Hitchhiker

I am on the cusp of being unemployed with my position being eliminated due to budget cuts.  Consequently, I'm up at 4 AM  this  morning .  I'm 57 - not old enough to retire - not young enough to hire.  I'm not marketable. That is the fact of it.  What I bring to the work place of skill, enhancements and vision are not recognized as valuable by current standards.  In the bleary predawn I was trying to amuse myself  after a restless night by scrolling through songs.  I spent some time watching Johnny Cash videos, seeing as how that is the only cash I can spend right now.  I then moved into songs about the heart of the matter:  work and the economy...

For a long time I have been thinking in terms of the last twenty years when I think of America's dependence on oil and an inflated economy but as I looked at this video I realized that our dependence is really embedded deeper within the American psyche and it goes back farther than that.  It actually seems to reside on the level of myth for those of us born into the automobile culture. 

Given that the oil industry provided the groundwork for the American economy for so very, very long, it stands to reason it will take some time and creativity to realign the structure of the economy on a new foundation.  With all the pressure for social reform, tea parties, posturing, posing and denial it seems I am part of a collective group of people who have driven the combustible engine to the end of the line and we just can't stand it.  Right and left both seem apoplectic over how they have been "wronged" by each other. I contend that the arguments are somewhat distracting from what has really happened to us all.  The gas guage is empty and we have run out of road. 

Just as sure as I have skittered along as a wage slave all of my life on the high tide of other people's wealth, taken my directives as a worker bee and carved out my niche of happiness, so have I reached the end of my working day as I have known it.  Nobody took me where I didn't want to go and the same goes for my post-war baby clan because on some level, we flow together and we are identified as a group.  We are the aging; we contributed ; we deserve respect for that because our work added to the greater good. We will never be young again and...I must say it, though it raises the shackles of my friends who design their very lives around raging against the tide of age, "I'm sorry, but young is NOT better than old; it is other than old".

When it comes to speed and efficiency in the workplace, we are not young and uncomplicated.  We bring the depth of experience into the bigger picture.  In most work environs, the older worker spells problems and without an understanding of the need for depth and value in the work environment, we become parodies of ourselves and a farce in the workplace.   We are living history and history has a vital and rewarding place in all aspects of society.  Not recognizing this fact is not only ageist (and a financial bonanza in the pharmaceutical and cosmetic field), but it is detrimental to the greater good of any organization or nation.  Elders are in jobs or needing work to make ends meet.  Some of the ends are not going to meet because, frankly, some people just don't "get" it. Sadly, some of the worst offenders are the old themselves who are so afraid of their own reflection that they can't stop staring at their wrinkles long enough to recognize the strength staring back at them.

Clearly these are hard times for everyone but if we do not allow ourselves to be overwhelmed and defeated over the loss of what was by busying ourselves with criticizing and commiserating over bits and pieces of our lost youth and arguing over our entitlements, we may just find the things that are possible and have enough strength left over to help develop positive changes.  I see this economic stop as a chance to build something not born of war or built on greed, self interest and suffering.  Anyway, this is my strategy for the time between now and my next mortgage payment.  ( I hear a Greek chorus in the chambers of my mind chanting, "Good luck with that.")

This flashback of Lucas' film "American Graffiti" as it is edited into this song inspired these thoughts in me. The combustible engine gave us a tremendous lift, didn't it?  Look where it took us all!  Some made piles of dough that they spent right away on novelties or adventures.  Some made a haul that they saved and lost in the stock market by trusting people who were greedy and disguised themselves as the status quo.  Some made the money and invested it in a better future for others.  Some made so much they did all three and then some! I think it is time to park it and take honest stock in what we think is our entitlement here.  It seems to me, if we did not enjoy the ride we were given when we were given it, we should check our complaining at the door. Whether we get paid for it or not, there is elder work to be done.

Thanks to AK47bandit for the "Get a Job" video

Happy Birthday, Millie

I found out about Millie through Ronni Bennett, of the blog Time Goes By. I've met a lot of cyber friends there. Older voices. Elder brainstorming, free associative thought, in-depth analysis of elder issues and storytelling that looks and feels more natural to me than the posturings that prevail in a multi-faceted younger perspective. We age; things look different. Things ARE different; things are fleshed out and clearer with age. Experience adds power and love in the world in a different way. As I age, I'm becoming more economic in my thinking and I find that I really prefer to "cut the crap and get to the point". I feel a companion in the awareness of how little time there is to get to the essence of things...

Blogging is a perfect elder past time and a possibly the most valuable tool for those of us willing to learn a few new technical tricks. Millie is one of the pioneer elderbloggers in the cyber sphere. She has been blogging since 2005. She was 80 years old when she started My Mom's Blog By Thoroughly Modern Millie and Millie turns 85 years old today. That's right she started talking on the intertubes at 8o years old! I think this speaks rather loudly for her intrepid spirit. I can only hope that I have a small amount the fortitude and pioneer spirit that this woman has exhibited should I make it to 80! You are an inspiration, Millie!

Dear Millie:

I understand that you like Sunflowers. I want to share with you a clip from one of my favorite movies, Everything is Illuminated. I'm not sure of the lyrics but I'm trusting what I found below on the internet about them.



to quote the commenter, kerbed "...the lyrics are lines from an Alexander Pushkin poem called To A.P. Kern. in English:

In the torture of hopeless melancholy,
In the bustle of the world's noisy hours,
That voice rang out so tenderly,
I dreamed of that lovely face of yours.
That voice rang out so tenderly,
I dreamed of that lovely face of yours.
Then to my soul an awakening came,
And there again your face appeared,
Like a vision, fleeting, momentary,
Like a spirit of the purest beauty.

Like a spirit of the purest beauty. "

Happy Birthday, Millie!
Many happy returns of all the love you give!

Back to School Sale

Something everyone can afford: the truth about attending school.



The more one listens to people telling the truth, the more one develops an ear for it.

Really Achieving Your Childhood Dreams

Being the youngest in my family I'm not afraid to be bring up the rear on anything noteworthy going on anywhere in this world or even in nether worlds. It is what I do. So it is not beyond my type of person to be passing on to you something you have probably already heard about ad infinitum since December 2007 when it was presented. Most things I assume everyone is already aware of. Then I thought, "Gee, did I already, over the course of the last 5 months, hear about this somewhere and passed it by?" Actually, I think I did. Which just shows-to-go-you if it is something worth finding, it will find you eventually...in spite of yourself...if you live long enough...

So I picked this video off WWR's Jim's Links (basically, his Google reader) and he got it from "Open Culture" by Dan Coleman (who may also be the youngest child - he posted April 20th) ...I would have no idea. I can't tell who he is. Perhaps if I spent an hour trying to figure out what 'track back' means but it sounds like something the FBI would use to send me to Guantanamo Bay or if I kept linking and linking forever. I wont post this if I do that. Thank you Dan, anyway...My point is it got to me, eventually, and now it is my turn to play it forward because it obviously carries an extremely important message. It seems especially vital to anyone in the educational field...anyone who works with youth or, frankly, anyone who had a youth of their own.

It has been jangling in my mind to ask the students what they want in terms of library services but it wasn't until I saw the entireity of this presentation did I understand what I was fishing for in terms inclusion. I had missed the part where I actually have to listen...Okay...also, after I listen...THEN what? Embedding in this video is a map to then what for anyone who is willing to open up to it...for anyone who might toy with the thought they could make a small improvement in a student's life. Within is a clue to a place to stand and help.

The fact the man is dying notwithstanding, his entire life up to this point is a great gift to everyone who listens to what he has to say about what has worked for him in merging the creative with the technical - the artist and the engineer - the right and left brain - the past with the future - the us and the them. After I watched this I came to understand something clearer regarding my role in the lives of the people around me and education, in general. Embrace the familiar of what is like us, the predictable, the family, the known; for it is there that rest resides; and go ahead to encourage the opposites of what is love; for it is there that the creative spark of life brings motion, action and growth into our lives and into the evolution of humanity. A great gift, understanding.

Thank you Randy Pausch. May your light of a life lived well shine on.