One of the small “boats” of sushi at Num Thai Restaurant
The three of us who prefer food cooked shifted around to sit together to make the process simpler and my chicken green curry was excellant as were the crunchy fried shrimp. In either case – raw or cooked, the Kirin beer was cold, the sake warm, and the friendship filled with laughter. Who knows, we might have to have another round as a Bon Voyage!
I have a longer post that I will do one of these days about the subject of self-awareness, but I was in a conversation yesterday that reminded me of this basic point that I used when I taught a freshman college class in Self Awareness/Personal Development. Not to misrepresent myself academically, that was in my ROTC instruction days when I held the position of an Assistant Professor of Military Science. The title really just means that you’re assigned to an ROTC department, although most colleges and universities do want you to have a Master’s Degree. I did have thoughts of pursuing a PhD during that assignment, but that’s an entirely different subject.
Back to the point that I made in class of there being tremendous value in developing self-awareness. You cannot effectively make changes in your life if you are not aware of why you do the things that you do. Now, you may not wish to make any changes, but you cannot make that determination either until you have a grasp of your own personality, desires, strengths, and weaknesses. In the exploration of yourself, it is often useful and sometimes necessary to seek assistance in doing so. However, in discussions with others, you may indeed have an “Aha!” moment then, or it may occur later in the privacy of your own thoughts. Those moments that yield this important understanding does not require that you share the insight with anyone, although you may choose to do so. The recognition may be so deeply personal that you don’t want to share, and there is no overriding reason is that you should. A major element of genuine self-awareness is that you don’t require validation from someone else to recognize a truth about yourself. Granted, you may want another individual’s feedback, but that is not the same thing as needing the feedback.
Now, is there a nuance between truth and perception when it comes to self-awareness? There certainly can be, but that, too is the subject for another post.
Among my other endeavors, I thoroughly enjoy guest speaking – big group, small group, doesn’t matter. I have a page on my website, http://charliehudson.net that lists the primary topics I speak to, and one of them is “Everyone Has a Story: Creating Family Histories and Memoirs”. While I have always had an interest in family history, it was really brought home to me during the period when I was coping with my first mother-in-law’s health crises that ended in her death and the settling of the estate. That experience, was of course, the background for my book, Your Room at the End: Thoughts About Aging We’d Rather Avoid, and in Part 2 of the book, I have a section about writing your family history or memoirs.
As a quick differentiation, capturing the family history may be guided by one person, but it is likely to involve multiple members of the family, whereas memoirs in general will be told by one or two people with perhaps input from others. Both are likely to contain old photos, maybe recipes, letters, etc., and perhaps portions from a professional geneaologist. The primary point that I make in my presentations is that in our mobile society, it is so easy to lose track of those stories and that as we (or whomever) in the family reaches later years, capturing those family memories and stories can be a wonderful project. Today’s technology and internet can be great resources and the project can be launched to coincide with a birthday, anniversary, family reunion, and so forth. One of the things that my father has mentioned (and even though he’s in good health for his age, he is having memory issues) is that when he was a boy, they didn’t have electricity or running water in the house. It existed, but not in the really rural areas and few people had vehicles. Think of the change between then and now from both a technology and availability perspective. Do you really think those are stories that should just disappear? And that is how I close the presentation. If you don’t capture these memories, who will? So, if you’re casting about for something interesting to do or have an older relative who is, this might be the time to get started.
My husband and I still wonder occasionally if there was an element of fate to the fact that we arrived at the Army installation where we met only two months apart. That meant we would be in the same place for at least a year and probably longer. With our careers, it was easy to meet someone who was being assigned as you were leaving an assignment or vice-versa, so that you would have very little time to establish a relationship. He and I had both experienced that situation and since, as it turned out, we had several personal complications to navigate, we needed the time to acknowledge that our fairly instant attraction was of the sustainable variety. But to move on to the subject of long distance relationships.
The military is by no means the only mobile profession, and I have friends and acquaintances who are faced with trying to manage a long-distance relationship. Today’s technology of email, cell phones, and video calling certainly help with the ability to have pretty much daily communications, and no, I’m not about to get into the topic of sexting. There is no doubt that easier communication is important in trying to maintain a long distance relationship, especially when significantly different time zones are involved. An interesting aspect came up in a recent conversation and I was reminded of it when I was on my trip last week. The question was prefaced with the statement of, “Getting together during a long distance relationship usually equals a romantic interlude because it often lasts for no more than one to weeks,” followed by, “As much fun as that is, who can’t sustain a relationship if you’re only around each other for a week or two at a time?”
Ah, yes, that is a question to consider. Keeping the romance going in a long term relationship, whether marriage is involved or not, is the theme for a lot of talk and millions of articles/books. So, in the most common list of reasons for starting a long distance relationship – work/school/family obligations – is there also a preference for prolonged “newness”, to avoid losing the sense of excitement that can happen as you learn of one another’s habits and the routine of everyday contact? How about it readers out there – do you want to weigh in with your experience and opinions?
Last week was decidely hectic, but we wanted to squeeze in one more lunch with a couple who are living their golden years in a manner that we enjoy observing, and I may do a post about that at a future time. Since they were preparing to leave the Keys and head back to upstate New York, the conversation naturally turned to climate. They are in an area that gets lake effect snow as well as regular snow and can expect 100 to 200 inches per year. While the very thought of that made us shudder, the comment was, “You prepare for it and really, you have the same issue in the opposite way with the heat.” Having both grown up in the deep South in the days before air conditioning, my husband and I did understand and it does raise an interesting point.
Let’s do snow first. Our friends actually have an RV and so rather than “move to Florida” to escape the cold as so many people do, they ride out the winter and then hit the road in the RV during March and April when it can seem like lingering snow and ice will last forever. They are retired now and therefore no longer have to be out for the daily jobs. They have the equipment to handle snow as well as enough indoor interests to hunker down during the worst storms.
As we were growing up in Georgia and Lousiana respectively, my husband and I knew that you simply spent part of the year sweltering. It’s that old saying of men sweat and women glisten. And in truth, when I left the house the other morning for an 8:30 appointment and it was already 78 degrees, I knew it would be a hot day. It actually didn’t get over 90, but it is still just May. The real heat is coming and yes, in the midst of the summer, there are plenty of people who “hunker down” in air conditioning and only emerge in the late afternoon and early evening hours. The intense heat and humidity (we’ll set hurricanes aside for the moment) is often misunderstood by people who visit Florida only in the winter. My husband and I have hats, sunscreen, and we hydrate a lot, but the truth is that we also sweat a lot from May through September and it isn’t the life for everyone. Rather than having to bundle up against the cold, we have lightweight clothes and sandals, as women try to avoid pantyhose and men try to avoid ties.
Fortunately, in this country of entrepreneurs and inventors, there are always new gadgets coming onto the market to help with overcoming these inconveniences. Radiant heating for floors in cold climates and misting systems for hot climates come to mind. I suppose in the end, it depends on what your preference is, and understanding that there just aren’t many places with a perfect climate. On the other hand, that is also why the “second home” idea is such a popular concept.
Our friends will arrive home to buds beginning to burst out in color as we say goodbye to strawberries, tomatoes, and corn that can’t tolerate the searing summer. The pool, however, will get more use than it has for the past few months. Snow and heat really are two sides of the same coin.
In the previous post on the discussion about women choosing to be stay-at-home wives and/or moms, I inserted the aspect of economic choice. When I abruptly and unexpectedly became a single parent with a four-month old, I had no real choice of not working. Continuing in my career as an Army officer was up for grabs, and I understood that was a particularly challenging choice that had the potential to become unmanageable. It didn’t, but that’s another subject.
Two income families have become routine and is expected in certain parts of our society, while not so in others. Both spouses working, however, does not always make as much economic sense as it would seem at first glance. There are costs to employment such as commuting, perhaps a certain type of wardrobe (includes dry cleaning), increased costs for restaurant meals because shopping and cooking are time consuming, cleaning and other household services, and the very large expense of childcare if applicable. During the nine-month period between my retirement from the Army and going to work for a small firm, I was surprised at how much money I was able to save by being at home. However, that was not emotionally fulfilling for me and we wanted a type of lifestyle that required supplemental income. I was in a position to earn more than I spent for employment expenses.
Computer technology has significantly enhanced remote work options and if that is viable, then some employment costs become negligible. So, in choosing a single or dual income household, there are two primary components – actual after expenses income and personal satisfaction level. (A momentary digression as I confess that I do view a stay-at-home husband differently from a stay-at-home wife and that is indeed a product of my age and upbringing. I acknowledge that there are times when the wife is in a position to have greater earning power than the husband.)
On the personal satisfaction side, there are a tremendous number of volunteer opportunities, even in small towns, and a wide array of hobbies that can be quite fulfilling. If a couple objectvely analyzes their personal financial situation, the bottom-line answer could be that the second job does not produce significant income, particularly if the second job is stressful to the individual and subsequently the family. The math is not complicated, but it does have to be done correctly and requires several months of accurately tracking expenses. It can be an eye-opener if you’ve never run the numbers and It might be an exercise worth undertaking if you are in a position to do so.
It is beautiful outside and I suppose this may seem to be an inappropriate topic for such a lovely day. The problem though is that Death doesn’t stop out of respect for a pretty day or a holiday and when you lose someone who you care deeply about, it is a dark day no matter what the weather is like. If you have not experienced the kind of loss that leaves you in breathless grief, and you are faced with trying to help someone who is coping with it, you may be uncertain as to what you should do. You may be fine with taking the immediate traditional actions, but what I want to talk about is something that comes later.
In general, we don’t deal well with death in our culture, and we have somehow created this “timeline” that we think is applicable. If you are not the individual who has suffered the loss, there is a tendency to view six months, and certainly a year, as this sociatially-imposed guideline for when you should be “getting on with your life”. While the individual may indeed be functioning and have dealt with estate or other “practical” matters, the kind of grief that I am talking about can reach and grab you at the most unexpected moments – a song on the radio that had shared meaning, something as mundane as a trip to the grocery store when you realize you no longer need to purchase a particular item because it was the loved one’s favorite. The passage of time does help, but adapting to the loss is not a straight-line process. There are ups, downs, U-turns, and that leads me to the main point here.
The anniversary of someone’s death can be particularly unsettling and I don’t just mean the first one. The grief can seem almost fresh and it may not be something that the person can articulate, or perhaps feel comfortable in trying to explain. If you have a friend or a loved one who is in this situation, I am not suggesting that you ask the direct question. This is the time to send one of the lovely “I’m thinking of you today” kind of cards, or make the offer of going out without stating the reason why. If the individual wishes to express why, then you are there to listen. On the other hand, the individual can take the opposite approach of wanting to very much acknowledge the day and that’s fine, too. In some cases, the individual might prefer to be alone. The main thing is to understand that emotional support can be incredibly important at that moment and you need to take your cue from the individual. If you are tempted to say, “Well, I don’t want to remind him or her”, trust me, a loving gesture from you isn’t what will trigger the memory.
No, this is not an advertisement per se and certainly not any sort of compensated endorsement. It is merely something for me to relate to anyone (male or female) who hates the ritual of car buying. I do know people who revel in that process and I once took a friend with me after I expressed reluctance to buy a new car. He genuinely enjoyed the back-and-forth, “Well, let me check with the manager” crap that I detest. I was grateful for his help and annoyed that there wasn’t an easier way to do it.
A number of years ago, a friend told me about their experience with Carmax and when we were in Puerto Rico and our son was in Northern VA, I was concerned with the age of his car. I gave him the dollar limit he had to work with and suggested he try Carmax. They couldn’t have treated him better and so when it was time for me to get another car upon our return from PR, I had already been searching their web site. One of the many good things about them is their inventory changes daily and you can go in and specify the type of car you are looking for. If they don’t have the one you want in a particular location, they will bring it in using zones for shipping price. Nearby zones have zero cost and then they expand all the way across the country. As with everything else about Carmax though the price is clearly shown and that is the price. No surprises, no haggling. When you are on line, you can narrow the seach by price, and number of miles on the car as well as make, model, or type. Carmax does sell some new cars (mostly Toyotas) at some locations, but they primarily have previously owned cars.
If you have a car to trade, they will give you as good a price as you are likely to get anywhere – again, they tell you the price they will pay and that’s it. The trade-in value doesn’t change the longer you talk. Since I didn’t have a trade-in, I basically bought the car on-line (a make and model I was familiar with). We flew into Atlanta where my sister-in-law and her husband picked us up. The Carmax was close by. We arrived, the car was ready. Did we want the extended warranty? No? Did we want Lo-Jack? Yes. Okay, they took my husband’s mother’s address so they could have a technician come to her house to do the installation. Sign paperwork, give them a check, take car. That was it. The extended warranty and Lo-Jack are the only options they offer. Their dealer price of $149 (I think it’s $199 now, maybe a little higher) is clearly shown as the only addition to the price of the car. No endless list of services to be pitched, no trying to wear you down with why you ought to have something else added. We weren’t doing financing, but their financing process seemed fairly quick from what I saw going on around us.
Between us and our son, we have purchased five vehicles through Carmax. While you can go on-line as I usually do, you can also go to a location and wander as you wish with no pressure. Again, one of the primary differences in Carmax is that when you look at a sticker price, it is what you get, although tax and title are not shown. If a car price is shown for let’s say $21,099, the $199 Carmax addition is shown for a purchase price of $21,298 and then tax and title costs that vary by state/municipality. They will even tell you the percentage of that before hand if you ask so you can do the calculation yourself if you wish.
When we left the Carmax in Atlanta, my brother-in-law was impressed. My sister-in-law was too, but she said that no, she enjoyed the traditional haggling. And yes, if you want a brand new car they are probably not a good option. On the other hand, if you are in the market for a previously owned one and you are near a Carmax, at least check out their web site.
This is not a light–hearted post, but one that may strike a chord. Many of us in life have made careless or incredibly stupid mistakes that we sometimes initially lie about. Why? Because we’re really embarrassed, because we think it’s a small enough lie that it won’t be found out, or one of several other reasons. That leads into two points about lying in a case like this. First, if caught in a lie of this nature, there is usually a time period when you can ‘fess up’ and work through it. Second, trying to cover up the first lie is what frequently sets unpleasant happenings into motion. The saying, “What a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive,” is as true today as when it was penned.
The thing about mistakes though is that sometimes, particularly if the person you have lied to doesn’t like you/trust you, a genuine mistake can be perceived as a lie. For example, you have a project at work and you are about to miss a critical deadline. Let’s say a few things have gone wrong and you’re trying to adjust the timeline to minimize missing the deadline. Let’s also say though that back when the project was being planned, someone warned you that this could occur and you weren’t really paying attention or you literally put the warning out of your mind. Another individual (or that same one) brings the discussion up and you defensively deny it. That is actually a mistake because you genuinely didn’t remember, but when an email or other “trail” is produced, your denial of knowing about the warning can be viewed as a lie. Even if you convince most people that it was a mistake, others may choose to continue to think of it as a lie. There is little you can do to change their minds. A genuinely humble meeting to clear the air might work, or it might not.
What you do at that stage will also depend on who the individual is (or individuals are). If your very credibility is damaged with people that matter to your continued employment/relationship, it may be time to move on and accept it as an unfortunate episode that you hopefully learn from. If they are not of particular importance, then you may still be able to take a lesson of value from the incident. The flip side of the coin is if you are faced with trying to determine if a person made a mistake or is lying to you. It is rarely a comfortable thing and if you decide it was a mistake, it may still impact your relationship with the individual. That goes back to an earlier post about why genuine apologies are so important; that is usually the best way to heal a breach of credibility.
The sad truth though is that people we trust are capable of lying and betrayal. That will be the subject of the next post.
We all see the emails that circulate periodically about the importance of girlfriends that goes beyond “let’s do lunch”. In addition to the ones we have a good time with, there are the ones that are so close that we are sisters in spirit if not in blood. You have fun with them, yes, but they are the ones to turn to when you need that shoulder, that understanding for something heartbreaking, or the one you want to share something uplifting with. No matter how much you love your husband/significant other or children (when that applies), real girlfriends are important and the truth is that you won’t have many of them. The balance of who needs whom tends to be equal as you support each other in times of crisis or just intense frustation. They are the ones you can reveal your frailties to, although you don’t always – but the point is that you can.
We are sometimes separated by geography in our mobile society, and one of the great things about the Internet is how much easier connectivity is than it used to be. If you really can’t sleep at 3:00 a.m., or time zones make telephoning impractical, you can send an email or post a message to Facebook. I count myself fortunate in the girlfriends I have that bond with and I cherish those relationships. (You know that I love you, too, Sis!) If your busy life has kept you from telling one of those special girlfriends how much she means to you, maybe you can take a few minutes to call or send a message through whatever means you prefer.