How Goes The Battle?

I found this in an article on military families in relation to child abuse statistics, but it sounded equally applicable to some missionary families - not in the category of abuse but in another area:

Geographic Mobility and Isolation

The frequency of moves has a significant effect on the family and the personality of its members. They may develop a sense of restless transiency and superficial relationships with a tendency to avoid deeply felt extrafamilial attachments to lessen the hurt of separation. Furthermore, frequent moves disrupt ties to the extended family structure. This requires increased dependency on the nuclear family which itself is often confronted with periodic splitting because of temporary assignments and isolated tours of the father. Sorokin (1959) noted a definite relationship between pathology, alienation, and geographic mobility. Other studies (Gabower,l960; Hi11,1958; Pedersen and Sullivan,1964) also imply a detrimental effect of mobility. [Emphasis added].

Hm. Y'think this might shed any light on someone's fear of intimacy or commitment?

Of course, since this was just a study, there were no helpful tips on how to overcome any negative effects of the geographic mobility and/or isolation, but this is just a point along the path.

Must Be Something In the Air...

OK, I truly do not know where this is coming from, but ... there seems to be, ahem, something in the air that is leading me to getting ready to dip my toe back in the dating pool and see how the water is.

Yes, I realize that just by saying so, I've probably condemned the entire operation, but I'm not going to do the same dumb things I've done in the past. No sir! I'm probably going to come up with completely new dumb things I wouldn't have thought I could do!

I am, however, taking in a little dating advice from so-called "experts" (OK, it's iVillage's dating latest maven), only this time, I'm actually doing the exercises. The results have been a little surprising.

First, they ask you to write down the qualities you are looking for in a man - and you have to come up with at least 10. Fine. Done. The idea is that if you want to find something (or someone), it helps to know what (or whom) you're looking for.

Then, they have questions for you to answer - questions like: Why do you want to start a relationship? What scares you about starting a relationship? What will change in your life if you start a relationship? and What feelings -- good or bad -- might you have to let go of?

Those are a little trickier - for instance, I thought the "why I want to start a relationship" question would be a no-brainer, until I realized that my answer was that I don’t want to live the rest of my life alone. What scares me about relationships was an equally troubling answer: so much of my answer was "fear" - fear that I would "settle", fear that I would get hurt, and fear that ... (deep breath) I will have to make room for someone else in my life.

That was tough to acknowledge: that I don't really want to make room for anyone else in my life. That dovetailed quite nicely into "what would change" if I were to start a relationship: I would have to make time for someone else’s needs and activities. I wouldn’t have the autonomy I’ve learned to enjoy.

The way my life is now, I can come and go whenever I want. If I don’t want to go someplace, I don’t go. I don’t have to make meals or do laundry or clean house on anyone’s schedule except my own, and I don’t have to rush home to spend time with anyone (except my dog).

The feelings I would have to let go of would also be pretty telling: I'd have to give up my autonomy - my control over whatever in my life I can control. I'd also have to give up my defensiveness about not being married yet - weirdly, that's a bit comforting.

I mean, come on: what better answer is there to the question from the well-meaning little old ladies in my neighborhood and church: "you're such a nice person/wonderful cook/(whatever)! How is it that you're not married?" How can you not love that question? It presumes such lovely things about you and your character and abilities, and it places all of the blame for your singleness on the stupidity of others? :) In a relationship, I'd have to give up that assumption of my quality and character. I'd have to be a wife. OK, girlfriend at first.

Maybe that's part of the underlying fear: that, with all of the expectations of marriage because of my age, there would be no room for enjoying courtship or choosing someone who was right for me. My mother's mother was good at reminding me of that: I might not get another chance, so I should snag the first one that comes along.

But in this society, how do you say you want to take things slowly or that you aren't in a rush to get married without sounding like you're interested in a FWB* relationship?

We'll have to see. For now, I have a couple of goals - for one thing, I will feel much more inclined to meet someone if I am in better shape, and while I know "round" is a shape, it's not the shape I want to stay in! :) (And really, it's not that bad - it's not where I'm most comfortable, but it's not that bad.....OK, maybe it's worse than I think it is, but that's beside the point!)

I also know that I will feel more like meeting members of the opposite sex if take a little more control over my schedule and actually schedule time to be out and about. The Dating Doyenne had a good tip: I'm not going to meet suitably eligible men if I stay home all the time or confine my walks with my dog to my own condo complex. If I don't make time to meet someone, how will I make time for him in my life if I were to find him?

The biggest challenge is going to be the conversation portion of the exercises. I can talk all day about lots of different things, but I am not so good with the small talking. (No. Really.) I guess that's why one of the first exercises (after the identification portion) is to practice saying "hello" to random strangers - to get over that feeling that every encounter has to mean something.

The next stage after that is to practice light conversation: the weather, the surroundings, etc. Again, the goal is not to get a date or even a phone number, but to practice the art of conversation without it's leading to anything. Since that is probably about all I can keep straight for a few weeks, I'm going to work on those things first - as I'm heading out the door in my sneakers with my dog pulling at the leash!!


*FWB = "friends with benefits"

Catching Up

Just another traumatic Thursday!

Mom's visit is really going well. We got through the initial phase smoothly. It helped that she left Monday morning to go someplace overnight with my aunt, and by the time she got back, we were able to have the Clearing of the Air Talk, which wasn't as hard as I thought it might be. So far, she's planning to stay til Sunday - :). I'm trying to talk her into staying for church, but she said she thinks it might be easier to get through construction on the way home if she goes on a weekend day, which is probably the case.

My dog is LOVING the extra attention!! He's just thrilled that his Nana is there all day to take him outside for little walks and love on him. We went to the local park (not a dog park - just a regular park) last evening, and he lunged after the geese and the ducks the whole way around the park.

What was kind of fun was that my mom loved the park, too. She didn't do much walking. We got someplace where there were picnic tables, and she sat there and watched people while Tanner and I walked, and when we got back, she suggested that we plan to go back again tonight and grill dinner.

Hopefully, it won't rain, 'cuz if it rains, we aren't going to grill outdoors......

Slow Day Update

I wrote a bit previously about things to do to develop new friendships, and the last item on the list was "Hang out on your porch." Totally unintentionally, I ended up doing just that in the last week - not once, not twice, but three times.

All three times, I talked to a neighbor or two, and it was not "about" anything specific. We just had a really nice chat.


I could get used to that.

Just a Quote

I found this today while looking for stuff on Ethel Barrett:

"We would worry less about what others think of us if we realized how seldom they do." - Ethel Barrett.

Ethel Barrett did some recordings of children's stories, most of which were Bible stories, and I can remember sitting in front of my grandparents' stereo listening to her tell these wonderful stories about baby Joash and Gregory the Grub. This is sort of what the stereo looked like:

Although it isn't the exact same stereo, it's close. You could lay on the floor right in front of it, and just listen to the records (we stacked as many as my grandma would let us up to the stereo's maximum).

That was fun.

New Day Update

Well, here's the denouement. They both read the email, and they've talked, and my dad called and said, "you're right." Not entirely unexpected, because I was right, but that's not really the point.

He then says, "I've got somebody here who wants to talk to you," and hands the phone to my mom. Her first words are, "I understand - I understand that I'm just not going to be able to talk about my feelings."

AAAAAAUUUUUGGGGGHHHHHH! [head explodes]. We are now entering the "poor me" phase of the next who-knows-how-long.

Anyway, she's coming up to see my aunt on the 23rd, which is a week from yesterday. At first she said that she was going to go up there, pick my aunt up, take her to look at this place where the cousins' reunion is going to be in September, take her home, drop her off and then go home, "since I don't want to interfere in your life...." [head explodes again].

Either she doesn't get that her talking about how she feels is fine as long as she respects certain boundaries about it, or her life with my dad is so miserable that the only feelings she has about her life are that my dad is making her miserable - which I don't entirely believe, BTW. My dad can be a selfish brat, but he's not intractible.

So, we'll see. I know that part of the reason she's really pissed off at me is because she didn't want to admit some of what she said about the choices she made, and I don't think she wanted my dad to know any of it, either. See, my parents had what used to be called a "shotgun" wedding back in '63 (although, technically, there was no shotgun, and my grandfather and my uncle would have just as rather my parents didn't get married, but that's another story for another day).

There were issues there that pre-dated her and my dad's courtship that my mom has just sat on for 44+ years, and she won't let go of any of it, since it seems much more useful to hold it over his head for the rest of their married lives. As I sit here now, I don't know whether my mom is mad that my dad knows things she hadn't planned to tell him, or if she's sort of glad that it's out in the open because she wanted him to know but didn't want to actually come right out and take responsibility for it. Or both.

Damn! Raising parents is hard......

New Day

Well, one thing at a time, I guess. I wrote a long email to the parental units about everything. I haven’t heard from them, so I guess they either got it and read it and have disowned me, or they’re talking about it. We'll see.....

Cleaning House

Just as the cleaning of a home brings a sense of order and peace to the resident, so cleaning the inside of my head brings a sense of order and peace to, well, me.

I am inherently mistrustful of things that happen too quickly. If it's fast, it's probably not done well or thoroughly, and it's probably going to need fixing again. However, when a train goes off the tracks, putting it back immediately is usually a successful endeavor.

Last week, I went off the tracks. So totally off the tracks that I blocked out certain things I had agreed to do. I even forgot an appointment I apparently agreed to last week that I was supposed to go to my aunt's and uncle's yesterday. My aunt called me last night asking if I was coming - I hadn't even remembered agreeing to go.

I told her I was very sorry - that I hadn't written it down, and so when I was looking at my calendar yesterday and Saturday, I didn't realize I was supposed to be there. I told her that I would bring dinner next time since I was the one that had totally messed up.

On one hand, I think she was ticked because she'd gone to a lot of trouble to fix a nice dinner both weeks (I didn't go last week either because I had just gotten back, and I didn't realize that she expected me the day I returned from a 12-hour drive - she did).

On the other hand, I think she was a little relieved that even 40-something year olds forget things like that. Plus, she was going to call my mom anyway to confirm when my mom is coming for her visit, so that was probably just as well.

And on that, I have started working on what happened the last time I was at my parents' house, and as far as the boundary problem, I decided that one healthy boundary I can set is to tell my mom that I am not going to listen to her complain about being married to Dad. I love them both, and while I recognize they both have imperfections, I will not listen to either one of them criticize or tear down the other one. Either deal with it between the two of them, or seek outside assistance from a qualified and trusted person, but do not dump that crap on me. There. That’s one.

The other things I decided I could do were 1) get a quiet time diary from the bible institute I attended back in 1983 (which I ordered today); and, 2) get involved in something specific at the church that I can commit to doing for at least a year, other than the choir.

The church I belong to has a library of its own, and I've always loved libraries. They were places of refuge and places from which to explore the world without leaving the comfort of my own place.

The lady who has been in charge of the church library for what is apparently a very long time needs help, especially since the last donation Sunday yielded a contribution for a computer system for the library. She can only see out of one eye, and she can't do the computer work for long without a break, so I volunteered to help her - not just with the computer stuff but with the library as well.

I learned how the card system works, and I learned that I can help with the cross-referencing and indexing of subject matter when they get the computer, which will help people who want to research a particular subject but don't know what is out there on what they want.

Since that's how my brain works, I thought that would be a good idea. At least for a year or so - I don't want to just jump in and out of things, but I also want to try different things and see where my talents are best used. The church also has a website, and I'd like to do something there, too, but I need to go slowly. There is nothing like agreeing to do too much too quickly to get a really bad case of burnout.......

Weekend Remnants

Benjamin asks some good existential questions. He sometimes gets the answers wrong, but he’s asking the right questions. The most recent one (June 17) involves adventures in decorating. I feel his pain, although I'm doing my decorating solo. I'm almost there but not quite. I have some really nice things in my place, but I haven't figured out how to tie it all together.

My cousin and her husband (who have more money than almost anyone else I know) just redecorated two of their bathrooms. I honestly don't know how many bathrooms they have, but it is enough that the master bathroom and the powder room inside the front door were both under construction at the same time, and with four people in the house, no one died. Both places look beautiful. I now feel inspired to put white crown molding in my powder room that I just painted Ralph Lauren "light sky" - it might be overkill, but who cares.

Our choir director at church is going to her ENT today. I don’t know her that well, but I keep thinking about her – I can’t imagine how it feels to be reduced to speaking in a whisper as a grown-up. I had laryngitis regularly when I was younger, but after we moved to South Dakota, I didn’t have any more trouble with my throat. I had migraines, chronic sinusitis, and other maladies, but not laryngitis.

She said that the last time she had this kind of problem, it was a lesion on her vocal chords. She’s hoping that this time, it’s just gook. Me, too.

Rumplestiltskin

The words to the song "How to Save a Life" have been running through my head all afternoon. Maybe if I give them another place to continue playing, I can think about the fourteen things I have to do this afternoon before I leave:

Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life.

Not sure why I'm being haunted by these words, now that I look at them in the light. It reminds me of the fairy tale Rumplestiltskin in that when the girl held captive to spin straw into gold finally called her captor by his name, he lost his power over her and disappeared. Maybe looking at the words robs them of their power to hold me?

Probably true of other things, too.

What am I here for?

After all of the yammering about this or that event, the really troublesome issue comes out to this: If all of the things I thought my life was going to be and involve turn out to be wrong turns or detours, what really is my purpose?

Catechism's answer: The chief end of man is to glorify God and to serve Him forever.

That's a fine answer, but what is the practical outworking of that? How do I do that? I mean, it's a generic, ivory-tower concept - does that mean eschewing everything connected with the material world and devoting myself to good deeds like Mother Theresa or going to a mission field someplace far away, or what? I don't think so. Not that those aren't good things, but I haven't felt that call on my life.

Does it mean working day in and day out to achieve debt-free living? Still a good idea, but then what? What do you do when (OK, for me that is still an "if") you get all of your bills paid off, even the student loans and the mortgages? Then what?

I don't have children - which is probably a good thing in my case - and I'm of about the same mind about children as I am about missions: good idea, but not for me. There was a time I felt differently, but honestly, at 43 (and a half) years old, I'm too tired for children!

What is there about making a life worthwhile? 'Cuz here's the thing: other people may be content to just go through their lives working and paying bills and doing whatever they do, but I'm not used to that. There always has to be more, for me anyway.

When I moved here, in the back of my head, there was this thought that maybe living here on my own was the set of circumstances and attitude changes that would bring the One I'm Supposed To Spend The Rest Of My Life With into my life, and I'd meet him, get married, settle down, and live the life I was really supposed to be living. I would never have admitted that - not even at gunpoint - but that's what is supposed to happen, right? Single, getting to that age, find someone, etc. That's the script.

That was one part of the reasons behind my purchase of a residence - because, after all, who takes a 30-something (at that time) year old woman seriously unless she owns real estate? If she's just renting, she's either a gold-digger or she's hopelessly inept, financially, and not a good prospect. These days, we women have to be not only attractive, slender, and modest-but-with-sensual-potential, but we also have to have our financial s*** together. (The other part was that I needed to move due to Neighbors From Hell living upstairs, renting was as expensive as buying, and I only wanted to move once).

Except it didn't happen. None of it. The one I thought might be either the One or someone through whom I might meet the One not only turned out to be neither, he turned out to be nothing like I'd thought he would be (and now he's marrying someone else - who is divorced and has two kids already: the instant family concept).

None of the choices I've made to get where I ended up seem at all in line with what I wanted my life to be like in the four years it's been since I made this move in the first place. All things being equal, my life is at least half over, and I'm still not sure what I'm doing with it.

As of right now, I'm pretty well into screwing up my job - I have a certain amount of billable hours I need to put in to justify my continued existence. As of today, I'm far enough behind that I don't even know how far behind I am - except, I'm pretty sure I would have to bill (not work, bill) 200 hours a month to get caught up by the end of the year. If that isn't self-destruction in action, I don't know what is.

The struggle there, though, is why am I doing this anyway? I'm doing the same thing - at which I do not completely suck, which is always good to know - for more money than I've ever made in my life. The money I make pays my bills (or it would if I didn't keep spending more than I can afford). I joined the church I was talking about and started with choir practice on Wednesday night.

So why do I feel like chucking it all in the can and starting over?

Generation Gap

I knew it. I found this article by Jason Ryan Dorsey (Special to Yahoo! Personals) that confirmed everything I’ve been thinking about “these kids today” (and in a lot more people than you would think in my generation). Take a look at his comments:

“Many Twentysomethings have grown up always getting what they want. They got the clothes they want. They got the car they want. They begged for better grades and got those, too. And they're used to getting what they want immediately and on their own terms. They expect to walk into a coffee shop and get their triple-cream-mocha-latte with sprinkles made just for them, with their name written in bold green marker on the side of the cup to prove it. They also get their favorite DVDs delivered directly to their home, their emails forwarded to their phone, and up-to-the-minute weather bulletins displayed on their computer screen. They even have the option to get fresh groceries delivered, but they won't because they can't cook unless Mom helps.

In addition to being raised on instant everything, these consistently head-over-heels-in-love and heartbroken Twentysomethings have huge expectations. The real world hasn't always gone the way they wanted -- instead of making CEO in a year they make 4,000 copies in a day -- but they use their 12 credit cards to fill the self-esteem gap. After all, who needs to buy a red 3 Series BMW with chrome rims when you can lease it?”

This is why I don't fit in today's world. I grew up in an era when you got things the old-fashioned way: hard work. Everything, including relationships, moved at a slower pace. I'm just not wired for this high-speed, fast-paced world. Despite having been born in the mid-1960s, I am squarely smack-dab in the pre-Baby Boomer generation. My values are more in tune with those WWII folks (in some ways) than with my own kind, so to speak. But there are other areas in which I'm right on track with my generation (or a generation or two after mine).

I like jazz - the good kind, not this whiny, wimpy Muzak nonsense that passes for jazz - and swing and folk music and classical music, much like my parents and my grandparents (and their contemporaries) did before me. But I also like Green Day, The Fray, Daniel Powter, Norah Jones and other new artists, too.

I don't think there is necessarily a need to patch the generation gap. Not in my own life and not in general. I do think that transgenerational exploration is beneficial to almost anyone, and that the more we learn from the past, the more likely we are to survive.

Not that I am likely to be texting anyone in the near (or distant) future - that's one form of shorthand I can't fathom at all.... U?

Whew! I feel much better!

What's new, pussycat?

This isn't new, but I heard this on the radio this morning and almost choked - Tom Jones sings "Kiss":

[Video removed from YouTube due to a copyright claim by Universal Music Publishing Group].

After seeing the video clip, I remember seeing something about it at the time, but OMG! How funny is it to listen to a white guy from Wales singing ... well, Prince? :)

Enjoy the cheese!!