Temper, temper
This is an observation I just have to share (
right now).So I can be wicked exuberant. Sometimes I get an idea and I want to talk about it/act on it, and it feels essential and urgent. I'll get home after work and want to talk talk talk to OM, before I've even peed, or taken off my coat. While OM loves my exuberance (or claims to), there are times when even he deems it excessive. While blogging, I'm usually loath to invoke SATC, but it's totally like this: remember when Carrie and Aidan move in together before their joint apartment is refurbished, and she walks in the door every night and Aidan peppers her with questions: "Hey gal. What’s up? Where you been and what do you know?" And he's totally overwhelming and all she wants is a few minutes of peace, to regroup? Well, I can be Aidan, even when
I'm the one showing up after a long day.
In fact, I can be Aidan anytime. I will be traveling soon for work, and my destinations are on a spreadsheet that I can't always access on our office shared drive. The other day I suddenly needed to googlemap the different stops on my trip, I wanted to book my flight and hotel and get it all sorted out
right now, like absolutely
immediately. My co-worker had the spreadsheet open and I couldn't access it even after she closed it, which led to my over-enthusiastic suggestion that she email the info to me. I was excited and well-meaning, but I could tell that my behavior was irritating. My co-worker dryly encouraged me to hold off for a while, and I dropped the topic.
Luckily, I am somewhat self-aware, and I try to gauge my "audience" before launching into a tirade, a rave, or a sudden flurry of activity. But tempering enthusiasm and urgency is by definition difficult. And I realize it may come across as tempering tempering tempering - with the sole objective of enduring the five minutes before I can tell you the rest of this story or ask you again about that spreadsheet.
Posted by Dori at 2:16 PM
Things that are a Thing
I would be hard-pressed to say that OM has his finger on the pulse of pop culture, but he constantly surprises me. I thought I was all impressive and hip when I invoked
Hilary’s use of the term “
funemployment,” but he’d already heard of it. “It’s a Thing.” He told me. And when I bemoaned my non-toned triceps, he asked if I was lusting after Michelle Obama’s. Apparently,
Michelle Obama’s arms are a Thing too, as is
Shopping Your Closet.
I don’t know how one gets ahead of the curve when it comes to Things. There is, of course, the list of Things (actually Stuff)
White People Like and Things
Jewish Young Adults like. While entertaining, neither list is demographically inclusive, nor rife with neologisms or new trends. OM reads
AV Club, which sounds like a dubious source of things Thing-related, but it may in fact be quite useful.
That's all. I don't have any Thing else to add.
Posted by Dori at 1:25 PM
What You Hear Me Saying
So I'm taking a 30-hour, intensive mediation class. Said class is taught at the Very Prestigious School at which I work. Given that VPS' culture is the antithesis of touchy-feely, I expected it to be a cut-and-dry, almost technical experience. Prior to launching my VPS career, I worked for many years in the nonprofit sector, and before that attended a liberal arts college. Thus, I am intimately familiar with Interactive Training Techniques, Experiential Learning, and the notion that trainers should capitalize on the Wisdom of the Students. Readers, I am tired of this. I crave a training where I show up, the trainers impart the content, I practice the skills, get feedback, and then everyone goes home.
As soon as I saw the flip charts and markers, as soon as I saw the "Parking Lot" (large sheet of paper on which to write "burning questions" that can't be addressed In The Moment), I experienced a sinking feeling of familiar dismay. When we were Split Into Groups, and asked to Collaboratively Generate Our Definition of Consensus, I knew I was in for it.
I studied education in college and so I understand that grappling with content (as opposed to being spoon-fed) is an effective teaching strategy. But I take issue with
needless grappling. A definition of consensus exists. The instructors know it. So what's the value of spending almost an hour working in groups to come up with "our" definition? The trainees, who were mostly VPS grad students, rose to this task and proceded to split hairs and debate whether the word "general" should or should not remain in the definition that one (goody-two shoes, ubernerdy) guy later posted on Wikipedia: "a general agreement among the members of a given group or community, each of which exercises some discretion in decision making and follow-up action."
Because we just couldn't get by without a dash of kinesthetic learning, at one point a facilitator stood on a chair and said "I am Conflict. Please position yourself physically in a way that corresponds to your relationship with me" (i.e.: hide under the table, leave the room, etc.). Then we spent 15 minutes moving and then debriefing.
Then we brainstormed words we associate with conflict. When almost all the words were negative, the instructor prodded and asked fishing, leading questions in order to elicit words that reflect the rewards of conflict and its resolution: "opportunity," "growth" and "satisfaction." Wouldn't it be better and quicker (and more genuine) to say: "Most of us perceive conflict as a negative thing, but it actually can provide opportunities to strengthen relationships. Let's talk about some of those situations." Despite their statements to the contrary, the instructors clearly have a Right Answer in mind. Why not just share the wisdom and move on?
The other maddening aspect of the this training? The instructors' constant need to make us feel "heard"... by rephrasing each students' contributions and then circling back to the student to affirm that they've "captured" his or her meaning: "I think I heard you say that you think the definition of 'self-determination' resonates with you because of its close connection with initiative and independent thought." The student is often so confused by the restatement that (s)he forgets what her original intent actually was, and then says something else that is then restated.
I was so excited to take the class and have gotten great value from it; I am not quite halfway through. But what I hear myself saying (and correct me if I'm wrong) is that I'm frustrated with the ultra inclusive and responsive teaching methodology and would love it if we just got to the point.
Posted by Dori at 2:47 PM
Two Parties and Some Smurf
So I attended two parties recently.
The first, hosted by a scientist friend of OM's, who is heavily involved in "early music" (recorder, viola de gamba, etc), resembled a cartoon. In the living room, the early music guests embodied every stereotype: they all had frizzy hair and sported renaissance-inspired clothing. One guy, who introduced himself as "Joe, Harpsichord," wore a purple studded belt around his waist; his protruding belly had bust open a button on his top, exposing a contrasting undershirt. The musicians traded jokes punctuated by guffaws of laughter: "What do the Beatles and the London Symphony Orchestra have in common?" Snicker-filled pause. "Neither have played together in years!"
After a bit, OM and I ditched the early musicians in favor of the scientists, who had congregated in the kitchen to make excruciating small talk.
The host, a lovely and social guy, pattered around happily, distributing fancy homemade cake.
The second party was a much more festive event hosted by E., who knows an astonishing number of very outgoing people. This event was loud and crowded. There was space for dancing to contemporary dance music. (OM and I do not dance, so this was lost on us.) People socialized and mingled. I hung out with a few mutual friends, including AD, who I haven't seen in ages and who I learned instantly is heavily pregnant with her second child. Her belly protruded much in the same way as that of "Joe, Harpsichord," and yet she managed to keep it completely and tastefully under wraps.
Other than that, I don't have much to report. The only somewhat interesting news is that OM and I painted the entryway to my apartment, which used to be a blah pale blue and is now a color I can only describe as"Smurf-esque." It is a pretty and saturated hue, but I cannot escape the association.
Posted by Dori at 11:05 PM
The I in Intern
As much as I reject generational stereotypes, I work with college students at a Very Prestigious School (VPS), and I think that Claire Raines, author of
Connecting Generations: The Sourcebook, is right on when she describes Milennials (people born between 1980-2000) as “sociable, optimistic, talented, well-educated, collaborative, open-minded, influential, and achievement-oriented. They are arriving in the workplace with higher expectations than any generation before them—and they’re so well connected that, if an employer doesn’t match those expectations, they can tell thousands of their cohorts with one click of the mouse.”
In my almost two years at VPS, I have generally delighted in our student population. I find them to be savvy, funny, ambitious, often over-earnest, and yes, impossibly ADD. It is hugely entertaining to communicate with them. They are also very self-centered, but but I attribute much of that, and their often excessive quest for self-knowledge and goal attainment to be the sum of a) What we teach them at VPS and b) What they learned during AP Mommy and Me, and at the high-powered nursery, elementary, and high schools they attended after that. I am aware that I foster this along with my co-workers, and that I encourage students to seek out the best opportunities possible, assert themselves, and ensure they are comfortable in potentially sketch situations. These are all good things when they remain in the right proportions.
Behold the case of “Adam” which is drastically simplified and condensed here for confidentiality and bandwith. Adam is an extremely talented and driven student. He completed two summer job applications, one to “Jet Bleu” and the other to “Air Train.” Air Train offered him a staid but challenging position and a tight deadline for acceptance which he tried unsuccessfully to extend. After a ton of agonizing over the freaky economy and a lot of self-talk about why Air Train would be a perfectly good option, he accepted the offer. Then, against hours of my cautionary advice, he continued the interview process with Jet Bleu, even flying cross-country for an on-site visit. When I challenged Adam on the supreme shadiness of this action, he shrugged and said that he “wanted to practice second-round interviewing skills.”
Long story short: Jet Bleu offered him a higher-paying summer job than Air Train had. Then, after more hours of advice during which I tried to impart the very serious karmic and professional consequences of reneging on a job acceptance, he tried to negotiate with Air Train for more money. This pissed off his future Air Train supervisor. After the poorly executed “negotiation,” Adam came into our office in tears. He felt “threatened” by his future supervisor and contended that he could not possibly work in such a combative environment. After much thought, he had decided to "turn down" the job. Conveniently, he had not yet turned down Jet Bleu. The Air Train guy, who accurately surmised that Adam had been using his company as a backup all along, sent him an email with the subject line "goodbye." In very polite yet strongly worded terms, it described the small and interwoven nature of the aviation community and the bite-marks Adam’s ass would bear as he launched his career. This made Adam cry all the more and ask us over and over why he was being victimized. After all, he insisted,
he hadn’t done anything wrong.
Now this could be any story about any slightly entitled, slightly misguided job searcher, right? Not necessarily millennial at all, right? Except ... WAIT ... FOR ... IT...? You know it’s coming … Adam’s dad. Adam’s dad! Dear ol' dad supported the notion that
Air Train was at the root of all this evil, and that despite the fact that Adam had wasted the time of a ton of people, gone back on his word, taken a job away from some runner-up student who would have happily taken it had Adam turned it down in the first place ... it was an
airline acting in good faith that needed remediation.
He suggested that Adam contact the Air Tran supervisor's
manager. Because that, my friends, would have really made this truly awesome.
I’ve been reflecting on this a lot, and realize that it's Adam et al's parents and teachers that sowed the seeds for the entitled self-centeredness milennials are charged with. And it is therefore unfair to blame them entirely. Also: I’m contributing too, by teaching some of the wrong lessons. It's not just that unprofessional behavior might eventually damage your career. The more important point is that it's not OK to advocate for or explore your own interests at the expense of other people's. Apparently, this is not an obvious point.
In the end, Adam will have spend a fun, enriching, and lucrative summer at Jet Bleu. The Air Train guy will probably find himself a Plan B intern and forget about this whole matter. Adam's career will probably go on just fine. The scary, strongly worded "goodbye" email will live on in Adam's inbox and prevent him from pulling such shenanigans in the future. But the challenge to myself and my co-workers is to make Adam see the role he played in the internship search implosion, and to shake off daddy's comforting assurance that he did the right thing. After all, he's been pushed out of the nest already.
It's time to fly, and he better start flying right.
Posted by Dori at 10:04 PM
Light in the Kitchen Window
Before OM, no man has ever had keys to any place in which I have resided. I did not see the point; if OM, or any one of his predecessors, would like to enjoy my tasteful home decor and delight in my company, well, that could easily be arranged in advance. I did not like the idea of a guy being in my space when I wasn't there--not because he might be nosy or messy, but because it would mean ceding control about his whereabouts in regards to mine.
For practical reasons, OM introduced the idea of procuring my house key a long time ago, and I demurred and avoided the topic until one night, when a combination of poor planning, cell phone issues, and bad timing left him stranded in my neighborhood. He spent several hours waiting for me to let him into my apartment, and alternated between the 24-hour drugstore, the supermarket, and finally the subway station, where he eventually gave up and left.
After that night, I got him a key, and was stunned at how much
easier life became. We no longer have to coordinate comings and goings and so precisely. If I go to the gym before dinner, for example, and get absorbed in a workout (or, let's be real, the latest edition of
Oprah), I don't feel rushed, since I know he can let himself into my place. And if he wants to come over after a late night out without me, I need not get out of bed to unlock the door.
And most blissful? On several occasions I have come home to the loveliest and most heartwarming sight ever: an apartment in
which the man I love is cooking dinner without having arranged this with me beforehand. This is something I fantasized about during the many, many years in which I was single and sad.
It is precisely this turn of events that has led me to completely re-think the whole cohabitation situation. For a very long time, the notion of a guy and his stuff in my space on a permanent basis filled me with a real sense of dismay (I always loved snuggling and bonding with prior boyfriends, but was also happy when they left at the end of the weekend, and I could reset my environment to my exact specifications). For ages, I wanted/longed/
ached, to be in a partnership, but still shuddered at the thought of sleeping in the same room with someone for the rest of my life, and I wondered if I'd ever be able to not just tolerate but embrace a guy's possessions, tastes, and habits.
For various lease-and-real-estate-related reasons, OM and I were prompted to have cohabitation conversations in April, and I was all skittish and opposed to the notion of having him in my (wah! no longer my!) space 24/7. I have no delusions about the logistical and emotional complexities that go along with living together, and we decided to hold off for the time being, but now it's like the house key; I'm finding my feelings have changed. He has four kinds of cereal at my house, and I enjoyed finding matching canisters to store them in a manner befitting the decor concept of my kitchen. I like seeing his shoes next mine in the entryway (not so much his random piles of miscellanea, but that's another issue). Whenever he makes (polite, tentative) domestic suggestions, they fill me with joy. My mismatched, poorly organized tupperware "collection" made him nuts and we spent a blissful hour revamping it. It made me freakishly happy.
We discussed all this last night because we hadn't had an SRT (State of the Relationship Talk) in a while. I told him that sometimes, when I come home from work on days when we have not made evening plans, I strain to see from afar if maybe he has come over anyway, and if maybe when I walk in the door he will greet me from the kitchen where he is cooking dinner. I got all choked up when I described how this made me feel, because it made me realize how crazy I am for him and how profoundly--OM--and our relationship--has changed me.
Posted by Dori at 7:56 PM
Life's A Beach
Boston is not a beach-oriented city, and if you're experiencing beach-going urges, you're most likely to go to one of a handful of places: Cape Cod (this is an extremely preppy, expensive, and time-consuming undertaking), or a gentrified fishing village like Rockport or Manchester. Despite the fact that the city is built right on the water, people do not tend to swim or sunbathe right around town. So living in Boston and getting your beach on generally means planning a whole day traveling to a "real" beach, avoiding traffic/crowds, eating fried clams (or lobster if possible), and wearing a layered ensemble to account for the extreme temperature differentials between the air-conditioned car/restaurant and the actual seashore.
It was 86 degrees out today, and my delightful Israeli conversation partner, Ziv, and his wife, Zsipi (OM and I refer to them as Z squared) suggested that we hit Nahant Beach, which Ziv said was highly rated on yelp.com. OM has lived in this area for most of his life and never been to Nahant, a working-class city of Boston's North Shore. We expected it to suck: a gritty urban backdrop, possibly a dollop of medical waste, maybe a hairy high school principal sunning himself. We wondered if we were better off going to some other more precious destination. But we were up for adventure, and happy to be proven wrong.
At the same time, we wanted to manage the expectations of Z&Z, who had never visited a New England (much less a city) beach. Without being a hater, I tried to intimate that "it might be a bit cold for swimming" when we picked up Z&Z, and they were both wearing swimsuits, and expecting a 4 star Yelp experience, while OM and I were hoping not to step on a syringe.
When we got to the beach the tables turned fast. OM and I were struck by how
adequate it was. It seemed, to us, that it had the right amount of sand and water and sun. The beach was quite long and wide and sandy, and it was mostly clean (though I did not check the water quality online beforehand). It was less than 30 minutes away, traffic and parking were definitely manageable for noon on the first hot day of the season. This description makes it sound idyllic or even nice - and there was nothing nice about it at all. It wasn't a place we would choose to go, but it wasn't nearly as bad as we'd expected.
Z&Z, however, were underwhelmed. They found the sand dirty, and the beach itself
undeveloped. We discussed the fact that there were no cafes or bars or cool places to hang out - just a kitschy restaurant at one end near the parking lot; no place to rent a chaise or sun umbrella; no flowers or landscaping or anything.
As we walked along the beach, Z&Z stopped in their tracks.
What the hell? Are those horse shoes those people are throwing? They had never seen a game of horseshoes before, which was natural enough, I now realize, but I never thought of horseshoes as a uniquely American thing before. Apparently they don't have seagulls in Israel either; but Zsipi recognized the sound from one of her relaxation tapes.
And the kicker? The tide was out, exposing a long slick expanse of wet sand. OM pointed out where high tide would eventually reach, and then OM and I learned that the Mediterreanean doesn't have tides (well, technically it has negligible, "
feeble" tides), and so in one afternoon we discovered that:
1) Nahant Beach is a fairly decent city beach
2) Not all oceans/seas have tides
3) Horseshoes is an American game
4) There are no seagulls in Israel
I'm not sure who learned more today: the locals or the "foreigners."
Posted by Dori at 10:21 PM
