Discipline

More news about how overweight/obese we are (do you need to read it to know this is a problem?). Here's news, people: The only sure-fire way to lose weight is through an increase in calorie burning and/or a decrease in calorie consuming, ideally in fulfilling not destructive ways. Hmm, that's probably not news either. Okay, how about this: Some people will never have a weight problem no matter what they eat or do (get over it), and some people who think they have no health problem, in fact do. Your wellness is about more than just how much you weigh. I like the public health campaign that asks people to "know your numbers". Do you know your blood pressure, blood cholesterol, and BMI? And how would you hold up under a stress test?

I wonder, if you or I had this guy as our doctor, would we be healthier (weigh less and exercise more on average)? Certainly my health is much more about what I do than what my doctor does, but I appreciated Dr. Lerner's comment on the role of the doctor in a patient's struggles with health, however futile they might seem given what we know or believe now about willpower, genetics, lifestyle changes. "Somehow it still seems to me that part of a doctor’s job is to push patients to try harder." Amen.

I could say lots more about this. About individual vs. shared responsibilities. About the time and place for economies of scale. About the need for--and benefits of--people learning to establish and maintain meaningful, honest, constructive relationships with family, friends, coworkers, doctors and so on. About why people make obviously dumb (aka unhealthy, unhappy) choices, every stinkin day of our lives. About the key role of self awareness and self acceptance in all of this. But I won't. Not today, anyhow.

Here's a good quote (among many) from 19th century philosopher William James:

Believe that life is worth living and your belief will help create the fact.

Amen to that, too.

Community

Not that you asked but...
In real life I have friends, many people I stay in touch with, and I think I do a pretty good job of it. But in the virtual world of connections and links and "community" I am a total loser, capital L. I have accounts (or identities or whatever lingo label is applied to one's membership these days) on MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn (see link over on the right there, below my profile), Netflix, Amazon (look further down below my profile for another link), and many more. Did you even know that? Apparently between 4 and 9 people know these things. Actually, let me correct that, between 1 and 5 people and 4 authors and bands know I exist in online communities. I even have, nominally, another blog. But that qualifier word in there, that's the trouble--my presence in these places tends to be nominal.

Even with Netflix, from whom I have rented nearly a thousand movies since the service began, I have a strictly business interaction. Nope, no movie reviews or comments from me, and merely one friend. ME, who loves to write reviews! Who loves to share opinions and recommendations for fabulous movies! So I'm going to launch a campaign to attract virtual friendships. Okay, virtual versions of my real friendships. I wouldn't want to go and branch out, meet new people (shivers). ;-)

I'll start with this: Are you a Netflix subscriber? Will you be my (and David's) Netflix friend?

Resignation

The architect/evil genius is leaving the White House. I'm sort of sad. [Don't worry my liberal friends, keep reading.] There's so little these days to get excited about in domestic politics. Yes, there's lots to be frustrated or sad or potentially hopeful about, but not much blood boiling excitement. Even Rove has been off his game lately, which has made politics a lot less, hmm, fun is not the word, but less stimulating certainly. Karl Rove and other great political strategists both impress (through their skills) and nauseate me; like 'em or not, they do tend to create some excitement in politics, definite stimulus for better or worse. So it's a bit of a sad day. I said a bit.

Not that you asked but...
Does anyone else sense that there is an informed apathy about our times? Maybe it's information overload, but that makes it no less distressing. We are bombarded daily with images from Iraq. People saw Hotel Rwanda and still hear this "genocide" bandied about, maybe you read that little snippet in the print news last week about how the latest civil war events in Sudan have hurt both sides. Or what about that little military prison we maintain down in Guantanamo, Cuba, anyone remember that place? [Just an aside that intrigues me: We apparently can't let some of the people we've warehoused there go, as they would be in more danger at home than in prison. Not that this is a new concept with prisons and parolees, and there's always a risk of letting "bad guys" go if nothing else, but it seems a tad ironic in this case.]

All of these unhappy, deadly, life- and dignity-affecting events bring about a moment's distress, an hour or two, maybe even an hour each week, when we actually pay enough attention to hear about it in the first place. But what do we do? We put a "Save Darfur" link on our facebook page (a marginally do-good thing for an obviously big problem) then electronically poke our friends (a mindless fun thing). We tune in for a few minutes to Live Earth (a marginally do-good thing) then complain about how hot/cold/rainy it is or how bad the traffic is while driving alone in our car and how expensive the gas while driving an overly large car or a poorly maintained one. [Just an aside: check out gas prices in Europe, where they're paying 2-3 Euros per liter. Do the math, 3.875 liters to 1 gallon.]

Don't get me wrong, I am not claiming all innocence. I do a bit to help the world, but probably far more that hurts. Maybe I should turn my attention inward rather than outward. In truth I usually do. [I am racked with guilt as a result. ;)] But that was not my point. Right, what was my point? Ah, yes, that apathy seems on the rise but in a new form. People seem to feel they are informed on various sad issues, sympathetic to them as well, but just as un/involved as ever. Being informed and doing nothing makes such a person's apathy more distressing. What does it mean when you willingly acknowledge things as bad and then let them continue? Ah, yes, accesory to the crime. Or maybe that's human. We can only do so much, after all. (This is a bitter pill which I refuse to swallow, but I pay it lip service from time to time.)

This brings me back to good old Mr. Rove and his fellow truth filterers. I think they are the granddaddies of this informed apathy as I will call it, or at least should be the honorary captains. These people have learned to accept that there is good and bad in the world and that the voting public doesn't always know what's good for them or care what's good for others, things I regretfully accept as true. Plus, they know that people take action when and if they feel compelled to do so, and external motivators can be so much more powerful than internal ones. Rove, Luntz, et al know people will generally do what seems the best choice among what also happens to be the easiest or most popular choice. So their work becomes the retitling, rebranding, renaming of distasteful choices into favorable sounding options (and yes, it's almost all in the point of view. Check out Frank Luntz's book Words That Work, subtitled "It's not what you say, it's what people hear"). So those in control present us with their slate of desirable choices that hint at doing good for the world over the terrible undesirable choices of "other people" (bad people, naughty people, those who disagree with us). What we get in the end are a bunch of one-sided political decisions made on our behalf without imparting the feeling that we participated in anything distasteful. After all, I was an American for freedom and justice and individual rights, etc. Who can argue with that?

In theory this is not a bad thing. It only becomes a problem when you turn over real control to those people and they use their powers for evil. Worse still, evil in the name of good. Alas, we tend to realize this kind of thing occurring only after the fact (um, can anyone name a few good examples in history?). I'd prefer not to get to that point in my own personal experience, and I prefer not to live in denial either.

All of this has evolved into one of my standard messages: Inform yourselves and get involved, people. Work for good, after having thought about what good is. And never count on someone else to do good for you. Now go read Bowling Alone.

Wow, a farewell comment to Karl Rove in the White House turned into a meandering rant about social engagement. My initial comment was wrong. It seems there's always something to get me excited about in politics. Soapbox done.

Fertile

It's late and this was a random thought; if I have missed anyone's cute offspring, I apologize in advance....

Apparently it is the year of the baby. Among those I know, six have had babies born in the past few months. Welcome to Maggie, Owen, Mia, Sienna, Harrison, and Chaya. Correction, seven. Welcome Avi! They join their fellow 5-and-unders born to my friends and family: Kyle, Victoria, Tobias, Tony, Riley, Frances, Gavin, Justin, William, Terrence, Kaylia, Olivia, Kiera, Kiera (or is it Keira?), and the most adorable nephew ever, Mikey.

Travels

Last published June 29?!?! Sorry. In my defense, I only just got regular access (in other words, more than two minutes at a time) to an Internet connection and working computer yesterday. Considering the number of job applications I have put out today before getting around to the blog, I am not going to feel guilty.

My countdown clock says it's been 20 days since I left for Greece. I'm glad someone is counting, because I could not tell you the day or date today. I know time in relative terms these days. It's been a little over a month since I left Texas, a little less than a month since I went to DC. As I now have no other date to attach meaning to, I will have to begin calculating time in terms of return from Greece. It is now 4 A.G.

I had planned to post pictures from my recent travels (four states, one district, two foreign countries, and counting), but the cables for my picture reader machine are currently MIA. I think I know where they are but am currently too lazy (and housebound-undermotivated) to find them. You'll just have to wait a day or two. In the meantime, here are a few passing memories or lessons from my travels.

Turkey is not a scary country to travel to for Americans, particularly when you stick to the Turkish coast in the height of summer vacation season. I say this for the benefit of those of you out there who think Turkey is a strange and exotic world where foreigners are the enemy (not true--they want your money the fair way, through capitalism), bombings are rampant (not true, though there have been incidents, the government publicly punishes any and all found threats), and that women must wear headscarves (only a few do, and almost none in western Turkey). Turkey is an interesting place and worth exploring. It's a rather large country with rugged, mountainous inland terrain, and lots and lots of coastline, both accessible and non. For the record, Turkiye is a Muslim country, though the vast majority of the population are secular and not particularly observant (again, especially in western Turkey), though mosques are certainly prevalent. It is vying for EU membership though it is (mostly) in Asia. Its membership application is stymied partially by the fact that Turkey is the Mexico of (almost-) Europe; its citizens form a goodly proportion of the cheap labor in Europe, especially Germany, including illegal immigrants and guest workers who are no longer treated as guests. If Turkey gains entry to the EU (against France's express wishes), it would be the first Muslim country to do so.

The Greek islands are full. If you wish to go there during the idyllic height of quiet summer sunshine and romance, find a time machine and go back about, oh, 25 years to the time of that Daryl Hannah movie. If you want nightclubs, swarms of fashionable (and smoking) people, and megayachts, go now. Right now. Nah, I mean nothing bad in my comments. I absolutely love the bustle of the Greek islands in summer, there is nothing like it in my experience. Fabulous people watching, great food (on local diet, not tourist diet--blech), amazing deep blue water. Sleepy islands, desolate, dull, and unfashionably damp or dry the rest of the year, come to life with out of towners in late July. Populations increase by a factor of 10 in some places. All of Greece and fair portions of Germany and England have relocated out to the islands for a few weeks of sun and fun. There is an entire industry catering to the 6 weeks out of the year when this happens. In the past I have seen the busiest and most popular of the Greek islands (the ones close to Athens, the far out ones with near-mythic reputations, like Mykonos and Santorini, the historic ones near Turkey, such as St. Paul's Patmos and crusaders' Rhodes). This time we went to one new island--Tilos. It has that pre-tourist explosion feel to it, where there's a single bus that makes the rounds of the island, goat trails that lead to isolated beaches for camping out (and whatnot), and very little to do other than walk/scooter around or lie on the beach. It was quiet, unassuming, slightly developed, a bit dull. When we hiked to the top of the town (Megalo Horio), a woman in the church asked where we were from. "We don't get many Americans here." She wanted us to come in and see her art exhibit. "You don't have to buy anything."

Everywhere we went, people spoke English or had information posted in English, both in Greece and in Turkey. In Greece this was just a matter of business. The Greek alphabet had been translated into Roman letters for purposes of commerce, primarily, because as I said, the Greek islands are the place to be in the summer, whether you speak Greek or not. In Turkey the use of English was a default second language. Many tourists there were from Russia, and the Turks did not speak Russian, so English it is. In one small town, three children followed David and I up a road. "Hello, how are you?" one asked quite formally and offered his hand to each of us. After he received David's response to "What is your name?" the boy repeated for his friends (many times) "My name is David." The kids were quite pleased to accompany us up the mountain and were more amused by our attempts at Turkish. When in town, especially Marmaris and Bodrum, it became a bit of an amusement when people thought we were something other than American. Never did we encounter any animosity, either personally for our behavior or for our homeland. David pointed out to others on our boat that Turkey likes the USA and the USA supports Turkey, so maybe it had little to do with us personally. Still, I like to think it was because we were well behaved tourists.

I feared that I might have missed out on what was going on in the rest of the world while I was gone. While on my boat adventure I found out two things from the local newspapers: the results for the Turkish election and the marriage status of an over-the-top Turkish transsexual tabloid star. Asked about the latest haps in the US of A upon my return, Ben informed me that Lindsay Lohan's career is over. I guess this means I did not miss much.