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Jan. 14th, 2017 09:00 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
shadowkatRetreating from Face Book posting back to interactive journaling. Mainly to get away from opinionated family members and church folks. Many of whom do not appreciate my sense of humor, which admittedly is rather dry.
They are busy doing something today - that is rather noisy in the hallway. The hallways of the apartment complex echo...reverberating sound back at you with hollow glee.
Last night on the phone to my mother, who is nearing 75, and I talk to daily via phone, I'm ranting about my boss, then half-way through my rant, as I tend to do, I switch gears and start to defend him.
Mother: You have an interesting way of handling things.
Me: How so?
Mother: You're telling me how horrible your boss is, and how much you hate the work assignment he gave you, then you suddenly switch gears and start to break down how what he did made total sense,
was reasonable and you understand why he gave you the assignment...
Me: Well, he had to give it to someone and I do have the background for it..
Mother: You did the same thing recently in regards to your brother, you were upset with him, really angry, then all of a sudden you started to defend him to me. It's fascinating. And when you were a little girl and your friend Cathan treated you horribly, you defended her actions to me and still do.
Also, possibly makes me look a bit nuts to the outside observer. I don't know if it is the writer or the lawyer in me or not, but I have this knack of jumping back from a situation, looking at it objectively, observing everything, analyzing it, and understanding everyone's position -- not only understanding their position but arguing it. I've always done it. Even when I was a small child.
I did it in fandom. I could see both sides, really clearly. It can get confusing at times. It's also really hard to understand why others don't do this as well. I rather loved a comment that Sherlock makes in this past week's episode, in which he states that he just analyzed everyone's motivations, figured out the probabilities of what they would most likely do next and went with that --- "And doesn't everyone do that?"
My aunts, per my father, accused me of overthinking recently on FB. I think I annoyed them. Their main posts on FB are pics of walking a beach, Disney World and puppies. What they don't understand and I'm not sure it is a good idea to enlighten them, is I joined FB to discuss politics not look at pictures of people's kids and pets. Not that I necessarily mind seeing the pics.
I'd written a brief post about how FB was scaring me again - in the space of an hour, I'd learned that there were creepy sites that had all my personal information, salmon carried tapeworms, and let's not even begin to discuss politics. I love you all, but seriously, sometimes I miss the age when there was no internet. We wrote letters. And read papers. With less news.
I do miss that at times. Although the drawback of letters, was that you rarely got responses, and if you did, not quickly. I corresponded a lot with people by letter in my teens and twenties. Overseas and in the US. Sort of like now, but with a journal. Some would respond within a week. Some within months. Some not at all -- which felt a bit like sending messages in a bottle. I'd write the letters in multi-colored ink. Sometimes doodle on the edges. And they'd be a bit like my journal posts -- except with crossed out words, and multiple typos. Cursive and printed letters fighting for dominance along the page.
The letters that came back, some typed, some hand-written, rarely responded to what I said, so much as circumvented it. It felt at times as if we were strangers or rather ships passing each other in the night and lighting a brief flare or honking a horn in greeting. Or maybe just throwing messages in bottles at each other -- the messages not connected at all. If you read the letters, it would seem as if the writers had not read each others correspondence.
That appears to be the etiquette on dreamwidth and live journal and other media sources. Most of the time. We write as if we are in bubbles. Not seeing each others posts, unless we directly respond to them. I wonder if that is the problem? This bubble existence. I'm nice and comfy here. I can ignore what is happening over there. That is until it comes barrelling through the bubbled walls of my life?
I don't know.
Off to eat breakfast and watch telly and give the internet a rest for a bit. Considering I left my cell phone at work (at least I hope it is at work, because if it isn't, I have a problem, I'm probably not wandering too far from home. Not that I can't. Seriously that sounds dumb, doesn't it? I rarely use the thing except as a watch, GPS, to check facebook, and occasionally listen to music. I'm just using it as an excuse to be lazy, write and watch telly this weekend.)
They are busy doing something today - that is rather noisy in the hallway. The hallways of the apartment complex echo...reverberating sound back at you with hollow glee.
Last night on the phone to my mother, who is nearing 75, and I talk to daily via phone, I'm ranting about my boss, then half-way through my rant, as I tend to do, I switch gears and start to defend him.
Mother: You have an interesting way of handling things.
Me: How so?
Mother: You're telling me how horrible your boss is, and how much you hate the work assignment he gave you, then you suddenly switch gears and start to break down how what he did made total sense,
was reasonable and you understand why he gave you the assignment...
Me: Well, he had to give it to someone and I do have the background for it..
Mother: You did the same thing recently in regards to your brother, you were upset with him, really angry, then all of a sudden you started to defend him to me. It's fascinating. And when you were a little girl and your friend Cathan treated you horribly, you defended her actions to me and still do.
Also, possibly makes me look a bit nuts to the outside observer. I don't know if it is the writer or the lawyer in me or not, but I have this knack of jumping back from a situation, looking at it objectively, observing everything, analyzing it, and understanding everyone's position -- not only understanding their position but arguing it. I've always done it. Even when I was a small child.
I did it in fandom. I could see both sides, really clearly. It can get confusing at times. It's also really hard to understand why others don't do this as well. I rather loved a comment that Sherlock makes in this past week's episode, in which he states that he just analyzed everyone's motivations, figured out the probabilities of what they would most likely do next and went with that --- "And doesn't everyone do that?"
My aunts, per my father, accused me of overthinking recently on FB. I think I annoyed them. Their main posts on FB are pics of walking a beach, Disney World and puppies. What they don't understand and I'm not sure it is a good idea to enlighten them, is I joined FB to discuss politics not look at pictures of people's kids and pets. Not that I necessarily mind seeing the pics.
I'd written a brief post about how FB was scaring me again - in the space of an hour, I'd learned that there were creepy sites that had all my personal information, salmon carried tapeworms, and let's not even begin to discuss politics. I love you all, but seriously, sometimes I miss the age when there was no internet. We wrote letters. And read papers. With less news.
I do miss that at times. Although the drawback of letters, was that you rarely got responses, and if you did, not quickly. I corresponded a lot with people by letter in my teens and twenties. Overseas and in the US. Sort of like now, but with a journal. Some would respond within a week. Some within months. Some not at all -- which felt a bit like sending messages in a bottle. I'd write the letters in multi-colored ink. Sometimes doodle on the edges. And they'd be a bit like my journal posts -- except with crossed out words, and multiple typos. Cursive and printed letters fighting for dominance along the page.
The letters that came back, some typed, some hand-written, rarely responded to what I said, so much as circumvented it. It felt at times as if we were strangers or rather ships passing each other in the night and lighting a brief flare or honking a horn in greeting. Or maybe just throwing messages in bottles at each other -- the messages not connected at all. If you read the letters, it would seem as if the writers had not read each others correspondence.
That appears to be the etiquette on dreamwidth and live journal and other media sources. Most of the time. We write as if we are in bubbles. Not seeing each others posts, unless we directly respond to them. I wonder if that is the problem? This bubble existence. I'm nice and comfy here. I can ignore what is happening over there. That is until it comes barrelling through the bubbled walls of my life?
I don't know.
Off to eat breakfast and watch telly and give the internet a rest for a bit. Considering I left my cell phone at work (at least I hope it is at work, because if it isn't, I have a problem, I'm probably not wandering too far from home. Not that I can't. Seriously that sounds dumb, doesn't it? I rarely use the thing except as a watch, GPS, to check facebook, and occasionally listen to music. I'm just using it as an excuse to be lazy, write and watch telly this weekend.)
no subject
Date: 2017-01-14 04:13 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-01-15 12:22 am (UTC)These days the last time I got "personal" mail was at Christmas time. Two people sent cards, one very brief with a family photo and one that actually talked a little about her doings. Otherwise I might get a package at my birthday or something but no one sends just letters anymore.
I don't generally see people responding to one another's posts online either with standalone posts. The exception is meta fandom pieces where people may see someone else's post as a jumping off point for either responses or further thoughts.
no subject
Date: 2017-01-15 03:12 am (UTC)It was easier when I lived in Kansas City. Not so in New York City.
no subject
Date: 2017-01-15 04:21 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-01-15 09:33 pm (UTC)For me, suburbian life is impossible and remarkably inconvenient. But see, I despise driving. I don't like cars. Don't like being in them. Don't like driving. I have a visual coordination issue that makes driving stressful and znxiety inducing. Almost no depth perception. I flip left and right in my head. And everything feels closer than it is. Also, no sense of direction whatsoever.
I feel I have control in NYC. I can walk everywhere, more or less. I can take any number of trains to get where I need to and I love trains. They are cleaner than cars, by the way. And safer. You can go to the bathroom on a train, eat on a train, sleep on a train, read on a train, work on a lap-top on a train...Also, in some respects, it's faster to get from point A to point B on a train.
I've lived various places in NYC, Manhattan (not my favorite), Queens, and Brooklyn (which works quite well). And I adore the diversity. Suburbia isn't very diverse, very segregated, and people don't see each other quite as much. Or so I've noticed.
The culture in the city is right there -- in your face. Daily. Busters sing and dance on the trains and sidewalks.
And with food? You get what you can carry. All that you really need.
Having lived in both suburbia - Kansas City, Missouri, Colorado, Lawrence, Kansas, and Pennsylvania..I can tell you, I'd pick NYC over all of them in a blink of an eye. If I move outside the city, I'd go more rural, less cars on the roads, less strip malls or malls, or a college town...similar to Colorado Springs or Boulder, but I don't know. I hate driving, and you have to drive in all of those places. Uber's get expensive after a bit. And I despise the bus.
no subject
Date: 2017-01-15 09:50 pm (UTC)Given you already don't like to drive, it's little wonder you wouldn't want to do so in NYC! I actually took the bus daily when I was still commuting to work or school and there were definite conveniences to it. Not, however, when grocery shopping. I prefer to do so once a week and that's more than I could carry around. But I could actually walk to several groceries from where we live (as well as shops, restaurants, the mall, and a movie theater). So I think a lot depends on where you live -- not so much the city, though that also makes a difference -- but the particular neighborhood you're in. I've lived in various parts of the country too and have found I prefer small cities. It's quick and easy to get around yet you usually have enough retail resources available.
no subject
Date: 2017-01-16 12:20 am (UTC)Haven't driven in 20 years...because driving in NYC just isn't going to happen. I could handle driving in KC but not NYC.
I don't want to ride a bike in NYC. LOL!
no subject
Date: 2017-01-16 04:58 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2017-01-18 12:13 am (UTC)My brother has no problems with it and enjoys it -- but he doesn't have the depth perception problem.
I drove a lot in Kansas, but again that's Kansas. Not as much traffic. Also flat with rolling hills. And not many one-way streets. Remember driving with a friend once in Kansas City though...where she decided to ignore the one-way streets and drive the wrong way down them...not an experience I'll ever repeat.