Category: Real LIfe

Promote This

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I have been listening to Promote Yourself – New Rules for Career Success by Dan Scwhabel. Maybe I shouldn’t have, but I assumed this was about promoting oneself without seeming boastful or opportunistic. Instead, it seems to be a book advising Millennials on how to get promoted at work. Such exciting tips as:

    Learn the skills you need. Take advantage of training programs and conferences. Maybe your employer will pay.
    First impressions count. Be aware of body language.
    Be able to work with members of all generations. Older people are used to hierarchy, not the cool world we live in now where Millennials just move around as they wish (apparently).
    There are insensitive jerks in the workplace. People who actually enjoy pushing others down. Don’t be one of these people.
    Master soft skills to be the person others want to work with
    Be a good team member
    Be careful of ‘reply all’.
    Use Facebook and Twiiter, but be careful what you post. People are watching. I would tell you more about the social media chapter, but I had to fast forward because life it too short.

The sub-title of this book is New Rules for Career Success? These are the same rules. The same rules! Is there anything above that any survivior of junior high school doesn’t know? It makes me sad that this information had to be written down for Millennials, and are referred to as ‘new’. New to you. I continue to be amazed at business books that provide absolutely no new information. How do they keep getting published?

Is Fairness Achievable?

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or is it merely ‘more than possible’, as Kevin Cullen suggests, Fair trial is more than possible for Dzhokhar Tsarnaev
The standard, especially in a death penalty case, should of course be better than ‘more than possible’. I agree with everything Kevin Cullen says in this piece, including the implication that it’s somewhat insulting that an impartial jury can’t be found in Boston. The criteria shouldn’t just be Boston, it should be intelligent people who can analyze and interpret information without emotional judgement. Yes, that is a smaller pool than the general population, so sorry if that offends anyone.

Tsarnaev’s lawyers make the case that “everyone in metropolitan Boston is, in effect, a victim of the Marathon bombings.” Hmmm…. neither I, anyone in my family or anyone I know personally was injured or worse in the marathon bombings. Am I disturbed by being about half a mile away, just having walked out of Fenway. Yes. Was it disturbing to watch the majority of the cops be called off Marathon crowd control to respond to a ‘major explosion’ and roll out (amazing quickly, I might add. Excellent work BPD), followed by watching cops from many municipalities west of the city start screaming into the area. Yes. Did I stay up all night the night of the chase, tv, laptop, ipad and phone going watching complete insanity unfold. Yes, I did. Am I disturbed that residents of a major American city went on ‘lockdown’ and people were advised to not leave their homes. Absolutely (though I 100% agree with decision to do so. Don’t mess with Boston! Thank you Deval Patrick, Tom Menino and all law enforcement). Was I shocked to watch a tank and law enforcement carrying major artillery march down the street of Watertown, MA, ten minutes from where I grew up. Yes, I was.

None of that makes ME a victim of the bombings. It makes me a human being.

So I’m sure I wouldn’t be considered for the jury, and I haven’t been called so it’s not an issue. However, I am intelligent and highly educated, therefore if Tsarneav’s attorney’s could produce one shred of evidence he didn’t do this, one shred, I would be happy to consider it. I would love to believe that this young person, who by most accounts of people who knew him when he was younger was a good (if pot dealing, hey there are worse things) kid, could not be so easily swayed to do these atrocious things.

In reality, it almost doesn’t matter where this case is tried. Once the photography of Tsarnaev standing behind Martin Richard, the eight year old who was killed, is shown or even the ATM video footage of him using their carjacking victim’s ATM card to take $800 (the least serious of the charges. See them all: http://www.cbsnews.com/htdocs/pdf/Tsarnaev_Indictment.pdf) are shown, this case is over. I base my opinions on such things as photographic evidence, which despite being reported in the media, are factual. That is what should be sought in a jury pool: people intelligent enough to make their own determinations, not form opinions based on alleged media manipulation. It’s insulting to think that there is no one in the Boston area who can do so.

What Matters

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Today I received a stellar review, and acknowledgement from the head of my division in front of a large group of people of my achievements at work. Later I received an email that the shy, stand-offish cat that I’ve spent time playing with in my volunteer work at the local shelter, the cat that just recently came out of her shell and come over to head butt me has been adopted. The later is the thing that matters most and that I’m most proud of.
I need a new job/a new jam. Good luck and have a wonderful life, Patches. I will miss your sweet face.

Make the Library Books Stop!

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I mean I should make myself stop. Late last year I came to the conclusion that I would die before I could read all the books I wanted to read. It didn’t help that I was in denial about my to be read list. Sure, I had an Amazon wishlist, but you couldn’t see all the books on one page (or I couldn’t figure out how to do it). Fourteen pages of an Amazon wish list isn’t that bad, right? Perhaps not, but the wish list didn’t include all the books in my home that were sitting sadly on shelves, waiting for their day in the sun. What if I wasted time reading a dumb book and never got to the most perfect book for me, the one that would make me understand everything, be the best person I could be and live free and happy? I stopped everything and created my favorite of all things: a spreadsheet. I typed all the books into it. I figured out how to export the wish list (not an option on Amazon at the time, except to GoodReads, which lets you export to Excel – natch!).
I would love to have an app that would allow me to easily drag and drop by priority and category (I need to prioritize fiction v fiction, and non-fiction v non-fiction, etc). I have found no such app.. perhaps I should figure out how to write one and do it. I digress. Now I have my crazy spreadsheet, my prioritized list and all is good. I’m feeling organized. It helps me see progress (I have already read this year the same number of books I read in all of 2013 – Gold Star for me!). I adore my spreadsheet. Nerd alert!

I could read from my list of house books or Nook books for probably years without having to look elsewhere, but that wouldn’t let me invest in all the new books or even recent books that everyone has read except me (how many times will I mention that Gone Girl is STILL on my list?). But sometimes I can not control myself. My read all the books.. even the recent ones. In my excitement to read all the books, though there is no way to read all the books, I occasionally go on a library jag. All the books: For free! In many formats! And then… the books come in. I must go get them. There is a deadline or (gasp!) fines ensue Yes, two weeks no matter how many other books are being juggled when the email arrives that the book is waiting. It’s easy to sign up. They are new books. It will take awhile for me to arrive at the top of the list. Don’t be fooled. They will arrive.. soon, and many at once.

How does one handle this? Choices must be made. One can try to read all the books, but one most certainly can not read all the books at the same time. So the library books move to the top of the priority list, because they are here and on a deadline. Gone Girl continues languishes as one of the books on my shelf. Somewhat of a kismet affect: you must read me now, you can’t resist reading me now, you will have to return me if you do not read me now (not technically true if one doesn’t mind fines and alarmed emails from the library). What to do, what to do?

Read on.. it’s the only thing to do.

The Power of a Deadline

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Today is MLB trade deadline day. Something to obsess over. Something outside your own life that feels important. One should spend time fixating on every rumor, every possibility. After all that fixation will have impact on what happens, obviously. Blockbuster trades will result emotions completely in proportion to the impact on your life, right? No. So why do we do it? Is it something out of our control that we can fixate on so we don’t fixate on our own lives for awhile? Or is it that sports personalities are a part of our lives, especially baseball players, as they are in our lives daily for up to eight months a year. Maybe there is something to loving something, being passionate about something outside of yourself that is part of being human. How much you react or don’t react, how much time you spend on the rumors, options are a function of the room in you have in your life for such things.Many will think the time spent silly. But you love what you love, and that can’t be wrong. So bring on the rumors, let them wash over me. I’m more interested in the end result. For me it will most likely be that one of the best left handed pitchers ever to play for my team will be gone, treated badly by the ownership group that treats us all badly by making baseball into a pure money making machine rather than the joy of a small child going to the park for the first time, or sitting watching games with a family member being their first memory. I love baseball, and all the shenanigans that come with it. At 4pm or so today, my team will look different. At 4:01 we start the next phase of our relationship. How I let that affect me is up to me. As an adult, I will understand what needs to occur, but the child in me will hurt, knowing you let a hero go for reasons that only adults consider. The child in me will hurt; hurt because the world isn’t the place I thought it was, and my friends the players need to come and go.

Bring it on, MLB trade deadline. I’m ready for the craziest day of the year.

Misongny

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This post started out as a women in the workplace post: Lean In! The Confidence Code! (I’ve only read the Atlantic article, but I did download the book to my Nook – yes, I said Nook). But… recently news, Jill Abramson aside, suggests women’s issues are globally still lower on the hierarchy of needs. We are still on the physical safety rung. Some of us are fortunate to be upset at being called a bitch at work (let it be said: Bitch is a badge of honor at work. ‘Bitches’ get shit done. I’m not one bit sorry that men have issues with it).
This post started last week when I noticed that the topics on This Week with George Stephanopoulos were:

– Nigerian kidnapped girls (how dare they want an education)
– Sexual assaults on campus and the lack of response (not noted was the similar problems recently exposed on sexual assault in military. I would bet this issue is not new, just newly exposed.)
– Jill Abramson and being pushy. (I have no inside information on how she worked at the NY Times, but I know what it’s like to be called pushy and bitchy at work in situations where a man would not be called out)

Then came this shooting. Someone who is going to kill females because they don’t meet his needs. How dare they? I know he must have been trouble, perhaps mentally ill, and his family seems to have done what they could to address it, but.. it happened. And women feel unsafe every day in ways that most men do not understand. I highly recommend reading the #YesAllWomen twitter tag. Actually I don’t recommend it, I demand it. Immerse yourself in those stories. Women live like this every single day in the richest, most evolved culture on earth. And it’s worse other places. I’m not proud to tell you that though I put Jimmy Carter’s latest book, A Call to Action: Women, Religion, Violence, and Power on my reading list, but haven’t picked it up because I frankly couldn’t face quotes like (and I am not proud to tell you that):

UNICEF reports that more than 95 percent of all the women and girls in Egypt have been sexually mutilated. Well, this is a horrible affliction that is in more than 90 percent of Djibouti and all the women in Sudan, all the women in Somalia, all the women in Egypt and more than 50 percent in more than a dozen other countries.

http://www.wbur.org/npr/292429202/jimmy-carter-issues-call-to-action-against-subjugation-of-women

I could’t face it, but we need to because it’s not acceptable.

I hope This Week covers this shooting appropriately, though it is rapidly changing from a serious news program to a variety show, appealing to the lowest common denominator. An earlier tweet from them says they will be covering NFL lawsuits. Sure, it’s not right that the NFL doesn’t help with medical bills after making so much money off of the players, but they chose to play football. Women don’t chose to be women and the certain don’t chose to be targeted because they are women.

This topic is so large, it’s difficult to know where to start. I’m tired of: what if it were your mother, sister, daughter? What if it were a fellow human being?

Watch more with Jimmy Carter:
http://video.pbs.org/viralplayer/2365243875

Not a Zero Sum Game

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Ah Mother’s Day, a day to give thanks to the wondrous gifts that mothers give us: support, unconditional love, hugs and kisses. The ads tell us that is how it should be. The rides to activities, the open hearted listening to our problems and helpful advise, the people who say they wouldn’t be where they are if not for the support of their mom. But what about the people who do not have that. People who have lost their mom, or whose mom wasn’t supportive, wasn’t there for them. What about the women who desperately want children, but can’t have them. This day, those images, are painful, representing an ideal that they do not get to experience. I got to wondering if for every thing we celebrate, there must be someone who wanted that thing badly, but could not have it. How painful that must be. For every player drafted in the NFL, there is someone who wasn’t selected. For every college grad there is someone who didn’t get in to their school of choice or couldn’t afford the cost and is lost. I say for every.. but maybe it’s not a one to one ratio. But we can’t all have everything we’ve ever wanted. Perhaps the cracks that appear from the loss of not having what we want are what makes us what we are. Perhaps the reinforcement of what hurt us makes us stronger. Perhaps the drive to fill the need in some other way makes us better, fulfilled in a different way. I just wish more people could see it that, appreciate it; appreciate what they do have rather than mourn what they do not.
So though it’s almost over, Happy Mother’s Day to all the moms doing the hardest, but most rewarding job there is. To the moms who do live up to the dream especially. And to my own mom, who fulfilled none of those dreams, but in that made me strong in other ways, made me able to take care of myself, made me see what not to do.

Life isn’t a zero sum game. You get what you get, but it’s up to you what you do with it.

End of the Year Wrap Up

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I have been thinking about all the things to say about a whole year gone by of life, but none of them really sums it up like Steve Silva’s video of the Boston Marathon bombings. Watch it to see the joy of the day, followed by the horror, then watch as members of the Boston Police Department and other first responders run toward where the bombs went off. Toward it. Watch them manually rip down the barriers meant to keep the crowd off the street so the runners can run so they can get to them. Watch medical people run from the medical tents after the finish line back to the spot. And finally watch out Steve Silva doesn’t once try to take a salacious, graphic shot of the injured. Bravo.
Disclaimer, as in the Boston Globe: This is raw, unedited footage. It is not for everyone.

http://c.brightcove.com/services/viewer/federated_f9?isVid=1&isUI=1

These poor Marathon volunteers who earlier probably thought the hardest part of the gig that day would be donning that hideous yellow jacket, not keeping journalists away and I have to imagine at some point, family members.

I was about a mile away, in Kenmore having just come out of the Red Sox game (and I would be remiss to not mention Napoli hit a walk off that day). We were SO happy, until the minute we went came out on the Comm Ave side of the Kenmore T stop and were walking by a line of parked police motorcycles. Suddenly one of the them yelled into his shoulder: major explosion.. everyone roll out. And the police came from everywhere. It was an impressive and terrifying display. We then watched police stream in from municipalities near and far. I asked twitter to tell me why and sadly, it did. In real, terrifying, time.

Four days later my city, a major US city, went on lockdown. Lockdown. Amazing. Terrifying. I stayed up all night the night of the chase/gunfight. TV, laptop, ipad and cell phone going. I watched a gun fight on live tv. I watched tanks and men in swat gear walk down the streets of a place ten minutes from where I grew up. It was surreal and still somewhat unbelievable to me even now. That same we we had a reorg at work and my job was eliminated. It did not seem to matter anywhere near as much (it still consider it to be the least important thing to happen that week, though I did end up landing on my feet).

Boston is my home. Patriot’s Day is one of my favorite days of the year. I know much has been written, discussed, and analyzed about this event by people more eloquent than I, but this was personal. Not as personal as for the three lives lost that day or Thurs night, or for any of the multitude of injured, but it hurt, it really, really hurt. That hurt is only tempered by the site of those first responders going toward it, of the site of catching the guy and the pride in seeing the people who came out of their homes after being locked down all day to line the street to applaud the police.

Then there was Papi (I’m writing this wearing a ‘This is our fucking city’ t-shirt) and the Red Sox. The little, bearded team that could. These are the two things I will take away from this year. What others should take away is: This IS our fucking city, do NOT mess with us. I couldn’t be more proud, nor do I have any desire to live anywhere else (even though tomorrow we’re looking at 12+ inches of snow). I was on Boylston St. the first night it re-opened (and I have the picture of Anderson Cooper to prove it). I was at Fenway the first game we could get tickets for and will absolutely be back there for next year’s Patriot’s Day game.

These two of the three things I’ll remember most this year. The third was adopting the owner of this sweet face:
001 crop, who knows nothing about any of these things.