspiracy is just outrageous.
"But people who say (X) are so sincere and convinced! And they should know!" people say to me. I'm sure they are. And yet, they could be wrong.
I never confused a live coyote with a cartoon one.
Thursday, December 21, 2017
Dangerous and Disruptive
It was very amusing to me that, as a senior in high school, I got a reputation among the adults at school (teachers, administrators, security personnel) of being an anarchist and agitator. It amused me because I am the most rule following person that I know. Remember how in "Back to the Future," all you had to do in order to manipulate Marty was to call him "a chicken"? When I was growing up, all you had to do to manipulate me was to say, "It's the rule."
I've never understood people who are born rebels. I mean, I can tell you, on a factual and intellectual level, why they behave that way, but it's not in my default reactions, at all. I like order and predictability and safety, and rules provide that.
Of course, it is this very admiration for rules and order that elicits outrage when the rules are misguided or just bad, or when those charged with implementing or interpreting them do so badly. In short - there are few things worse than a dirty cop.
So, in high school, I occasionally butted heads with those who were capricious in their enforcement of rules. Like the teacher who'd raise your F to a passing grade if you helped clean the classroom; like the principal who explained his behavior by saying, "You just chose the wrong friends, Sharon." Or, like the teacher who went the other direction, and changed a passing grade to a failing one over personality issues. It was not OK with me to blur academic distinctions with decidedly non-academic ones.
This is not to say that I never broke any rules. It just meant that I was not going to try to hide that fact, but was likely to respond to questioning with, "You bet I did. Let me tell you why."
But, I was a kid, and kids are notoriously without perspective, and few adults wanted to hear my gripes. It was always very important to me that others understand me. I don't care if you agree (or if you like me), but I want your disagreement (or dislike) to be fact based instead of perception based. I am, by nature, an over-explainer. So, it was infuriating when someone didn't even bother to hear me (or anyone else).
For most of my life, I loved school - the teachers and the actual learning. I'd never had a citation, detention, suspension, any disciplinary action at all (aside from having grades docked points for tardiness). At that point in my life (high school), I regularly dropped in on the principal to air a grievance, and his secretary would wave me through, calling, "Sharon's here." (He never said, "I'm too busy." He also rarely intervened, but he listened.) So, when I was summoned to the office of the guidance counselor in January of my senior year, I expected some kind of canned speech about college or other post high school plans. I'd never met the man before, but I hadn't taken the SAT or applied for scholarships or any number of other things related to leaving high school, and I supposed it was his job to see what my plans were.
I was wrong.
He didn't spend any time on pleasantries. He informed me, rather blandly, that I was now banned from taking any theater classes "or being in the theater classroom during any class." I was also now banned from setting foot in the actual theater itself. "The teacher informs me that you are dangerous and disruptive, and she can't teach when you're in the room."
It was not news that the teacher and I didn't get along, or that I was critical of her methods. I'm positive that at that point I actually said out loud, "Yeah, well, she doesn't do that great a job of it when I'm not in the room, either." His eyebrows raised.
The only other thing I could think of to say was, "I'm in the current play. We open soon. There isn't any time for someone else to learn the part. How am I supposed to perform if I'm not allowed in the room? Or are you cancelling the play, too?"
He looked a bit taken aback, as though this was information that he didn't have, and he was now forced to wing it. For just a second, he appeared to contemplate the wrath of many sets of parents if the show was cancelled. "Yes. Well. You'll be allowed to be in the theater during the times you're actually onstage. Otherwise, you'll have to wait in the hall."
I'm pretty quiet and mild mannered, most times. When I'm angry (or depressed, really), it's a different ball game. To mix my sports metaphors, the gloves come off.
"Oh, that'll be really convenient. Every time I have an entrance, the show will grind to a halt while someone comes to get me. That'll be great. And what about performances? Are the actual performances going to have to suspend time while someone comes to hunt me down? Is everyone just going to freeze onstage until I get there?"
The counselor looked annoyed. "You can be in the room during the entire rehearsal or performance as long as you behave properly and aren't disruptive."
"What, exactly, would that entail? Exactly which behaviors are forbidden? Do you have a list?"
"No, I don't have a list. Just don't do anything that would be against the rules."
"Well, since my mere presence is apparently a problem, I'd just like to clarify which behaviors are and aren't allowed. Did she tell you what it is that I do that's a problem?"
More annoyance. "No. She did not. I didn't ask."
"That doesn't seem to be a really great plan. You'd think that she'd have to describe what I did that's a problem."
He leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands. "No, she does not. I take her word for issues involving her classroom management."
"Well, that's a mistake." His eyebrows raised again, and it occurred to me that I might not want to antagonize this man who'd never set eyes on me before, but was willing to believe that I was dangerous.
"Will there be anything else?"
He looked a bit blank. I rephrased. "Is that it?"
Brisk, administrative behavior; he stood up, indicating that the meeting was over, and said, "That'll be it. You can go back to class now." As he held the door open, I reflexively said, "Thank you," and then mentally kicked myself for it. Oh, sure, thanks a lot. Thanks a whole lot for dropping that bombshell on me; I appreciate it so, Guidance Counselor Who I've Never Met Before. Thanks for the "guidance."
I did not go back to class.
I can't remember what class I'd left to go to the office. I think it was after lunch, but I'm not entirely sure. At any rate, my afternoon had just opened up wide, because all I had after lunch were theater classes and after school rehearsal. The whole thing took maybe two minutes; now I was a wreck. I was distraught and weepy.
I began wandering the halls, crying and talking to myself. It was exactly two weeks before my 18th birthday; I remember because I kept saying, "I have another month. I'm supposed to have another month."
It was January 15. The year before, when my best friend was a senior, he'd been suspended on February 15, and finally, expelled. If I was going to be kicked out, it just seemed to me that it should happen on the same day. Like I said, I like predictability.
Classes let out and the halls were suddenly full, so I went outside. I could not handle being around other people.
I kept trying to figure out what had precipitated this, what I had done that had caused backlash. I couldn't think of anything in particular. (I still don't know.)
The irony was that I couldn't imagine offending the teacher, because we barely spoke. The only incident that I thought might be what had her goat had taken place weeks before.
I was a yearbook photographer. I loved the job. A few weeks earlier, we'd taken the drama guild group photo. It was either at lunch or after school, the way most clubs were photographed, so that all the members could be there. The schedule was dictated by yearbook deadlines; we had to turn in a certain number of pages at each deadline during the year. Time specific events - homecoming, sports, etc. - had to be photographed during their time frame, obviously, and things like club photos were spread out over the year.
Another senior was, at that point, barred from the theater. (Yeah, my expelled friend the previous year, Tony, had been the first, but now there were a handful of us not allowed in the theater.) We'd made the teacher angry during set construction by hauling sawhorses and lumber outside the theater to the sidewalk, and having this particular member, Tim Lange, cut the lumber there, so that we could list him in the program under "set construction crew." We also made a big deal about labeling the back of a board he cut - "TIM LANGE CUT THIS BOARD!" - and using it center stage as the fireplace mantle.
(Hence the principal's jibe about my friends; over three decades later, we're still friends.)
I mean, gasp, right? What subversives.
On picture day, Tim was going to wait in the hall - I'd insisted that he be in the photo. He hadn't wanted to, had argued with me, but I really insisted. We set up, placed the camera, had him come in just long enough to take the shot, and he went back into the hall. "Rule" breaking, sure, but I'd do it again.
No, that's not what I think bothered the teacher the most that day.
She was just out of college when she got her job at our school. She was nervous, insecure, not too much older than we were, and eager to be liked. All understandable; all fine. But things deteriorated as she faced strong willed students who knew more about theater than she did; she'd never seen a live production when they gave her the theater classes. It was not a great staffing choice. For a year, everything ran decently, if not smoothly, but that train soon derailed.
It used to be very important to me that people understand, that they hear our side. I left that behind ages ago.
Anyway, as things became more tense, she clamped down with unreasonable rules. We spent an entire set building day being told that we were not allowed to speak, at all, which was then amended to, "You can only ask for tools or give directions;" it was pretty clear that mute, angry kids with power tools miming were an accident waiting to happen.
One of the latest rules was that students could not touch the light switches. It was, in my eyes, a pure power play - I mean, light switches? That's the hill from which you cannot retreat?
In a theater, the "work lights" are standard fluorescent or incandescent lights turned on during set building, early rehearsals, classes, cleaning, and the like. "House" lights are those over the seats, and "stage" lights are the ones directed to the stage, the ones used during performances. We (the students) weren't allowed, at this point, to touch any of them, especially the house or stage lights, unless it was during a performance. Those ran on dimmers on the light board. Back in the days before computers, each light had its own slider on a board full of them. Changing them during a performance meant balancing a bunch of sliders. During class, or any other non-performance time, it just meant running the house slider up to full so that the room was illuminated. It's a one finger operation.
On photo day, I walked into the room, flicked on the work lights (they were a standard light switch just inside the door), and ran up the house lights. The teacher left the room without a word, which I took to be a sign that I could work in peace. We - the drama guild president and I, with a lot of input - were deciding where to take the group photo when the Dean of Men, who was also in charge of most school discipline, came in, with the teacher trailing him.
"I'm told that someone touched the lighting board," he said, with that big, loud, authoritative voice. I found this rather silly.
"Yeah, I did. I turned on the lights."
"Why?"
Seriously? Why did we need light?
"Because I'm taking photos for the yearbook, and I can't do that in the dark."
At that point, I almost wanted him to make a big deal out of it, so that we had to involve the yearbook adviser, and explain that I hadn't been allowed to take photos because I turned on the lights.
This was the only time I saw any staff member behave as though the teacher's complaints were, if not outright silly, at least overblown. He sighed, then turned to her and said, in that voice used when a quarreling parent says, "Tell your father..." even though Father is standing two feet away, but Junior is complying, "She says she's taking pictures for the yearbook. She says she can't take pictures in the dark."
The teacher said, "Oh. OK." The Dean left. The teacher went out without another word and sat in the audience seats until we were done. (I'm pretty sure that I turned the lights back off when we left, but maybe I left them for her.)
So, wandering the campus in tears and talking to myself after being banned, that was the only incident that I could imagine being over the top, in her eyes. It was embarrassing, in front of another faculty member. But why weeks after the fact? Did it matter?
"She's too early. It's too soon. I should have another month."
Now, here comes the crux of this story - what is, for me, the most important part.
I know that, when they're sad, a lot of people would need hugs, consoling, reassurance that they're a good person and the other person is wrong. Usually, that annoys me or makes it worse. It turns out that this time, I needed Joe Beard and Tim Groves.
They were more theater kids, way cooler than I was, and if I remember right, also not allowed in the theater at this point. I ran into them just outside the school as I was wandering and crying. Finding out what was wrong with me did not elicit sympathy and hugs, but loud congratulations and high fives. They acted as though I'd just won the lottery. "Good for you!" "That's great!" "She only does that to people who know what they're doing!"
It worked. The tears dried up. I don't know where they'd been headed to when they found me, but they stayed with me and walked the school grounds aimlessly, talking about nothing in particular, just being next to me. When we ran into Gwen, another theater kid, they told her the story with breathless delight, and large hand gestures, as though it was something to celebrate. Gwen hugged me, but by then I was OK.
When I was finally ready to re-join the world, Tim and Joe wanted to know, "Are you OK?" before they left.
"Yeah. I'm OK." And I meant it.
I finished the play, and the school year, without theater classes. I told my mom the story, but not my dad. And "dangerous and disruptive" became a phrase that made me, and my friends, laugh.
Years later, I told my husband. He, too, laughs at the phrase.
I'm thinking of this because someone recently informed me, again, that I was dangerous. This time, they didn't pair it with "disruptive;" they called me "evil." This is because we have religious and political differences; apparently, that merits a label of dangerous and evil.
They're certainly entitled to their opinion, which I told them. I did not tell them that, at a time in my life when I was vulnerable, someone in a position of power had already fired that particular cannon at me, so its effect is very much blunted now. It's not fun, but it's certainly no longer devastating.
I don't really know what effect the speaker hoped those words would have on me, but I don't think they expected to evoke what's now a warm and fuzzy memory. When I hear myself described that way, I no longer think first of the devastation I was feeling at 17 - I think about Joe and Tim, and high fives. I think about a time that two teenage boys had my back, even though I was a hysterical, weeping teenage girl. I think about them walking with me until I was alright. That's a happy memory.
I've never understood people who are born rebels. I mean, I can tell you, on a factual and intellectual level, why they behave that way, but it's not in my default reactions, at all. I like order and predictability and safety, and rules provide that.
Of course, it is this very admiration for rules and order that elicits outrage when the rules are misguided or just bad, or when those charged with implementing or interpreting them do so badly. In short - there are few things worse than a dirty cop.
So, in high school, I occasionally butted heads with those who were capricious in their enforcement of rules. Like the teacher who'd raise your F to a passing grade if you helped clean the classroom; like the principal who explained his behavior by saying, "You just chose the wrong friends, Sharon." Or, like the teacher who went the other direction, and changed a passing grade to a failing one over personality issues. It was not OK with me to blur academic distinctions with decidedly non-academic ones.
This is not to say that I never broke any rules. It just meant that I was not going to try to hide that fact, but was likely to respond to questioning with, "You bet I did. Let me tell you why."
But, I was a kid, and kids are notoriously without perspective, and few adults wanted to hear my gripes. It was always very important to me that others understand me. I don't care if you agree (or if you like me), but I want your disagreement (or dislike) to be fact based instead of perception based. I am, by nature, an over-explainer. So, it was infuriating when someone didn't even bother to hear me (or anyone else).
For most of my life, I loved school - the teachers and the actual learning. I'd never had a citation, detention, suspension, any disciplinary action at all (aside from having grades docked points for tardiness). At that point in my life (high school), I regularly dropped in on the principal to air a grievance, and his secretary would wave me through, calling, "Sharon's here." (He never said, "I'm too busy." He also rarely intervened, but he listened.) So, when I was summoned to the office of the guidance counselor in January of my senior year, I expected some kind of canned speech about college or other post high school plans. I'd never met the man before, but I hadn't taken the SAT or applied for scholarships or any number of other things related to leaving high school, and I supposed it was his job to see what my plans were.
I was wrong.
He didn't spend any time on pleasantries. He informed me, rather blandly, that I was now banned from taking any theater classes "or being in the theater classroom during any class." I was also now banned from setting foot in the actual theater itself. "The teacher informs me that you are dangerous and disruptive, and she can't teach when you're in the room."
It was not news that the teacher and I didn't get along, or that I was critical of her methods. I'm positive that at that point I actually said out loud, "Yeah, well, she doesn't do that great a job of it when I'm not in the room, either." His eyebrows raised.
The only other thing I could think of to say was, "I'm in the current play. We open soon. There isn't any time for someone else to learn the part. How am I supposed to perform if I'm not allowed in the room? Or are you cancelling the play, too?"
He looked a bit taken aback, as though this was information that he didn't have, and he was now forced to wing it. For just a second, he appeared to contemplate the wrath of many sets of parents if the show was cancelled. "Yes. Well. You'll be allowed to be in the theater during the times you're actually onstage. Otherwise, you'll have to wait in the hall."
I'm pretty quiet and mild mannered, most times. When I'm angry (or depressed, really), it's a different ball game. To mix my sports metaphors, the gloves come off.
"Oh, that'll be really convenient. Every time I have an entrance, the show will grind to a halt while someone comes to get me. That'll be great. And what about performances? Are the actual performances going to have to suspend time while someone comes to hunt me down? Is everyone just going to freeze onstage until I get there?"
The counselor looked annoyed. "You can be in the room during the entire rehearsal or performance as long as you behave properly and aren't disruptive."
"What, exactly, would that entail? Exactly which behaviors are forbidden? Do you have a list?"
"No, I don't have a list. Just don't do anything that would be against the rules."
"Well, since my mere presence is apparently a problem, I'd just like to clarify which behaviors are and aren't allowed. Did she tell you what it is that I do that's a problem?"
More annoyance. "No. She did not. I didn't ask."
"That doesn't seem to be a really great plan. You'd think that she'd have to describe what I did that's a problem."
He leaned back in his chair and clasped his hands. "No, she does not. I take her word for issues involving her classroom management."
"Well, that's a mistake." His eyebrows raised again, and it occurred to me that I might not want to antagonize this man who'd never set eyes on me before, but was willing to believe that I was dangerous.
"Will there be anything else?"
He looked a bit blank. I rephrased. "Is that it?"
Brisk, administrative behavior; he stood up, indicating that the meeting was over, and said, "That'll be it. You can go back to class now." As he held the door open, I reflexively said, "Thank you," and then mentally kicked myself for it. Oh, sure, thanks a lot. Thanks a whole lot for dropping that bombshell on me; I appreciate it so, Guidance Counselor Who I've Never Met Before. Thanks for the "guidance."
I did not go back to class.
I can't remember what class I'd left to go to the office. I think it was after lunch, but I'm not entirely sure. At any rate, my afternoon had just opened up wide, because all I had after lunch were theater classes and after school rehearsal. The whole thing took maybe two minutes; now I was a wreck. I was distraught and weepy.
I began wandering the halls, crying and talking to myself. It was exactly two weeks before my 18th birthday; I remember because I kept saying, "I have another month. I'm supposed to have another month."
It was January 15. The year before, when my best friend was a senior, he'd been suspended on February 15, and finally, expelled. If I was going to be kicked out, it just seemed to me that it should happen on the same day. Like I said, I like predictability.
Classes let out and the halls were suddenly full, so I went outside. I could not handle being around other people.
I kept trying to figure out what had precipitated this, what I had done that had caused backlash. I couldn't think of anything in particular. (I still don't know.)
The irony was that I couldn't imagine offending the teacher, because we barely spoke. The only incident that I thought might be what had her goat had taken place weeks before.
I was a yearbook photographer. I loved the job. A few weeks earlier, we'd taken the drama guild group photo. It was either at lunch or after school, the way most clubs were photographed, so that all the members could be there. The schedule was dictated by yearbook deadlines; we had to turn in a certain number of pages at each deadline during the year. Time specific events - homecoming, sports, etc. - had to be photographed during their time frame, obviously, and things like club photos were spread out over the year.
Another senior was, at that point, barred from the theater. (Yeah, my expelled friend the previous year, Tony, had been the first, but now there were a handful of us not allowed in the theater.) We'd made the teacher angry during set construction by hauling sawhorses and lumber outside the theater to the sidewalk, and having this particular member, Tim Lange, cut the lumber there, so that we could list him in the program under "set construction crew." We also made a big deal about labeling the back of a board he cut - "TIM LANGE CUT THIS BOARD!" - and using it center stage as the fireplace mantle.
(Hence the principal's jibe about my friends; over three decades later, we're still friends.)
I mean, gasp, right? What subversives.
On picture day, Tim was going to wait in the hall - I'd insisted that he be in the photo. He hadn't wanted to, had argued with me, but I really insisted. We set up, placed the camera, had him come in just long enough to take the shot, and he went back into the hall. "Rule" breaking, sure, but I'd do it again.
No, that's not what I think bothered the teacher the most that day.
She was just out of college when she got her job at our school. She was nervous, insecure, not too much older than we were, and eager to be liked. All understandable; all fine. But things deteriorated as she faced strong willed students who knew more about theater than she did; she'd never seen a live production when they gave her the theater classes. It was not a great staffing choice. For a year, everything ran decently, if not smoothly, but that train soon derailed.
It used to be very important to me that people understand, that they hear our side. I left that behind ages ago.
Anyway, as things became more tense, she clamped down with unreasonable rules. We spent an entire set building day being told that we were not allowed to speak, at all, which was then amended to, "You can only ask for tools or give directions;" it was pretty clear that mute, angry kids with power tools miming were an accident waiting to happen.
One of the latest rules was that students could not touch the light switches. It was, in my eyes, a pure power play - I mean, light switches? That's the hill from which you cannot retreat?
In a theater, the "work lights" are standard fluorescent or incandescent lights turned on during set building, early rehearsals, classes, cleaning, and the like. "House" lights are those over the seats, and "stage" lights are the ones directed to the stage, the ones used during performances. We (the students) weren't allowed, at this point, to touch any of them, especially the house or stage lights, unless it was during a performance. Those ran on dimmers on the light board. Back in the days before computers, each light had its own slider on a board full of them. Changing them during a performance meant balancing a bunch of sliders. During class, or any other non-performance time, it just meant running the house slider up to full so that the room was illuminated. It's a one finger operation.
On photo day, I walked into the room, flicked on the work lights (they were a standard light switch just inside the door), and ran up the house lights. The teacher left the room without a word, which I took to be a sign that I could work in peace. We - the drama guild president and I, with a lot of input - were deciding where to take the group photo when the Dean of Men, who was also in charge of most school discipline, came in, with the teacher trailing him.
"I'm told that someone touched the lighting board," he said, with that big, loud, authoritative voice. I found this rather silly.
"Yeah, I did. I turned on the lights."
"Why?"
Seriously? Why did we need light?
"Because I'm taking photos for the yearbook, and I can't do that in the dark."
At that point, I almost wanted him to make a big deal out of it, so that we had to involve the yearbook adviser, and explain that I hadn't been allowed to take photos because I turned on the lights.
This was the only time I saw any staff member behave as though the teacher's complaints were, if not outright silly, at least overblown. He sighed, then turned to her and said, in that voice used when a quarreling parent says, "Tell your father..." even though Father is standing two feet away, but Junior is complying, "She says she's taking pictures for the yearbook. She says she can't take pictures in the dark."
The teacher said, "Oh. OK." The Dean left. The teacher went out without another word and sat in the audience seats until we were done. (I'm pretty sure that I turned the lights back off when we left, but maybe I left them for her.)
So, wandering the campus in tears and talking to myself after being banned, that was the only incident that I could imagine being over the top, in her eyes. It was embarrassing, in front of another faculty member. But why weeks after the fact? Did it matter?
"She's too early. It's too soon. I should have another month."
Now, here comes the crux of this story - what is, for me, the most important part.
I know that, when they're sad, a lot of people would need hugs, consoling, reassurance that they're a good person and the other person is wrong. Usually, that annoys me or makes it worse. It turns out that this time, I needed Joe Beard and Tim Groves.
They were more theater kids, way cooler than I was, and if I remember right, also not allowed in the theater at this point. I ran into them just outside the school as I was wandering and crying. Finding out what was wrong with me did not elicit sympathy and hugs, but loud congratulations and high fives. They acted as though I'd just won the lottery. "Good for you!" "That's great!" "She only does that to people who know what they're doing!"
It worked. The tears dried up. I don't know where they'd been headed to when they found me, but they stayed with me and walked the school grounds aimlessly, talking about nothing in particular, just being next to me. When we ran into Gwen, another theater kid, they told her the story with breathless delight, and large hand gestures, as though it was something to celebrate. Gwen hugged me, but by then I was OK.
When I was finally ready to re-join the world, Tim and Joe wanted to know, "Are you OK?" before they left.
"Yeah. I'm OK." And I meant it.
I finished the play, and the school year, without theater classes. I told my mom the story, but not my dad. And "dangerous and disruptive" became a phrase that made me, and my friends, laugh.
Years later, I told my husband. He, too, laughs at the phrase.
I'm thinking of this because someone recently informed me, again, that I was dangerous. This time, they didn't pair it with "disruptive;" they called me "evil." This is because we have religious and political differences; apparently, that merits a label of dangerous and evil.
They're certainly entitled to their opinion, which I told them. I did not tell them that, at a time in my life when I was vulnerable, someone in a position of power had already fired that particular cannon at me, so its effect is very much blunted now. It's not fun, but it's certainly no longer devastating.
I don't really know what effect the speaker hoped those words would have on me, but I don't think they expected to evoke what's now a warm and fuzzy memory. When I hear myself described that way, I no longer think first of the devastation I was feeling at 17 - I think about Joe and Tim, and high fives. I think about a time that two teenage boys had my back, even though I was a hysterical, weeping teenage girl. I think about them walking with me until I was alright. That's a happy memory.
Tuesday, November 28, 2017
On The Street Where You Live
Recently, as we sat in traffic in a large city, my husband grumbled about being "surrounded by nothing but trash and crazy people."
"It's actually cleaner than I expected. And you're generalizing, aren't you? You haven't even met many residents. They might be lovely people." (I'm usually pretty Pollyanna about things.)
He looked at me as if I was also clearly crazy. "Sane people wouldn't put up with this!" He waved his hand at the traffic, the noise, the crowds (and also, I'm pretty sure, the inflated prices).
I laughed. "You know how many people say that about where we live, right?"
I have several loved ones who have waged a years long battle to convince me to move elsewhere, or at least to get with the program and consider my home state to be a punch line. I know that they sincerely want what's best for me, so I cut them slack, but it grates on my nerves.
For one thing, I sincerely like my area. We're high mountain desert, tucked up against a mountain range; everything from the wide open sand and sage of the Great Basin to the pine forests overlooking deep mountain lakes says "home" to me. It's pretty fantastic.
I like my house. It's comfortable and cost effective. I am intensely irritated by people who think that I'm living my life in the way that I am because I'm unaware that there are other options.
Recently, a friend moved to a new city, and asked for advice on her social media. "We're considering two houses. One is larger and less expensive, but the area isn't considered as desirable. The other is more money than we wanted to spend, but it's in a popular area. Which should we buy?" I think that I was the lone voice saying, "The less expensive house! Obviously!" Everyone else voted for the more expensive house, saying things like, "Think of the resale value!" and telling her that, obviously, the neighbors and the schools would be better in the popular area.
(They finally chose a third house that split the difference.)
People are frequently perplexed by our choice of a fixer upper in an aging neighborhood - not old enough to be "historic," just old enough to be "older." I say, "Hey, I'd rather live here and take my kids on vacation and send them to summer camp." I've been told that I'm doing things "all wrong." "It's more important to spend the money on something you'll use every day, not on something that only lasts for a week or two."
Balderdash. I can show you studies that verify that spending money on experiences instead of belongings results in a happier life, but I don't need them to justify my choices. I am happy in my life.
A friend was once trying to describe what she loved about living in a large city. "In my neighborhood, when I go to get coffee, or shop, or have lunch, the people working there know me, and I get personalized service." I responded, "That sounds like living in a small town." The last time I lived in a truly small town (it made the front page of the tri-county newspaper when we got our second stoplight), when I was buying groceries the cashier said, "That shed's looking pretty good!" My husband was building a shed in our yard, one visible from the road, but I have no idea how the clerk knew that I lived at the house with the shed under construction.
My friend was sure that I was deliberately misunderstanding her. I don't think so; in my city, when I go to the bank, the grocery store, the convenience store, and several restaurants, they know me, often by name. Sometimes, I will have known them for literally decades. I don't think that the size of my city has any bearing on that.
Of course, there are other conversations and other tactics.
"It's such a shame for your kids," to be living here, I was told.
"How do you figure?"
"They're never going to be exposed to different people from different backgrounds. Where you are, it's pretty homogenous; everyone's the same."
I have no idea where that mischaracterization came from. I went to church with a significant number of Tongans with names like Feofa'aki. My daughter's boyfriend was Navajo, and her best friend was from El Salvador. We'd planned birthday party menus to include Hindu, Muslim and Jewish guests. I know lawyers, accountants, ranchers, artists, singers, right here in my community.
I tried to encapsulate all of that in one sentence, without sounding like I was trotting people out as show ponies ("How can you say that? Look at my Token Minority friend!"), and speaking to the experiences of my kids. "My daughter is the only white girl in her Girl Scout troop."
"Well, yes, but I'm talking about professional, educated people."
Um, what? This is a lovely, sincere, well educated person, who always means well, but I was appalled. "Oh, I just know that you did not just imply that their parents are all dishwashers and maids, or that there would be anything wrong with it if they were!"
"No! No. I'm just saying that people in my community have been recruited from all over the world for their particular areas of expertise."
"Do you know what my Scouts' parents do? Because I don't, and I see them every week." This is true; I have actually known people for years before I find out what they do for a living.
I meet a lot of people at church or doing community theater, and we tend to "talk shop," not go through the cocktail party small talk of, "So, what do you do?" I rarely ask this of people. Sometimes, I'm taken by surprise when I find out.
The girls in the Scout troops I led always had parents who took their cookie order forms to work, and sometimes I'd find out what they did for a living based on where they made their sales. On year, the top seller had a (very pretty) mother who was a bartender, and made her sales at the bar. ("And if they don't pick up the cookies, I know I can just sell them to somebody else who's there.") One year, the top seller had a grandmother who worked at a local brothel, and made her sales there. No, I didn't ask in what capacity, although I know that they have non-prostitute staff. I once did theater with a young lady who was the cashier at a brothel.
No, I did not bring up the brothel workers at that point in the conversation. No, I do not think that they prove my loved one's point. No, I did not point out that the area in which this person lived in is known for a particular industry, and therefore more "homogenous" than many other communities, in that you can probably accurately guess what industry in which any person you meet is likely to be employed. I did not point out that when I'm sitting in church in between the owner of a construction business and the owner of a potato farm, listening to a schoolteacher give the lesson, I'm simultaneously experiencing diversity and not categorizing people based on occupation or education.
What I did was rather forcefully change the subject. This is a relationship that I truly value, but if I'm expected to be a job snob and feel that I'm shortchanging my kids by refusing to be badgered into moving to a sprawling metropolis, well, I may start to value it less.
Someone else described me to myself this way - "You're so... so... provincial!"
(You know how sometimes you make a friend, and you laugh together about how you never would have hung out when you were in high school? Yeah - I'm aware that people who love me, but met me when we were kids, would probably not be interested in making friends with me if they met me today. That's OK. We love each other anyway.)
I enjoy visiting large cities in order to experience museums, theaters, historic sites and the like, but then I want to leave and go home.
Something I discovered as an adult, and it was a pleasant surprise, is that I could conceivably live anywhere. I pick up real estate guides every time I travel. We recently spent time in cities older than my nation, staying in apartments, and commenting, "I could live here." I may live somewhere else in the future; but it won't be because I don't like it here, where I am now.
Why am I thinking about this? I was sorting through and organizing photos recently, and I came across this:
Oh, yeah. This image is comfortable, happy - it says "home." It lowers my blood pressure. I could live down that road. Looking at it, I know what it smells like, sounds like, feels like. I want to know what's over the horizon. I want to wander and explore.
That's in contrast to how I feel looking at this image:
I also know what this sounds, smells and feels like; I took both photos. I know that there are places to discover, to eat, to shop. I could conceivable live there. But, given a choice - not so much.
Given a choice, I'll probably always take the dirt road.
"It's actually cleaner than I expected. And you're generalizing, aren't you? You haven't even met many residents. They might be lovely people." (I'm usually pretty Pollyanna about things.)
He looked at me as if I was also clearly crazy. "Sane people wouldn't put up with this!" He waved his hand at the traffic, the noise, the crowds (and also, I'm pretty sure, the inflated prices).
I laughed. "You know how many people say that about where we live, right?"
I have several loved ones who have waged a years long battle to convince me to move elsewhere, or at least to get with the program and consider my home state to be a punch line. I know that they sincerely want what's best for me, so I cut them slack, but it grates on my nerves.
For one thing, I sincerely like my area. We're high mountain desert, tucked up against a mountain range; everything from the wide open sand and sage of the Great Basin to the pine forests overlooking deep mountain lakes says "home" to me. It's pretty fantastic.
I like my house. It's comfortable and cost effective. I am intensely irritated by people who think that I'm living my life in the way that I am because I'm unaware that there are other options.
Recently, a friend moved to a new city, and asked for advice on her social media. "We're considering two houses. One is larger and less expensive, but the area isn't considered as desirable. The other is more money than we wanted to spend, but it's in a popular area. Which should we buy?" I think that I was the lone voice saying, "The less expensive house! Obviously!" Everyone else voted for the more expensive house, saying things like, "Think of the resale value!" and telling her that, obviously, the neighbors and the schools would be better in the popular area.
(They finally chose a third house that split the difference.)
People are frequently perplexed by our choice of a fixer upper in an aging neighborhood - not old enough to be "historic," just old enough to be "older." I say, "Hey, I'd rather live here and take my kids on vacation and send them to summer camp." I've been told that I'm doing things "all wrong." "It's more important to spend the money on something you'll use every day, not on something that only lasts for a week or two."
Balderdash. I can show you studies that verify that spending money on experiences instead of belongings results in a happier life, but I don't need them to justify my choices. I am happy in my life.
A friend was once trying to describe what she loved about living in a large city. "In my neighborhood, when I go to get coffee, or shop, or have lunch, the people working there know me, and I get personalized service." I responded, "That sounds like living in a small town." The last time I lived in a truly small town (it made the front page of the tri-county newspaper when we got our second stoplight), when I was buying groceries the cashier said, "That shed's looking pretty good!" My husband was building a shed in our yard, one visible from the road, but I have no idea how the clerk knew that I lived at the house with the shed under construction.
My friend was sure that I was deliberately misunderstanding her. I don't think so; in my city, when I go to the bank, the grocery store, the convenience store, and several restaurants, they know me, often by name. Sometimes, I will have known them for literally decades. I don't think that the size of my city has any bearing on that.
Of course, there are other conversations and other tactics.
"It's such a shame for your kids," to be living here, I was told.
"How do you figure?"
"They're never going to be exposed to different people from different backgrounds. Where you are, it's pretty homogenous; everyone's the same."
I have no idea where that mischaracterization came from. I went to church with a significant number of Tongans with names like Feofa'aki. My daughter's boyfriend was Navajo, and her best friend was from El Salvador. We'd planned birthday party menus to include Hindu, Muslim and Jewish guests. I know lawyers, accountants, ranchers, artists, singers, right here in my community.
I tried to encapsulate all of that in one sentence, without sounding like I was trotting people out as show ponies ("How can you say that? Look at my Token Minority friend!"), and speaking to the experiences of my kids. "My daughter is the only white girl in her Girl Scout troop."
"Well, yes, but I'm talking about professional, educated people."
Um, what? This is a lovely, sincere, well educated person, who always means well, but I was appalled. "Oh, I just know that you did not just imply that their parents are all dishwashers and maids, or that there would be anything wrong with it if they were!"
"No! No. I'm just saying that people in my community have been recruited from all over the world for their particular areas of expertise."
"Do you know what my Scouts' parents do? Because I don't, and I see them every week." This is true; I have actually known people for years before I find out what they do for a living.
I meet a lot of people at church or doing community theater, and we tend to "talk shop," not go through the cocktail party small talk of, "So, what do you do?" I rarely ask this of people. Sometimes, I'm taken by surprise when I find out.
The girls in the Scout troops I led always had parents who took their cookie order forms to work, and sometimes I'd find out what they did for a living based on where they made their sales. On year, the top seller had a (very pretty) mother who was a bartender, and made her sales at the bar. ("And if they don't pick up the cookies, I know I can just sell them to somebody else who's there.") One year, the top seller had a grandmother who worked at a local brothel, and made her sales there. No, I didn't ask in what capacity, although I know that they have non-prostitute staff. I once did theater with a young lady who was the cashier at a brothel.
No, I did not bring up the brothel workers at that point in the conversation. No, I do not think that they prove my loved one's point. No, I did not point out that the area in which this person lived in is known for a particular industry, and therefore more "homogenous" than many other communities, in that you can probably accurately guess what industry in which any person you meet is likely to be employed. I did not point out that when I'm sitting in church in between the owner of a construction business and the owner of a potato farm, listening to a schoolteacher give the lesson, I'm simultaneously experiencing diversity and not categorizing people based on occupation or education.
What I did was rather forcefully change the subject. This is a relationship that I truly value, but if I'm expected to be a job snob and feel that I'm shortchanging my kids by refusing to be badgered into moving to a sprawling metropolis, well, I may start to value it less.
Someone else described me to myself this way - "You're so... so... provincial!"
(You know how sometimes you make a friend, and you laugh together about how you never would have hung out when you were in high school? Yeah - I'm aware that people who love me, but met me when we were kids, would probably not be interested in making friends with me if they met me today. That's OK. We love each other anyway.)
I enjoy visiting large cities in order to experience museums, theaters, historic sites and the like, but then I want to leave and go home.
Something I discovered as an adult, and it was a pleasant surprise, is that I could conceivably live anywhere. I pick up real estate guides every time I travel. We recently spent time in cities older than my nation, staying in apartments, and commenting, "I could live here." I may live somewhere else in the future; but it won't be because I don't like it here, where I am now.
Why am I thinking about this? I was sorting through and organizing photos recently, and I came across this:
Oh, yeah. This image is comfortable, happy - it says "home." It lowers my blood pressure. I could live down that road. Looking at it, I know what it smells like, sounds like, feels like. I want to know what's over the horizon. I want to wander and explore.
That's in contrast to how I feel looking at this image:
I also know what this sounds, smells and feels like; I took both photos. I know that there are places to discover, to eat, to shop. I could conceivable live there. But, given a choice - not so much.
Given a choice, I'll probably always take the dirt road.
Monday, October 16, 2017
Defending the Fairy Tale
While newer movies like "Zootopia" and "Moana" earn raves from the public (and many critics), many of the older Disney features are falling out of favor. "Disney princesses are terrible examples for children!" I hear. "They're weak and passive and waiting for someone to save them! And they think that marrying a prince is their life's goal!"
I disagree; that's not what I see happening.
On the other hand Disney also takes heat for sanitizing the stories. Why is that even a criticism? Do we want the Brothers Grimm versions, where, for instance, the prince is so taken by the lady experiencing enchanted slumber that he has sexual relations with her while she's unconscious, and she wakes up to find herself a mother of three? Did anybody seriously like the original Andersen version of "The Little Mermaid" where the prince rejects her, and she's content to be turned into seafoam and lap at the base of his castle? Seriously, I can't imagine preferring those versions, even if they are the original source material.
I think, as well, that the critics aren't actually watching the movies, just repeating previous complaints. I don't see the problems they insist exist.
Let's take Cinderella, the original animated version; she catches a lot of flack. "She just waits to be rescued! She lets other people treat her badly! Why doesn't she just leave?"
First, let's address the idea that the victims of abuse are somehow responsible, because they don't leave. They just "take it." I could spend pages - volumes, even - citing research about the effects that abuse has, the complex psychological issues, the fact that leaving is the most dangerous and deadly time, the fact that it is never the fault of the victim, but let's just settle on the latter - never the fault of the victim - and move on.
Mostly, I'm touching only briefly on those issues because, although they are very valid and the conversation could stop there, when I watch Cinderella, she doesn't behave as though she's damaged.
I want to start with the late 20th/early 21st century assumption that Cinderella should just walk out, get a university degree, and open a fashionable boutique or become a women's advocate attorney. We should all be conversant enough in history to know that it was not physically possible for Cinderella, or anyone else, to be a "strong, independent woman who don't need no man." A woman could live three basic places - her father's home, her husband's home, or a convent. That's it. There was no avenue to being a single, self supporting woman. Cinderella knew that she had, basically, two choices - live in the family home, or become a servant in someone else's home. She already had the tasks of a servant, so she chose - actively chose - to stay in the family home, rather than performing those tasks somewhere else.
Why? Because she wasn't about to let someone run her out of her own home, the one where she was born. Because she had the advantage of "the devil you know." Because the home held happy memories of her loved ones, as well as their physical belongings. Because she knew, having lost both of her parents, that parents die; she therefore knew that, chances were, her stepmother would pass one day, and the home would again be hers alone. She could wait it out.
Which brings us to another admirable trait, one we should all cultivate - she did not let her circumstances, or the opinions of others, determine her self worth. No matter how she was treated, or how often someone told her that she was worthless, she never felt that way.
She didn't start to droop and wince like a kicked puppy. She did not pine and suffer and ask, "Why are you doing this? Why don't you love me?" She did not lash out and become spiteful, spitting in their food. She knew that how people treat you reflects on them, and how you treat people reflects your character. She was calm and competent, no matter what the others around her might say or do. Do you know how hard it is to find and live that balance? She did it apparently effortlessly.
She befriended those that others overlooked, those who, in theory, can do nothing to benefit her. She doesn't feel sorry for herself - she's grateful for what she has, and doesn't consider it a second best substitute that she jetisons as soon as her circumstances change. And, guess what happens? They find a way to help her.
She was not looking for someone to rescue her. She didn't complain. She wanted a night out, not deliverance. She wasn't looking to get spirited away, or to find a husband. She wanted to attend a party. She didn't want to be the prettiest one at the ball, or to have men court her. She just wanted to be well enough dressed that they'd let her in.
Something people seem to forget, too - when she danced all night with a handsome man, she didn't know that he was the prince. He could have been the cook or the gardener or a distant cousin of the prince. She didn't care. When she makes her excuses to leave, she says, "I haven't met the prince," and he's surprised. "Didn't you know?" he asks.
When she hears that he's looking for her, she finally admits to herself that she wants to see him again. He was not the point of the evening; meeting him was a happy side benefit.
And, let's talk for a minute about the Fairy Godmother. She doesn't swoop in to alleviate or reduce difficulty. She doesn't take away problems. She just makes a night out possible. That speaks to me, as well. That's the way the universe works. Whatever you believe is the highest power - God, karma, whatever - does not make it so that you will never be unhappy, lonely, mistreated. It just helps you hang in there and bear the adversity that every life has. Then, when something good happens, it's not because you were helpless, and someone swooped in. It's because that's how life works, too. There is always beauty and happiness to be found, and you'd miss it if someone micromanaged your life for you; you'd be unable to distinguish it. Experience is what gives you perspective.
I'm a bit miffed, too, at criticism that her "happily ever after" includes getting married. Ask any person in a happy relationship if their relationship is one of the most important, most cherished things in their life, and they'll say "yes." Heck, a significant number of people in unhappy relationships would still say "yes." So, why would you criticize someone for wanting something that's important to you? She doesn't "define herself" by her marital status. She's just glad to have what most people want.
And once she gets the chance to leave the house with her tormentors in it, and craft the life she wants, she does not do any of the following: complain that getting there took too long, insist on revenge, gloat, punish those who did her wrong, insist on telling the story over and over so that "people know the truth." She just walks away. (And she takes her friends with her.)
I'll take those life lessons, for children or adults, any day.
I disagree; that's not what I see happening.
On the other hand Disney also takes heat for sanitizing the stories. Why is that even a criticism? Do we want the Brothers Grimm versions, where, for instance, the prince is so taken by the lady experiencing enchanted slumber that he has sexual relations with her while she's unconscious, and she wakes up to find herself a mother of three? Did anybody seriously like the original Andersen version of "The Little Mermaid" where the prince rejects her, and she's content to be turned into seafoam and lap at the base of his castle? Seriously, I can't imagine preferring those versions, even if they are the original source material.
I think, as well, that the critics aren't actually watching the movies, just repeating previous complaints. I don't see the problems they insist exist.
Let's take Cinderella, the original animated version; she catches a lot of flack. "She just waits to be rescued! She lets other people treat her badly! Why doesn't she just leave?"
First, let's address the idea that the victims of abuse are somehow responsible, because they don't leave. They just "take it." I could spend pages - volumes, even - citing research about the effects that abuse has, the complex psychological issues, the fact that leaving is the most dangerous and deadly time, the fact that it is never the fault of the victim, but let's just settle on the latter - never the fault of the victim - and move on.
Mostly, I'm touching only briefly on those issues because, although they are very valid and the conversation could stop there, when I watch Cinderella, she doesn't behave as though she's damaged.
I want to start with the late 20th/early 21st century assumption that Cinderella should just walk out, get a university degree, and open a fashionable boutique or become a women's advocate attorney. We should all be conversant enough in history to know that it was not physically possible for Cinderella, or anyone else, to be a "strong, independent woman who don't need no man." A woman could live three basic places - her father's home, her husband's home, or a convent. That's it. There was no avenue to being a single, self supporting woman. Cinderella knew that she had, basically, two choices - live in the family home, or become a servant in someone else's home. She already had the tasks of a servant, so she chose - actively chose - to stay in the family home, rather than performing those tasks somewhere else.
Why? Because she wasn't about to let someone run her out of her own home, the one where she was born. Because she had the advantage of "the devil you know." Because the home held happy memories of her loved ones, as well as their physical belongings. Because she knew, having lost both of her parents, that parents die; she therefore knew that, chances were, her stepmother would pass one day, and the home would again be hers alone. She could wait it out.
Which brings us to another admirable trait, one we should all cultivate - she did not let her circumstances, or the opinions of others, determine her self worth. No matter how she was treated, or how often someone told her that she was worthless, she never felt that way.
She didn't start to droop and wince like a kicked puppy. She did not pine and suffer and ask, "Why are you doing this? Why don't you love me?" She did not lash out and become spiteful, spitting in their food. She knew that how people treat you reflects on them, and how you treat people reflects your character. She was calm and competent, no matter what the others around her might say or do. Do you know how hard it is to find and live that balance? She did it apparently effortlessly.
She befriended those that others overlooked, those who, in theory, can do nothing to benefit her. She doesn't feel sorry for herself - she's grateful for what she has, and doesn't consider it a second best substitute that she jetisons as soon as her circumstances change. And, guess what happens? They find a way to help her.
She was not looking for someone to rescue her. She didn't complain. She wanted a night out, not deliverance. She wasn't looking to get spirited away, or to find a husband. She wanted to attend a party. She didn't want to be the prettiest one at the ball, or to have men court her. She just wanted to be well enough dressed that they'd let her in.
Something people seem to forget, too - when she danced all night with a handsome man, she didn't know that he was the prince. He could have been the cook or the gardener or a distant cousin of the prince. She didn't care. When she makes her excuses to leave, she says, "I haven't met the prince," and he's surprised. "Didn't you know?" he asks.
When she hears that he's looking for her, she finally admits to herself that she wants to see him again. He was not the point of the evening; meeting him was a happy side benefit.
And, let's talk for a minute about the Fairy Godmother. She doesn't swoop in to alleviate or reduce difficulty. She doesn't take away problems. She just makes a night out possible. That speaks to me, as well. That's the way the universe works. Whatever you believe is the highest power - God, karma, whatever - does not make it so that you will never be unhappy, lonely, mistreated. It just helps you hang in there and bear the adversity that every life has. Then, when something good happens, it's not because you were helpless, and someone swooped in. It's because that's how life works, too. There is always beauty and happiness to be found, and you'd miss it if someone micromanaged your life for you; you'd be unable to distinguish it. Experience is what gives you perspective.
I'm a bit miffed, too, at criticism that her "happily ever after" includes getting married. Ask any person in a happy relationship if their relationship is one of the most important, most cherished things in their life, and they'll say "yes." Heck, a significant number of people in unhappy relationships would still say "yes." So, why would you criticize someone for wanting something that's important to you? She doesn't "define herself" by her marital status. She's just glad to have what most people want.
And once she gets the chance to leave the house with her tormentors in it, and craft the life she wants, she does not do any of the following: complain that getting there took too long, insist on revenge, gloat, punish those who did her wrong, insist on telling the story over and over so that "people know the truth." She just walks away. (And she takes her friends with her.)
I'll take those life lessons, for children or adults, any day.
Sunday, October 15, 2017
Vandals
From my Facebook page:
Time for a story, boys and girls. Well, really, two related stories.
Once upon a time, many moons ago in the days of big hair and neon clothes, I was a high school theater student. During the rehearsal period for one of our shows, we came to rehearsal to find that the theater had been vandalized. The big double doors that led to the backstage area had the words, "GO AWAY" spray painted on them in black paint. Our set also had the words sprayed across it in black, along with a couple of weird symbols that we didn't recognize.
We had an uneasy relationship with the school administration ("uneasy" as in, the vice principal once said, in public, that he wished he could shut the department down "and be rid of all of you"), so we were sure we'd be blamed for the vandalism, even though it was clearly aimed at us. We repainted our set, but the teacher forbid us to paint the doors. We didn't have the right color, and, "The district will take care of it."
Three of us went back under the cover of night with paint and flashlights. Everyone who was in the department with us knows who The Instigator and the artist was. I held the flashlight. When we left, there were comedy/tragedy masks painted over the words. If we were going to get in trouble, we at least wanted it to be for something we did.
School started at 8 am; by 9 am, the masks had been painted over. None of us got in any kind of trouble (although the principal was unamused).
Plus, we seized on the phrase "go away" as our own, and used it as a greeting, farewell, and best wishes. When we went to the movies together (like the Monty Python film festival we attended as part of our "Thirteen Radical Days of Christmas"), we cheered every time a character said, "Go away!" I had Oscar the Grouch and his "go away" sign on my binder. To this day, if you say "go away" to a certain number of us, the response will be a cheery "Go away!" right back.
After high school - and the explanation is a long one - I wasn't sure I'd ever audition for anything again, even though the theater was where I most wanted to be. The Instigator dragged me half willingly to auditions at the local university; the university theater department became my home, for many years. I was in shows there while I was pregnant with three of my four children. He handed me back that part of my life, and there is no way to express my gratitude.
There's a tradition in theater of signing the back of the set, or the backstage walls, or leaving show related art there. At the university, one hallway between the theater and the art department has become a community art space. People paint or write, leaving quotes and images, without needing permission.
Recently, someone went into that hallway and painted some hateful words, as well as several symbols that everyone very much DOES recognize - symbols of a hate group, designed to elicit fear and promote oppression.
The university could have just quickly and quietly rolled white paint over the vandalism, and told no one what was there. They appear to have asked the Fine Arts faculty for input, though, because the decision was - invite current and former students, as well as any interested community members, to paint over the vandalism with something positive.
I'm now old enough that three of my children are college graduates. I had to miss church meetings to be there, but it was important to me to go. Even though I haven't been in the building for years, in a very real way it will always be my home. Even if I had no connection to the building, no student should show up Monday morning and see those images.
So, I dressed in my "don't care if I get paint on them" clothes, and went up.
Nobody thought it was odd that a person my age, wearing a shirt older than most of the kids there, had come. A kid young enough to be mine thanked me for being there. The hallway was full - really full - of people painting. Where the vandalism had been, there are now a portrait of Frederick Douglass, leaves blowing in the wind, a dove, a freehand sentiment - "DUDE, BE NICE" - and more. Everyone was polite, excited, trying to help. I overheard a young lady - who was painting blocks with the letters L-O-V-E on them - say, "I wish I had purple," and I offered, "I can go and buy some, if you'd like."
"No, that's OK. I'm fine. I don't even go here. I'm still in high school," she said.
Someone was handing out fresh fruit and cookies. Someone was providing stencils for those who wanted to help, but "can't paint." I bumped, literally, into two men with news cameras. "I'm sorry," the cameraman said. "No, you're fabulous," I said. "Well, you are too," was the reply.
I painted one thing - well, actually the same thing, twice. It's the symbol in this photo. It's The Golden Rule. Yes, that "Golden Rule" - the one that says to treat people the way you'd like to be treated. The symbol was created by someone dear to me. It is still on the ceiling of that high school theater.
It may not stay - it may already be painted over, and that's OK. It was the sentiment that was important to me, leaving that symbol at the site of a hate crime.
If you see this symbol there, or anywhere else, now you know.
The moral of the story, boys and girls: do not mess with the artists, the creators. They will take your bad behavior, and they will make it something beautiful. Every time.
Friday, July 14, 2017
Birthday Invitations
We tend to go through life assuming that other people - at least reasonable, informed people - are thinking and feeling the same things that we are, and that they perceive facts, situations and personalities the same way that we do. We're wrong, of course, but at least we're reasonably well intentioned.
I've discovered that anything that we consider to be An Important Occasion magnifies ordinary miscommunication and misunderstandings. Don't even talk to me about how crazy people get about weddings.
Birthdays ought to be pretty relatable and understandable, right? Wrong. I know people who stress out about having a birthday, who feel sad because another year is past. I don't get it. Some people want to ignore them and pretend that they don't exist. I don't comprehend that level of denial - we were all born, and time continues to move forward.
On the other hand, I know people who don't just celebrate the day itself - they have Birthday Week. Celebrations for days! They and the "it's not a big deal" people tend to think that the other is crazy.
I understand a bit, at least intellectually, the conflict between the "just ice cream and cake" crowd and the "blowout super extravaganza bash" crowd. I just simply will not do over the top parties for my family, even if I wake up tomorrow with obscene wealth. I know that there are people who fear that their kids will be outcasts with no friends if they have a "lame" birthday party. I'm just not particularly capable of holding or accommodating that mindset. "You're willing to like my kid if I give you expensive things and experiences? Aw, great! My kids will have such caring friends!" Yeah, I know that I've alienated people. I know that there are the "if you can't have a 'nice' party, don't bother" folks. My kids have certainly attended parties where the favors they brought home were more expensive than the gift they gave. To me, a "nice" party is spending time with people that you like, having something good (even if it's only cake) to eat, and a fun activity or two - games, swimming, etc. So, if that doesn't work for you, don't attend any party that I throw. Seriously; we'll both be happier.
I've always erred on the side of inviting too many people. I was the kid who was frequently left out, and I never wanted another kid to feel deliberately excluded. Even when I was invited, it didn't always go well - like the time in 6th grade when everyone else was invited to go roller skating, but my best friend and I were invited over only after the skaters had come back to the birthday girl's house for cake and presents. (The mom was mortified, and promised to take us skating another day, but neither of us took her up on it.)
I was therefore quite surprised when I met other moms who felt that birthday parties should be best friends only, the kids who were always over anyway, and that extending that invitation list was a blatant grab for gifts. I'm used to relatives and friends who give very modest gifts, and expect very modest gifts. Knowing that there were gift grumps made me even more grateful for the kids who came, gift or no gift, to celebrate with my kids.
One of my daughters has a birthday two days after Halloween - she loved it when she got gifts of leftover Halloween candy. (What kid doesn't love candy?) One girl made it into an adorable wreath. The birthday girl reveled in having more candy than her siblings.
I've had people RSVP to say that they can't bring a gift, and I always tell them, "A gift is not necessary. Or, something from the dollar store is fine. Or, since gift opening is the last thing we do, you can pick your child up before gifts are opened. Just say that you have to leave early, and no one will mind." Once, a mom told me that her daughter would not be coming to my daughter's party because she could not afford a gift. I gave her the spiel above, and she finally agreed to bring her daughter. That year, the party was at Build a Bear Workshop, where you get to stuff your own stuffed animal. It was pretty outrageously expensive for us, but that's the perk of being the youngest child - parents have more money and less patience for party planning/throwing. So, the girl showed up, built her bear, and was picked up from our party and taken straight to another party, where the bear she'd just built was the gift. I was happy that our invitation allowed her to attend two parties.
My vision of "parties" was always just cake, ice cream and drinks, as far as refreshments went. For the first few parties we threw for our kids, that's what we did. We usually put candy in the goodie bags to take home.
Then, one very vocal complaint changed the way we threw parties. It shouldn't have - maybe we should have stood our ground - but we also wanted guests to be happy.
On the day of my daughter's party, my husband worked 7 A.M. to 3 P.M., and was home by 3:30. I had rehearsal for a play that evening. I had to drive 45 miles, across three county lines, to get to rehearsal. I had to leave by 6:15 if I wanted to be on time; I could push to 6:30 if I knew I'd have great traffic, and felt like speeding a bit (which I do not). So, we planned the party for 4 to 6, at our house.
Since it was right before dinner - for my kids, anyway - we had cake, drinks, goldfish crackers and pretzels. That way, there was "party food," but everyone would still feel like eating dinner. We had chicken thighs in the oven for our family, so they could come out as soon as the guests were gone.
Everybody showed up on time, played, ate, opened gifts, got goodie bags, and went home on time, except for two family members (and their kids) who lingered. Not wanting to eat in front of them, I left my husband to feed our kids when the guests were gone, and stopped for a sandwich on the way to rehearsal. Eating in the car when I had a show was not uncommon.
Later that evening, my husband got a call from an irate family member who'd brought kids to the party. Like all of our family (and many of our friends) in the area, they lived in the next town, the same town my rehearsal was in. Driving to our house meant a 30 to 60 minute drive. She called to tell him that she was "so offended" that we hadn't fed them dinner. "I drove all that way with hungry kids, and I had to stop for fast food in order to feed them! There was no way I could make it home and cook something with them starving like that."
The worst part was that she apparently felt singled out. My husband pointed out, "We didn't feed anyone dinner."
"You didn't? You had a party and didn't provide food?"
"There was food, but not dinner. Even my wife didn't eat dinner at home." As he was telling me this story, I was thinking, I ate fast food that night. Welcome to my world. It also could not have escaped her attention, as the last one there, that all the other guests left without having dinner; how could she feel singled out?
And, she had not RSVP'd; we were surprised to see her when she came. (I think it was the only time that she ever came to that house, and we lived there for over 5 years.) Even if we'd planned dinner, we wouldn't have planned on them having any.
There was a fairly protracted conversation between her and my husband about what people "expect" from an invitation. My husband and I both thought that it was fairly obvious that a child's afternoon party would not provide dinner. If it was from 6 to 8, OK, expect dinner, but right after school? Who eats dinner at 4 or 5? The time was clearly printed on the invitation. It also said, "Join us for..." and cake was the only food listed. I couldn't imagine that this had been a surprise.
But, it had been, and she was madder than a wet hen. We never again threw any birthday party without including a meal, but I don't think she noticed. She attended a grand total of two more birthday parties for any of our kids - two total, not two per child. She was at a total of three parties - and we have 4 children, who had birthday parties every year.
Sometimes, we'd have an afternoon party, and serve things like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and goldfish crackers. Many times, we served pizza. A couple of times, we had McDonald's, like when my 4 year old had her heart set on a party at their Play Place. The only other time anyone said anything derogatory about the food was the year a friend said, "What brand cake mix was this? Because it was awful; I want to make sure that I never buy it."
(Well, and when one of my daughters, as an adult, complained, "We went to a pizza place for my 16th birthday party." Sorry, Kid - no over the top "Sweet 16s" with a live band and dancing. No boozy 21sts, either.)
We were also informed that our invitation process was lacking.
I've always tried to do written invitations. One, it just seems more official and less offhand - if we send you an invitation, you know that we want you there. Plus, all the details are written down - no, "Was that Friday or Saturday?" or, "Was that 4 or 5?" You don't have to rely on your memory. Or on notes - I've watched people write down incorrect information as someone is speaking right to them. All the info you need is there and correct in a written invitation.
Two, I tried to mail them. Getting mail is fun. But, more importantly, if you aren't inviting every single child in a class at school, at church, at dance or gym, on your Little League team or your Scout troop, it's a little less obvious if you aren't handing invitations out to some kids and skipping others. Doing it through the mail feels less exclusionary to me. I always collected mailing addresses of kids that we wanted to invite.
With family, of course, we had their addresses, and we always made sure that we mailed invitations to our family and those that we considered family before we sent them to anyone else. Family invitations might go out on Monday, and the rest go out on Friday.
Three, they establish the theme; you know if the birthday child is into princesses or airplanes.
Even though we carefully mailed the invitations to family first, we had a relative who didn't come, and kept making comments about "if I'd been invited." When that happened, we'd either reiterate the plans, assuming they didn't get the invitation, or assure them that we'd love to see them next time if the party had passed. After this happened for at least two years, I finally asked, "Is your mail delivery a problem? Do you not get home delivery?"
"No, we get home delivery, and my mail lady is great. We're on a first name basis."
"I have your house number right, don't I?" I recited the number.
"That's right."
"Then how do you not get the invitations? We mail them in plenty of time."
Then she said, "Oh, I get the little cards," in a voice that indicated that "the little cards" were somehow icky.
"Then you've been invited. That's the invitation." How was this not clear?
"But you never called me!"
What?
"I never called anybody."
"You never called anybody?"
"No. We sent out invitations." She looked horrified. "I didn't even call my mother."
"You didn't talk to anybody?"
"No." She looked so shocked, and this was apparently a difficult concept to grasp. "Sometimes, people RSVP, but not very often. Or, they'll call to ask what kind of gifts to get. But other than that, no."
She really was horrified. "And people came?"
"Yes, people came." I wanted to add, "Because we invited them," but I didn't.
"You'd better be glad they love those babies enough to overlook your rudeness!"
Rudeness? I invited them to a party!
Apparently - and I was unaware of this - she considered only a phone call to be a "real" invitation. Even if you mailed something, you called to say that you'd mailed it, then again to see when it arrived. She also thought that this was how "everyone" felt; I was baffled.
I'm not much of a phone person. My husband never got over the fact that my mom and I, who adore each other, could have phone calls that lasted less than a minute. Of course, I've also talked for over an hour, numerous times; it's not a phobia or anything. I just don't make many phone calls. Plus, as I listed above, I believe in actual, paper invitations. And my husband just does not make phone calls unless it's practically life and death.
Her attitude seemed wrapped up in a trait shared by a number of my friends and relatives - the idea that people only love you if they phone you, and frequently. The person who receives, not makes, phone calls is the one who is loved most. Plus, other communication, including face to face, is "not making an effort." I find that to be very weird.
Also, some people tend to feel that if they have to specifically tell you about something in their lives (whether good or bad), it's because you don't really care. If you "cared," you'd talk to them so frequently that you'd already know. If I didn't know something that was going on in their life, it was because I "never" called, and therefore "obviously" didn't care. The ball always seems to be in my court, though - if they didn't know something about my life, it was also my fault for not phoning them enough.
This never made sense to me. It made even less sense when I'd say, "You never call me, either!" and the answer was, "Well, I would, if you called me." What? "I think this is the only correct way to behave, but I'll only do what I think is right if you do it first"? That's ridiculous.
The thing is, if she'd said, up front and in a timely fashion, "I'd really appreciate a phone call," I would have done my best to call. I would have found it needy, but I would have made an effort. But to have someone ignore written invitations, make passive-aggressive comments about "not being invited" and then tell me that it was my fault for not being attentive enough produced the opposite reaction. If other people could figure out that receiving a mailed invitation meant that they were invited, by golly, every recipient could. Show up or don't, but don't gripe about it, either way.
And yeah, even with 4 kids, even after being told that I entertained badly and made gross cake and had bad manners, we had parties for our kids every single birthday while they were growing up - because we are parents, and the kids come first.
(I will readily admit, though, that as they got older and we had a bit more money to spare, I no longer cleaned, decorated and cooked - we went to restaurants, movie theaters, bowling alleys or elsewhere, including a corn maze. Less stress for me.)
I wonder, sometimes, if things have changed in the digital age. Probably now, people get upset about getting or not getting texts, not phone calls. I rarely text. I still send paper invitations, I still mail them to relatives first. But, everybody else might get an e-vite or Facebook Event invitation. My daughter just graduated from high school, and I don't have physical addresses, or phone numbers, for many people that we know, and are in electronic contact with regularly. I'm pretty sure that an electronic invitation is socially acceptable.
But, if you think it's not, we pretty much have two choices - let's just avoid each other's events, or attend them without griping. As "the kids say these days," you do you. I'll do me.
I've discovered that anything that we consider to be An Important Occasion magnifies ordinary miscommunication and misunderstandings. Don't even talk to me about how crazy people get about weddings.
Birthdays ought to be pretty relatable and understandable, right? Wrong. I know people who stress out about having a birthday, who feel sad because another year is past. I don't get it. Some people want to ignore them and pretend that they don't exist. I don't comprehend that level of denial - we were all born, and time continues to move forward.
On the other hand, I know people who don't just celebrate the day itself - they have Birthday Week. Celebrations for days! They and the "it's not a big deal" people tend to think that the other is crazy.
I understand a bit, at least intellectually, the conflict between the "just ice cream and cake" crowd and the "blowout super extravaganza bash" crowd. I just simply will not do over the top parties for my family, even if I wake up tomorrow with obscene wealth. I know that there are people who fear that their kids will be outcasts with no friends if they have a "lame" birthday party. I'm just not particularly capable of holding or accommodating that mindset. "You're willing to like my kid if I give you expensive things and experiences? Aw, great! My kids will have such caring friends!" Yeah, I know that I've alienated people. I know that there are the "if you can't have a 'nice' party, don't bother" folks. My kids have certainly attended parties where the favors they brought home were more expensive than the gift they gave. To me, a "nice" party is spending time with people that you like, having something good (even if it's only cake) to eat, and a fun activity or two - games, swimming, etc. So, if that doesn't work for you, don't attend any party that I throw. Seriously; we'll both be happier.
I've always erred on the side of inviting too many people. I was the kid who was frequently left out, and I never wanted another kid to feel deliberately excluded. Even when I was invited, it didn't always go well - like the time in 6th grade when everyone else was invited to go roller skating, but my best friend and I were invited over only after the skaters had come back to the birthday girl's house for cake and presents. (The mom was mortified, and promised to take us skating another day, but neither of us took her up on it.)
I was therefore quite surprised when I met other moms who felt that birthday parties should be best friends only, the kids who were always over anyway, and that extending that invitation list was a blatant grab for gifts. I'm used to relatives and friends who give very modest gifts, and expect very modest gifts. Knowing that there were gift grumps made me even more grateful for the kids who came, gift or no gift, to celebrate with my kids.
One of my daughters has a birthday two days after Halloween - she loved it when she got gifts of leftover Halloween candy. (What kid doesn't love candy?) One girl made it into an adorable wreath. The birthday girl reveled in having more candy than her siblings.
I've had people RSVP to say that they can't bring a gift, and I always tell them, "A gift is not necessary. Or, something from the dollar store is fine. Or, since gift opening is the last thing we do, you can pick your child up before gifts are opened. Just say that you have to leave early, and no one will mind." Once, a mom told me that her daughter would not be coming to my daughter's party because she could not afford a gift. I gave her the spiel above, and she finally agreed to bring her daughter. That year, the party was at Build a Bear Workshop, where you get to stuff your own stuffed animal. It was pretty outrageously expensive for us, but that's the perk of being the youngest child - parents have more money and less patience for party planning/throwing. So, the girl showed up, built her bear, and was picked up from our party and taken straight to another party, where the bear she'd just built was the gift. I was happy that our invitation allowed her to attend two parties.
My vision of "parties" was always just cake, ice cream and drinks, as far as refreshments went. For the first few parties we threw for our kids, that's what we did. We usually put candy in the goodie bags to take home.
Then, one very vocal complaint changed the way we threw parties. It shouldn't have - maybe we should have stood our ground - but we also wanted guests to be happy.
On the day of my daughter's party, my husband worked 7 A.M. to 3 P.M., and was home by 3:30. I had rehearsal for a play that evening. I had to drive 45 miles, across three county lines, to get to rehearsal. I had to leave by 6:15 if I wanted to be on time; I could push to 6:30 if I knew I'd have great traffic, and felt like speeding a bit (which I do not). So, we planned the party for 4 to 6, at our house.
Since it was right before dinner - for my kids, anyway - we had cake, drinks, goldfish crackers and pretzels. That way, there was "party food," but everyone would still feel like eating dinner. We had chicken thighs in the oven for our family, so they could come out as soon as the guests were gone.
Everybody showed up on time, played, ate, opened gifts, got goodie bags, and went home on time, except for two family members (and their kids) who lingered. Not wanting to eat in front of them, I left my husband to feed our kids when the guests were gone, and stopped for a sandwich on the way to rehearsal. Eating in the car when I had a show was not uncommon.
Later that evening, my husband got a call from an irate family member who'd brought kids to the party. Like all of our family (and many of our friends) in the area, they lived in the next town, the same town my rehearsal was in. Driving to our house meant a 30 to 60 minute drive. She called to tell him that she was "so offended" that we hadn't fed them dinner. "I drove all that way with hungry kids, and I had to stop for fast food in order to feed them! There was no way I could make it home and cook something with them starving like that."
The worst part was that she apparently felt singled out. My husband pointed out, "We didn't feed anyone dinner."
"You didn't? You had a party and didn't provide food?"
"There was food, but not dinner. Even my wife didn't eat dinner at home." As he was telling me this story, I was thinking, I ate fast food that night. Welcome to my world. It also could not have escaped her attention, as the last one there, that all the other guests left without having dinner; how could she feel singled out?
And, she had not RSVP'd; we were surprised to see her when she came. (I think it was the only time that she ever came to that house, and we lived there for over 5 years.) Even if we'd planned dinner, we wouldn't have planned on them having any.
There was a fairly protracted conversation between her and my husband about what people "expect" from an invitation. My husband and I both thought that it was fairly obvious that a child's afternoon party would not provide dinner. If it was from 6 to 8, OK, expect dinner, but right after school? Who eats dinner at 4 or 5? The time was clearly printed on the invitation. It also said, "Join us for..." and cake was the only food listed. I couldn't imagine that this had been a surprise.
But, it had been, and she was madder than a wet hen. We never again threw any birthday party without including a meal, but I don't think she noticed. She attended a grand total of two more birthday parties for any of our kids - two total, not two per child. She was at a total of three parties - and we have 4 children, who had birthday parties every year.
Sometimes, we'd have an afternoon party, and serve things like peanut butter and jelly sandwiches and goldfish crackers. Many times, we served pizza. A couple of times, we had McDonald's, like when my 4 year old had her heart set on a party at their Play Place. The only other time anyone said anything derogatory about the food was the year a friend said, "What brand cake mix was this? Because it was awful; I want to make sure that I never buy it."
(Well, and when one of my daughters, as an adult, complained, "We went to a pizza place for my 16th birthday party." Sorry, Kid - no over the top "Sweet 16s" with a live band and dancing. No boozy 21sts, either.)
We were also informed that our invitation process was lacking.
I've always tried to do written invitations. One, it just seems more official and less offhand - if we send you an invitation, you know that we want you there. Plus, all the details are written down - no, "Was that Friday or Saturday?" or, "Was that 4 or 5?" You don't have to rely on your memory. Or on notes - I've watched people write down incorrect information as someone is speaking right to them. All the info you need is there and correct in a written invitation.
Two, I tried to mail them. Getting mail is fun. But, more importantly, if you aren't inviting every single child in a class at school, at church, at dance or gym, on your Little League team or your Scout troop, it's a little less obvious if you aren't handing invitations out to some kids and skipping others. Doing it through the mail feels less exclusionary to me. I always collected mailing addresses of kids that we wanted to invite.
With family, of course, we had their addresses, and we always made sure that we mailed invitations to our family and those that we considered family before we sent them to anyone else. Family invitations might go out on Monday, and the rest go out on Friday.
Three, they establish the theme; you know if the birthday child is into princesses or airplanes.
Even though we carefully mailed the invitations to family first, we had a relative who didn't come, and kept making comments about "if I'd been invited." When that happened, we'd either reiterate the plans, assuming they didn't get the invitation, or assure them that we'd love to see them next time if the party had passed. After this happened for at least two years, I finally asked, "Is your mail delivery a problem? Do you not get home delivery?"
"No, we get home delivery, and my mail lady is great. We're on a first name basis."
"I have your house number right, don't I?" I recited the number.
"That's right."
"Then how do you not get the invitations? We mail them in plenty of time."
Then she said, "Oh, I get the little cards," in a voice that indicated that "the little cards" were somehow icky.
"Then you've been invited. That's the invitation." How was this not clear?
"But you never called me!"
What?
"I never called anybody."
"You never called anybody?"
"No. We sent out invitations." She looked horrified. "I didn't even call my mother."
"You didn't talk to anybody?"
"No." She looked so shocked, and this was apparently a difficult concept to grasp. "Sometimes, people RSVP, but not very often. Or, they'll call to ask what kind of gifts to get. But other than that, no."
She really was horrified. "And people came?"
"Yes, people came." I wanted to add, "Because we invited them," but I didn't.
"You'd better be glad they love those babies enough to overlook your rudeness!"
Rudeness? I invited them to a party!
Apparently - and I was unaware of this - she considered only a phone call to be a "real" invitation. Even if you mailed something, you called to say that you'd mailed it, then again to see when it arrived. She also thought that this was how "everyone" felt; I was baffled.
I'm not much of a phone person. My husband never got over the fact that my mom and I, who adore each other, could have phone calls that lasted less than a minute. Of course, I've also talked for over an hour, numerous times; it's not a phobia or anything. I just don't make many phone calls. Plus, as I listed above, I believe in actual, paper invitations. And my husband just does not make phone calls unless it's practically life and death.
Her attitude seemed wrapped up in a trait shared by a number of my friends and relatives - the idea that people only love you if they phone you, and frequently. The person who receives, not makes, phone calls is the one who is loved most. Plus, other communication, including face to face, is "not making an effort." I find that to be very weird.
Also, some people tend to feel that if they have to specifically tell you about something in their lives (whether good or bad), it's because you don't really care. If you "cared," you'd talk to them so frequently that you'd already know. If I didn't know something that was going on in their life, it was because I "never" called, and therefore "obviously" didn't care. The ball always seems to be in my court, though - if they didn't know something about my life, it was also my fault for not phoning them enough.
This never made sense to me. It made even less sense when I'd say, "You never call me, either!" and the answer was, "Well, I would, if you called me." What? "I think this is the only correct way to behave, but I'll only do what I think is right if you do it first"? That's ridiculous.
The thing is, if she'd said, up front and in a timely fashion, "I'd really appreciate a phone call," I would have done my best to call. I would have found it needy, but I would have made an effort. But to have someone ignore written invitations, make passive-aggressive comments about "not being invited" and then tell me that it was my fault for not being attentive enough produced the opposite reaction. If other people could figure out that receiving a mailed invitation meant that they were invited, by golly, every recipient could. Show up or don't, but don't gripe about it, either way.
And yeah, even with 4 kids, even after being told that I entertained badly and made gross cake and had bad manners, we had parties for our kids every single birthday while they were growing up - because we are parents, and the kids come first.
(I will readily admit, though, that as they got older and we had a bit more money to spare, I no longer cleaned, decorated and cooked - we went to restaurants, movie theaters, bowling alleys or elsewhere, including a corn maze. Less stress for me.)
I wonder, sometimes, if things have changed in the digital age. Probably now, people get upset about getting or not getting texts, not phone calls. I rarely text. I still send paper invitations, I still mail them to relatives first. But, everybody else might get an e-vite or Facebook Event invitation. My daughter just graduated from high school, and I don't have physical addresses, or phone numbers, for many people that we know, and are in electronic contact with regularly. I'm pretty sure that an electronic invitation is socially acceptable.
But, if you think it's not, we pretty much have two choices - let's just avoid each other's events, or attend them without griping. As "the kids say these days," you do you. I'll do me.
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