At all. As my liberal friends on Facebook have made me abundantly aware these past several weeks every time I have posted even the mildest endorsements of the candidate running against our incumbent. As my family has made clear as a condition for visiting at Thanksgiving. Talking politics in and of itself is a hot button issue. Unless, of course, you simply agree with me. Why should this be? (I know, it's me being naïve again, but here we go.) "Don't talk religion or politics except to very intimate friends," or so Lily Haxworth Wallace advised way back in 1941 in her New American Etiquette . On that count, however, I have no intimates, at least politically. Or the ones that I do have are all at the National Review . Plus Barry (hi, Barry!), my oldest friend in the world (albeit three months younger than me), and Prof. Mondo , whom I know only from the blogosphere. And maybe you, if you're reading this now. (Maybe.) But why? Why should politics of
FB: thanks. This has been a very enlightening theme.
ReplyDeleteI've become horribly aware that addictiveness probably runs in my family. I have a number of siblings who ... ermmm ... like their drink too much, and that has been an issue for me too. Though not as much as my tendency to get sucked into compulsive interests that have no benefits in the real world: playing Go on the Internet, editing Wikipedia, or answering questions on Yahoo! Answers.
But lately I took up accordion (and I mean weird accordion - Russian B-system button-key accordion). The compulsiveness has manifested in assiduous daily practice: I feel uneasy if we're away somewhere and I can't do it. And it has benefits: I'm up to a level where I can play in public, and enjoy doing it. People find it surprising and cool.
These traits can be harnessed.
Ray: You are most welcome! Thank you for sharing your experiences with me. It's powerful stuff, addiction. We have drinkers in my family, too, but I'm starting to see that it's a bigger issue, not just about drinking. It's anything that we use to suppress feelings that we would rather not have. But if we allow ourselves to feel them and understand why we have them, then we can actually address what is upsetting us. Which is hard. But ultimately healing. It's such a fine line between passion and compulsion, it's, well, sobering.
ReplyDeleteAnd musically stimulating! Congrats on your playing!