Next Time.

Next time I'm going to be an artist.  something visual in 2D or 3D, but that is it.

It does require reincarnation, with which I have no problem, but I do have a problem with regrets.  And I regret that every time a decision came up, it put the possibility of focusing on what I wanted to do most--make beautiful or moving or amazing or bizarre things that when other people looked at them they had to think a little different, look a little harder, wonder, it took that choice out of the decision..

I have spent a lifetime trying to learn to paint, trying, just trying.  I currently get the opportunity about 8 hours every 3 weeks.  That is the most time I have ever had for it, and I have wanted it since I was ten.
But I always had the benefit of other people's regrets.  My parents who did not prepare for well-paid and in-demand jobs;  the family friend that was an art teacher--and hated it because he spent most of this time preparing for the social studies classes he had to teach so that he could also teach art---to a bunch of kids that thought art class was "an easy A" or "free time", my grandmother(who wanted to be a nurse, but trained as a teacher, then got married before ever getting to work) who recommended a solid education in nursing or education (I now have both) which are appropriate for good women, and a school system that not only didn't recommend that I take art, they didn't offer art unless you were in the 2nd grade class that the only art teacher in the system, taught.  (I was in the other teacher's 2nd grade).

I am trying to avoid regrets.  I've had a decent life.  And I my free time is spent on what I want, but I don't have much free time.  Perhaps because when a person reaches a certain age, all that you can interrupt is their hobbies.  Hobbies aren't important.  They are time fillers.  Something for lonely, old people to fill up their time.  But I really would like the time to practice, experiment, maybe take a class or two.  Instead, I work 40+ hours a week, and babysit, and help with other people's current projects around their houses.  Other people are family.  I do love my family.  But family is family whether or not they know you, know what you want, what you believe, how you think. In other words, family is not necessarily a friend and definitely only an intimate friend if their version of talking also involves listening.

Has anyone else noticed that listening is not important anymore.  People that love to talk about themselves, their lives, their complaints, their problems, how stressed they are, how busy they are---well those people can talk about those things for hours without interruption.  WITHOUT INTERRUPTION!  The fact that they can stop interruptions is a sign that it is not a conversation, they are using the listener. 

They need to quit being selfish and get a journal.....

Or a blog.

Well, off to a family birthday party.  Maybe I can paint a while when I get home.

Romance in the 21st century

ro·man·tic

 adjective \rō-ˈman-tik, rə-\

: of, relating to, or involving love between two people

: making someone think of love : suitable for romance

: thinking about love and doing and saying things to show that you love someone.

But what about love?  Surely there is more to a relationship than romance.  Most people realize rather quickly that life is a lot of things. Yet I hear, "he isn't romantic enough"  "she doesn't treat me like she used to"  "the zing is gone"

Good grief.  Turn off the porn and chick flicks and grow up.  People are not there to help you live your fantasies.  If you both want to share some fantasy time--ask for it, and be ready for the other person to say no.  These days people want to compete with their spouse, use their spouse for chores, rely on their spouse for money,  not have to be alone, always have a date for weddings and funerals, etc, etc, etc.

Who ever treats their spouse with the same respect they want to be treated with; who talks to them like they value their opinion; uses them as a sounding board because they know they will be honest; shares their hopes, fears, hateful thoughts about others or themselves without fear of their words being thrown back in their face.  Who treats their partner like family?

If you want to be romantic---lay down the phone, listen to them when they tell you a story, and tell a story back and see if they listen.  And if either of you decide to debate, dissect, judge or minimize any part of the other's story.  You have a problem.  If you can't show your partner the love and respect of hearing them, just hearing them, then there is no hope for a future of happiness (plus your kids are in for a bad time and other people probably are glad when you leave early)  A romantic relationship must be safe.  And both people, if they are competitive, must be on the same team.

So the next time you want to gripe about the lack of romance, ask yourself these three questions?

1. Am I really talking about sex?
2. Do I trust my partner enough to be relaxed and open with them and visa versa?
3. Do I listen like a friend?

 And of course, last but not least,  do you like each other or have you treated each other so badly for not being the person you wanted them to be that you currently hate each other.  

 

I don't know if that can be fixed, but fantasy is only in your head.  If you want a fantasy partner, you don't really want another person in your life.  You just need your imagination.

 

Grow up!

Why all the panic about Social Security running out?

Think about it.
Social security is paid for by everyone that receives a paycheck, every month.(or two weeks, or twice a month or weekly--whatever)  It is not part of your federal taxes or state taxes.  It's not even part of your medicare payment as that is now an additional and separate amount.  I also pay for an employer determined health insurance amount, a dental insurance amount, and the amount to put into my 401k.
(No one has ever called my 401k an entitlement.  But I am putting less in that than I am into Social Security)

Since I was knee high to a grasshopper, and yes, I was short even as a child, there have been news announcements about the Social Security running out before I will ever get there.  It was supposed to run out before my parents got there, but they got lucky, and received their monthly.check and it supplemented them until their deaths.   Both took their social security at 63.  My father received his for 19 years and my mother for 12 years.  Social Security started August 14, 1935, so they both paid in their entire working lives. Both called it their Welfare check.  The humiliation of a government check has long been present.

So why did FDR start the Social Security Administration?  Other than he was some kind of communist and bleeding heart liberal etc, etc?  Before Social Security, the PROPORTION OF ELDERLY WHO were poor was nearly one in two, and it is now less than one in eight.  More than 60 percent of those lifted from poverty were women.

Before social security, each community had their own way of dealing with the destitute.  From providing for them in individual family's homes, indentured servitutude was used.  The family provided food and shelter in exchange for chores.  Frequently this involved children and widows.  The poorhouse or almshouse was another method, and a good many horror stories started with this type of house.  These houses were transitioned to nursing homes and hospitals after social security.  The fear of both nursing home and hospital among those that experienced the great depression was very closely related to the horror and shame of the poorhouse.

But why the constant threat of it running out?  It is tied to the constant threat of more people than ever that are elderly.  The median age in the U.S.A is  37.6 years.  That means half the population is under 37.6 and half is over 37.6.  Projections always imply that this median will go upward as the population ages, but reality is that the population is always being increased.  In 1960 the median age was 29, in 1970 it was 28, by 2010 it was 37.2.    We talk about the baby boomers as the root of all population evil, but the median age in 1950 was about 30 and in 1940 it was about 29.  But in 1920 it was about 23 (men about 25 and women about 21).  We had just finished a world war, we had no antibiotics, we had just gone through a nightmarish influenza season, women died in childbirth, there was no insulin, we didn't get the whole germ theory thing then, so people died and not of old age.  
So it sounds like more people than ever are living long enough to work and pay into social security.  (what?  you have never heard anyone say it like that?)  

So what is the pay-off for constantly threatening that social security is going to run out?  Is the pay-off fear?  Is it a way to try and stop a social program so you can then tax that money--moving it from social security to the general coffers where the politicians can spend it on their favorite pet donator?  Is it to keep people too rattled to ever feel secure enough to think about what else is going on around them?

Am I paranoid?  Sure I am.  I don't trust the current people in power as far as I can throw them.  History should explain why, look at all the long-term corruption that has come to light at various times in our countries history.  We have stories about it daily in our own time.  How much never sees the light of day?  Do I think that the global warming deniers getting massive contributions from the oil industry have only my best interest at heart?  Do I think that the richest congress this country has had for eons is highly empathetic to the plight of the poor.  (Mary Antoinette's famous though probably inaccurate quote comes to mind--"let them eat cake")  

Our power structure encourages people to work until they fall over dead, acts as if retirement is a sign of a lazy user.  All the while they are vacationing for weeks and months each year as part of their due, most of us have been putting off getting to travel, relax with our favorite past times, fish, paint, or do anything we would choose to do---until we can retire.   Since no one ever said "when I grow up, I want to set in a cubicle 40-60 hours a week while a crappy daycare raises my kids and the public schools expose them to poorly paid teachers and undiscipline peers whose parents don't want them disciplined at threat of violence to the poorly paid teachers.  I want to put off seeing the national parks and put off seeing great art and put off relaxing on the beach because I just love this boring, underpaid, repetitive, unappreciated but necessary job I have and that  is why I'm on the planet."  No one has ever said that.  

Is Social Security going to run out?  Only if we keep messing with it until it does.  Its basically an annuity system.  A person that lives long enough could get more than they put in, but every person that dies without collecting has already donated to the annuity.  Most annuities pay the insurance company to keep selling them.  And there are a lot of people profiting off of social security besides the people putting in to the coffer.  

Yet the panic continues.  Why do we panic---I personally am going to be really hacked off if I die without getting to retire.  I don't think I'm alone in that.  I think the panick is from that sick feeling that "I wasted my whole life trying to get to do just what I want, and now its too late."  I have a lot of empathy for those poor individuals that died in slavery never knowing freedom, that died in prison for false or ridiculously silly charges hoping every day for a reprieve, that died at work...... 

I'm taking retirement the minute I can. 

strange connections

Sometimes, when I'm working and it is boring (and how many times can you do the same job with no differences without it being boring) and the halls are noisy, I put on my headphones and turn the classical music on my Ipod to shuffle.  The assumption is that it is to relax me, but boring does not really call for relaxing.  I drink my coffee and the music causes my brain to travel--not far, the job is in no danger, but the computer is slow, so while the little circle slowly spins, I think and with the classics, I remember.

For some reason, when the big drum, or the cymbals, or certain runs on the piano start, I can see the TV of my childhood, and feel my parents sitting to my left, eating popcorn or ice cream while i'm snuggled under a quilt. Late night television; those old black and white movies that were the bread and butter of after-the-news entertainment, almost always used the classics for their soundtracks.  Early Disney cartoons did, also.  But watching the old shows doesn't put me back in my childhood, it just reminds me of how glad I am that we now have color on more than cartoons and how cheezy some of those old movies were.

At any rate, doing my repetitive and boring work with my long gone parents sitting in the dark behind me is very comforting.

My point is, anything can be the connection.  I used to want a blue popsicle every time I smelled DDT.  No one ever purposefully gave me DDT, but they sprayed it on the dump about the same time the ice cream man came when I was four.  I loved blue popsicles back when I was four, and from then till it was outlawed (probably later, those DDT stashes were loved by farmers and all my family were farm folks).

Smells, music, tastes--not like chicken, but like paw-paws or persimmons or really soft blackberries,  and occasionally some strangely perfumed cleaner or body wash that makes me think of the medicine I was given when I was sick.  Kid medicine has changed in the last 50 years, these days its bubble gum or cotton candy.
Sometimes a shadow from a tree will remind me of a conversation sitting on a rock wall with an uncle gone almost 40 years.  Sometimes the memory will almost make me dizzy, as if my feet are fully on the earth, as if I might be hurtling through time.  Sometimes these strange mental connections make me miss someone so much i could cry.  Other times its like I have them back for a moment, a tiny blessing brought by the wind.

I don't understand the human brain or the memory connections that create such things.  I understand the human soul even less, but such memories make me think we have a soul.  Something that hooks us to a universe that is beyond time and space, something behind the physical.  Could it be my own loose screw?  Sure.  But it might be my favorite.