Friday, November 21, 2008
Monday, November 10, 2008
A Surprising Thing I Hate About Working in an Office
That Monday-morning small talk about what you did with your weekend.
If you did a ton of fun, interesting stuff, no one really wants to hear you recite it all, and if you did absolutely nothing, just sat around in your sweats, knitted a bit, maybe made that banana bread you've been promising your roommate for weeks, you end up feeling so so boring.
And everyone in the office manages to ask you about it individually, so you end up reciting the same boring list 20 times. By the end you have the same stupid non-jokes all outlined every time. "Ha! I know! It's like, maybe the cable guy could come when he said he would! Ha! Ha!"
Most devastatingly though, once all the little bits have been recounted, "oh, I puttered around, did some errands, saw a movie Saturday night, blah blah blah," it all sounds like SO LITTLE. WHAT HAPPENED TO MY WEEKEND??? I SWORE there were 48 hours in it last time I checked!!
Sigh.
If you did a ton of fun, interesting stuff, no one really wants to hear you recite it all, and if you did absolutely nothing, just sat around in your sweats, knitted a bit, maybe made that banana bread you've been promising your roommate for weeks, you end up feeling so so boring.
And everyone in the office manages to ask you about it individually, so you end up reciting the same boring list 20 times. By the end you have the same stupid non-jokes all outlined every time. "Ha! I know! It's like, maybe the cable guy could come when he said he would! Ha! Ha!"
Most devastatingly though, once all the little bits have been recounted, "oh, I puttered around, did some errands, saw a movie Saturday night, blah blah blah," it all sounds like SO LITTLE. WHAT HAPPENED TO MY WEEKEND??? I SWORE there were 48 hours in it last time I checked!!
Sigh.
Thursday, April 24, 2008
Recommended Reading
A couple of days ago, I read this article (http://www.nytimes.com/2008/04/20/magazine/20wwln-lede-t.html) by one of my favorite authors, Micheal Pollan, and I keep thinking about it. The article begins with Pollan working through this question of why bother about trying to save the environment - there seems to be too much to do, and not any reasonable assurance that others will join in on the efforts that need to be made, and we are not sure that it would not all be too late anyway.
I think it particularly speaks to me because I really struggle with this question - "why bother?" - not exactly as he describes it, not so much at the beginning of the effort, but more in the middle. I find that I can easily get myself worked up to make changes and save the world, yaddayaddayadda, but that in the middle, when the sacrifices and challenges are no longer novel and all I want is to just eat a cheeseburger and get on with my life, or not spend 3xs as much on the fancy green light bulbs and instead get the regular ones and have enough left over to buy a pretty new skirt. I find myself wilting at that point - find myself standing in the aisle with a light bulb in either hand, talking myself into buying the cheap one. But I think Pollan is right - I believe that it will take one person after another making all the changes they can, it will take one person after another calling for technological, legislative, and truly, moral, change. I do believe that.
And I believe something that Pollan doesn't talk about directly, but opens the way to with his discussion of "living as if". Pollan uses Vaclav Havel, a Czech politician who was instrumental in the overthrow of communism in Czechoslovakia, as an example of what can happen when people go ahead with what they believe is right even when all but sure that those attempts will be futile if not personally dangerous. I think that what Pollan doesn't explicitly say, but is exceptionally true, is that there is something very pure and valuable about doing what you believe is right, regardless of surrounding situations. That in a very direct and simple, yet somewhat elusive way, there is value in doing all the little energy saving, emission reducing things you can - whether or not they lead to others following, to legislative changes, or to technological advances. I believe that there is something valuable in doing what you know to be right, even if that action is ineffective or fruitless.
Additionally - I also wanted to point you towards Pollan's comment about observing Sabbath - I kinda love this idea - it's so simple and direct. I've been thinking about implementing it in my own life, perhaps with the modifications of allowing for use of lights and food-related devices.
I think it particularly speaks to me because I really struggle with this question - "why bother?" - not exactly as he describes it, not so much at the beginning of the effort, but more in the middle. I find that I can easily get myself worked up to make changes and save the world, yaddayaddayadda, but that in the middle, when the sacrifices and challenges are no longer novel and all I want is to just eat a cheeseburger and get on with my life, or not spend 3xs as much on the fancy green light bulbs and instead get the regular ones and have enough left over to buy a pretty new skirt. I find myself wilting at that point - find myself standing in the aisle with a light bulb in either hand, talking myself into buying the cheap one. But I think Pollan is right - I believe that it will take one person after another making all the changes they can, it will take one person after another calling for technological, legislative, and truly, moral, change. I do believe that.
And I believe something that Pollan doesn't talk about directly, but opens the way to with his discussion of "living as if". Pollan uses Vaclav Havel, a Czech politician who was instrumental in the overthrow of communism in Czechoslovakia, as an example of what can happen when people go ahead with what they believe is right even when all but sure that those attempts will be futile if not personally dangerous. I think that what Pollan doesn't explicitly say, but is exceptionally true, is that there is something very pure and valuable about doing what you believe is right, regardless of surrounding situations. That in a very direct and simple, yet somewhat elusive way, there is value in doing all the little energy saving, emission reducing things you can - whether or not they lead to others following, to legislative changes, or to technological advances. I believe that there is something valuable in doing what you know to be right, even if that action is ineffective or fruitless.
Additionally - I also wanted to point you towards Pollan's comment about observing Sabbath - I kinda love this idea - it's so simple and direct. I've been thinking about implementing it in my own life, perhaps with the modifications of allowing for use of lights and food-related devices.
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