All posts by X Teri

Technology

05052014 Aliens !

Playing the game of “what if” for a moment. What is one of my most-anticipated things to see happen outside of my personal life?

Aliens. Seriously. Not the redneck anal-probe-in-the-deep-woods aliens, but bona fide aliens.

Whether through undeniable communications or appearance, I would love to live long enough to to know that alien life capable of communication exists. I don’t have to see them, just evidence of their existence, communications, etc.

Not just because every aspect of our society would be called into question, not to add novelty to our lives, not to render pointless much of politics, economy, education or beliefs…

But to know that we have been living in a fishbowl of isolation, letting our narrow, horrible ideas slowly poison us. Knowing that we aren’t alone, even if we are still unable to directly communicate, will transform everything about our culture and planet. It’s time for something to shake us out of our isolationist stupidity.

I think confirmation of alien life would be the single best thing to happen to humanity since… humanity. Our illusions of self-importance would vanish. Maybe it would cause a ripple of destructive effects here. Maybe not.

Originally, I had included Fermi, Sagan and other people’s views and arguments in this blog post. I edited all that content out as it detracts from the optimism.

I’m fairly certain that we will soon have alien contact. It is going to be interesting, watching the unexpected consequences ripple across our world’s cultures, economies, and religions.

P.S. I’m not referring to the kind of aliens portrayed on the “History Channel” or late-night sci-fi television.  

Holiday, Minimalism

01012012 One Less Gift – a Xmas Alternative!

I ran across this again recently while catching up on missminimalist.com.
Missminimalist Post

Everything about it is awesome.

It speaks to the heart of what makes the holiday season so difficult for many people.

Can we keep it simple? Can it really be about the spirit and not the stuff? Probably not, but it is a noble inspiration and reminder.

For people who know me well, my minimalist side should be self-evident. To be contradictory, I love wrapping presents creatively. I don’t like the obligatory nature of gift exchanges, though. I’m not free to be weird and make it spontaneous and off-the-cuff.

And I enjoy the clutter aspect of it even less. I don’t need anything to remind me that you like or love me. Surprise me during the year or do something unexpected.  Get me a book that you know will tickle my fancy.  I have more or less everything I need.

But for many people, we need a way to let people know that we don’t expect or even want more stuff. It should be okay to be honest with people without your honest desire being turned into a character flaw, or worse- an accusation.

Who wouldn’t prefer time over trinkets? Shared laughter over obligation? I know that I am simplifying the issue too much so you over there with the scowl on your face can forget about pointing that out to me.
Maybe you could meet someone you cherish and go buy a gift together for someone who needs a gift or someone who needs a visit, a surprise or a word of encouragement? Wouldn’t this be a great memory to share with your friends and loved ones?
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I’m still not expressing well enough that it isn’t the idea of gifts that I’m not too fond of – what fool doesn’t like gifts? I dislike the reciprocity and etiquette of it all. It fatigues me.
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(Note: seeing someone truly in need, lonely and without one bit of anything to call his own or anyone to love him back in this life, this post almost equates to a stupid waste of time.)
Writing

“Be known what you are for, not what you are against.”


“Be known what you are for, not what you are against.”

Reading the title of this post, I’d like to go on record as saying that this makes sense to me. It doesn’t make me happy, however, as I’m failing at meeting the goal it states.
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I’m quick to point out that most of my environment is equally guilty of not meeting it, either. That probably doesn’t mitigate my guilt, though, does it?
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There’s one person in my life in particular who is almost consumed by his insistence of categorizing the world in 2 columns: For / Against. I laugh when I hear him talk, sometimes. He would be furious at me if he knew that I was privately not only noting this tendency but laughing about it. He probably doesn’t realize that he does this so pervasively. I’m sure, too, that he doesn’t see that people often delegate him to the “crackpot” status due to the vehemence of his opinion.
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Having said that, I wonder how often I’m guilty of the same and don’t notice that people are placing me in the same “negative” group?  Hmmm… (But blogging or anything worthwhile is almost impossible to do well without sounding like you oppose everything.)
General

Revisionists

In the past, I’ve sometimes used the word “revisionist” to describe people who vainly try to rewrite personal history. I can understand the need to do it, as many people have some fairly terrible stories in their past. The way I’m using the word, though, isn’t in regards to someone concealing specific secrets; rather, it encompasses attempts to minimize, gloss over or call into question another person’s detailed memory of an event. For those people like me that don’t fee ashamed about family history beyond our control, it is a constant pull to avoid getting sucked in by those who fight against even the most basic truths.

A revisionist to me is someone who can’t help but to rewrite history to change the perception of what happened. Dad beat your mom constantly? “No, it was only every once and a while, and nothing like what you say.” Did someone do a lot of drugs? “Well, it was that boyfriend’s fault, not really hers. It was all a big misunderstanding.”

I think using the word “revisionist” as a short code for “not quite telling the truth” could be very useful.

Holiday

Having a Birthday on or Near Xmas?

Don’t you feel badly for those unfortunate souls whose birthdays are around the holiday?

Especially when they are younger and don’t understand why they don’t get the extra parties, gifts, and hoopla about their birth like the other kids?

Lucky for me, my wife’s birthday is on Xmas Eve. Unlike most people, she doesn’t stress over her birthday. She’s like me in that regard – birthdays are mostly for children. A celebration every once and a while is great for adults, but the obligatory celebration/cake/big to-do over it every year is a little…. unnecessary might be the word I’m looking for.

Her birthday falling on Xmas also gives me an out. If we don’t want to make a big deal out of Xmas, I can disguise any of my gifts as a birthday gift and she’s left with no possible complaint.

I wouldn’t respect her less if she was like so many other people in regards to birthdays. But I do love her more because she says it’s no big deal – and means it when she says it. That’s not true for a lot of people.

Personal

Hobby Over Children

A couple of people I know feel cheated by one of their parents. The mother had a hobby that all but eliminated the children’s importance. Most of the mom’s free time, money, and mental focus were dedicated to the pursuit of the hobby. The hobby also rendered the home to be an unclean mess throughout their childhood. The children had to fend for themselves or do without. The hobby resulted in at least one bankruptcy, liens on property, etc.

(In fact, if the mom were asked for pictures of the children, the mom wouldn’t have any to show people, but carried an entire album of hobby-related pictures.)

Fast forward twenty years. The revisionist mom doesn’t want to discuss her negligence toward the children. Any mention of the negligence is ignored and if it can’t be ignored, an attempted dismissal of the allegations ensues. The mother can’t understand why the children could be wounded by her betrayal or why it would be so important to continue trying to understand so many years later.

It is easy to wait until later in life and hope that time and memory have softened the details and other people’s desire to dredge up the past. But “let the past be in the past” is not a useful cliché in situations where real emotional damage occurred.  It’s a good reminder, but only goes so far and should only be applied when the issue at hand is small – otherwise, murder wouldn’t have an unlimited statute of limitations, would it?

One of the daughters had a couple of complete mental breakdowns in life. When she speaks of the negligence brought on in part from her mom’s hobby, the anger and hurt are still apparent after so many years. She tells a story involving a counselor, one that both mother and daughter visited. The mom said that she couldn’t devote more time to the daughter, as it would harm the pursuit of her hobby!

I don’t really have a “point” to this blog entry, it’s just another example of how stupid we can be at times.

(In my own personal case, my parents spent a fortune on drinking, cigarettes, and stupid pursuits. It was their right. But it wasn’t right of them to do it.)

Ancestry, Biographical, Personal

It’s No Secret…

Someone is trying to make it sound like that it is a secret that I didn’t talk to my own mother for a long, long time until fairly soon before her death. Everyone close to me knows the circumstances and can’t understand why I tolerated such anger for so many decades. Whatever my actions toward her, it was up to her to live a good life, independent of my opinion of her.

I had written about my mom many times on my blog, and social media, well before her death and while she was sick. It’s no secret and everyone who knows me or reads my blog is well aware of it and the circumstances that led to it. My parent’s issues were a major stumbling block for me for most of my life. I could have used their violence and attitude to justify things I did – some of my family chose that path.We each must look back and make our own conclusions about how it affected us.

My decision to stop talking to my mom was mine to make; whether anyone else agrees with another version of this “truth” is for that person to decide. Mom’s legacy is quite well known to people. She left a path of anger behind her. I didn’t stop talking to her for a long time to punish her, but rather to try to live a more normal, sane life for myself. I couldn’t do it with her crazy drinking and anger. (To be honest, it is the same reason I don’t talk to many other family members. I don’t appreciate their behavior and don’t live like that.)

As for the problem last year with another family member,  my only goal was to “get away” from it and insist on being left alone. Again, everyone involved knows the truth. Attempts to characterize it any other way are nothing more than angry tirades to lash out at other people and to distract from the sadness and violence in other people’s lives. I worked very hard to avoid causing pain and suffering to the other family member. Sometimes, looking back, I think I should have followed the advice given to me, but most of the time, I’m glad I took the tougher route.

I didn’t write specifically about the other issue because regardless of what happened, I thought it was an invasion of the other family member’s privacy for me to do so, regardless of how angry anyone had been about it. My other family member worked hard to get back to a place of “better” in his or her life, just like I did. Ranting and screaming about it on social media doesn’t add anything positive to the issue. It wasn’t my right to tell that story. Again, though, everyone who knows the people involved understand how and why. That someone not involved is lying about who, what, when and where is to be expected, given their life up to this point. They don’t know any better and don’t understand that most people don’t live with all the drama and damage that they find to be normal. When all you’ve done is plant poison in life, it should be expected to find bitter fruit in their crop. It’s just disappointing. You’ll notice that I don’t mention names or lash out just to feel that righteous indignation being let out. I can only imagine he or she would feel if they read or heard some of the  nonsense being spouted on social media. Using that person’s pain to rant makes the person being angry look childish and spiteful.

I can’t worry about the lesser people in life using their anger and revisionist stupidity to lash out over and over. Comparing my life against theirs leaves no mistake which ones of us are trying to live an authentic life, even if misunderstood, instead of one characterized by wrath and destruction.

Death

Funerals

No one can be certain as to what goes on inside your head. Not your motives, fears, nor perspective. Try as we might to get close to other people, each of us still has our own filters in place to foolishly attempt to control how we seem to other people. The same is true with our attitudes at funerals: each of us tends to judge critically other people’s behavior, attendance and attitudes at funerals, while being forgiving toward ourselves.

A decision I’ve made is that I no longer will feel so responsible or attentive toward the “shoulds” of other people’s ideas about whether I should attend a funeral or viewing.

Only I know whether I appreciated, loved, or admired another person. It’s my choice to celebrate, observe his or her passing or think about someone who has died in the manner I choose. It doesn’t have to be taken as an insult to someone’s legacy if I observe a death differently than you think I ought to. The deceased has no opinion on the matter, in my opinion. I’m just one person, a person whose opinion doesn’t really signify much when weighed in the balance. I would rather someone spend time with family and friends looking at pictures, eating, telling stories, and sharing another person’s life than I would to have them obligated into the traditional viewing and funeral process.

I’ve grown so weary of being concerned about the “ought-to” factor with funerals. If I choose to not attend either a viewing or a funeral, it means that I’ve used my own personal criteria to come to this conclusion. Your “shoulds” and guilt-inducing words or behavior are your own responsibility. I’ll take your reasoned words into consideration if they are graciously tendered, but at the end of the day it is my life to do with as I wish, even if it involves me not participating appropriately in funerals.

Not that I am getting a traditional funeral, but I wouldn’t want someone to attend who felt apathetic or even resentful about me. Sometimes, people get upset that a certain dress code isn’t followed, flowers aren’t bought, thank-yous are forgotten, someone isn’t mentioned in the obituary or funeral program and so forth. 

Don’t twist my words. I don’t mean to convey that I will be rude or inconsiderate. Quite the contrary. What I want to get across is that each of us can and should decide how and if we each will be involved with a specific person’s funeral. We should not take our participation lightly nor callously disregard the feelings of those we love. I’ve noted a lot of funeral-related anger and venom hidden in the veneer of social obligation and guilt. The people I admire don’t browbeat or use coercive words and guilt to push someone into attending or observing funeral services.

We should take a long moment to honestly evaluate just how willingly we have been involved in viewings or funerals in our lives when we shouldn’t have. I don’t want to ever hear “You really should go” (or “shouldn’t go,” either) anymore.

Keep in mind as you read this poorly-written exposition that I personally don’t “get” most funerals. Burial is strange to me. Viewings are strange to me. Not uncomfortable- just strange and alien. I don’t need to hear words of spiritual comfort. Each of us is tasked in our lives with our own spiritual guidance and we certainly have our own minds made up about where we go when we die. I would much rather be a part of gatherings of friends and family, sharing memories. The traditional rituals for me are devoid of the meaning so many other people seem to be able to derive from them.

(I keep forgetting to mention that funerals as we know them are a recent invention. They haven’t “always been done this way” as many mistakenly insist. It is folly to use a traditionalist argument in regards to viewings and funerals. )