Category Archives: Sailing Through Life

The good life

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Living here in a small town is very pleasant. The local folks are engaged in the practice of survival, that is, participating in community activities in various holiday celebrations, neighborly exchanges of small gifts and visitations, and multi-generational family gatherings. There is a positive air covering the town!

Nevertheless, only because few residents want to talk about it or still watch broadcast news and have ignored social media’s tendency to fawn upon itself, it is almost possible to separate community from national and world catastrophe. One forgets how pleasant normal life can be.

It’s amazing how many hobbies surface during the holidays. A service organization is building a tiny house for a veteran; the quilting club is turning out quilts for sale; several folks make their own holiday greeting cards – some quite exquisite; many choirs perform musical events around the county; there are Santa events in most public service agencies. Even Nosey Mole was seen wearing a Santa hat.

Appropriately, if not conveniently, the weather outside is frightful but the fire is so delightful, and since we’ve no place to go let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

There is no doubt that a human’s emotional survival skills have evolved with significant intensity and purpose. Let us pray that increased disorder will not test them further.

Ancient Mariner

Sticks

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Seasoned readers may remember that, on occasion, mariner yields a post to the creative works of his wife. She is a nonprofit, unpublished professional poet. Her collection on 8 1/2 x 11 paper is close to three inches deep. He has urged her to get published to improve the family income. Here is her poem:

A Short Sermon

If you go for a walk in the woods
You need a walking stick:

Something to support you
When the footing is dangerous,
Something to defend you
When the cougar stalks.
You don’t need aluminum
Trekking poles with hand grips
And carbon steel tips-
Any stick will do.

You only have to look around
To see that the woods provides
Sticks in abundance.

The woods which is full of treacherous footing
And cougars
Is also full of sticks.
It is, after all,
What the woods is made of: sticks.

Isn’t it a miracle
That what we most need
Is provided in abundance?
And by sticks I mean
Courage, hope, faith, love.
And by woods I mean
The world

MKM 11/20/13

The experiment comes to an end

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Mariner has spent the last ten days living alone. His wife went to California to help with our newest granddaughter. His wife returns tomorrow. Recent posts reflect what mariner observed during his own ‘shut in’ experience. Below are some firsthand observations.

• It was a good time to update mariner’s alter ego, Chicken Little. Contemporary history has eliminated innocence in daily life. No one is surprised at anything that happens today. But neither is there is any relief in looking forward. There seems to be no way back to cultural or governmental stability. The new alter ego is Nosey Mole – a survivalist. It is a time when one draws closer to the safe, close by values – neighborhood, family and helping to keep everyone alive.

• When Trump won the election, it was like tearing the scab off a large wound too soon. Mariner had a good idea what would transpire over the next 18 months. Challenges, abuse of public trust, plutocratic spasms and the dismissal of any moral obligation to a national democracy. He stopped listening to the news from every source. To this moment, the affairs of the world are unknown to him.

• Left only with non-news broadcasting, it became obvious that, in reality, there wasn’t anything worth watching. Mariner turned off the television except for select gardening shows and a few British mysteries. In a rare moment, he may find a worthy documentary. These educational documentaries are lost among the mishmash of entertainment from the last century and new broadcasts one has to pay to watch, as if the viewer were going to a sporting event.

• It was not hard to abandon the television. Entwined with social media and deep fake technology, there is no interest by broadcasters to support the moral good of the viewer. So what to do with his time? Fortunately, he virtually is a full time gardener. Given a full day’s length of time, the garden provided some distraction. Still, he became aware of the blank space in which one has only empty time. Having too much of this non-dimensional space is like taking opiates – there is no reality. It’s as if a ship lost its rudder but keeps sailing.

• Being alone on a continuous basis also distorts meals, sleeping patterns and daily chores. Breakfast is a slice of spam; a nap may last most of the day; daily chores are put off. (Mariner must admit that he knew his wife would return shortly so he kept up his daily chores for fear of negative judgment).

• There were a few opportunities to visit other people. Neighbors and relatives fed him and checked to see if he was okay. Fortunately, he has the Blog to exercise emotional perspective and to express his opinions. His final observation, however, is that for the moment, Nosey is right in staying close to what is personally important: survival.

Ancient Mariner

A new pet word

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Seasoned readers know that mariner has a world class linguist as a friend. One of our pastimes is collecting words that catch our fancy. Most of them are American slurs like ‘jeetjet?’, or the word may be a ridiculously long and convoluted word like ‘hippopotomonstrosesquippedaliophobia which happens to mean fear of long words. Mariner has a new one: peer. As an adverb, it is someone going to the bathroom; as a verb, it is someone looking with timidity; as a noun, it is someone who is equal to others; as a proper noun, it is the name of Gynt’s fancy hotel room. In British usage, being a peer suggests one belongs to an upper class rank like Duke or Lord; in the United States, it means that a person is accepted and equal in a group of others with similar circumstances – as in the democratic phrase ‘All men are created equal’ which, of course, has never been true.

Mariner came upon ‘peer’ nestled in psychological essays. The essays suggested that the desire to be a peer is a strong need to sustain the ego and is a core survival skill. One quickly can identify with this urge especially in school rooms; if classmates are not openly friendly, an individual may have doubts about their own worth in this peer group. A nuanced suggestion is that ‘peer pressure’ is at the foundation of human behavior in that it is a desire to have others accept the individual as a social member and to be part of the tribe’s protection against harm. So while the ego is sensitive to group acceptance, it also is the motivation for achievement AKA defender of the tribe.

Throw the word ‘peer’ into the political mixing bowl and one can see what drives social conflict. It has become common knowledge that MAGA emerged from a labor class that for half a century has been underpaid, lost guaranteed benefits and ultimately was not considered as successful as college graduates. Talk about peer pressure – from the white collar world!

To survive, the ego must be satisfied. it finds others who share the person’s disgruntlement and together launch counter attacks against those who deny their equality.

It turns out not all humans are peers and, will a computer ever be a peer to a human?

Armageddon proceeds.

Ancient Mariner

Retired and alone

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There comes a painful time to many in life when the spouse passes on, the children are grown and away, and many friends are in retirement institutions or passing on as well. Perhaps ‘painful’ is the wrong word; perhaps depressed, melancholy, lonely and mentally unfocused may apply. There may be a strong sense that one is in a different time zone than the rest of the world may be. This is not an accident. It is in our genes: primates prefer to be among their clan, their family and have a desire to be recognized as a peer. Being among their kind perhaps is the strongest defense mechanism, a means by which to stay alive.

Disease and physical maladies take their toll as well. Caring for others is a motivation found not only in primates but in most mammals, many birds and fish as well. Even community-based insects show signs of willing maintenance for the community’s wellbeing. Even so, many humans are left to go on their own – perhaps a cultural phenomenon among blended clans (e.g., large cities).

There are a few behaviors that may sustain the human spirit for those left in isolation. Most of them make sense but the challenge from within is the gumption to do them. What follows is a limited list of things to do to ward off those feelings of depression, melancholy, loneliness and mentally unfocused times:

⊕ When one arises in the morning and has dealt with bathroom issues, make the bed – neatly and every day. It is amazing how much this sets self-discipline for the rest of the day.

⊕ Have a specific morning routine, typically involving opening the house for the day and preparing a breakfast meal. The morning routine may include feeding pets, watering plants, etc. If you are fortunate, you have a daily newspaper to read. The trick is to perform the same tasks every morning; short term memory may benefit.

⊕ Check social media, including email, to see what friends and family are talking about; it would be highly beneficial if you could join in! Let’s face it, one of the great improvements in society is the internet. Every retired person should own an inexpensive computer tablet or (shudder) smartphone for no other reason than safety. If you have a tablet, a cell phone will suffice.

⊕ While it is still morning, walk outside for 20 minutes; do not stroll but take a healthy stride that will stir the circulation system. Inclement weather, except storms, is not an option. Taking on the weather will add to your gumption. Resist deciding to skip walking for any reason.

⊕ If you are fortunate, your walk may take you by one of the following: Visit a fellow loner – stop in a restaurant to meet a coffee group – pick up trash – on the way back home, stop by your next-door neighbor or good friend’s house. (This may feel awkward at first but quickly becomes a favorite part of your routine – it could include a short side trip with them to the store or some other diversion. Don’t forget to finish by walking home.)

⊕ Prepare lunch. Afterward, a nap may call your name; keep it under an hour and a half.

⊕ Pick an organization to attend regularly. Many will choose a religious institution; consider a wide variety of groups like reading club, garden club, VA meetings, exercise sessions offered by libraries, YMCA, etc., golf and bowling leagues, etc. It is important to attend faithfully.

⊕ Tidy one room so it looks clean and neat. On another day, tidy another room.

⊕ Prepare supper. If you can afford it, an occasional dinner in a restaurant is a nice break – especially if you can get a friend to go with you!

⊕ Develop a past time that makes you think, solve puzzles, or how to go about doing a complex task. Most common are crosswords, jigsaw puzzles, small shop projects or reorganizing a room. Mariner has a friend that had a career in an office then retired to be a contractor. A few folks may actually take an educational class just for the new knowledge and social activity. Another friend learned about investment and did fairly well. But here is a handy task: make your own sourdough bread or some other intriguing recipes.

⊕ This may be hard to establish: go to bed before midnight, maybe as early as ten.

* * * *

So there you have it – a full day’s example of how to avoid the doldrums. Mix and match any way you like to accommodate your circumstances. Note the theme throughout: talk to people as often as it is convenient; get daily exercise; do some chores; stay physically active; care for others.

Yes, it is damned hard to get started.

Ancient Mariner

 

 

 

The new world ain’t so bad

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As many, many voters have done, mariner has shut down news in its entirety. Not only that, he has removed television in general from his options. He and his wife spend one evening each week on a ‘date’ to watch British mysteries together. Other than that, the television sits dark in its corner.

After a few days of dysfunction, one begins to fill in the space with other options – everything from talking more often with family members, to reading books, to crosswords, to reading magazines, even to stopping to talk to neighbors more frequently. Did the reader know they could still go to the movies?

Slowly, the brain turns to other things not thought of in a long time; there’s that attic door lock that has needed fixing for years; building a clear report of family assets, budget patterns and tax detail; tossing out one million four hundred pieces of 8½x11 paper that has been cordoned off for most of one’s life; gifted non-viewers may recall knitting, crocheting, painting and writing. Two friends of mariner make jewelry.

There is time to restart your attendance to community organizations and social events. If he wanted, mariner could go to a square-dancing club; even if he wanted to go, his knees and vertigo would make a mess of things.

How long has it been since the reader washed their dog? Does that trip to a lifelong friend nine states away seem more likely? The point one realizes is that an awful lot of life has been missed while opting for television to fill one’s day.

Brain scientists say an inactive brain goes south faster than an active brain – that is, if the brain has to learn new facts or skills on a daily basis, the brain may likely go southwest – a longer trip.

Speaking from his own experience, gearing up a daily to-do list and be willing to execute it is as difficult as gearing up a heavy 18-wheeler.

But the good side is a feeling of being an independent person, not attracted and seduced by television and, if one is committed to becoming a busy individual, one may lose track of the smartphone once in a while.

Remember: psychologists say that happiness comes automatically if one is active in the community, loves one’s family and graciously works at supporting the least of us.

Ancient Mariner

Bats, Beavers and Bears

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Regular readers know that in his younger years mariner spent some time as a preacher. One sermon he wanted to preach but never did because it would be confusing to the congregation, was a sermon about the common relationship between bats, beavers, bears and humans. Without needing to sustain a congregation’s comprehension, he may try to deliver it in essay format.

* * *

This topic rests upon the definition of survival, behavior and faith. They all are identical, come from the same set of brain cells and are managed in the subconscious mind except when rituals are performed. This phenomenon is identical in bats, beavers, bears and humans – and virtually all creatures in the animal world. If one is a zoologist, the common term is survival; if one is a psychiatrist/sociologist, the common term is behavior; if one is a theologian, the common term is faith.

Some explanation of brain function may be helpful. As a machine, the brain performs the same functions for BBB&H and other warmblooded creatures as well. The mastermind that induced brain function is evolution, a very slow operator that takes many, many lifetimes to change genome reasoning gene by gene to keep pace as environmental reality shifts. If one could watch long enough, they would see the subtle similarity as bats behave as bats, beavers behave as beavers, etc.

In the human brain, evolution took a strange turn and added a frontal lobe to the pre-wired, automatic decision maker housed in the subconscious. The frontal lobe has a brand new function: humans can imagine stuff that doesn’t exist. This puts a strain on the subconscious engine that actually makes human decisions. Humans can easily imagine that a fantasy actually is real and live by it even though it has nothing to do with survival. The bats, beavers and bears are fortunate in this regard.

The term ‘ritual’ is simply a visible, three-dimensional act executed by the subconscious decision maker. It is an act to sustain survival. A bat decides to look for a cave, a beaver decides to build a dam, a bear looks for a den. Humans, with their artificially enhanced reality will look for shelter as well, but with distorted judgment. It is only the destitute and very poor who know that their decision is based solely on survival.

The second perspective, social behavior, is a montage of experiences among family, community and core personality. The core personality is found in the genome and provides the primary actions for survival but how a human behaves in public, under stress, confrontation, and accountability is a montage of ingrained behaviors externally induced to survive.

So the human frontal lobe, along with the fantasy that each human owns the planet and its natural processes, that community bonding isn’t as important as driving the interstates to new fantasies, that money measures surviveability, has led to a third category needed to describe the ethics of surviveability: faith.

Bats, beavers and bears don’t need nor can induce faith beyond a simple behavioral principal that allows them to take advantage of unusual situations. For example, a bear may depend on a human. Humans, however,  can  interpret reality many different ways. Humans often have the imagination to leverage reality beyond the rules of existence provided by evolution.

The subconscious decision maker, for all it’s sophistication, is swayed by the constant barrage of confrontations caused by wishes for glory, adventure and self-serving behavior. Reality has become a circus of convoluted survival values. Which value is a genuine risk to survival?

Enter faith. In addition to subconscious survival decisions, humans have a tool called ideology to help separate the wheat from the chaff. Ideology has many concentrations. For example, there is theological, political, communal, economic and whimsy. The advantage of faith is that it lays an organized value system over reality by which to measure decisions that are genuinely about survival. Unfortunately, the subconscious decision maker doesn’t accept these decisions; ideology is strictly a preoccupation of the frontal lobes. Unless a human convinces themselves that their ideology is the actual reality, humans tend to drift in and out of ideological allegiance depending on its convenience. Hence the need for divine forgiveness for habitual sinners.

Given all these machinations, the subconscious decision maker doesn’t wander far from it’s genome instructions. Survival, care for loved ones and concern for it’s tribe are the core reality. The extent to which the circus realities of the frontal lobe cause nuisance and disruption to our subconscious survival skill places great pressure on the true interpretation of reality. Just ask the bats, beavers and bears how much.

Ancient Mariner

 

 

It doesn’t take groups, even

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A few of mariner’s recent posts have focused on that point in time when an individual must reinvent their identity, perhaps look for another income, and not lose their collaboration with their fellow humans. Those solutions ascribed to the social psychology of organizations and self sufficiency.

But it is easier than that. Mariner doesn’t get out very often, that is, to roam about in the rambunctious diversity of the public domain, but every once in a while he must visit the medical industry in a nearby small city.

Many folks are preoccupied with personal issues and aren’t prone to notice other public folks. Nevertheless, most citizens moving about in the public domain are willing to engage in ‘of the moment’ encounters.

While roaming about the halls and offices of the hospital, numerous interchanges occurred between mariner and others in the halls. When he first arrived, he met with a coordinator who checked credentials and scheduled his visit. She mentioned during the interview that she could smell the cookies baking in the souvenir shop; she lamented that she could not leave her post to buy some.

After that, while a guide led him to the right waiting room, she said that she recognized his face. That led to a short exchange of sharing geographical histories.

Visiting with the technician, mariner inquired about the kind of decisions that were promulgated because of his examination. The conversation led to a discussion about the complexity of decision making among many medical individuals.

While mariner was walking back to the front exit, two nurses at different moments asked if he needed a wheelchair or was lost. Finally, mariner met with his wife at the souvenir store where he bought cookies for the coordinator. When he delivered them, all the coordinators had a cheer that someone gave them a gift.

So collaboration is such an intrinsic human behavior that it almost ignites itself. Still, each individual must strike a match to engage. That’s all there is to it. Mariner realizes that certain personality types will find it hard to engage with random strangers and many suffer from depression and life stress. Nevertheless, engagement is always there – even if political differences may prohibit extended collaboration.

Mariner was well aware that he had roamed a public domain rich with fellow collaboration. Who needs an organization?

Ancient Mariner

 

Keep it going – addendum

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When mariner reviewed his post to correct grammar and spelling, he noticed that he had zeroed in on ways to continue productivity as part of continued collaboration. Actually, productivity is a minor issue. It is collaboration that really counts.

For example, mariner used to visit a poker club every Saturday. The players were of a common stripe, each dressed in scrubby clothes, needing a shave or wearing beards and having the typical old man belly (mariner must note that by this time he was slim  though his wife wished he would shave more often). These men came to play poker but that wasn’t the real reason – the poker was atrocious because of many ‘special’ rules that made typical odds irrelevant. They came to associate with fellow humans; they needed to collaborate. Every attendee brought a simple snack of some kind, a subconscious desire to provide sustenance for the occasion.

These collaborative gatherings are quite informal and frequently available in established communities – for example, small towns or traditional neighborhood settings. They can be found at restaurants, golf courses, bowling alleys, community events and even within more structured environments like churches, Lion’s Club and VA clubs. Mariner’s town has a special women’s gathering called “The Red Hatters”, aptly descriptive. The sustenance piece is that everyone must wear a red hat.

So remember that the central goal is collaboration. If the reader also can profit, more power to them!

Ancient Mariner

Keep it going

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Mariner is older than most folks. Old enough, in fact, to look back on that time when a person suddenly becomes old – retired from career, lifelong friends and family are disappearing, maybe even die, institutions that were the core of society back in the day are not mainstream anymore, children and grandchildren are off living that life an old person remembers with melancholy.

Humans, by their nature, are born and raised to be collaborative. Each person contributes to the sustenance needed by themselves and their family and even, in these modern times, needed by God and Country. It is natural for a person to take on a role that contributes to others as well as to themselves.

But what to do when that role disappears, when that role is no longer meaningful to the day-to-day world, when the role a person played in life has become passé? The answer is to keep it going. Remember the old days when a person had to look for a job or go hungry? Remember when parents had to move to a new region and it meant having to find new friends at school? Remember when the company laid off people and they had to start over?

It’s that time again.

No one does this job for the new oldster. The oldster must make a concerted effort, often taking a year or two, to find a new way to collaborate with fellow humans. Most adjustments relate to known skills and social behavior but don’t overlook something completely new.

One of mariner’s old friends had a career working 40 years in the offices of a large corporation. When he retired, he became a carpenter specializing in refurbishing home attics. Word-of-mouth recommendations kept him busy full time.

Mariner’s wife, a career librarian and author, has established a busy day by working whenever needed at the town library, belonging to writers and readers clubs, is active in her church, maintains a visiting network with friends who go back to her childhood in the town, remaining on a daily contact basis with lifetime friends and her children, participating in art and exercise programs – and still takes care of mariner!

A couple mariner knows are retired from running a grocery store. The wife makes artistic refrigerator magnets and sells them at town fairs across the midwest, saying that the fair sales and a tax write off pay for their vacation.

For most new oldsters, collaborative participation comes from continuing the skills and behaviors of their lifetime. For example, carpenters can continue their trade by taking on smaller projects that full time contractors find unprofitable. Hobbyists who knit, make jewelry or create artwork of any kind can use their hobby by connecting with small stores, charitable organizations and selling at fairs and yard sales.

New oldsters with a background in humanities may have to be a bit more creative to find a way to use their skills. Search politics, religion, social work or presentations in retirement homes, charity organizations, community and local government organizations. History has many famous examples of old folks becoming authors – social media is waiting.

If the new oldster is sitting in a recliner watching television and scrolling games on the smartphone, get off your ass and find a new collaboration. Otherwise, depression, loneliness and boredom will be the new lifestyle.

Ancient Mariner