CONFRONTATION, TRUTHFULNESS, AND THOSE WHO SAY WHATEVER THEY THINK THEIR AUDIENCE WANTS TO HEAR.

Why do so many people see confrontation and telling the truth (though it may not agree with the person to whom you are speaking) as one and the same.  If that were the case, that any differing opinion is a confrontation.  We would have someone like Romney who says what he thinks people want to hear most of the time, if not all.  I think he messes up when he hasn't been told enough about the audience for whom he is speaking.  Clearly he did not mean to be secretly taped when he gave the 47% speech.  But a real leader must be able to tell the truth and not be changing his stance every audience change.  A real leader must assume that everything he says will be archived and thrown back at him/her at some later date.

Having treated couples for many years in less than ideally functioning relationships, not saying what you feel (if you even know what you feel) and not meaning what you say (for whatever you fear the result may be) are two problems that confront many. It cayuses cause people to drift apart because both fear the other doesn't love or approve of them and both are too fearful  to share their real thoughts. Communication becomes limited to 'safe' topics.  "How was your day?  How are the kids? What plans do you have for the weekend?, etc"

How people conduct themselves in a relationship is not usually too far from their handle politics. Are you having trouble with authority?  The Tea Party is for you.  Joe Walsh considers himself a family man but does not pay court ordered child care for his children and wants a smaller government.  He tells whoppers and seems unaware of his own hypocrisy.  My guess is that he has always had a problem with facing up to his obligations and responsibilities, which would give him the illusion that a smaller government would be more comfortable for him.  He obviously either never read or doesn't believe in the predictable results as portrayed in Lord of the Flies in a leaderless crowd with no rules.

There really should be a test for the job of being a Congressman, Senator on both state and federal levels.  There should also be one for President and Vice-President.  After watching what the Roberts court has done to the political campaigning process, there should be a test for that job as well....not the popularity or polical favor one that is now used.

NEVER FEELING ON THE INSIDE OR AS 'ONE OF THEM' Part 3

As time went on, my husband and I were cut off from my family as I was disinherited.  Unfortunately, he did not see marriage as his responsibility to take care of his family and support them.  I went to work in the 50s to support my three children.  A woman stopped me and asked how I dared to work with three children.  I asked her if she wanted to support my family or would prefer to pay for me on welfare?  She left me, looking puzzled.  Again, I felt the outsider because I really wanted to be like other women who were able to be around their children as they grew up and share in their 'firsts'.  Our marriage ended in divorce before the country followed me statistically.  Once again, I was an outsider. Married couples were uncomfortable, the women jealous that I might be after their husbands and the men all to happy to make up the physical lack in my life.  The few couples who remained my friends were few.

Once again, with my graduate degree and general need, like a sponge,  to absorb knowledge from the world around me, I felt alone and misfit, I did not fit with the line of ladies at the console with me who were satisfied with little intellectual stimulation, working as a telephone operator from 11 PM to 7 AM so I could care for my children while they were awake. 

The result was I took the first social work job that found me, literally.  A few months later.I worked for a residential treatment center for teen age girls,working up to clinical director.  The school was located in a town outside Chicago, where the area was so ritzy, we were not allowed to hang clothing outside to dry.  Everyone had to have a dryer.  Once again, I felt part of the school but a total outsider to the community.

My next job was in a mental hospital where there were rarely professional of Greek descent.  The in group were the psychiatrists with the byword, "Think Yiddish; look British"  I recognized another group that felt 'outside' but I was even more outside than they.  A few years later I traveled to Greece with the hope that among my parents' roots I would feel that I belonged.  I learned that I was as much an outsider in Greece as I was in America.  At lunch with one of the psychiatrists with whom I worked, we talked about how he, too, went to Israel hoping for the same thing as I in going to Greece.  We were both disappointed and concluded feeling accepted is something that happens within yourself.  When you are comfortable with who you are, it doesn't matter if those around you accept you or invite you into their inner circles.  By then I was in my early forties.  Was I on an evolutionary schedule in which I would naturally mature into these insights?  I'll never know.  I learned to be comfortable in my own head and skin as my version of living happily ever after.  I love the Kazantzakis quote on his gravestone in Crete.  I want nothing; I fear no one; I am free. (even if there are few places in which I belong).

NEVER FEELING ON THE INSIDE OR AS 'ONE OF THEM' Part 2

Relating the feelings that watching the documentary on Obama on CurrentTV stirred in me, I also rarely found people who could have understood my life.  How could I relate to a sorority when my mother said things such as when she asked me why I wasn't like other girls.  "Why didn't I buy a nice nightgown and join a nice nightclub?'  By attending school three summers, I graduated with a liberal arts degree when I was not yet 20while my class went on until June.  By graduation, I was disconnected with everyone with whom I had shared .classes, occasionally with 300 in the class presented totally in lecture form.  The detachment from close relationships, though I dated and was close to boyfriends, those were perceived as temporary ion my mind.  We had moved from the farm to the city, so once again, I felt displaced and disconnected as I commuted (a shorter T die) to graduate school for the next two years.

Once again, at barely 20 I fond myself within classes much older than I up to their 60s.  Like Obama, to find peace within myself, my personal contacts shrunk to those few with whom I felt comfortable and friends who accepted me for who I was.  Barack Obama faced a great deal more animosity than I and I realized, he as a male was judge for her 50% of blackness.  Though he had identified as white earlier, he now identified as black and he married where he loved and felt accepted.

Oddly, while my parents wanted me to marry within their religion and culture, especially to young man of first generation in the US of Greek descent.  I did not love him and did not wish to live a life caught up in tat decades old culture which had not changed since being cut off from Greece sine WW1.  My parents had many friends just as they but I was now caught between two worlds.  I disobeyed my father, refused to marry his choice for me, and instead chose someone whose family arrived in America in 1630.

To be continued.....

NEVER FEELING ON THE INSIDE OR AS 'ONE OF THEM'

Becoming Barack, the documentary on CurrentTV describes a youngster with dark skin, worshiping his Kenyan Dad who he later felt had abandoned him and for whom he lost his awe about his accomplishments when his character fell short. It was easy for me to identify in many ways which evolved on a life-long spectrum.

My parents an emigrated from Greece and I was a first generation American with my three older siblings. We lived in a very rural community during the years of the depression as my father had bought a 140 acre farm to carry us through and to save the business properties he owned, many not rented.   My Dad was always humble around his neighbors so, while we did not have it as rough as many others during the depression, we never spoke or admitted that we survived more easily.  Nevertheless, we lived out of the center of town and a distance away from grade school and high school.  I took a school bus home and was never able to interact outside of school with my peers.  I was usually the brightest girl in the class which also did not endear me to other girls and many boys were also intimidated by me as I was never shy or without an opinion freely given, asked for or not.

Throughout high school (the WW2 years)I left school early to catch the bus to my full time job as a waitress, from 2 PM to 10 PM.  Again, I believe I was the only one in my class to do so and that eliminated all social activity after school.  I left school two months early to start in college to which I commuted daily.  Once again, I did not belong to the dorm crowd so, once again there was no 'after school' socializing.  At that time, the majority of students were returning vets.  I was years younger that all my classmates and shared totally different life experiences.  In essence, though I was accepted into a sorority, I never felt one of them and, frankly, thought most of their activities were a total waste of time.

To be continued.....

HURRICANE SANDY

As I write this, I sit in the current warmth of my home, watching Nature having a hissy-fit outside. I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop. that shoe being the power to go off.  I've charged up my cell phone and 2 iTouch, my camera, and my iPad.  Like a boy scout, I want to BE PREPARED.  In an urban area, sort-of, my toilet will flush (one of the few unautomated appliances in the house).  I have batteries, flashlights, portable radios for when the TV is no longer visible, clean clothes and enough food for a long time, though it may not be what I prefer.  I am on the side of a hill so we have rarely had the high winds other people seem to feel.  We have no great body of water nearby so I do not perceive a flood. 

By the law of averages, the East coast was due for something big because we have been spared for a long time from the disasters much of the rest of the country have had to endure.  However, this seems to be a lot broader than the usual glide up the coast past hurricanes have taken.  I don't believe I have ever seen a storm here that is 500-800 miles wide. 

There is no way to prepare further.  Like the third little piggy, my house is made of brick and the 'wolf' is huffing an  puffing out there has never, even in worst storms, succeeding in 'blowing the house down'.  My lap went out but the computer and TV stayed on.  That was strange.  I pushed the button and the lamp came back on.  I suspect we endured a power drop which makes me think it is time to stop writing on the computer.  Having just talked to a neighbor on the phone who had gone to Arizona for a few months, I listened to her joy at sitting in the sun in her yard,  Life is full of contrast.  We have snow storms while others sun bathe in the heat.  Our world has much to offer.  You just have to decide where you want to be at any given time.

It is time for me to stop writing and wait for whatever will happen.  I'll let you know later how it fares in this hurricane.

CURRENT-TV: LOTS OF THINGS TO WATCH AND LEARN

There is a great antidote for Fox Cable News in the form of Current TV.  As much as I think that MSNBC does a great job at many things, I find that watching the many people on Current TV like discovering a great new affordable and easily obtainable food.  If you have never watched this cable station, you should try it.  Some of the people with shows are:Cenk Uyger, Jennifer Granholm, Eliot Spitzer, Joy Behar, and many others who have shows.  Tonight was a surprise as I happened on the documentary, Becoming Barack.

Having this man's life, hardships, goals and achievements spelled out clearly makes Romney look like a kindergartner, self-centered and full of lies.  Barack Obama, if Donald Trump ever allowed himself to see the truth, show what an uniformed, egotistical, viscous man Trump actually is for all his smiling ways.

I can only hope that the documentary will be repeated several more times before the election. If more people really knew his history, brilliance, and all the things he has done to make the world a better place, the would no longer begrudge him the Nobel Prize given to him.

Check the schedule.  If it is repeated, don't miss it whether you like our President or not.

READING THOSE SQUIGGLY LETTERS TO CONFUSE BOTS IS NEARLY IMPOSSIBLE EVEN FOR HONEST PEOPLE WITH POOR EYESIGHT.

As I sit at my computer wondering what else I have to do to prepare for Hurricane Sandy, I have been catching up on many of the blogs and emails I hadn't had the opportunity to read.  On one blog I wanted to leave a comment.  I wrote out what I wanted to say and hit publish.  I got one of those SPAM defender thingies that twists letters to make them illegible to the bot.  However, I am not a bot and they are illegible to me with my blossoming macular degeneration.

Using a magnifying glass, it usually takes me several tries to get the letters correct.   When I make reservations at my favorite  jazz club, I encounter the same problem,as I do in some other sites.  It would be great if someone invented another way of giving an answer that a bot could not do, such as a problem of logic or deduction.  Perhaps  there could be a choice of what a bot cannot do but a reasonably sighted human could do?

Just to add to my confusion, I went to ASK.com with the question 

I learned those little boxes might be called CAPTCHA.  I know that when I read: 'Best Practices for Preventing BuddyPress Spam User Registrations on that linked site, I was left more confused and depressed than before I asked the question.  Oh well, solutions aren't always simple, are they?

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