My ex-boss was at my house the other day to tape his segment of the goodbye video I was making. He’s also leaving the company. He watched the video and said that it was bittersweet; clearly everyone believes the best days of that company are behind them. He said that I wouldn’t really understand, as someone who’s never questioned their path. Say what? “Well,” he said, “in my interactions with you, you seem like someone who just goes where the universe takes you.”
I couldn’t believe it. Really? I assumed he meant because I dropped everything and moved to the Bay Area for a job. Then he continued, “I mean, I know you’re disappointed about this job but I really think it brought you to San Francisco for something better.” It remains to be seen but I sure hope he’s right. He asked me how the job hunt was going and I told him about this company I was interviewing with. Oooh, he said, they would look great on my resume. It struck me that maybe he was right. I’ve never taken a job or even considered a job based on how it would look on my resume. I’ve done things that I think would be fun or because it was something I wanted to learn.
Before I left Seattle for LA, I was offered a job as to start up an account department by a friend and ex-coworker. I turned it down, saying that I was going to be an actress and move to LA. My friend said he didn’t care how long he had me but I should come. When I thought about it, he was the best salesperson I knew and I ended up taking the job so I could learn from him. I stayed for two years and then went to LA. Ten years later, I’m still trying to live that experience down, in a way, because people want to keep me in that box. My resume defies definition, which isn’t usually a good thing. One company I interviewed with, the last time I was unemployed, told my recruiter “I didn’t know what I did.” In reality, they didn’t know what they wanted and were hoping my resume would tell them.
I asked my friend and co-worker about my boss’ comment. She concurred that I do seem like someone who goes with the flow and doesn’t get stressed out about things. Isn’t that amazing? I certainly don’t feel like that. She said, “it’s not a bad thing, like you’re just a flake or lazy, you just seem very confident that you’ll land on your feet.” Now that’s a phrase I’ve heard a lot. But what kind of person needs to always be landing? I know many people who never seem to fall but I’m falling all the time so thank god “she lands on her feet,” eh? I guess I have always been terrified of life always being the same, and maybe that stability is something for me to always strive for while keeping things interesting in my own unique way.
Monday, March 31, 2008
Sunday, March 30, 2008
A post I started in December
I watched Local Hero the other night, a fantastic little Scottish comedy from 1983. It was kind of a cult-favorite of my parents and for some reason I don't remember having ever seen it. I think I refused to watch it as a teenager out of some kind of protest. If they liked a movie, the only way you could get them to stop trying to get you to see it, was to watch it (and love it). I held out for 24 years but turns out, it's a great film - simple and totally ahead of it's time. A rally cry for what makes us happy in this world; it isn't money, it isn't power, it isn't prestige. It's friends, love, nature and a sense of belonging in the world.
I've never been much of a consumer. My dad was the king of what we didn't need, he actually had his priorities straight in a lot of ways. He spent money on travel and experiences for us, but we never got the jeans we wanted, the toys we wanted and we were were the last ones on the block to get a microwave, VCR and a host of other things deemed necessary by our neighbors. That dialogue ran in my head to the extreme until the last couple of years when I've let myself buy things that make my life better. But I still question my need for everything. Even things I already own.
In 1998, I made a decision that I couldn't live my life making people buy stuff. That's when I moved to LA to be an actress. One of the pinnacles of success in that pursuit is getting a commercial agent. Imagine my surprise to realize even in this endeavor, I was hoping to make a living off of selling stuff. It's nearly impossible, working in the U.S. to NOT have a job that makes people buy stuff, because that's what we do. A friend of mine sent me a short film to watch, The Story of Stuff, that while it sounds like it's made for seventh graders (and maybe it is) makes a really good point: We made this culture and this economy and we can unmake it.
Then I heard an interview on the radio with Judith Levine, who published Not Buying It: My Year Without Shopping about the year that she and her husband decided not to be consumers. It reminds me of the day in Seattle, more than ten years ago, that my boyfriend and I decided to try not eating for a day. It was a spontaneous thing, we woke and up and said, let's fast! We lasted about three hours. We wandered around town and literally couldn't think of anything to do that didn't involve eating. So we went to our favorite vegetarian cafe and had our usual lunch but it tasted better that day than it ever had. See, even going without for a short period of time raises our enjoyment level when we do consume. Clearly our national hobby of consumption has not made us the happiest nation on earth.
I don't think we need to stop purchasing altogether but I do think we can should be much more conscious of what we think we "need" and recalibrate. Even "green" has become consumerized and we're being encouraged to offset our guilt by green things that we clearly don't need. It's like they've just replaced the heroin with morphine. The catch for me is that I love marketing. I think I'm good at sharing information and changing people's perceptions and behaviors and it's easier to make a living using that skill in advertising than anything else. One of these days, though, I would like to try my hand at marketing for something good.
I've never been much of a consumer. My dad was the king of what we didn't need, he actually had his priorities straight in a lot of ways. He spent money on travel and experiences for us, but we never got the jeans we wanted, the toys we wanted and we were were the last ones on the block to get a microwave, VCR and a host of other things deemed necessary by our neighbors. That dialogue ran in my head to the extreme until the last couple of years when I've let myself buy things that make my life better. But I still question my need for everything. Even things I already own.
In 1998, I made a decision that I couldn't live my life making people buy stuff. That's when I moved to LA to be an actress. One of the pinnacles of success in that pursuit is getting a commercial agent. Imagine my surprise to realize even in this endeavor, I was hoping to make a living off of selling stuff. It's nearly impossible, working in the U.S. to NOT have a job that makes people buy stuff, because that's what we do. A friend of mine sent me a short film to watch, The Story of Stuff, that while it sounds like it's made for seventh graders (and maybe it is) makes a really good point: We made this culture and this economy and we can unmake it.
Then I heard an interview on the radio with Judith Levine, who published Not Buying It: My Year Without Shopping about the year that she and her husband decided not to be consumers. It reminds me of the day in Seattle, more than ten years ago, that my boyfriend and I decided to try not eating for a day. It was a spontaneous thing, we woke and up and said, let's fast! We lasted about three hours. We wandered around town and literally couldn't think of anything to do that didn't involve eating. So we went to our favorite vegetarian cafe and had our usual lunch but it tasted better that day than it ever had. See, even going without for a short period of time raises our enjoyment level when we do consume. Clearly our national hobby of consumption has not made us the happiest nation on earth.
I don't think we need to stop purchasing altogether but I do think we can should be much more conscious of what we think we "need" and recalibrate. Even "green" has become consumerized and we're being encouraged to offset our guilt by green things that we clearly don't need. It's like they've just replaced the heroin with morphine. The catch for me is that I love marketing. I think I'm good at sharing information and changing people's perceptions and behaviors and it's easier to make a living using that skill in advertising than anything else. One of these days, though, I would like to try my hand at marketing for something good.
Wednesday, March 26, 2008
How to be on camera
I volunteered to make a goodbye video for one of the many departing executives at my soon-to-be-former company. I don't have that much to do these days and thought it would be fun. I videotaped about 20 people saying how much they'll miss him or what he meant to them. As someone who has been on camera quite a bit and also spent time on the other side, I noticed a number of basic "mistakes" that these people made on camera. Because we're in a digital age, more and more people will find themselves in front of a camera without any special training. Come to think of it, more people will also find themselves behind a camera without any special training. So I thought I'd make a quick list of helpful things to know:
1) Find your light. The best light for shooting is outside on an overcast day. The clouds naturally diffuse the light so there are no harsh shadows and no squinting. Avoid standing in overhead light as it casts very unflattering shadows, or being half in the sun, half out. Just be conscious of where the light is coming from, you can feel it on your face and adjust accordingly. On one really bright day, I had people stand in the shade and used a bounce board (in this case a white piece of poster board) to bounce light from the sun, back onto the subject.
2) Close your mouth and open your eyes. People tend to hold their breath until they're ready, because they're nervous, and then just before speaking take a huge breath. It looks really weird and it makes for an awkward cut. Almost everyone started speaking with their mouth wide open and their eyes closed. There's no hurry here. Take a deep breath. Release it. Close your mouth, make eye contact and then start speaking.
3) Wait for "action!" People think that just because the camera is pointed at them that the camera person is taping and ready. Not so. I need to adjust my framing, look at the lighting, and check a number of things before I'm ready. I know it's uncomfortable to have a camera pointed at you but just take your breaths and be patient. Wait to hear "when you're ready" and then take a beat before starting. I missed a number of lines because people were already talking by the time I hit "record" or I had to start a cut with their mouth wide open.
4) Don't run away. By the same token, please don't be in such a hurry to leave. Again, I know people don't like to be on camera but being uncomfortable only makes it worse, the camera sees everything. When you're done talking, close your mouth and make eye contact and just breath until the camera person cues you to leave. It makes for difficult cuts when people immediately turn their head and walk away or close their eyes, look down, etc. One person actually put their hand in front of their face at the end of the take!
5) Do two takes. Everyone is better the second time. Most professional actors don't hit it on the first take, why do you think you will? Again, people are uncomfortable and want to get it over with as soon as possible but the hitch is, the video lasts forever and your thirty seconds of gaping mouth, closed eyes, hurried gestures and half finished sentences are captured for everyone to see. It won't kill you to do it again and I guarantee it will be 100% better. My voiceover coach used to say "you never want to say the words for the first time in the booth." In other words, practice. Practice a few times before being on camera, and then do it on camera at least twice.
6) Speak up. Most amateur video is recorded with an in-camera mic. If the camera is pointed at you, so is the microphone but it always helps to speak a little louder than normal. Don't shout, just speak clearly and confidently. Also keep in mind that the mic is recording any other sounds coming from your direction - foot tapping, pen clicking, paper rustling or any other nervous tic. There will be this hideous noise running over your dialogue that can't be removed because it's on the same track as your audio. Stay calm.
7) Get unnaturally close. I like to fill the frame with my subject and have them slightly off to the side. But if there are more than one person in the frame, they need to stand close together, closer than you would normally. You can overlap your bodies so one person stands slightly in front of the other but you seriously have to huddle for three or more people. The camera puts a lot of space in between you so even though you're closer than normal, you'll look normal on camera. In fact, three people standing comfortably together don't even fit on camera and look like they're miles apart me. Trust me.
8) Ask how you were. You probably think it will sound vain to ask the camera person how you did but it will be so appreciated. When people are this uncomfortable in front of the camera, it's hard to ask them to do different things and try it again. Asking lets me know that you're willing to make adjustments. If I can direct people, they'll be ten times better but most people aren't willing to be directed. That stubbornness will come across on camera. Everyone can look good if they want to.
1) Find your light. The best light for shooting is outside on an overcast day. The clouds naturally diffuse the light so there are no harsh shadows and no squinting. Avoid standing in overhead light as it casts very unflattering shadows, or being half in the sun, half out. Just be conscious of where the light is coming from, you can feel it on your face and adjust accordingly. On one really bright day, I had people stand in the shade and used a bounce board (in this case a white piece of poster board) to bounce light from the sun, back onto the subject.
2) Close your mouth and open your eyes. People tend to hold their breath until they're ready, because they're nervous, and then just before speaking take a huge breath. It looks really weird and it makes for an awkward cut. Almost everyone started speaking with their mouth wide open and their eyes closed. There's no hurry here. Take a deep breath. Release it. Close your mouth, make eye contact and then start speaking.
3) Wait for "action!" People think that just because the camera is pointed at them that the camera person is taping and ready. Not so. I need to adjust my framing, look at the lighting, and check a number of things before I'm ready. I know it's uncomfortable to have a camera pointed at you but just take your breaths and be patient. Wait to hear "when you're ready" and then take a beat before starting. I missed a number of lines because people were already talking by the time I hit "record" or I had to start a cut with their mouth wide open.
4) Don't run away. By the same token, please don't be in such a hurry to leave. Again, I know people don't like to be on camera but being uncomfortable only makes it worse, the camera sees everything. When you're done talking, close your mouth and make eye contact and just breath until the camera person cues you to leave. It makes for difficult cuts when people immediately turn their head and walk away or close their eyes, look down, etc. One person actually put their hand in front of their face at the end of the take!
5) Do two takes. Everyone is better the second time. Most professional actors don't hit it on the first take, why do you think you will? Again, people are uncomfortable and want to get it over with as soon as possible but the hitch is, the video lasts forever and your thirty seconds of gaping mouth, closed eyes, hurried gestures and half finished sentences are captured for everyone to see. It won't kill you to do it again and I guarantee it will be 100% better. My voiceover coach used to say "you never want to say the words for the first time in the booth." In other words, practice. Practice a few times before being on camera, and then do it on camera at least twice.
6) Speak up. Most amateur video is recorded with an in-camera mic. If the camera is pointed at you, so is the microphone but it always helps to speak a little louder than normal. Don't shout, just speak clearly and confidently. Also keep in mind that the mic is recording any other sounds coming from your direction - foot tapping, pen clicking, paper rustling or any other nervous tic. There will be this hideous noise running over your dialogue that can't be removed because it's on the same track as your audio. Stay calm.
7) Get unnaturally close. I like to fill the frame with my subject and have them slightly off to the side. But if there are more than one person in the frame, they need to stand close together, closer than you would normally. You can overlap your bodies so one person stands slightly in front of the other but you seriously have to huddle for three or more people. The camera puts a lot of space in between you so even though you're closer than normal, you'll look normal on camera. In fact, three people standing comfortably together don't even fit on camera and look like they're miles apart me. Trust me.
8) Ask how you were. You probably think it will sound vain to ask the camera person how you did but it will be so appreciated. When people are this uncomfortable in front of the camera, it's hard to ask them to do different things and try it again. Asking lets me know that you're willing to make adjustments. If I can direct people, they'll be ten times better but most people aren't willing to be directed. That stubbornness will come across on camera. Everyone can look good if they want to.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
This should be a non-issue
I can guarantee that no one is going to die if they can't wear a white fur coat. I can also guarantee that banning the bludgeoning of baby seals (that are often skinned alive) isn't going to kill anyone either. But thousands of baby seals (see, they only have those lovely white coats for four weeks) are going to die a brutal death in a couple of weeks. Nigel Barker, famed fashion photographer and, apparently, judge on America's Top Model is championing this cause. See his pre-bludgeoning pictures and read all about it on his blog.
Please take the pledge to boycott Canadian seafood until they end the hunt by signing the Humane Society petition. Nigel asks you to tell your friends. Oh, Canada!
Please take the pledge to boycott Canadian seafood until they end the hunt by signing the Humane Society petition. Nigel asks you to tell your friends. Oh, Canada!
Wednesday, March 19, 2008
Addendums to earlier posts
This is possibly, fantastic news! I just read that the San Francisco Zoo, under pressure since the tiger attack in December, might become a rescue zoo. Apparently it means that the animals would likely get more space and bigger habitats more closely resembling their natural ones. I won't take credit for this development, ha ha ha, BUT I will say that I think blogging is a powerful tool. Public opinion matters and the easiest and most visible way to track public opinion these days is on the Internet. If hundreds of people blog that they're upset and hundreds of people (or dozens in my case) read that blog, it adds up. This is still one of my favorite videos (Nick Park is a genius).
I met a guy who works at Yelp this weekend. Actually, another 24-year old who wanted to "date" me. It's bizarre how young this town is. I guess it's the dot com thing, and actually, this is a cool place to be. Young people graduating from college want to live in San Francisco or New York. He said that the CEO and founder of Yelp is 28 and came to a meeting the other day in a "hoodie and sneaks." This guy, at 24, was flabbergasted that his millionaire boss is basically a slightly older version of himself. Imagine how I feel! Anyway, he told me that doctor recommendations are HUGE on Yelp and that some doctors have had to stop taking patients for six months or more because of the demand. It's very interesting, when recommendation works, it really works!
As it turns out, I wasn't the first person to think of a virtual concert (I know, amazing!) A friend of mine went to the 3D U2 show and said it was really cool. He heard a guy comment on the way out that it was better than a live concert for all the reasons that I specified. It was in a movie theater which is not conducive to the concert vibe though as people were self-conscious about singing along, shouting, etc. I maintain that this kind of thing should be shown at a dark, loud club just like a real concert, except better. Miley Cyrus' concert movie has already made ten times what it cost to make and parents don't have to let their teenagers drive into the city to see her in real life. A friend wrote me that now you can now see your opera in HD at the local movie theater. I love this idea that culture comes to you.
I got such a delightful number of comments on my post about starting a village. I seem to have struck a nerve! I had a little bit of anxiety after that because I thought "what if someone actually expects me to do this?" My biggest concern was how I was going to find a boyfriend. All of my friends who are up for it are already married or coupled, so it's great for them I guess, but what about me? I can't date three guys in our community of 150 at the same time (awkward!) And then it wouldn't work out with any of them and they'd all have to leave. You know? But that book about my North Node said that I have an enormous amount of love to give and that the receptacle, if it's a person, isn't big enough. I'm supposed to pour that love into a philanthropic venture, something that will make life better for other people. Once I focus on that, love will come to me and it will be easier for the other person to deal with me if I'm already in love with my "work." There's a lot of buzz right now about eco-villages: building with green materials, using renewable energy and aiming to be carbon neutral. I totally support that but my village would be communal in that "it takes a village to raise a child" way; everyone could have a role but wouldn't spend their whole life working a job they hate, and we'd all have land to grow our own food! I'm starting to wonder, however, if maybe we can make that change right where we are? There's a growing movement to plant food instead of grass in lawns (here's a fun article in the NYT Magazine about it). One step at a time, we can transform our world.
I thought this op-ed in the NYTimes today was interesting. The author criticizes the abduction of Generation 9/11 by Obama's campaign, calling them "Generation Obama." He goes on to say:
The more you learn about him, the more Obama seems to be a conventionally opportunistic politician, impressively smart and disciplined, who has put together a good political career and a terrific presidential campaign. But there’s not much audacity of hope there. There’s the calculation of ambition, and the construction of artifice, mixed in with a dash of deceit — all covered over with the great conceit that this campaign, and this candidate, are different.
After watching his speech today, addressing the comments of his pastor, I have to say that he is an amazingly composed and grounded orator. He speaks plainly so the masses can understand, everything he says makes sense and as I've said before, if all he does is inspire us it's more than most have done. The accusation of a politician being a politician is pretty weak. The Republicans haven't had someone this inspirational in office in years, if ever.
It's wise to be wary, perhaps especially of politicians, but instead of throwing the baby out with the bathwater we should instead remind ourselves that we have to bring our revolution to Washington as much as we expect our leaders to bring it to us. Right on, right on!
I met a guy who works at Yelp this weekend. Actually, another 24-year old who wanted to "date" me. It's bizarre how young this town is. I guess it's the dot com thing, and actually, this is a cool place to be. Young people graduating from college want to live in San Francisco or New York. He said that the CEO and founder of Yelp is 28 and came to a meeting the other day in a "hoodie and sneaks." This guy, at 24, was flabbergasted that his millionaire boss is basically a slightly older version of himself. Imagine how I feel! Anyway, he told me that doctor recommendations are HUGE on Yelp and that some doctors have had to stop taking patients for six months or more because of the demand. It's very interesting, when recommendation works, it really works!
As it turns out, I wasn't the first person to think of a virtual concert (I know, amazing!) A friend of mine went to the 3D U2 show and said it was really cool. He heard a guy comment on the way out that it was better than a live concert for all the reasons that I specified. It was in a movie theater which is not conducive to the concert vibe though as people were self-conscious about singing along, shouting, etc. I maintain that this kind of thing should be shown at a dark, loud club just like a real concert, except better. Miley Cyrus' concert movie has already made ten times what it cost to make and parents don't have to let their teenagers drive into the city to see her in real life. A friend wrote me that now you can now see your opera in HD at the local movie theater. I love this idea that culture comes to you.
I got such a delightful number of comments on my post about starting a village. I seem to have struck a nerve! I had a little bit of anxiety after that because I thought "what if someone actually expects me to do this?" My biggest concern was how I was going to find a boyfriend. All of my friends who are up for it are already married or coupled, so it's great for them I guess, but what about me? I can't date three guys in our community of 150 at the same time (awkward!) And then it wouldn't work out with any of them and they'd all have to leave. You know? But that book about my North Node said that I have an enormous amount of love to give and that the receptacle, if it's a person, isn't big enough. I'm supposed to pour that love into a philanthropic venture, something that will make life better for other people. Once I focus on that, love will come to me and it will be easier for the other person to deal with me if I'm already in love with my "work." There's a lot of buzz right now about eco-villages: building with green materials, using renewable energy and aiming to be carbon neutral. I totally support that but my village would be communal in that "it takes a village to raise a child" way; everyone could have a role but wouldn't spend their whole life working a job they hate, and we'd all have land to grow our own food! I'm starting to wonder, however, if maybe we can make that change right where we are? There's a growing movement to plant food instead of grass in lawns (here's a fun article in the NYT Magazine about it). One step at a time, we can transform our world.
I thought this op-ed in the NYTimes today was interesting. The author criticizes the abduction of Generation 9/11 by Obama's campaign, calling them "Generation Obama." He goes on to say:
The more you learn about him, the more Obama seems to be a conventionally opportunistic politician, impressively smart and disciplined, who has put together a good political career and a terrific presidential campaign. But there’s not much audacity of hope there. There’s the calculation of ambition, and the construction of artifice, mixed in with a dash of deceit — all covered over with the great conceit that this campaign, and this candidate, are different.
After watching his speech today, addressing the comments of his pastor, I have to say that he is an amazingly composed and grounded orator. He speaks plainly so the masses can understand, everything he says makes sense and as I've said before, if all he does is inspire us it's more than most have done. The accusation of a politician being a politician is pretty weak. The Republicans haven't had someone this inspirational in office in years, if ever.
It's wise to be wary, perhaps especially of politicians, but instead of throwing the baby out with the bathwater we should instead remind ourselves that we have to bring our revolution to Washington as much as we expect our leaders to bring it to us. Right on, right on!
Tuesday, March 18, 2008
Monday, March 17, 2008
Music to live for
Music continues to be one of the things that I am grateful for every day. I don't think I could live without music. I just applied for a job at Pandora, which has been my work radio since I moved here. Before that it was KCRW on iTunes but my last job was on PCs and we weren't allowed to have iTunes. What's up with that? Anyway, there are so many great ways now to listen and discover new music - Pandora, Lala, Buzznet, Last.FM - and buy it with a click on iTunes or Amazon. Lala actually has amazing prices on CDs.
I'm listening to some particularly amazing discs right now that I wanted to share with you.
1) I've only JUST discovered Cat Power with "Greatest" but she has a score of albums that I haven't heard. I'm really particular with female vocalists but I just love her stuff. Listen to one of my favorites from this album, "Love and Communication."
2) If you haven't heard The Gorillaz they are amazing! To get the full range of their music, you only have to listen to this song, below, and "Kids With Guns."
3) I've always liked Beck but the first album I actually bought is his latest, "The Information." I love everything on it and listened to all of his other albums. My next favorite album is "Sea Change." You can listen to three songs (including my favorite, "Cellphone's Dead") and read a great review on NPR. I'm telling you, new music is waiting to be discovered all over the Internet.
4) Thom Yorke is the lead singer of Radiohead. I like them but have never purchased their music. After hearing "Black Swan" on Pandora, I bought his solo album, "The Eraser," and am in love with it.
5) A friend introduced me to Beirut. He's a 19-year old from New Mexico who made an album inspired by gypsy music, it's amazing. This is the first song I heard but the rest of album, "Gulag Orkestar," is all different.
You can find out more about all of these artists on the websites I listed above. I encourage you to buy and try!
I'm listening to some particularly amazing discs right now that I wanted to share with you.
1) I've only JUST discovered Cat Power with "Greatest" but she has a score of albums that I haven't heard. I'm really particular with female vocalists but I just love her stuff. Listen to one of my favorites from this album, "Love and Communication."
2) If you haven't heard The Gorillaz they are amazing! To get the full range of their music, you only have to listen to this song, below, and "Kids With Guns."
3) I've always liked Beck but the first album I actually bought is his latest, "The Information." I love everything on it and listened to all of his other albums. My next favorite album is "Sea Change." You can listen to three songs (including my favorite, "Cellphone's Dead") and read a great review on NPR. I'm telling you, new music is waiting to be discovered all over the Internet.
4) Thom Yorke is the lead singer of Radiohead. I like them but have never purchased their music. After hearing "Black Swan" on Pandora, I bought his solo album, "The Eraser," and am in love with it.
5) A friend introduced me to Beirut. He's a 19-year old from New Mexico who made an album inspired by gypsy music, it's amazing. This is the first song I heard but the rest of album, "Gulag Orkestar," is all different.
You can find out more about all of these artists on the websites I listed above. I encourage you to buy and try!
Sunday, March 16, 2008
Dying to get here
I’m still reading Eat, Pray, Love and I think Indonesia is my favorite country in this book. Her experience with Ketut the medicine man is so fantastic. This little man with no teeth has been sitting on his porch for decades, helping people who need his help even though he wanted to be an artist, because that’s what God asked him to do. He’s never been anywhere and a cup of coffee with sugar is the biggest luxury he can afford. The author answers all of his questions about the world and the West and takes him on journeys far beyond his porch, which is why he loves having her around. She describes one experience where she photocopied his handwritten medical journals because they were falling apart and irreplaceable. One by one she takes them to town and brings them back brand new in plastic folders. This is how she wins over his surly protective wife who had for weeks been giving her the evil eye. The wife makes her a cup of coffee one day, just for her, and limps out of the house with her bad hip to deliver it. I read this part of the book and started to weep.
What went through my mind is how amazingly easy it is, in most of the world, to make a significant difference in a person’s life. A little bit of coffee, a few stories, a dose of technology, and you can rock someone’s world. It made me think of something I’ve been trying to articulate for a week now. My dad sent me this cheesy PowerPoint presentation about the demographics of the world, represented by an island of 100 people against the backdrop of PowerPoint’s stock photos. I’ve seen this kind of thing, almost exactly, so many times over the years and yet something was different this time. It might be me or it might be the fact that my dad sent it to me.
I know it sounds strange but you don’t understand how stoic my dad is, how totally rational he is, unsentimental and not generally affected by other people’s suffering. The fact that he would forward this to me is kind of astounding. He has changed a bit since he started dating a woman from Peru. She has thirteen brothers and sisters, grew up in abject poverty and was kept in a basement when she came to the U.S. as a nanny and eventually escaped her captors. At first, skeptical of my dad doing anything for someone else, I believed that she fed his hero fantasies. They go to Peru and he’s the tall (at 5’9”) white man who brings money and clothes, and makes it possible for their sister to go to school in the U.S. without working in a factory all night.
The presentation says, in a nutshell, that 6 out of the 100 people on this “island” would have 59% of the wealth and they would all be Americans; the majority of the rest would be poor, illiterate and/or malnourished. We, Americans, aren't threatened by war, can worship as we please, and most of us have homes, jobs and food, which makes us wealthier than more than 75% of the world population. What are we supposed to take away from these statistics? What can we do? What should we do? I think everyone deserves to have what we have, and no one would argue with that. Everyone wants what we have so it’s okay to want it and have it. The next thought is that we should appreciate it or enjoy it more but that is almost impossible. We can’t appreciate what we have without understanding, not just from statistics, what other people don’t have. Travel and time spent with those less privileged is the only way to really appreciate what we have, and it has to be done regularly.
I guess the fundamental question is what will make humankind happiest: The pursuit of improving our own lives incrementally or the pursuit of improving the lives of all of humanity? In other words, is it more valuable to improve life for those at the bottom, maybe in expense of our own improvement, or do we at the top keep forging the way to an even better life? I suppose without democracy, without a constitution and a government that basically works, there would be nothing for people in countries with corrupt governments to aspire to. They would think that corruption is all there is. In fact, the countries where people are most excited about democracy are in Africa. Places where the people have literally, nothing to lose, and everything to gain.
Then there are adventures like space travel. Years ago, I had a conversation with an old friend about NASA. He was complaining about how much we spend on the Space Shuttle and how much could be done with that money to help the poor. The number one cause of child mortality on this planet is malnutrition, something that can be cured with food. I defended space exploration as a necessary inspiration for humanity. Frankly, the money we spend on space exploration is a drop in the bucket compared to what we spend on war, but that’s another conversation. The point is, a decade later, I see that he was right. How is humanity lifted by us landing on the moon? Does that achievement really trickle down into some kind of improvement for everyone the way that drugs for HIV or the Internet have transformed our world? No. Then again we don’t know what’s going to improve our lives. Some things developed to help us end up hurting people, and vice versa. We should continue to innovate, that I believe.
What does this mean for me, as an individual, to know that I am more privileged that almost everyone else on earth? Guilt will get me nowhere. Donating everything I have to someone else might make me feel good for a short while but then how will I live? I’m tempted to travel, like the author of this book, and stay in villages with people like Ketut and just make their lives a little bit better by bringing the world to them. When I was traveling in India, I met a man who was Christian; they are a very small minority there, less than 5% of the population. He, with all seriousness, asked me to take one of his children back to the U.S. with me. There was nothing that could be done for him, he said, but maybe one of his children could have a better life. He was desperately unhappy, and was the only person I met there that I thought that about. He told me that Hindus, because they believe in the caste system, are generally happy because they make do with what they are given. They don’t entertain the idea of having more because that isn’t possible. You see lepers with missing body parts, begging for food on the street, who are overjoyed when you hand them a ripe piece of fruit every morning. It’s the desire for more, and the knowledge that more is possible that makes us unhappy.
That encapsulates the American malaise right there. We aren’t spoiled and selfish because we’re rich. Most of us don’t perceive ourselves as being rich. Most of us know we could do better and have more and that makes us feel like failures. Our advertising has capitalized on that reaction for years, make us feel like failures and then convince us that buying whatever product is being sold will make us happy. (But that’s another conversation too!) It reminds me of the Netflix contest. Netflix is offering a million dollars to any person or team who can improve their recommendation system by 10%. The challenge has proved to be very difficult. Almost immediately, a few teams were able to improve it by 7% and eventually by 8% by building off of each other’s work, but the 10% remains elusive and may even be impossible.
See, we’re already at the top and we’re already living life at such a high capacity that improving it by 10% is almost impossible. We suffer and struggle and fight against that remaining 2% and the failure to attain it makes us miserable. We take drugs and see doctors and write self-help books and watch sad movies about people who make each other unhappy. Meanwhile, there are children in Africa afflicted with a disease that eats their face, right down to the bone, and there are millions of people all over the world living in refugee camps on borders of countries for decades, unable to leave. There are these struggles in our own country, however, and these are the struggles that we can do something about.
Another story in the book is about a musician that the author met. He worked on a cruise ship, cleaning 12 hours a day with one day off a month, living in the bowels of the ship, to save money and get to America. When he finally got to New York, he thought it was the place on earth where the most love was. He got a job and played music and eventually met and fell in love with an American woman. They got married and everything was going swimmingly. He had improved his life 500% almost overnight, just by coming to the U.S. After 9/11, however, he was arrested, detained and then deported, back to Indonesia, never to return. His marriage is likely over as are his hopes for a musical career.
It’s one thing to accept the bounty of our country gracefully, and do what we can to improve it that 2%, but it’s another to deprive others of having it at all. Our President would have us believe that what we have is possible for everyone, if only they had a democratic government. Maybe that’s true but to deny people access to what already exists and ask them to build it on their own is like telling kids in the inner cities that they can’t go to a better school but that they have to build their own better school in their neighborhood with no knowledge, tools or resources. The answer may not be to invite them all to attend the better schools, clearly they would be overwhelmed and no longer better schools, which is the argument against opening up our borders to everyone. People are already literally dying to get here.
But what if we, the privileged, gave our time, our knowledge, and our money, to help those kids, those schools, and those countries? We can make a huge and immediate impact. There was an article about an engineer who went to South America and was amazed at how little infrastructure they had and with his bachelor’s degree and fifteen years work experience, something most of us take for granted in this country, was able to transform a village and educate the villagers, vastly improving everyone’s lives there. He founded an engineering corps and brought more engineers from colleges in the U.S. to help other villages and gave these young people a reward they may never again experience in their lives.
This is the challenge I offer myself and everyone else in the top 75%: What can you do to radically transform someone else’s life? Now do it.
What went through my mind is how amazingly easy it is, in most of the world, to make a significant difference in a person’s life. A little bit of coffee, a few stories, a dose of technology, and you can rock someone’s world. It made me think of something I’ve been trying to articulate for a week now. My dad sent me this cheesy PowerPoint presentation about the demographics of the world, represented by an island of 100 people against the backdrop of PowerPoint’s stock photos. I’ve seen this kind of thing, almost exactly, so many times over the years and yet something was different this time. It might be me or it might be the fact that my dad sent it to me.
I know it sounds strange but you don’t understand how stoic my dad is, how totally rational he is, unsentimental and not generally affected by other people’s suffering. The fact that he would forward this to me is kind of astounding. He has changed a bit since he started dating a woman from Peru. She has thirteen brothers and sisters, grew up in abject poverty and was kept in a basement when she came to the U.S. as a nanny and eventually escaped her captors. At first, skeptical of my dad doing anything for someone else, I believed that she fed his hero fantasies. They go to Peru and he’s the tall (at 5’9”) white man who brings money and clothes, and makes it possible for their sister to go to school in the U.S. without working in a factory all night.
The presentation says, in a nutshell, that 6 out of the 100 people on this “island” would have 59% of the wealth and they would all be Americans; the majority of the rest would be poor, illiterate and/or malnourished. We, Americans, aren't threatened by war, can worship as we please, and most of us have homes, jobs and food, which makes us wealthier than more than 75% of the world population. What are we supposed to take away from these statistics? What can we do? What should we do? I think everyone deserves to have what we have, and no one would argue with that. Everyone wants what we have so it’s okay to want it and have it. The next thought is that we should appreciate it or enjoy it more but that is almost impossible. We can’t appreciate what we have without understanding, not just from statistics, what other people don’t have. Travel and time spent with those less privileged is the only way to really appreciate what we have, and it has to be done regularly.
I guess the fundamental question is what will make humankind happiest: The pursuit of improving our own lives incrementally or the pursuit of improving the lives of all of humanity? In other words, is it more valuable to improve life for those at the bottom, maybe in expense of our own improvement, or do we at the top keep forging the way to an even better life? I suppose without democracy, without a constitution and a government that basically works, there would be nothing for people in countries with corrupt governments to aspire to. They would think that corruption is all there is. In fact, the countries where people are most excited about democracy are in Africa. Places where the people have literally, nothing to lose, and everything to gain.
Then there are adventures like space travel. Years ago, I had a conversation with an old friend about NASA. He was complaining about how much we spend on the Space Shuttle and how much could be done with that money to help the poor. The number one cause of child mortality on this planet is malnutrition, something that can be cured with food. I defended space exploration as a necessary inspiration for humanity. Frankly, the money we spend on space exploration is a drop in the bucket compared to what we spend on war, but that’s another conversation. The point is, a decade later, I see that he was right. How is humanity lifted by us landing on the moon? Does that achievement really trickle down into some kind of improvement for everyone the way that drugs for HIV or the Internet have transformed our world? No. Then again we don’t know what’s going to improve our lives. Some things developed to help us end up hurting people, and vice versa. We should continue to innovate, that I believe.
What does this mean for me, as an individual, to know that I am more privileged that almost everyone else on earth? Guilt will get me nowhere. Donating everything I have to someone else might make me feel good for a short while but then how will I live? I’m tempted to travel, like the author of this book, and stay in villages with people like Ketut and just make their lives a little bit better by bringing the world to them. When I was traveling in India, I met a man who was Christian; they are a very small minority there, less than 5% of the population. He, with all seriousness, asked me to take one of his children back to the U.S. with me. There was nothing that could be done for him, he said, but maybe one of his children could have a better life. He was desperately unhappy, and was the only person I met there that I thought that about. He told me that Hindus, because they believe in the caste system, are generally happy because they make do with what they are given. They don’t entertain the idea of having more because that isn’t possible. You see lepers with missing body parts, begging for food on the street, who are overjoyed when you hand them a ripe piece of fruit every morning. It’s the desire for more, and the knowledge that more is possible that makes us unhappy.
That encapsulates the American malaise right there. We aren’t spoiled and selfish because we’re rich. Most of us don’t perceive ourselves as being rich. Most of us know we could do better and have more and that makes us feel like failures. Our advertising has capitalized on that reaction for years, make us feel like failures and then convince us that buying whatever product is being sold will make us happy. (But that’s another conversation too!) It reminds me of the Netflix contest. Netflix is offering a million dollars to any person or team who can improve their recommendation system by 10%. The challenge has proved to be very difficult. Almost immediately, a few teams were able to improve it by 7% and eventually by 8% by building off of each other’s work, but the 10% remains elusive and may even be impossible.
See, we’re already at the top and we’re already living life at such a high capacity that improving it by 10% is almost impossible. We suffer and struggle and fight against that remaining 2% and the failure to attain it makes us miserable. We take drugs and see doctors and write self-help books and watch sad movies about people who make each other unhappy. Meanwhile, there are children in Africa afflicted with a disease that eats their face, right down to the bone, and there are millions of people all over the world living in refugee camps on borders of countries for decades, unable to leave. There are these struggles in our own country, however, and these are the struggles that we can do something about.
Another story in the book is about a musician that the author met. He worked on a cruise ship, cleaning 12 hours a day with one day off a month, living in the bowels of the ship, to save money and get to America. When he finally got to New York, he thought it was the place on earth where the most love was. He got a job and played music and eventually met and fell in love with an American woman. They got married and everything was going swimmingly. He had improved his life 500% almost overnight, just by coming to the U.S. After 9/11, however, he was arrested, detained and then deported, back to Indonesia, never to return. His marriage is likely over as are his hopes for a musical career.
It’s one thing to accept the bounty of our country gracefully, and do what we can to improve it that 2%, but it’s another to deprive others of having it at all. Our President would have us believe that what we have is possible for everyone, if only they had a democratic government. Maybe that’s true but to deny people access to what already exists and ask them to build it on their own is like telling kids in the inner cities that they can’t go to a better school but that they have to build their own better school in their neighborhood with no knowledge, tools or resources. The answer may not be to invite them all to attend the better schools, clearly they would be overwhelmed and no longer better schools, which is the argument against opening up our borders to everyone. People are already literally dying to get here.
But what if we, the privileged, gave our time, our knowledge, and our money, to help those kids, those schools, and those countries? We can make a huge and immediate impact. There was an article about an engineer who went to South America and was amazed at how little infrastructure they had and with his bachelor’s degree and fifteen years work experience, something most of us take for granted in this country, was able to transform a village and educate the villagers, vastly improving everyone’s lives there. He founded an engineering corps and brought more engineers from colleges in the U.S. to help other villages and gave these young people a reward they may never again experience in their lives.
This is the challenge I offer myself and everyone else in the top 75%: What can you do to radically transform someone else’s life? Now do it.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Look over there, it's a sex scandal!
I've been reading a book, recommended by a friend, called "Astrology for the Soul." I'm not a devout believer of astrology but I find pretty much any "what's it all about, what am I all about" questioning to be helpful and enjoyable. This book is about the North Node, which dictates what this life is all about for us, based on our past life! As the story goes, in my past life, I was a queen or some kind of royalty and I came into this life bossing people around, wanting to get my way, including my parents. Which is pretty much true. While it's natural for me to pursue the spotlight, it says, I will not be happy there and should instead devote myself to a humanitarian cause. Have I not been fumbling towards that same conclusion for months now? The description of my love life is shockingly true and too embarrassing to disclose here.
But I think the most interesting point is that it says Aquarius North Node people are here to bring in the New Age. We pick up messages from the future, as we have a way of seeing what is coming, and communicate those messages back to everyone else. If I follow a selfless path, I will have angels and support beyond my wildest dreams. I once went to a party with a good friend and a deaf comedienne with a knack for seeing auras and such, told me that she saw me coming up the drive surrounded by beautiful spirits. I can't help but think that this might be the point of my blog, to show people the future and rally for change.
So in the face of a brand new sex scandal - thank goodness, the Bush administration was a little dry in that area - I want to point out three stories from the paper that we should actually be concerned about. (By the way, I predict this girl will get a TV show from all the publicity.)
1) We're about to hit a major traffic jam in the Internet. Of course there are people who say that isn't likely, that we're improving the technology at the same rate that we're increasing demand for it, but it's not just about technology. Access requires physical and finite things like server space, power and a robust network to connect. Every day more people start using the Internet regularly and watch their first video or upload their first photo. Entire countries of people are still not on the Internet and young people are expecting in the near future to have access to all of their friends online, on video, all the time. We can bemoan the possibility of "missed opportunities" that are predicted but far more serious consequences await us as this network has become something our entire world depends on.
2) Small farmers in the United States are about to disappear forever. This is a critical issue. Mass-produced food is laden with chemicals, poisoning the animals, the earth, and us. It's devoid of nutrition, is tasteless and nearly half of it is not eaten but used as fuel so we can keep driving cars. The small farmer can't compete with the commercial farms and are selling out to developers. We're building houses and roads and gobbling all the islands of open space that dot the country. Birds that migrate thousands of miles need to stop somewhere to rest. If the islands disappear, they won't be able to rest and they'll die. Other animals will lose their habitats, migratory paths and will die or be killed trying to live in a human world. You must watch this great video about two endangered Whooping Cranes that landed on a farm in Tennessee. We apparently spent $11 million to hatch a group of them and teach them fly (most of them died but these two survived) but we can't stop developers from using up all the open space? I don't understand the logic of this!
3) 1 in every 100 adult Americans is in prison. This is the highest incarceration rate of any country at any time in history. The numbers are frightening for certain ethnicities, 1 in 35 black men is in prison. In the 1990's we passed mandatory sentencing and increased penalties for drug offenses. We had more money then and prisons were a booming business. Now they're overcrowded, crime has not gone down in response and the "drug war" is a joke. Housewives in the Midwest are getting hooked on meth cooked up in a house down the street using legal ingredients. Non-violent drunk driving offenders are mixed in the with murderers and rapists and very few people are receiving any kind of treatment. At the same time, our president is defending our right to torture to keep our country safe.
There are positive changes happening the in the world too, but even these are overshadowed by the sex scandal of a guy who stood on a soapbox for morality. Why hasn't everyone figured out yet that the people who preach morality are almost always the ones committing the offenses they so vehemently reproach?
But I think the most interesting point is that it says Aquarius North Node people are here to bring in the New Age. We pick up messages from the future, as we have a way of seeing what is coming, and communicate those messages back to everyone else. If I follow a selfless path, I will have angels and support beyond my wildest dreams. I once went to a party with a good friend and a deaf comedienne with a knack for seeing auras and such, told me that she saw me coming up the drive surrounded by beautiful spirits. I can't help but think that this might be the point of my blog, to show people the future and rally for change.
So in the face of a brand new sex scandal - thank goodness, the Bush administration was a little dry in that area - I want to point out three stories from the paper that we should actually be concerned about. (By the way, I predict this girl will get a TV show from all the publicity.)
1) We're about to hit a major traffic jam in the Internet. Of course there are people who say that isn't likely, that we're improving the technology at the same rate that we're increasing demand for it, but it's not just about technology. Access requires physical and finite things like server space, power and a robust network to connect. Every day more people start using the Internet regularly and watch their first video or upload their first photo. Entire countries of people are still not on the Internet and young people are expecting in the near future to have access to all of their friends online, on video, all the time. We can bemoan the possibility of "missed opportunities" that are predicted but far more serious consequences await us as this network has become something our entire world depends on.
2) Small farmers in the United States are about to disappear forever. This is a critical issue. Mass-produced food is laden with chemicals, poisoning the animals, the earth, and us. It's devoid of nutrition, is tasteless and nearly half of it is not eaten but used as fuel so we can keep driving cars. The small farmer can't compete with the commercial farms and are selling out to developers. We're building houses and roads and gobbling all the islands of open space that dot the country. Birds that migrate thousands of miles need to stop somewhere to rest. If the islands disappear, they won't be able to rest and they'll die. Other animals will lose their habitats, migratory paths and will die or be killed trying to live in a human world. You must watch this great video about two endangered Whooping Cranes that landed on a farm in Tennessee. We apparently spent $11 million to hatch a group of them and teach them fly (most of them died but these two survived) but we can't stop developers from using up all the open space? I don't understand the logic of this!
3) 1 in every 100 adult Americans is in prison. This is the highest incarceration rate of any country at any time in history. The numbers are frightening for certain ethnicities, 1 in 35 black men is in prison. In the 1990's we passed mandatory sentencing and increased penalties for drug offenses. We had more money then and prisons were a booming business. Now they're overcrowded, crime has not gone down in response and the "drug war" is a joke. Housewives in the Midwest are getting hooked on meth cooked up in a house down the street using legal ingredients. Non-violent drunk driving offenders are mixed in the with murderers and rapists and very few people are receiving any kind of treatment. At the same time, our president is defending our right to torture to keep our country safe.
There are positive changes happening the in the world too, but even these are overshadowed by the sex scandal of a guy who stood on a soapbox for morality. Why hasn't everyone figured out yet that the people who preach morality are almost always the ones committing the offenses they so vehemently reproach?
Friday, March 7, 2008
Lessons from the week
I haven't blogged in over a week, putting in my first March post at the end of its first week, and I'm not going to flog myself over it. I'm not Catholic so why do I live with so much guilt? I just keep wondering when I got to be so flaky. I used to have lists and goals and always knew what I wanted and where I was going. Then somewhere along the way I looked up and I was lost. I looked back down at what I thought was my map but it there was nothing on it except a couple of things from a "to do" list crossed off. Get a degree, travel in another country, move to another city, become an actress, make a film, find true love. Huh, now what? LESSON: There's never been a map. Get used to it.
There's a stone around my neck about this documentary that I volunteered to make for a non-profit in June. I then promptly moved and proceeded to put it off for about six months. Now it's due and I'm utterly uninspired by the footage they've sent me and pushing much to hard to figure out how to tie it all together. I keep thinking brilliant inspiration is right around the corner. In the middle of trying to make that movie, I made a little movie for the Bicycle Film Festival. Shot it, edited it, recorded voice over, even got a friend to make a soundtrack, burned a DVD and submitted it - in about two days. Today, I got a call from the woman at the non-profit. Crystal Light hired a production company (real filmmakers!) to make their own movie and she wants me to hold off for a while until we see what they're doing, and thanked for my flexibility! All this time I've been feeling guilty and she's thanking me. LESSON: Guilt is a waste of time. So is waiting for inspiration.
I read this great article about the advertising world and how mean the industry is. I was so thrilled that someone was finally saying it's not cool anymore. After a work experience at a small ad agency that left a very bad taste in my mouth, it's refreshing to hear an industry insider chastise these guys for "ad campaigns based on a hardening spirit, a lack of tolerance and an egocentric meanness that characterizes so much of today's advertising." It's not like I'm one of those goody two-shoes who only wants nice things in the world (or maybe I am!) but advertising is particularly rude, sexist, insulting and seems to delight itself in humiliating others. As someone who has auditioned for commercials, worked with the people writing them, and worked for the "client", I've seen it inside and out. Ad guys (and they are almost all men) conduct a brainstorm meeting like a pow-wow in the locker room after a game. The things I used to hear these guys say in would make their wives divorce them. The writer ends the article by saying that "it behooves marketing professionals to understand the difference between subtle irony and idiot snideness and aim for an advertising denominator cognizant of the maxim that expansive, confident consumers part with their cash far more readily than do angry, fearful ones." Shortly thereafter, I saw the film "Be Kind, Rewind," and realized walking out of it that it was actually, and truly, a film about kindness. No one was made fun of or belittled, no one acts like an ass for our amusement, no one is called ugly or fat and yet no one is held up as the ideal for us to worship. It's a movie about regular people coming together to make something beautiful. LESSON: Kindness is cool!
After all my blah-blah'ing about not caring that only 12 people read my blog, I have to say that I still wish my blog would show up in Blogger's "blogs of Note." There are some pretty cool ones in there and they prove my theory that popular blogs have shorter postings, more frequent postings, a single theme (a garden, photos of Paris) and lots of pictures! People like pictures. So I'm going to try that. Instead of not posting because I'm composing some big essay on things I know nothing about, I'll just post a photo and some tidbit. LESSON: Keep it simple.
There's a stone around my neck about this documentary that I volunteered to make for a non-profit in June. I then promptly moved and proceeded to put it off for about six months. Now it's due and I'm utterly uninspired by the footage they've sent me and pushing much to hard to figure out how to tie it all together. I keep thinking brilliant inspiration is right around the corner. In the middle of trying to make that movie, I made a little movie for the Bicycle Film Festival. Shot it, edited it, recorded voice over, even got a friend to make a soundtrack, burned a DVD and submitted it - in about two days. Today, I got a call from the woman at the non-profit. Crystal Light hired a production company (real filmmakers!) to make their own movie and she wants me to hold off for a while until we see what they're doing, and thanked for my flexibility! All this time I've been feeling guilty and she's thanking me. LESSON: Guilt is a waste of time. So is waiting for inspiration.
I read this great article about the advertising world and how mean the industry is. I was so thrilled that someone was finally saying it's not cool anymore. After a work experience at a small ad agency that left a very bad taste in my mouth, it's refreshing to hear an industry insider chastise these guys for "ad campaigns based on a hardening spirit, a lack of tolerance and an egocentric meanness that characterizes so much of today's advertising." It's not like I'm one of those goody two-shoes who only wants nice things in the world (or maybe I am!) but advertising is particularly rude, sexist, insulting and seems to delight itself in humiliating others. As someone who has auditioned for commercials, worked with the people writing them, and worked for the "client", I've seen it inside and out. Ad guys (and they are almost all men) conduct a brainstorm meeting like a pow-wow in the locker room after a game. The things I used to hear these guys say in would make their wives divorce them. The writer ends the article by saying that "it behooves marketing professionals to understand the difference between subtle irony and idiot snideness and aim for an advertising denominator cognizant of the maxim that expansive, confident consumers part with their cash far more readily than do angry, fearful ones." Shortly thereafter, I saw the film "Be Kind, Rewind," and realized walking out of it that it was actually, and truly, a film about kindness. No one was made fun of or belittled, no one acts like an ass for our amusement, no one is called ugly or fat and yet no one is held up as the ideal for us to worship. It's a movie about regular people coming together to make something beautiful. LESSON: Kindness is cool!
After all my blah-blah'ing about not caring that only 12 people read my blog, I have to say that I still wish my blog would show up in Blogger's "blogs of Note." There are some pretty cool ones in there and they prove my theory that popular blogs have shorter postings, more frequent postings, a single theme (a garden, photos of Paris) and lots of pictures! People like pictures. So I'm going to try that. Instead of not posting because I'm composing some big essay on things I know nothing about, I'll just post a photo and some tidbit. LESSON: Keep it simple.
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