Last night I went walking in my neighborhood after the sun had set. We have odd-looking street lamps that cast a soft orange glow on the sidewalks but they cast this glow sporadically. Some streets are well-lit and others are dark and spooky. I remembered playing a game as a kids where I would force myself to walk in the dark and imagine all the scary things that were there hiding and ready to jump out and get me.For some reason children like to be scared hence the invention of the roller coaster. I don’t like to be scared anymore. I have really had enough of fear and don’t like it when it appears in my life. Fear is bad for your body anyway. Think about it. When you are afraid you feel a terrible feeling in the pit of your stomach and an almost sickening sense comes over you. Your heartbeat speeds up and your skin becomes clammy. There are a lot of people in the world who are in this state most of the time. Say soldiers, for instance, or some cops, abused women or children, and small animals who have no place to hide. Fear is an ugly and dangerous force as it debilitates both humans and animals and makes their lives different from those who have little fear. We go into the state of fear so rapidly in todays’ world. One minute we are outside having fun and the next we are terrified as the war is escalating, the market is falling, our house is being foreclosed or our children are in danger. I think life was easier a generation ago. There was a lot to lose then too but not as much fear. People had their families to count on and to shelter them. You could go home to your wife who wore a Betty Crocker apron and have a nice dinner, watch the evening news and go to sleep. You could do this all across America.That’s why I like to walk in the newly dark evening. I started this habit as a child. In our neighborhood there was a lot of land around the houses so in order to see into them you had to walk up very close and peer into windows. I used to take evening walks when our Dad was out-of-town as then we had an early dinner and were supposed to be doing our homework. I liked some houses better than others as they were cozier and more interesting. The smaller the house was , the more apt I was to see a whole family sitting together. This was what I liked to find as it made me happy. Looking into the window of a happy family was and is infinitely comforting to me as it reassures me people still can find a place to live without fear. The house size correlation seems to be still as true as it was 50 years ago. Last night I saw a house that was smaller than all the rest and inside the window I could see an older couple watching TV. The house looked comfortably used and had a slouchy sofa with an old fashioned TV. For a moment I thought they were watching a DVD of Walter Cronkite but then I saw it was Animal Kingdom. I would like to be watching Animal Kingdom on a slouchy sofa with some guy I loved. in a cozy house with drapes instead of Levelour shades.
Archive for single life
My Madrid Man
so I met this guy in Madrid and asked if I could take his picture. He smiled as if he did this all the time and posed against his car. I really liked this guy as he was so comfortable with himself. He lived in a town where everyone was a little unusual but I liked it there. It wasn’t as if people were mean or weird, they were themselves. Maybe there is something in the air in Madrid that allowed its townspeople to be happy just with what they had. Painting their houses red and blue, placing signs on their flowerpots, cowboy boots on their graves and making a world of hot color hues. I think you should visit Madrid and if you find my Madrid man, tell him thank you for making me believe there were still guys like him out there.
Santa Fe
For a single person Santa Fe is a good place to visit as it is casual and not focused on family entertainment. I am here for a photographic workshop which is probably my first since college. I find it challenging as well as frustrating as I am not as knowledgable as others in the class. We are learning how to use 35 MM digital cameras as well as Photoshop and the process is frustrating to me. I remember very well the beautiful simplicity of my Nikon camera with its simple F-stop setting and the round wheel that clicked softly when one changed the shutter speed. Now I have noticed in high-tech devices there is a fake sound attached to changes to make one aware the change has happened. I would rather have silence.
I first learned about cameras from my father who had many interests and many hobbies. A lot of very busy and successful people don’t have the time for this or the inclination but it is a good thing if you do. My father once went out to Yosemite and took a class from Ansel Adams. He came home with many photographs he had taken and was very proud of them. He decided we needed a darkroom in our house so he built one in our bomb shelter which had thankfully never been used for the original purpose. As it was 1969 by then I think he had decided the threat of nuclear war had ended or was at least in second place behind his new interest in photography. Before he destroyed the bomb shelter we had family bomb shelter rehearsals in it. There was a bike which someone had to pedal all of the time and boxes of fake food and games. Our family never played games so this box confused me. I don’t remember seeing water but this is not surprising as some of the time the most basic things were forgotten.
During these war rehearsals my Dad would explain how we were going to survive in the shelter for the requisite 8 weeks until the nuclear fallout had vanished.We were all assigned jobs to do in the event of an alert. My job was to fill several large, green cans with gas so we could drive to Vermont if we had time. There was an even larger bomb shelter there. He would take out a hand gun stored in a box and explain it was to be used to keep the neighbors out of our shelter as there was only room for our family. I found the gun terrifying and thought if there was an actual nuclear event I would run away in the neighborhood and take my chances with the fallout. I couldn’t imagine being contained in that small room with my family for 8 weeks as I had the distinct feeling some of us would not end out as we had gone in. Who would ride that bike all those hours? I rode my bike to school often but that was a 20 minute ride.
Anyway, the darkroom became our family photo lab once the threat of nuclear war was over in my father’s eyes. He took a few hours to show me how things worked but wasn’t the most patient teacher so I promptly forgot. My friend, Leslie Simmons, showed me once again some weeks later. The two of us spent many hours in there watching images appear through the developer like monsters from under a green and mysterious sea. My first job was developing photographs of cancer cells in a hospital as that was all I knew at 19. I had dropped out of college and needed to work so I took the first job I could find . After six months of trying to focus on cells, I returned to college.
Anyway back to Santa Fe…I think the most interesting thing about the class is how I tend to panic if I don’t think I can do what everyone else is doing with apparent ease. Yesterday I felt like I was in math class in seventh grade and the instructor was explaining an algebra problem. I could feel a slow daze freezing my brain and a feeling of exhaustion come over me .I started to think I shouldn’t be there and I had no place in the class though it had been billed as being for beginners.I think there are a lot of us who like to say we are beginners even if we are not as we are afraid of looking stupid. I have taken classes and said this only so I could feel a bit of confidence learning what I needed to learn. Once we were in the lab with the pictures we had taken that day and everyone was showing their pictures on the screens I felt inadequate and as if I were somehow not good enough to be there. Looking back on my life I see this is something I have felt before: an unwillingness to admit a lack of ability or knowledge as I might appear to be weak or pathetic in some way. This is so interesting to me as I thought I had overcome this but apparently I haven’t. It is good to be in a place where I am not even close to being as good as the class as I have to ask for help and try harder. This is not easy for me. I would like to be easily the best. I think I will sign up for another class.
where is my path?
- path
I have been remiss about writing in my blog because my personal GPS seemed to be broken. As much as I tried I could not see a direction and therefore I had little to write. The path is clearer today and I am happy about that. I have been reading about “Intentional Communities” which are communities formed by those who want to live in a social group. These groups are often based on spirituality, common interests, or economic purpose. I am finding more and more people who do not want to live alone any longer. The American ideal of self-sufficiency is no longer as appealing to many single people and we are looking for alternatives. This concept is not new but one which has been tried a few times in the past some more successfully than others. Imagine living with a group of people who were all connected with purpose and love. I think that would be a wonderful way to enjoy life and have the support of friends.
day by day love
Sometimes it takes a cold fall day in the hospital with a friend to realize what matters is the fact you are breathing. People all over Boston are going to work, eating meals, laughing, crying, but none of them are consciously thinking thank God I am breathing. I think we should think about that. I often forget that the air I breathe is gift just as the smile of my niece tonight as we have dinner and hang is a gift.The phone call from my friend, Peter , is a gift and the email from Marion is a gift. I am grateful for my life and my friends and the fact I am still breathing.
weekend blues…
So it’s friday and the weekend is upon us once again. Here’s my truth about weekends if you are single. They are basically not my favorite two days of the week. On weekdays I get up, go to work, exercise, eat meals, talk to friends, blah blah blah. On the weekends I notice how many couples there are and how few single people I see around. Starting Thursday night I review my calendar to see if I have enough events on it to travel through the weekend in a happy state. Here’s the reason why this is. SHAME! It is the shame of the single people. For those of us who live alone there is a common element of shame as we believe somehow we are defective for living in this state. We make excuses for it, we deny we are bothered by it, we act as if we couldn’t be happier to be sitting alone in a restaurant or movie theater, but actually we are all ashamed we find ourselves alone at this point in our lives. I know, I know…there are a lot of folks who will argue and say they are perfectly happy with their single lives. They have no desire to live with anyone else. They feel no shame whatsoever. I don’t believe them. I don’t believe if any single person is asked the question about their life they will answer in the negative. You wonder, what is the question? Here it is. If you could live with someone whom you loved and who loved you, would you want this? If there was someone home at the end of the day who was happy to see you would you want this? If you had a stroke in the middle of the night would you want to have someone there to call 911 for you? I doubt there is a single person who could honestly say they did not want this in their lives. I think all of us do better in a relationship even if the relationship happens to be with an animal (pet). Life is better and feels happier when we have someone in the house with us. Some friends who are married and don’t dare leave tell me I am wrong in this. They tell me how lonely they are living with their spouses. I ask them why they don’t leave and they say it is because of the money. They are afraid they won’t have enough to live with. I understand this as I understand fear. Having a lot of money makes life infinitely easier. Having a lot of money and living in a fearful state is not a good thing. Living with someone you don’t love because you are afraid of being alone is very common. Many people are in marriages where they feel little comfort and little joy. They stay because they don’t believe they have a choice. They stay because that is what they were raised to believe was the right thing to do. They stay and then they have affairs and lie about them. They stay and sometimes fall in love again with their spouse but it is often too late for the spouse. I still think it is better to live with someone else than not because there is a lot of stress to being single. It is easier on friday night to not have to plan for something over the weekend. If you are living with someone it really doesn’t matter if you have a plan as you can hang out with your partner and be fine. You don’t have to suffer from the panic of no plans!
I know this column will not be a great success with either the single group or the married one. Neither group wants to hear about unhappiness or loneliness for that matter. Most people want to read about solutions to problems they are suffering with. I have solutions to this problem as well. Sure, there are lots of solutions. Become religious! Go to church on Sunday! Join a walking club and walk all weekend! Volunteer! Make plans with other single friends. I think the biggest solution to this problem is to admit the problem exists. The first step is admitting to the loneliness and moving on from there. I meet people all the time who tell me how lonely they are but they only tell me after a long dialogue about how full their lives are. They only tell me when I admit how I may feel on any given day myself. I think there should be a single people’s hot line where we each have a call list. Just like people who are about to take a drink or use drugs and need help not to do this, we should have a number to call when we are lonely. There should be a matching service with other singles who want to do something at that moment! We could find each other and go out for dinner or to a movie. There would be no shame. As long as we no longer have families who care for their parents as they get older we need to find other ways for single people to find companionship aside from Match.com. There is a large group of us out there range in in age from 50 or so on up. We are the fastest growing demographic using the internet. Single people of the world, unite! We can conquer this.Call me!
Drive to Painted Post- much longer than expected
I can understand why my Grandfather wanted to get out-of-town now that I am in it. Don’t get me wrong, I love New York! The drive here from Connecticut took all of four hours and was pretty much the same scenery all the way once I had crossed the Tappan Zee Bridge. I listened to NPR and wondered why I was doing this until I saw my “sign” . If you wonder what I mean about “sign” just read my last blog. In this case my “sign ” was a road sign saying “Promises Fulfilled Valley.It was all I could do not to let myself steer off the highway as I thought maybe there might be a promise for me in that valley.
This part of New York State struggles between true poverty and weird business. There are some farms left here but most seem to be gone. There are a lot of discount malls advertised on the highway. The towns are factory towns and Painted Post is not really either one. I stopped in Corning as I was tempted by the Radisson Hotel’s “Sleep Number ” beds as the one lone motel in PP didn’t sound inviting. At the front desk of the Radisson I was treated with courtesy and given a room with not one but two “sleep number” beds. I plan on pretending to be Goldilocks tonight and trying them both.
I think I know why I am here but I can’t be certain. I want to discover why my grandfather decided to be a great success. I want to understand where that desire came from and all the discipline to fulfill his dream. I would like to know what his original dream was and where it came from. Of course I know I won’t be able to figure all of this out in one night but making the trip is a beginning. It is a way to pay homage to the man who built IBM and a way to see what his life was like as a child. The light in Steuben County hasn’t changed much in the 130 years since my Grandfather was born: the harsh, blue/white of the sky still fades softly into the good night of the hills around the town. The bite of approaching winter is felt in the air and the people here still work hard.
Tomorrow I will find the Watson Homestead and walk on the land where my relatives worked and lived.
still packing for Painted Post
I am always surprised at how late the sun is these days. For some reason I am having a hard time sleeping and I toss and turn until about 3:30 AM at which point I go to sleep. When Rosie wakes me at 6:30 it seems way too soon to be getting out of bed as the sky is still dark and there are no bird sounds whatsoever.This morning was no exception. I feel like staying in bed and I wonder why I am even making the effort to drive to Painted Post. What sort of “Eureka!” moment am I hoping for? An explanation for my life, I think, and this is why I reach for a new watch to wear during my expedition. I carefully remove my very chic watch and strap on my Timex Expedition. I am smiling as I do this. Isn’t it great I have found this watch in my closet? It must be a sign I am doing the right thing.Signs are important in our family. My Grandfather took it as a sign he should never drink alcohol again after his horse and buggy with his samples in it was stolen outside of a tavern where he was celebrating a sale. He took it as another sign he should never fly after the plane his family was going to fly in at a county fair crashed. They had decided at the last minute to get ice cream and had given up their turn. My grandparents always took ocean liners to Europe and my grandfather never flew again. My father had a lot of signs as well. Once when we were on a deserted island in Maine my father became convinced he had heard the voice of a woman calling out to him. He had all of us searching the island for the invisible voice in order to find the source. When no one was found he remained convinced it was something from another world. I think it was . There is a lot of psychic energy running through our group! I have often dreamed about events in future and not been surprised when they happen. sometimes I see information in my head as if I am watching a film when I work on a client.I am pretty much right on most of the time.
I think the Mormons are right to send their young church members on a mission in the world. I should have been sent to Painter Post years ago. Maybe along the highway I would have seen a sign directing me to the right future. Maybe a farmer’s market in western New York state would have brought me a vision as to what I should be doing or knowing. It is interesting in life how most of us don’t get the chance to try anything new. Most of us have to go to work in the same job daily which we are grateful for particularly today. Most of us stay married to the same person and have children and grandchildren along the way. Life is like the concentric circles written about with patterns happening in lives that spread in the same pattern out into the world: ripples from a stone thrown into a still pond. My life has been about throwing stones into different ponds and creating new circles in each one. This isn’t good or bad, just the truth. Yesterday I was having lunch with a friend and I remarked that my life was pretty much ready for me to shape it again as I wouldn’t have grandchildren to enjoy for a few years and I was lucky enough to have the freedom to do whatever I wanted.
Some people think I am spoiled when they read something like this. I think I am spoiled in material resources, but I would protest I am not spoiled in my belief system.
In our family we learned early on we were supposed to sing for our supper and “leave every campsite better than we found it.” We also learned that “It’s hard but it”s fair” and “When the going gets tough, the tough get going”.My father’s favorite book was “Cheaper by the Dozen” and he believed that negotiating a better price for six children for almost anything was the highlight of his day. I read recently in the new book about my family my mother persuaded my father early on in their marriage practical jokes were not a good idea. This is not a true statement as I could recount many practical jokes my father enjoyed during our lives. His favorite holiday was Halloween as it meant he could resurrect an old bear costume that must have lived in mothballs in our attic for years. Even though we knew it was him under all that fur we always screamed in terror when he jumped out from behind a curtain in our breakfast room. Never content with just one jump. he would go back behind the curtain numerous times until he collapsed in laughter on the floor. I think we thought this behavior was somewhat strange but acceptable as it wasn’t unusual. My parent’s generation was always having costume parties and loved dressing up.Once my mother invented a game for her dinner party where she paired off each guest with someone they were not married to. She gave the couple a paper bag with some material, straight pins, and a pair of scissors, instructing them they had 30 minutes for the man to design a costume on the woman. Unfortunately the housekeeper quit the next morning as she had overheard one man saying to his partner she must remove her dress or her couldn’t be really creative.
Another friend of my parents had a baby party and all the guests arrived dressed as babies. They entered the house via a children’s slide which had been moved to the front door and drank martinis from baby bottles. By the end of the night I think the hosts wished for a group of babysitters to arrive and straighten things out. Anyway I think my parent’s generation had more fun that the generations since. I say lets revive these traditions and fill up our costume closets!
It’s only 8:27 here and I have to wait until 10:00 AM to leave on my trip as my camera is broken and I need one to document all of my adventure up north. And that reminds me…why in the world did my Dad love Charlie Chaplin so much? We saw every single film of his and many, many times over. My father loved films and had a closet turned into a film room which had a projection window made of glass enabling the projector to shine the film through the window while the audience couldn’t hear the rustle of the projector .We sat on the floor of our living room and watched these silent films for what seemed like hours. Sometimes we watched family films where my mother was always the star with her lovely face and glamorous gestures. My mother had been a model before she married my father and she had no money. She had three blind dates in her life and ended up marrying the third. The first two were with Jimmy Stewart and Jack Kennedy. She had a bit part in a film in Hollywood when she was 20 called “Vogues of 1938″ and my father destroyed the copy of the film after they married as he was a jealous man! My mother loved to tell the story of her return from Hollywood where she had been paid $1000.00 in cash for her movie appearance. She jumped on her bed throwing all the cash around her and felt very rich and happy. The next day she came down with appendicitis and had to use the money for an operation. My mother had a great attitude in life and seemed to enjoy herself no matter what was happening.
Time to finish packing .
Visit to Painted Post
The actual distance from Greenwich, CT to Painted Post, New York is about 198 miles by modern highway guided by the GPS system in my sturdy German car. Deciding to make the journey, however, took 60 years and an email from my son early one morning last week.
I was sitting in the San Francisco Airport waiting for my plane east and saw I had an email from my son on my blackberry. He was letting me know there was a new book out about my family and his comment was “hope this isn’t too bad!”
There have been a few books out about my family, the “company”, and why things turned out the way they did. I have read all of the books and thought some were better than others. At times, I wish one in particular had spoken about things in a less personal sense. This new book seemed interesting as in the brief blurb in my son’s email, the author spoke about the connection between the temperaments of my father and grandfather and the currents running through the IBM Company over the years. This, I thought, was thought provoking and I immediately ordered the book on my Kindle, the amazing reading device that has changed the way we read in much the same way the computer changed the way we communicate and learn.
I read the book across the country: passing over the Rockies, the Midwest, up into part of Canada without even recognizing where I was as the book was completely engrossing. At one point the flight attendant called out to me asking if I recognized Rosie, my traveling Dachshund, who had escaped into the aisles of the plane. I hadn’t even noticed she was missing from her suitcase. I was fascinated by the book as it told a different story from those I had heard before. Somehow the author had found a way of correlating the stormy temperaments of my father and grandfather into the rise and fall of the IBM Company. This story was not told in a salacious way but in a tone full of truth and compassion. I learned about my grandfather’s father and his humble beginning in Painted Post, New York and my grandfather’s statement saying he was smarter than his father. I found this interesting and I wondered why he felt this and what he had based this decision on. I learned my grandfather had come from a family of women and had started work early in life in Painted Post. I wanted to see what Painted Post felt like and decided to make a visit there as I had no idea where it was. I knew my grandfather had been born there but we had not visited as children nor had my own father spoken about the town.
It seemed my grandfather had worked his way out of there and headed south to New York City where he could broaden his life and achieve the prominence he had dreamed of as an adolescent. I wanted to understand my Grandfather as when he died I was seven years old. Some might think he had little influence on my life but I remember him clearly for one simple reason. About a year before he died he took me to FAO Schwartz and told me I could have anything I wanted in the entire store. I remember being overwhelmed at the thought of the possibilities of this and I also remember my grandmother taking his arm and saying I should chose “something practical.” My grandfather looked at me with his large brown eyes and repeated once again I could choose anything I wanted. I have no idea why I was so lucky on that day to be the only child with my grandparents inside of FAO Schwarz but I was. Out of the 18 grandchildren I had lucked out. I have no idea if this was the first time my grandfather had done this or if each grandchild had this opportunity. I think I was in the right place at the right time.
I have been reading about my grandfather’s health in the latest book and he evidently suffered from colitis as well as ulcers and irritable bowel which were left untreated during his lifetime. It seems much of the time he was in pain as well as fearful. Rather than go to a doctor he believed it was better to ignore the pain and continue on in life. There is lovely piece in the book about my father and grandfather attending an event towards the end of my grandfather’s life. The event was to celebrate achievement within the IBM Company and my grandfather was called upon to give a speech. Prior to the speech my father comments on the apparently fragile state of his Dad and yet when the crowd began to applaud my grandfather’s presence he seemed to grow taller, walked with a more powerful gait and stood in front of the podium a much younger man than he had appeared some minutes before. It was “ShowTime” in the words of our family and he would be the showman he always was in order to play out the day.
I have been thinking about this aspect of my grandfather as “ShowTime” was a common phrase in our childhood. It meant you had to get ready to perform in your most charming manner: serve hor”deurves at a party, shake hands with the guests, trail a parent around an enormous room full of people shaking hands with each one, or just act as if you were the most polite child in the world. In our family we knew what “ShowTime” meant and it wasn’t hard to behave correctly. In a way it was easier to play a role than to be unprepared in life. I still hear the word in my head when I have to go to certain events or give a talk on why my charity deserves support. I say to myself, “it’s ShowTime” and I am filled with energy to do what I need to do. This is a good thing to learn as a child as life is filled with things we need to do in order to survive and flourish in our worlds. Sometimes recognizing you are doing them out of obligation is more empowering than just doing them.
Anyway, back to my grandfather and Painted Post. I have no idea what I am looking for but I am looking for something. I think it has to do with the illusive idea of happiness and satisfaction in connection with achievement. I have spent a lifetime thinking about achievement as I have a legacy of achievement in my family from my father and grandfather. I doubt my father was happy during his life as he was never able to look back at what he had accomplished and achieve a sense of satisfaction. He was restless in his nature and troubled in his relationships. I loved him dearly but couldn’t make him happy as no one could. I wonder if my grandfather was the same in temperament as the book suggests. Somehow I doubt my grandfather experienced a lot of joy as I think he was always convinced he might lose everything overnight.
I am curious about the genetic component of achievement and how one generation can be very successful and the next, hopelessly unmotivated. Often if there is a very accomplished patriarch there will be no successor as the patriarch prevents any offspring from achieving by refusing to recognize accomplishments and rewarding them in childhood. Children of very successful parents may have careers but have trouble believing their lives are in any way as important as their successful father or mother. The interesting thing about being a child of parents like this is learning how to value yourself and what you accomplish in your own life. How can any child possibly believe they can begin to compete with their parent if the accomplished parent has created a company like IBM?How can a parent who is incredibly successful insure their children will feel satisfaction from whatever work they chose?
Painted Post represents a path to more understanding for me. I am curious about how my grandfather did what he did and I would like to understand why my father was able to carry on the tradition without dropping out of the competition.Maybe a drive up the interstate through the dark cities of New York state will give me a sense of where I have been and where I will go from here.
