Within these pages, I continue to visit and revisit the themes of our culture’s relationship to cell phones and the general level of noise pollution we’re all subjected to on a daily basis. There are precious few places to go, it seems, to escape and find some peace and quiet.
I suppose part of my personal issue here is that I am a rather quiet guy myself…a quality that happens to go along with my reputation as a good listener. Everyone says so. For example, when we talk, I look you in the eye. And I pay close attention. I don’t interrupt. I strive to really grasp the meaning of what you’re trying to say to me. I ask questions of you to help deepen my understanding. I try not to insert my opinions where they’re inappropriate or unwanted. I really hope I don’t say anything to discount your ideas and/or feelings. And then: I’m just plain silent and attentive while you’re speaking.
Simply put, I’m a highly-skilled active listener. My training as a counselor, years ago now, has served me well in developing and maintaining a healthy set of communication skills. In fact, I have even been characterized as “scary” in this area. A female friend of mine once told me that I likely frighten other women away…since people are generally not very accustomed to being paid attention to so intensely. “Your ability to be present is very rare and actually a little scary,” she said.
Today, in the Sunday edition of the Marin Independent Journal, I found a reprint of an article from the Vallejo Times-Herald. The headline is “Performers Confront Cell Phone Offenders,” and the piece talks about entertainers’ issues with folks who show up to performances (plays, musical events, stand-up comedians, etc.) without turning off their phones. This is, of course, maddening for all concerned. For example, as an actor, how do you continue in your rhythm if a cell phone rings during a dramatic moment of a live on-stage performance?
My question for the day is: how does this very dynamic play out all the time in our own lives? How are we supposed to keep our personal rhythm when all anyone wants to do is pay attention to those electronic devices hanging from their belt, rattling around in their jacket pocket, or buried in their purse?
If we, as human beings, ever had the ability to really pay attention to each other, it seems to have totally evaporated. The article I read today contains a quote from comic Johnny Steele who characterizes this as a “national discourtesy epidemic.”
I absolutely agree. For all our gadgets that supposedly keep us connected, we are, in reality, totally disconnected. I submit that we just do not know how to be present with others: how to be present withjust one other person. I believe we’re always paying attention to something else.
I was having dinner the other night with a long-time friend who I hadn’t seen in a few years. I was trying to explain the stresses related to employment changes, and the physical challenges of my life, in recent times. I was unsuccessful in my communication efforts. During the conversation, I needed to halt at one point as the cell phone on his belt apparently vibrated: he held up his finger and then checked a test message that had just come in. And then, while trying to convey my mood and worries about these challenges, the message I got? My feelings don’t really matter: all I need to do is think of all the poor folks in Bangladesh who have it worse than me…and I should perk right up.
Truly, I believe, we’re a disconnected society, unable to care about or pay attention to each other. And I know it’s probably not the fault of cell phones, or TVs or computers. But regarding keeping us connected? They do just the opposite.
The daughter I never had lives in Eugene; she’s part of my “Oregon family.” I’ve known this young woman since she was a rebellious adolescent, though, in the present day, she’s an incredibly mature and talented, 27-year-old married college graduate who has two delightful kids herself (one of them little Gracie).
The absolute, without-a-doubt, best part of my existence the past two Christmas seasons has been the opportunity I’ve had to support and encourage “B’s” interest in photography. Last year, it took the form of proposing the idea to her (real) parents that we split the cost of purchasing a digital SLR camera for her holiday gift. The proposal was enthusiastically accepted and, incredibly, I was the one lucky enough to accompany her to the store when we picked up the camera. As we exited the store, she was smiling hugely while she gushed, “this is the best Christmas ever!”
She’s now had a full year with that particular piece of equipment, and has reportedly loved every minute of it. Late this year she purchased another lens for her system, indicating that she was ready, perhaps, to move up a notch in the technology hierarchy. So, this holiday season, as we talked about her wants and needs via email, I offered to sell her, at a hugely discounted price, my current digital SLR. It’s a camera body that’s still being manufactured, only nine months old, under warranty, and little-used by me this year due to a scarcity of personal time (what with all the changes I’ve made in my life recently). This year’s proposal also became a reality and she’s had the camera a little over a week now…luckily I was able to get it packed up and shipped out in time for Christmas. She’s currently busily, and happily, snapping away with this more ambitious piece of equipment.
I’ve teased her about her newly-acquired “addiction” and advised her of the dangers of said Nikon Acquisition Syndrome (NAS)…though I suspect she has not, yet, caught on to the full implications of my warnings. Still, I’ve told her, regarding NAS: there are many more dangerous and terrible maladies in this lifetime.
For me, I hope to get “out there” this year and produce many more photographs than I have in the last few months. That is, perhaps, my number-one ambition. (Thank goodness: it appears that I’ll not be engaged in a job search during 2008!) To support my goal, I’ve taken a couple of photographic steps myself lately. First, I’ve placed an order for the newly-introduced Nikon D300 (see the video below), just out in November to rave reviews, and currently in short supply. (I’ll be getting this camera body when my number comes up in the ordering queue.) Second, I’ve signed up for another full-day session at Nikon School. Hence, on January 27, I’ll be over in Berkeley, sitting a dark room with a few hundred other Nikon nuts, learning more about digital photography. And expecting to be inspired.
If this season is thinking about people you love, and making some plans for the future…well, I guess maybe there’s been a little of the holiday cheer for me this year after all.
Soundtrack Suggestion
Ev’ry time i see your face, It reminds me of the places we used to go. But all i got is a photograph And i realise you’re not coming back anymore.
I’m often in a bit of a funk during this Midwinter time of year. It’s usually cold, cloudy, and rainy outside. Yet, for some strange reason, everyone’s running around projecting this feeling called “holiday cheer.” I always imagine that a lot of the time it actually may be sincere.
Most years, of course, I’m left out of all the activity. Hence my tendency toward the blues. I’ve never been able, much, to insert myself into the holiday season when I’m single and alone. All of that family togetherness stuff is missing for me. And it almost always has been.
But, this year, there’s a bright side.
The winter, so far here in northern California, has been pretty mild. While we had one day last week that subjected us to nearly three inches of rain, and while I’ve been shivering many a morning recently, for the most part, weather-wise, here in my new land, it’s been mostly dry and manageable. Today was not particularly warm, but it was very sunny. And it was in the fifties when I went for a walk along my usual walking path. I had a wonderfully invigorating 39-minute trek, me and my iPod.
I don’t have the sunshine of my life. But I do have some sunshine in my life. And the days: from now on, they do get longer.
This is a good thing.
Soundtrack Suggestion
Time, time, time, see what’s become of me While I looked around For my possibilities I was so hard to please But look around, leaves are brown And the sky is a hazy shade of winter.
Mostly, I believe I’m perceived as a patient person. Actually, it’s more than mere perception: I am a patient person.
I know things don’t happen right away. I believe that “all things in their own time” is a good motto to live by. I realize that others have skill levels arranged on a continuum – and that they have various, competing priorities in their lives that don’t coincide with mine. And I know that having low expectations is probably a good strategy to maintain one’s own mental and emotional health.
Yes, being patient is a good thing.
Still, there are some behaviors out there in the world that I have very little use for. For example, it wasn’t long ago that I went on a rant about cell-phone users. I have absolutely zero tolerance for people who believe that shouting out the trivia of their lives to the world is more important than respecting others’ rights (to a little peace and quiet). I was at lunch in a Chinese restaurant two days ago, with a couple of work colleagues, when one of those walkie-talkie-type cell phones sounded off (right next to us). I turned to the (totally-oblivious) guy who was speaking into his mobile device while, at the same time, shoveling fried rice into his pie-hole. I mouthed, in his direction, much to the surprise of my lunch companions, “will you shut the f#*k up?!?!” (This asshole neither saw me nor heard me. Unfortunately.)
Then, yesterday, I was at Kinko’s doing some photocopying, while all the time listening to an embarrassingly-personal conversation between a woman and (apparently) one of her girlfriends. Their discussion of a relationship gone bad was something that really should have been carried out in private. Really.
Ok, enough about cell-phone etiquette (for now). The topic of today’s rant is about punctuality. Or, more specifically, the lack of consideration some people show to other people when they arrive late.
Isn’t this, though, the same kind of thing as the cell-phone issue: lack of sensitivity to, and respect for, others?
Last Wednesday, I had interviews scheduled to start in the early afternoon. I was the leader of a small, three-person hiring committee. We had a few, back-to-back, forty-five-minute interviews on the calendar. Still, one of the other two on the committee didn’t show up until fifteen minutes past the anticipated start time, thereby throwing everyone’s schedule off for the rest of the day. Candidates who had been instructed to arrive fifteen minutes early to review the questions, instead ended up with a thirty-minute wait before I went to fetch them.
The next day I was scheduled into a committee meeting that was to begin at 11:00 a.m. I arrived on time and there were only two others present (of a twelve-member group). The remainder continued to dribble in, until finally at fifteen minutes past the hour, the chairperson arrived and the meeting was called to order.
These are only two examples of the kind of chronic, non-punctual behavior I encounter on a daily basis. And I find it maddening!
Here’s what I think you’re saying when you show up late: you’re the center of the universe. That no one, or nothing, is as important as you and your agenda. That the time of others doesn’t count. That others don’t count.
For the record, let me declare to all you loud cell-phone users and “running-late” people (and I know this will be news): IT’S NOT ALL ABOUT YOU!
There I was, last Tuesday night (October 30). Minding my own business, at home. Vegging out on my sofa, watching TV.
It was a little after 8:00 p.m. (the cable box said exactly 8:05) and The Daily Show’s nightly re-run (of the previous evening’s broadcast) had just begun.
I vaguely remember that I was laughing out loud at something when: HOLY SHIT!
All of sudden it happened. It seemed as if I were, for a moment there, floating above my sofa. As if some immense cosmic force had picked me up with giant invisible hands and was joking around, having its way with me. The whole experience was a little bewildering, a lot frightening, and, weirdly, somewhat exciting.
Unlike the last time (which was actually my first time) I found myself in an earthquake situation, when I didn’t know exactly what was going on…this time there was no mistaking things: this was an earthquake! Holy craperino (I thought…), this is amazing! (And: I just hope I live through this!)
I was picked up and shaken once, then it seemed if as if there were a slight hesitation; subsequently I found myself being shaken again, even more vigorously the second time. The entire experience lasted only a few seconds, I suppose (quite literally, time seemed suspended), but that was enough for my thought processes (i.e, panic) to kick in and wonder if the whole apartment was going to detach from the building and slide down the cliff: with me scratching and clawing the entire way. To my ultimate, very painful, demise.
Then things stopped. Just. Stopped. The Daily Show continued on. The world switched back to normal, at least in my neighborhood. I continued to think and wonder: where was the epicenter? How far away was it? What must it have been like to be right ON TOP? How big was this thing, anyway?
Here’s the deal: news reports of the event listed it as a 5.6 quake, with the epicenter five miles northeast of the Alum Rock neighborhood of San Jose, along the Calaveras Fault. (I’m not exactly sure how far that is from me…but I suspect it’s at least 50 miles.) This temblor just happens to be the largest one to hit the Bay Area since the (6.9-magnitude) Loma Prieta disaster in 1989. (I safely followed news reports of that one from home on October 17…as I was watching, on TV in Corvallis, Oregon, the third game of the World Series.)
Just so you know: I’m keeping score. My arrival in the Bay Area was greeted by a 4.2 quake on July 20…just 18 days after I moved here. (It seems like only yesterday!) And, here I am again…this time experiencing the largest shaker since 1989. How (NOT!) lucky can I get?
One of the reports of Tuesday’s quake indicated that “the fault ruptured at a depth of 5.7 miles and the shaking was felt as far north as Eugene, Oregon.”
Well, good. I really wouldn’t want to have all the fun to myself. So, tell me: did any of my fine friends in the Great State of Oregon feel this thing, too?
Soundtrack Suggestion
I feel the earth move under my feet I feel the sky tumbling down, tumbling down I feel the earth move under my feet I feel the sky tumbling down I just lose control Down to my very soul I get a hot and cold all over I feel the earth move under my feet I feel the sky tumbling down, Tumbling down, tumbling down...
