Living the Dream

I was raised to believe in the American Dream and the intrinsic value of hard work as a means to success. The current envisioning of the American Dream is, that by participating in society and the economy, everyone has the opportunity to get a good education and a good job and can become successful.  “.. a dream of social order in which each man and each woman shall be able to attain to the fullest stature of which they are innately capable, and be recognized by others for what they are, regardless of the fortuitous circumstances of birth or position”.  James Truslow Adams   These days -  financial success depends more on what you do for a living, than how hard you work/how devoted you are at or to your job. How successful you are in terms of economic status is not just determined by your hard work in your chosen profession – its actually determined more by the profession you choose and the salary and benefits attached to them.  Of course, if you are a screw up then you’ll lose your job anyway – but reasonable competence in the corporate world guarantees you a fairly high standard of living with few – if any,  economic worries.   Certainly you can still be successful in terms of job satisfaction/personal happiness no matter what your career. But I am also equally certain that the janitor cleaning those corporate offices after business hours has substantially greater economic worries than the executive whose office he’s cleaning. And that doesn’t necessarily indicate that janitor is living beyond his means.

The Statue of Liberty front shot, on Liberty Island. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Somewhere along the way we came to equate the American Dream solely with financial success -  ie  if we ain’t livin large, we ain’t livin the dream. I completely disagree with that mindset.  And I’ll tell you why.  In my opinion – every job is an important one. Every career path chosen not only validates our interests, but also identifies us to the world at large.  No job is too insignificant. Performing your work well should be the primary factor in satisfaction but I know that  many times it is not. (We don’t always get that “attaboy” or “attagirl’ from our supervisors. But we always hear about it when we screw up, right?) Anyway, I’m not sure what we can do to change the mindset.  But I can tell you that I am blue collar middle class.  I work hard,  and I feel good about what I accomplish – every day.

Perhaps it is a gratitude issue.  We Americans are a whiny self entitled bunch these days.  I have a nice house,  food in my fridge and freezer, most of my bills are paid or pending to be paid, I have shoes on my feet, a choice of weather appropriate clothing to wear each day, indoor plumbing, laundry facilities, health insurance, heat and electricity, and an automobile to get where I need to go, and at least a few dollars in change in my pocketbook.   If I had to guess – that makes me better off than probably 75% of the rest of the planet. Most people I know are at least as well off. Even most of the poorest of us are generally better off than most of the other people on the planet. We have access to housing, medical, food and clothing, transportation  – all the basics are met – or can be. And yet – complain complain complain.  Because we don’t have the 52 inch plasma TV, or the jet ski, or the Beemer.  From my perspective, why do we care?  Having a BMW doesn’t make me “better” than  anyone else (not that I actually have one) And if you are receiving assistance, why do you feel the need to have the large screen HD TV?  If you can’t afford to pay for it yourself, perhaps you might consider finding something that fits into your budget.  Are you meeting the needs of your family – 3 hots and a cot? Are you proactively planning for your children’s education or vocational needs? Planning for your retirement? Planning for your essential living expenses?  If you aren’t doing these things/cant afford to do them , there is no place for that HD TV in your home. The world will not come to an end if you can’t watch The Avengers in HD.  Get over it.

American Dream (Photo credit: Robert Gourley)

More to the point, I strongly feel that the American Dream should be about what you can DO, not what you HAVE or can GET. The American Dream should be, was intended to be, about the pursuit of happiness. I can tell you happiness is not defined by what things you possess, but rather by interpersonal relationships and self esteem. We’ve lost sight of that, much to our detriment.  My ideas to increase our happiness quotient, and thereby put us on a path to achieving our dream:

• Volunteer -  Helping others – without judgement -  and sharing our wealth/resources is one of the best ways I know to get people out of their boxes, develop a broader world view, and develop empathy.
• Live within your means -  Understand that living is about relationships not about possessions. This is perhaps the biggest issue in terms of  achieving happiness.  We have to redefine it and tell ourselves it is perfectly OK not to “keep up” with our neighbors.
• Learn and Practice proper Social Etiquette -  Learn how to behave towards others in such a way that they feel valued – no matter their economic status, they are a person with intrinsic value and deserving of respect. You WILL feel valued in return, trust me on that.  Because  “in the end, the love you take – is equal to the love you make.”

I don’t have any other ideas at the moment, but would love to hear your thoughts.  Feel free to comment.  Thanks.

Related articles

• Sorry State Of The American Dream (justfartnaround.com)
• The American dream may be dying too (thestar.blogs.com)
• A requiem for the American dream? (independentmail.com)

Past Forgetting

Changes

We are born, we live, we die. A simple sentence. Yet what occurs between those two commas is everything. In order to truly do this, sometimes we must embrace change as eagerly as a new lover. Sometimes, we must accept it, matter of factly – as we accept that the earth is round and the sun rises in the east. It serves no good purpose to fight it. We are human, it is our nature to adapt.

We must also recognize that our time here is finite. The Fates, capricious bitches that they are, snip the threads of life too soon for some of us. Which, in my feeble mind, makes it all the more important for me to do something with my life.

There’s an expression going around these days: YOLO (you only live once). Truth. Yet all too often I see it used as an excuse for ridiculously self indulgent, immature behavior. It’s the “Gimme Generation”s self-entitled slogan du jour. But it doesn’t have to be.

We live. Once. I would like to be part of the changes I want to see in the world. I hope I already am. I want to look in the mirror when I wake up and see someone who made a difference to someone else. Some days that’s difficult. Anyone who knows me knows I’m absolutely not -ever- at my best in the morning, so gazing into a reflective surface is going to be a terrifying experience, at least until I’m caffeinated.

Anyway, all humor aside, I just want to point out we don’t have much time, on the grander universal scale at least. We can adapt to change, learn from each other, and grow during the time we have. Rejoicing in our differences, and remembering that we are stronger together BECAUSE of them. Or, we can squander ourselves and extinguish our precious inner light with futile, utterly senseless violence, prejudice, hatred and intolerance. I know what I choose. We are born, we live, we die. Lets make those two words between those commas count for something.

Deep Peaceful Summer Reflections

 

We need to find God, and he cannot be found in noise and restlessness. God is the friend of silence. See how nature – trees, flowers, grass – grows in silence; see the stars, the moon and the sun, how they move in silence… We need silence to be able to touch souls.  ~ Mother Teresa

Nature does not hurry, yet everything is accomplished. ~  Lao Tzu

Come to the woods, for here is rest. There is no repose like that of the green deep woods. ~ John Muir

Now he walks in quiet solitude the forest and the streams
Seeking grace in every step he takes . . .   ~ John Denver 

In the viridian depths of the forest we find solace.  In the quiet reflection of  jade-dark, slow-moving streams there is peaceful contentment. The jewel tones of the plants and flowers are mirrored  – jade, beryl, ruby, amethyst, emerald, and pearl – colorful little surprises. There is no sense of past or future – only the Dream Time; only the Now.  The rain patters softly on the surface of the water, or the sun dazzles and dances across it.  Clouds create depth and shadow.  The water and the forest watch.  They are ours to rejoice in.  Tomorrow, all will change.  The beauty will remain for us to see. The serenity inside,  for us to feel.  We take it with us when we go.  ~ Donna Erickson

 

Flora and Fauna: A Pledge of Paradise

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Pink Bee Balm, and a Bumble. I love how you can see the delicate veining and transparency of the bumble’s wings, the yellow fuzziness of the torso ( I have no idea what the proper anatomical term is. Emma – help me out on this one please and thanks!) – and how the wings function as a transparent screen for the edge of the flower blossoms. I’ve never seen pink bee balm before. It was everywhere along one section of the Harbor Walk in Gloucester. All sorts of bees were landing and taking off – creating a lovely background hum as we strolled along.

Floral Fireworks. I think these are some sort of daisy or brown eyed Susan, or maybe some type of coneflower. Flower Salsa! Very spicy! Red and Orange Rocket Flowers – Yeah, that!

I have no idea what the name of these flowers is – but they grow on the side of the road and in fields everywhere around here in July and August. They’re the prettiest shade of periwinkle blue.

Another view of the spicy firework flowers. I applied a “soft and faded” photoshop action – and also managed to catch a couple of honeybees hard at work. In this photo particularly the blossoms are shaking their petal skirts in a gentle breeze – swaying to a rhythm only they can feel.

Just some of the vibrant beauty to be found – right in front of me. If you have a favorite of these, please comment and let me know. Thanks.

“If a man could pass through Paradise in a dream, and have a flower presented to him as a pledge that his soul had really been there, and if he found that flower in his hand when he awake – Aye, what then? ” ~ Samuel Taylor Coleridge

. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Update: The Great Floral Identification Adventure: the bee balm is in fact bee balm; the red and orange rocket flowers – they also remind me of badminton shuttlecocks-are echinacea; the blue flowers are chicory. Thanks everyone!!

Home is the Sailor

Home from the Sea….. Gloucester July 2012

 

Quote of the Day

“If you want to view Paradise, simply look around and view it.  Anything you want to, do it. Want to change the world? There’s nothing to it”.  ~ Anthony Newley , ‘Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory’

Photo Credit: memegenerator.net

Nostalgia and Summer Magic

With apologies to Mr King (I edited the tense and changed the year)

“All the same, the past feels very close just now. Maybe it’s just the golden cast of the declining summer light, which has always struck me as slightly supernatural. It’s as if 1970 were still right here, only hidden beneath a flimsy film of intervening years”. ~ Stephen King, 11/22/63

Perhaps it’s because we were both born and reside in New England, albeit different generations, but I “get” Stephen King. His writing just lingers in my brain, mulling around – until I come out with some seemingly random quote that makes sense to absolutely no one but me. The quote above fits my feelings, thoughts and mood PERFECTLY today. It’s certainly because I am on holiday from my job this week! And lastly, perhaps it’s also because my children are now officially on their summer break – which of course makes me nostalgic for my own childhood summers. So, you lucky folks get to read about that today.

1970 – We’d moved up from Westfield the previous July – over the weekend of the 19/20th to be exact. I remember watching Neil Armstrong take that historic giant leap for mankind on a 19 inch Sony black and white which had been placed upon a stack of moving boxes in our new dining room. My dad’s mother, who lived with us until 1973, remarked several times how she’d never thought to see the day. Born in 1887, she went from outhouses, lanterns and horse drawn carriages to indoor plumbing, dishwashers, refrigerators, and men landing on the moon. Who’d'a thunk it, right? Or so she said…. 1970 marked the first full official summer in the hilltown of Blandford, MA.

First Congregational Church, Blandford MA

Old Stone Wall, Watson Park Blandford MA

So what’s a (then) city girl like me to do during a small town summer in the southern Berkshire hills? Pull up a chair and lemme tell ya about it….

We had a 2 story cape on 2 acres of partially wooded land on a hillside, with a useable barn on the property. Due to spring runoff, some seriously ingenious person finagled the cellar so that the runoff cascaded down one built up side and was directed into a man made channel that bisected the cement cellar floor and then down and out the other side of the foundation. How many people can say that they have a brook running through their cellar? I always thought that was pretty cool. The system worked extremely well, and the runoff eventually made it to a roadside spring on the edge of our driveway. Man was that water ever cold, and it tasted wonderful! Bikers, hikers, and riders often stopped to fill their canteens in passing. The spring usually dried up in September. The cellar never flooded while we lived there. I happened to meet the current owner of the property recently and he told me that the cellar always floods in the spring nowadays because an owner in between us dammed up the spring, and cemented over the runoff channel in the cellar.

Childhood summers are timeless, the days blend together until the one day your mother has to take you school shopping (a half hour drive down to the city to go to Grants, Newberrys and Steigers for clothes and supplies). If the day was gonna be a “scorcher” you could always tell because the “jar flies” would be loudly buzzing. The morning sky, a bright steely grey and maybe only a breathy whisper of a breeze. Plans for such a day usually included using a bicycle or “shank’s mare”. Either way, we had to be careful because we lived on the main road to a popular summer tourist destination (Otis Reservoir) – and there was always quite a large volume of summer traffic starting Memorial Day Weekend and running through mid- September. Mom would make her grandmother’s famous lemonade iced tea (see prior post for recipe) and put some in thermoses for us. We were usually off exploring by 9:30 or 10 am.

No cell phones or iPods mind you. If we wanted music, we took a battery operated transistor radio that usually only operated on AM frequency. Here’s my 1970 playlist:

Bobby Sherman – Julie, Do Ya Love Me

The Partridge Family – I Think I Love You

The Band – Up On Cripple Creek

Elton John – Your Song

Creedence Clearwater Revival – Travelin Band

Elvis Presley – You Dont Have To Say You Love Me

The Who – Summertime Blues – Studio Version

Chicago – 25 Or 6 To 4

Carpenters – (They Long To Be) Close To You

Norman Greenbaum – Spirit In The Sky

Blues Image – Ride Captain Ride – Single/LP Version

Dawn – Candida

Simon & Garfunkel – El Condor Pasa (If I Could)

Jackson 5 – ABC

Creedence Clearwater Revival – Lookin’ Out My Back Door

Just Me circa 1970…. not happy with Mom takin my picture…. and wearing my favorite summer shirt, jsyk…

We either had to be back to have lunch, or if Mom had packed us one, we had to be back before supper. Possessions ended up in a knapsack or placed in the carryall basket on the handlebars of the bike. My bike was THE Coolest. Turquoise blue with a “banana” seat. Plastic wicker basket with cheesy plastic flowers on it. I pumped the pedals backwards to brake. And we (my sister and me) were off. Some days we went down to the old mica quarry/swamp next door and caught pollywogs or built forts on the “islands”. (I have another story about the mica quarry for another day) Other days we ranged farther afield and rode down to the dairy farm, wandering through the fields looking for a place to picnic, and trying unsuccessfully to “scare” the cows. They’d just look at us as if to say “Are you serious?” Or we’d ride to Cobble Mt Reservoir and fly kites off the spillway. After 9/11 the reservoir is closed off but when I was a teenager we’d go up there to make out with our boyfriends (braving an encounter with the “Cobble Mountain Critter“), and take illicit pleasure from peeing in Springfield’s drinking water... I was SUCH a rebel, wasn’t I?

Sometimes we’d just hang out on our own property. Someone built a platform up in one of the white pines at the top of our hill and it was a great place to view the world from -provided you could stand the “pincher bugs” that seemed to infest the dang tree. Further back from that were the “Ponderosa” Pines. These were easy to climb and there were many days you could have found me high up in the limbs. You could hear quite a bit up there- lawnmowers, chain saws and the distant hum of the traffic from the turnpike down the valley aways. There were times were I actually fell asleep up there, dreamily watching the clouds and the world go by – don’t tell my mother! We also had permission to use a tree fort on the property of a summer home on top of the hill on Sunset Road. We’d play cards and eat our picnic lunches while listening to the dj on the transistor talk over/right through the beginning of the songs. (Didn’t you just HATE that? you could never tape a song back then…)

I mentioned the barn earlier. It was red, of course. That first full summer we were there we had not yet converted it to farm use. So the horse stall became our play house. We had a “Easy-Bake” oven up there and painted the inside of the stall to look like a kitchen. It was also a spot to jump in the hay pile, as we kept the hillside scythed, dried the hay, and gave it to our neighbors who had livestock at the time. We’d launch’ from the open second story of the barn, down into the stall itself. I miscalcuated once and knocked myself out, freaking out my sister and cousins who were visiting. I woke up alone a few minutes later and started wandering down to the house – only to see the adults swarming out the back door to come to my assistance. I still have a flat spot on the left side of my head where it hit the stall wall. This would explain much in terms of my personality, would it not? (nudge, nudge, wink, wink). We’d also use the barn to play “Hogan’s Heroes” if there were enough kids – and try to “escape”. We had NO idea it was not PC to do this at the time…..

Mom had a VERY loud whistle which she used to good effect to call us home. It had a range of a least a mile or so. The tune was “Me-Do” Supper was always between 5 and 5:30. It was expected that we’d come home in time to set the table and wash up. Conversation was expected at the table. Our day could never just be “good”. We were expected to have details about what we did that day, and to share them during dinner. We also had to ask to be excused from the table when we were finished, then help clean up and do dishes. After that, we were free to go back outside and play. Generally we’d arrange with our friends to play “hide and seek” and get ready to chase the fireflies at dusk; or play flashlight tag.

The world started to turn pinky- gold by 6:30/7pm. Twilight magic time. It lasted quite awhile in those long ago summers. The jar flies stopped buzzing, and as soon as the sun dropped behind the hill it cooled off by at least 10 degrees. You could hear the sound of kids playing throughout the neighborhood. The sound coming to you as if down a tunnel – drowsily. Like listening to a conversation as you’re falling asleep. Folks would come out to sit on their front porches in their rockers, comfy chairs or porch swings . Calling hello across the street to the neighbors, enjoying the sunset and the cool evening breeze. No one locked their doors, ever. No need. Everybody knew everybody, and you can bet your sweet bippy if you did something wrong one of the neighbors would tell your parents. On the other hand – you could also go to your neighbors if you needed something and your parents weren’t home. True community living.

I hope you enjoyed this trip down the backroads of my mind. In the “Wayback Machine” – 42 summers ago. It was fun – let’s do it again, soon!