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There is a massive archeological site right in the middle of the Miraflores neighborhood of Lima called Huaca Pucllana. Up until about 30 years ago it was used as a motocross site according to our guide. It is a pretty fascinating place, originally built by the native pre inca Lima culture from about 200 -700 AD, and then used by a few successive peoples (Wari) after their decline. One of the hallmarks of the Lima construction is adobe bricks stacked in trapezoidal shapes and like books on a bookshelf, which give quite a lot of seismic stability to the structures. It was amazing what good shape a lot of the buried compound was in. The site was apparently much much bigger originally, but over the years, the Miraflores neighborhood buildings were built on top of it, with only this part (which was a massive mound) still remaining and being excavated.
My mother is a very strong woman, and very accomplished. She raised me and my brothers to believe that we could be anything we wanted to be. And she raised us to believe in the human potential of all people, regardless of race, ethnicity, background or gender. She encouraged us to look at each person as an individual, not as a member of some group, and she strongly discouraged us from stereotyping people based on their membership in any one of these categories. She didn’t want us to make limiting assumptions about people especially because such limiting assumptions had been made about her at earlier times in her life. As a Jewish woman raised in the 50s in central Indiana, she had all too often been the target of stereotypes or lowered expectations based on what was expected of women in that time and place. She realized that she had internalized a lot of these prejudices and had to work many years to finally get to the place where she could rely on her own strength and judgment to determine what her capacities were. Such has been the case with many successful women in our society. And the men have also been bound in their way to the expectations placed on their potential and ability. So we were raised with an understanding that women and men could perform any kind of task they wished in any kind of setting, and that the world should not dictate a different set of possibilities based simply on gender. In short, we were raised to treat all people equally.
So it has been with some mirth that these many years later I look on the next generation of child rearing (especially in my brother’s case) and notice a few things. On the one hand, my brother is much more present in parenting than our own father was when we were at such a young age. Our parents got divorced when I was about 8 (and my brother 6) and our biological father never really played a part in our early childhood. It was only after my mother remarried about a year and a half later that we really got a father figure, and we could not have asked for a better one. My stepfather is in all ways the father we never had as very young children, and he (along with my mother) was always there for us, guiding us, teaching us, fathering us until we were adults. He and my mother are to this day one of those ideal couples I look at to demonstrate that long term love is possible and can be wonderful. They are the rock of our extended family, and spending time with them is always a treat.
My brother has been such a doting father during these early years and it is wonderful to see how much pride he takes in his family. One also gets the sense that he takes great satisfaction in being able to provide materially for them. My brother is clearly the best in the family with financial management. My parents were never great with money and the rest of us inherited their lack of financial acuity. Not so my brother, who has the right salary, investments and accounts. As a lawyer who deeply understands tax law and its implications, my brother has a clear eye on on the future with regard to retirement, health care and education for his children, each account carefully chosen and managed with some relish. Outside of the material well being of his family, my brother is constantly spending time with his kids, teaching them things, telling them how much he loves them at every turn. He punishes them when necessary, but always with a gentle hand and an eye towards making them more caring, responsible, and sharing individuals.
Yet there has been one area of his fathering that I have watched with a touch of dismay. Despite the ways in which we were raised, despite all the evidence around him, my brother is still choosing (perhaps semi-unconsciously) to reinforce gender stereotypes with his children. The evidence is everywhere, from the ways in which he describes them to others, to the names he calls them, to the way he treats them, to the different discipline paths he expects them to follow when they enter their teen years. He will describe his son repeatedly as being “all-boy” and “fearless”, and will go out of his way to reinforce these traits with rough housing and sporty activities of all sorts. He seems to find it important to talk about all the “girlfriends” he has (he is six years old) at school, and what a ladies man he will surely be when he grows up. Although I don’t think my brother would get angry if his son decided to play with Barbie dolls, he clearly has an image of how his son should be and reinforces it with his language, attitude and body language at every turn. Likewise with his daughter who is 4 1/2. She is his “princess” and he encourages her to think of herself that way. He will often talk about how she has “daddy wrapped around her little finger” and (half) jokingly talk about killing any young man that may want to date her when she is older. He routinely talks about how he will need to “protect” her in ways his boy will not need protecting, because she is a girl and therefore more vulnerable to attack. (My sister-in-law appears to be somewhat more even handed on this subject and routinely ridicules the idea that the kids should be treated differently.)
Of course there are some biological differences between boys and girls. But biology is not destiny, and certainly reinforcing the tired stereotypes of the past will not aid children in overcoming them. My mother tells a story about her not taking an economics course until college because that was something men were good at, but not women. She became the highest scoring student in the class. Society at large and parents in particular can’t always stop themselves from seeing their children in certain ways that make them comfortable, but shoehorning them into these roles is limiting. On a public policy level, my brother is completely egalitarian. He would never accept the idea that his son or daughter (or anyone else’s for that matter) would be limited by law or custom from achieving their potential. And yet it seems very important for him in his own family to see the boy as capital “b” Boy, and the girl as capital “g” Girl. When I point out to him some of these things, he dismisses it as the observation of someone who “doesn’t have children” and thus could know nothing about it. I beg to differ. Certainly there are things about the parenting role that I do not know having not experienced it myself. But on the question of gender roles in society, I am fairly expert, having experienced these things first hand. I know how difficult society’s obsession with gender conformity has made being gay for example, and I work every day to make it easier for those who come after me. Girls and boys deserve a world that doesn’t guide them along different paths for no other reason than biology. For them to become fully realized women and men, we need to encourage them to become fully realized human beings and to understand, reinforce, and create equal opportunity for all of us.
In every culture in the world there are questions, curiosities and concerns that preoccupy the mind. Although they are different in each locale, they all relate to placing ourselves in a cultural context. They allow for a classification and reassure the questioner that their world view is correct and that others fit within it. This maintains our illusions of order and keeps the chaos at bay. It is one of the ways we make sense of the world, and reinforce and comfort ourselves that our particular conception of the world makes sense and that we have our place within it.
In India, one of the first questions I was asked wherever I went was “Are you married?”
In Bali, it was invariably “Where are you going?”
In Mexico, almost always “Where are you from?” or “Where do you live?”
And here in the US, it is almost always “What do you do?” or “What are you going to do?”
Today is my last day in LA for awhile. Tomorrow I will board a bus (yes, a bus) for San Francisco, where I will be for about a week before entering a Zen farm in the Bay Area for a while to practice zazen. After that I will go back to visit my family for a couple of weeks and after that I think I will spend a couple of weeks in NYC.
And after that? Who knows?
For a few weeks I have been noticing with ever greater frequency the propensity of people to hold up their hand and move their index finger as if it were a little puppet or being with a consciousness all its own. And I kept thinking to myself, man these guys must really love The Shining. They all keep making that creepy “redrum, redrum” finger movement like that possessed kid.
Turns out that here in Mexico, this is just a culturally approved gestural way of indicating the affirmative. In other words, this just means “yes”. Like nodding your head, but on the tip of your index finger.
It still creeps me out a little.
1. I want a president who inspires, and gives hope.
2. I want my country to live up to its best ideals.
3. I don’t believe it is good for our democracy to maintain dynasties.
4. I strongly believe we need to move beyond rank partisanship.
5. I want someone in power whose highest value is public service, not power itself.
6. I don’t want someone in power who will say or do anything to get elected.
7. I want someone in power who will attack the problems that our country faces, not someone who will attack “enemies”.
8. I don’t want to have to pretend to be French when out of the country.
For all of the above and more, I strongly support Barack Obama for president. No candidate is perfect, but having looked at his stands on the issues, I find myself in greater agreement with him than any other candidate currently running. And Barack has the ability to inspire and move people in a positive way that I have not witnessed in any other candidate. I want to believe that we can move out of the darkest period I have ever witnessed. I want to be able to believe in my country again.
With no more of a plan than meeting friends for a 6pm dinner at Freemans (highly recommended, btw. The food was the best I’ve had this trip.), I chose to head downtown and slowly meander my way from West Village to East Village, taking in the sites along the way.
Still having a couple of hours to kill before dinner, I decided to check out the New Museum, especially keen to explore their brand new building on Bowery and their much discussed new show “Unmonumental“. The building was beautiful from the outside and serviceable from the inside, but the show was pretty much dreck to my eyes. It was the visual and cultural equivalent of a stretched out one line joke.
As I was surveying objet d’art number 20 and wondering if I really could spend another hour in this place, I noticed a fairly handsome man looking at me. He approached and started asking me what I thought about the various pieces and we pretended to discuss them for a few minutes over the subtext of “shall we take this outside to coffee and perhaps a walk to your place later?” We made our introductions and continued onto a few more sculptures, making wisecracks about the artists’ intent or lack thereof. My new friend John became aware of the presence of another nice looking guy who seemed to be hanging on our conversation and laughing at some of our jokes about the art.
“Is he looking at you or me or both of us?” John asked, more to the room than to me.
The guy then approached and sort of introduced himself, and the three of us struck up a conversation. At this point I had no idea where this was all headed, but I knew I had a dinner to attend in about 50 minutes’ time around the corner. We all continued our blather about the lackluster art, but at some point I realized that I was having a hard time making out the words of our new friend. It wasn’t that he wasn’t speaking clearly, but that the meter of his sentences would change rather quickly and it seemed somewhat difficult to process without paying very close attention.
Still, we came to understand that he was a library science major from somewhere in the Midwest. He was also a pretty handsome guy and I have to admit to feeling a little unsure whether John was flirting with him or me or both. Then again, I was unsure of the same about myself. For some reason the conversation came to a rather odd pause, with the three of us just smiling and standing there for a few awkward moments. John then suggested we move on to the next piece, which we did.
And that is when it happened. As we crossed the gallery floor, I heard a loud “HONK!”
I turned around, unsure of what had happened or where it had come from. I turned back to continue another few steps when I heard another, equally loud HONK (although now, thinking back on it, it was really more of a SQUAWK). I then noticed our new friend kind of turning and bobbing a little, as if to avoid eye contact. And then I heard another SQUAWK. I realized with a slight horror that the noises were coming from our new friend. This clearly also made John uncomfortable, who wished the guy a nice day and then hurried us along to another part of the exhibit, muttering something about having sexually aroused the guy leading to his squawking.
As we walked away, I was feeling a little odd about the whole thing. We continued to hear loud squawks in the distance. I mean, this was a gallery type space, with people quietly milling about looking at and discussing the art in hushed tones, punctuated by these loud outbursts. I suddenly realized what was happening and although this entire sequence of events had transpired in little more than a few minutes, it should have occurred to me by the second or third squawk that our new friend had Tourette’s syndrome. I had in fact read about it in a book by Oliver Sacks just a few months ago.
John and I shared a brief tea in the downstairs coffee shop, exchanged numbers and said our goodbyes. I stayed on in the cafe and moments later I bumped into the guy again and we chatted for a few minutes. He started to apologize and explain and I waved my hand, telling him I understood what it was and said I was sorry if I seemed a little taken aback at first. He was a pretty handsome guy and I told him so. He returned the compliment and asked for my number, so I gave it to him. He then let out an especially loud SQUAWK, said goodbye and left. It is somewhat unlikely that we will see each other again, as both he and I are visitors to the city and leaving in a couple of days, but who knows? Life is full of strange serendipity.
I was going to call this post “Gay internet dating etiquette” or “hook-up site etiquette”, but I realized these rules were probably more universal than that. These rules should work the same whether you are straight or gay, enjoy long walks on the sand or just want a quick roll in the hay. (Hey, that rhymed!)
In no particular order:
1. If someone compliments you, always respond with a thank you. It doesn’t matter if you are interested in them or not, this is common courtesy.
2. You do not have to respond to someone with no pictures in their profile (except in the case above, and then only to say thanks).
3. When someone insults you, they should simply be ignored and/or blocked. There is no reason to engage them.
4. Never go directly to someone’s home or allow them to come to yours. First meetings should be out in public (at a coffee shop or the like if possible).
5. If you should come across a profile of someone who is using your pictures instead of their own, compliment them on their good looks. Then report them to the site owner.
6. Never trash talk any member of a site to any other member (with the possible exception of the above member who stole your pics).
7. If someone does not respond to a message you have sent to them, drop it. Do not send endless followup messages asking why they aren’t interested. This reeks of desperation and the other party should be expected to apply rule number 3. You should apply the same rule in the reverse situation.
8. If, upon meeting someone, you discover that:
a. Their pics are at least 10 years old, OR
b. Their pics are not at all identifiable as them, OR
c. They have lied or misled you about important details (up to you to decide which these are, but being married might be one)
you should feel free to end it right there with a polite “This won’t work for me, but thanks for playing. Good bye.”
I reconnected with an old friend yesterday after a long absence. We had a great meandering talk about a number of things and I asked her what she was doing to occupy her time these days. She explained to me that she is working as a life coach. I began considering the outlines of this profession and started thinking that in some ways I was quite suited to it. Then today I crossed paths with another subject matter that I have recently become aware of: virtual worlds such as Second Life.
And then it hit me what a funny job it would be to become a virtual life coach. I could create a virtual website with virtual testimonials from virtual celebrities that had benefited from my virtual coaching. Since this world is virtual, everything can be larger than (real) life. The stakes are higher (and lower), the rewards greater (and smaller), the failures more spectacular (and less spectacular). In addition to coaching virtual people how to live a better virtual life and achieve their virtual goals, I could become a virtual expert in these sorts of things and attend virtual conferences that I would organize and even create a virtual certification for myself and others like me.
If I were a life coach outside of this virtual world, however, I might advise my clients to pay more attention to the game called real life pulsating all around them. Then again, who is to say what is real and what is not? Not me, that is for sure.
Being back in the US makes me feel somewhat anxious about not working (or maybe just anxious). Why? I’m not totally sure. Here are some of the possibilities:
- The Culture of Productivity. Let’s face it, everywhere one goes here there is an underlying need to be productive (or just look productive).
- The people I know all work. Somehow in my head, I imagined coming back and hanging out with all manner of friend, family and acquaintance. But every time I (finally) manage to get a hold of said people they are very scheduled and busy with very many things and not really available at the drop of a hat, or tomorrow, or even next Tuesday.
- The familiar surroundings. It may also be that just by the mere fact of being back here in a familiar place that I am induced to repeat old patterns and fall back into the mode I was in before leaving. This is one of the trepidations I had in coming back.
- Money. This one is pretty obvious. Things cost way more here and my money will run out in a few months and I will have to do something. That said, I really don’t have to worry this very moment and was planning on not having to worry for a few months. But just the shock of spending in a single night what I would in a week on food is disconcerting.
- Owning things. I bought a computer last week. The whole reason for it was to enable my writing and give me some flexibility in creative endeavor. But owning this thing has also caused me to invest a lot of time in caring for it, configuring it, tinkering with it. I’m letting it become a mini obsession, and I think part of the reason is to feel more productive, doing something. Ironically, this makes me a little anxious and leaves me feeling a little less productive.
- Being sick. It is also a real possibility that the mere fact of having a bad cold the past few days has affected my state of mind, clouding my ability to be present.
Before coming back here, I had resolved to give myself a couple of months to relax, get reacquainted, and figure out what to do near the end of the year, with no preconceptions. That could mean travel or work in any number of places (San Francisco, London, Madrid, HK, Sydney..take your pick). That could mean many types of work (writing, technology, design, etc) in many situations (self, non-profit, start-up, etc).
I need to relax and get back to my Buddhist lessons. Perhaps I’ll go to a drop-in meditation at the Zen Center tomorrow.
They all seem mixed together here in Varanasi. I have noted several times before how India is always a mixture of the sacred and profane, how all elements of life are seemingly jumbled up and criss crossing. In Varanasi this is even more evident and the addition of the palpable presence of death here completes the picture.
We took a fascinating walk last night through the tiny alleyways and over to the Manikarnika (also known as Cremation) Ghat. There, we witnessed the preparation of bodies and their placement on funeral pyres, and their burning. It was a very moving and slightly destabilizing sight. As we stood above the fires, our eyes burned from the fumes and we had to descend after several minutes. A while later after continuing our walk we came back and actually stood on the ghat next to the burning pyres, and I could see a body burning. I have to admit to being a little shaken up. Our guide had explained the whole process to us, what the family does, how people say goodbye and what rituals there typically are in mourning.
There are things that you understand intellectually, and there are things that you understand on an emotional level as well. Varanasi brought home to me something real and ultimately peaceful about acceptance of our mortality and the beautiful cycle of living and dying.
