Wednesday, May 12, 2010
Thursday, May 06, 2010
He Did the Best He Could
Latest op-ed, published in the Providence Journal on May 4, 2010.
By STUART VYSE
STONINGTON, Conn. My father died in March. He lived in California, and I was able to see him a couple of weeks before his death. I sat by his bed. We exchanged expressions of love and gratitude. We also shared an unspoken understanding that this might be our last time together. Despite the sad occasion, it was a pleasant visit, and I flew home knowing that I had fulfilled a son’s obligation to pay his last respects to a dying parent.
There was a time when an ending like this might not have been possible. My parents’ marriage came apart in 1962, when I was 11, and in those days, before our contemporary era of shared parenting, many divorced fathers, my own included, were rarely heard from. He was a Navy veteran, and I became a college student of the late 1960s. Our political views quickly diverged, and after visiting my apartment and finding it decorated with symbols of the anti-Vietnam War movement, he wrote my mother a letter expressing great displeasure with me.
As I grew up and established myself in life, our relationship improved. The philosophical divides between us could never be bridged, but we learned to avoid those topics and enjoy the things we shared. He had a wonderful sense of humor and was always interested in what I was doing. We found ways to strengthen the bonds between us by focusing on what we had in common.
In the weeks before his death, my father suffered a final humiliation. As his battle with emphysema wore on, he had to move to a nursing home, at which point his financial circumstances came to light. Dad had always presented himself as if he lived a comfortable lifestyle. A former business executive, he dressed well and displayed all the outward indications of a modest but solidly middle class life.
When the crisis hit, he was forced to reveal that he drew a small pension, owned little of value, had no savings, and had tens of thousands of dollars in credit-card debt. After a life spent complaining about taxes and denigrating government-run social programs, he found himself completely dependent upon those programs and died unable to pay what he owed to his creditors.
When I heard this news, I struggled to avoid reversing our old roles — becoming the critical son leveling judgment against a disappointing father. Because he was in his final days, I could never have said anything to him about my displeasure, but for a time, at least, it was hard to avoid feeling let down.
But I quickly recovered from this initial reaction. In recent years, I have tried to adopt the philosophy that, at any given moment, we are all doing the best we can. Perhaps, if we had greater encouragement or lived under different circumstances, we could achieve more and be better people. But given things as they are, we are all doing no better or worse than we are able.
It is easy to stand in judgment of other people. On talk radio and cable news, it is something of a national pastime to cheer on the heroes and rail at the villains, but in the real world of ordinary people, we are all equals. Even an attitude of forgiveness, with its flavor of religious authority, is something I try to avoid. Instead, I strive to accept people as they are and recognize that there, but for a cosmic roll of the dice, go I.
My father’s obituary concentrated on his military service in World War II and Korea, his successful business career, and his community volunteer work. When I think of him now, I will remember him in a similarly positive light. He loved me; I loved him; and I will always be grateful for what he gave me. He did the best he could.
Stuart Vyse, an occasional contributor, is a professor of psychology at Connecticut College.
By STUART VYSE
STONINGTON, Conn. My father died in March. He lived in California, and I was able to see him a couple of weeks before his death. I sat by his bed. We exchanged expressions of love and gratitude. We also shared an unspoken understanding that this might be our last time together. Despite the sad occasion, it was a pleasant visit, and I flew home knowing that I had fulfilled a son’s obligation to pay his last respects to a dying parent.
There was a time when an ending like this might not have been possible. My parents’ marriage came apart in 1962, when I was 11, and in those days, before our contemporary era of shared parenting, many divorced fathers, my own included, were rarely heard from. He was a Navy veteran, and I became a college student of the late 1960s. Our political views quickly diverged, and after visiting my apartment and finding it decorated with symbols of the anti-Vietnam War movement, he wrote my mother a letter expressing great displeasure with me.
As I grew up and established myself in life, our relationship improved. The philosophical divides between us could never be bridged, but we learned to avoid those topics and enjoy the things we shared. He had a wonderful sense of humor and was always interested in what I was doing. We found ways to strengthen the bonds between us by focusing on what we had in common.
In the weeks before his death, my father suffered a final humiliation. As his battle with emphysema wore on, he had to move to a nursing home, at which point his financial circumstances came to light. Dad had always presented himself as if he lived a comfortable lifestyle. A former business executive, he dressed well and displayed all the outward indications of a modest but solidly middle class life.
When the crisis hit, he was forced to reveal that he drew a small pension, owned little of value, had no savings, and had tens of thousands of dollars in credit-card debt. After a life spent complaining about taxes and denigrating government-run social programs, he found himself completely dependent upon those programs and died unable to pay what he owed to his creditors.
When I heard this news, I struggled to avoid reversing our old roles — becoming the critical son leveling judgment against a disappointing father. Because he was in his final days, I could never have said anything to him about my displeasure, but for a time, at least, it was hard to avoid feeling let down.
But I quickly recovered from this initial reaction. In recent years, I have tried to adopt the philosophy that, at any given moment, we are all doing the best we can. Perhaps, if we had greater encouragement or lived under different circumstances, we could achieve more and be better people. But given things as they are, we are all doing no better or worse than we are able.
It is easy to stand in judgment of other people. On talk radio and cable news, it is something of a national pastime to cheer on the heroes and rail at the villains, but in the real world of ordinary people, we are all equals. Even an attitude of forgiveness, with its flavor of religious authority, is something I try to avoid. Instead, I strive to accept people as they are and recognize that there, but for a cosmic roll of the dice, go I.
My father’s obituary concentrated on his military service in World War II and Korea, his successful business career, and his community volunteer work. When I think of him now, I will remember him in a similarly positive light. He loved me; I loved him; and I will always be grateful for what he gave me. He did the best he could.
Stuart Vyse, an occasional contributor, is a professor of psychology at Connecticut College.
Sunday, November 22, 2009
Philosopher Peter Singer at Connecticut College
Professor Singer participated in a panel discussion entitled "If I Can Save a Life, Should I? Affluence, Morality, and the Problem of World Poverty," sponsored by the Holleran Center for Public Policy and Community Service at Connecticut College, New London, CT, October 23, 2009.
Part One: Introduction and Opening Presentation
Part Two: Panelists and Singer Responds to Panelists
Part Three: Question and Answer Period
Part One: Introduction and Opening Presentation
Part Two: Panelists and Singer Responds to Panelists
Part Three: Question and Answer Period
Sunday, February 01, 2009
When Grownups Cry
There are many wonderful things about reading to children. The attentiveness of the child, the physical contact, and the sharing of images, characters, and stories. But children also sometimes learn about their parents during this time spent together. If the story is well written and if there are sad or poignant events on the way to the conclusion, the reader may become emotional, momentarily unable to go on. Or the parent’s voice may change, taking on a plaintive, half-crying tone. Not every reader responds this way, but some do—often the same ones who cry at movies.
When children see their parents become emotional in this way, they often respond with surprise and concern. “What are you doing, Mommy?” “What’s wrong, Dad?” The child is listening to the same words, but may not experience the same feelings. Adults have a longer history of emotional experiences. The events of the story are combined with others in the past to evoke powerful feelings. In some cases, the emotion comes from a level of understanding that the child does not yet possess.
Normally the child is not greatly alarmed, but kids know they are supposed to be the ones who cry, not parents. Parents are the soothers. When children get upset, parents are counted upon to remain calm and gently coax them back to steadiness.
I have always been a crier, and now that my kids are older, it has become a source of great amusement. They don’t need me to read to them anymore, but we still watch movies together. And I still cry. At a recent showing of Slumdog Millionaire, I got emotional at the very end, and my college-aged son was highly entertained. Filing out from our seats we ran into two friends, and he was quick to seize the opportunity to make fun: “He’s sobbing again.” Happy to extend the joke, one woman said, “it’s good he has you to hold him up.” The parent-child role reversal was complete.
Adults who cry are vulnerable to ridicule, yet despite the social risks, I think it is valuable for children to see their parents become emotional in this way. When we cry in response to a happy or sad story about someone else, it is a purely empathetic response, and an inclination to empathy is something we should want to pass on. Now that presidents have been photographed crying in public, even the old stigma against male tears is fading.
I once worked with someone who could be overcome by emotion at the a drop of a hat. She was Dean of the Faculty at the college where I teach, and almost daily she would begin to snuffle and tears would roll down her cheeks. All it would take was for someone to recount a kindness done for a member of the college community or an unfortunate event that had befallen a faculty member, and she would be overtaken with emotion.
This behavior was the object of much teasing, but more than anything else, it seemed to endear the Dean to those around her. Her job required making difficult decisions, many of which unavoidably created unhappiness for some. Nonetheless, she had a reputation for fair and compassionate leadership.
I think there may have been a connection between the Dean’s easy tears and her administrative style. She always kept the larger goals of the college in mind, but her sensitivity to others undoubtedly helped her imagine the consequences of her policies and anticipate their effects.
It was a formula that worked quite well, and when the Dean retired from the college, her colleagues threw her a party and celebrated her achievements with many warm expressions of gratitude. Of course, they also teased her about crying.
I suppose I might have tried to cover up my emotions while reading to my children. I could have hidden my tears at the movies. But if there is a chance that by crying openly I can demonstrate for my children a sense of compassion for others, it is worth suffering a little ridicule.
When children see their parents become emotional in this way, they often respond with surprise and concern. “What are you doing, Mommy?” “What’s wrong, Dad?” The child is listening to the same words, but may not experience the same feelings. Adults have a longer history of emotional experiences. The events of the story are combined with others in the past to evoke powerful feelings. In some cases, the emotion comes from a level of understanding that the child does not yet possess.
Normally the child is not greatly alarmed, but kids know they are supposed to be the ones who cry, not parents. Parents are the soothers. When children get upset, parents are counted upon to remain calm and gently coax them back to steadiness.
I have always been a crier, and now that my kids are older, it has become a source of great amusement. They don’t need me to read to them anymore, but we still watch movies together. And I still cry. At a recent showing of Slumdog Millionaire, I got emotional at the very end, and my college-aged son was highly entertained. Filing out from our seats we ran into two friends, and he was quick to seize the opportunity to make fun: “He’s sobbing again.” Happy to extend the joke, one woman said, “it’s good he has you to hold him up.” The parent-child role reversal was complete.
Adults who cry are vulnerable to ridicule, yet despite the social risks, I think it is valuable for children to see their parents become emotional in this way. When we cry in response to a happy or sad story about someone else, it is a purely empathetic response, and an inclination to empathy is something we should want to pass on. Now that presidents have been photographed crying in public, even the old stigma against male tears is fading.
I once worked with someone who could be overcome by emotion at the a drop of a hat. She was Dean of the Faculty at the college where I teach, and almost daily she would begin to snuffle and tears would roll down her cheeks. All it would take was for someone to recount a kindness done for a member of the college community or an unfortunate event that had befallen a faculty member, and she would be overtaken with emotion.
This behavior was the object of much teasing, but more than anything else, it seemed to endear the Dean to those around her. Her job required making difficult decisions, many of which unavoidably created unhappiness for some. Nonetheless, she had a reputation for fair and compassionate leadership.
I think there may have been a connection between the Dean’s easy tears and her administrative style. She always kept the larger goals of the college in mind, but her sensitivity to others undoubtedly helped her imagine the consequences of her policies and anticipate their effects.
It was a formula that worked quite well, and when the Dean retired from the college, her colleagues threw her a party and celebrated her achievements with many warm expressions of gratitude. Of course, they also teased her about crying.
I suppose I might have tried to cover up my emotions while reading to my children. I could have hidden my tears at the movies. But if there is a chance that by crying openly I can demonstrate for my children a sense of compassion for others, it is worth suffering a little ridicule.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Sunday, December 21, 2008
Adventures in Radioland IV
Last week I was on a show on a progressive radio network. The host promotes alternative health diets and supplements and calls himself “Dr.” despite a somewhat shaky academic background. He is something of a guru, and his radio style is to do long, pensive monologues rife with doom and gloom. In his view, the world is burning slowly as powerful forces align themselves against us.
I agreed to be on the show because—why not?—perhaps I could do some good and promote a book at the same time. In addition, I figured his audience would be politically liberal. Undoubtedly from the paranoid, conspiracy theory wing of the progressive camp (for example, the host is an HIV denier who suggests that HIV is harmless and is not the cause of AIDS), but liberal and, as a result, receptive to some of my ideas about commercialism and the economy. I felt a little better about my decision when I later heard the host say that Joe Stiglitz, the Nobel Prize winning economist, had recently been on the show.
As is often the case, I was approached via email by a producer who told me to be available in my office at 12:30, but on the appointed day, he called me about 15 minutes early and put me on hold, where I was able to listen to the show while waiting. What became obvious was that the producer did not communicate well with the host. The show had started at noon, and the host had been rambling on about doom and gloom with little sign of letup. Once on the line I listened and waited. And waited. Finally, at about 12:40—by now I had been listening to the monologue, uninterrupted by commercials, for 25 minutes—the host’s lecture turned to economic doom and gloom and he threw the ball to me.
The host asked no specific question. In effect, he was saying, “With that introduction, please take it away, Stuart....” Caught a little off guard, I began to ramble myself, but the question was, how long should I ramble? For most radio interviews, there is an expectation of a back-and-forth conversation. If there is time, the guest is allowed to go on for a minute or two if so moved, but monologues are discouraged. Not so in this case. When I paused to see if the host wanted back in, there was dead air for a few seconds. Finally, he came back with another languid, amorphous question, and it became clear that he wanted me to drift on for as long as possible. He had a two-hour block to fill and hoped I would do my share. Unfortunately, neither he nor the producer had given me any guidance about this. For all I knew, this was a six-minute interview, for which sound bites would be most appropriate, but in the end we went on at least 20 minutes, arriving safely at the top of his first hour.
Eventually the host thanked me for being on the show, repeated my name, title, and the name of my book and went on to talk about other things. So, after making certain I was not going to be called upon again, I hung up. In a couple of minutes the producer called back to ask whether I was supposed to return in the second hour. I said I didn’t know but it sounded to me like the host had sent me on my way. Uncertain, the producer—who should have been the one telling me just how long I would be on, instead of the reverse—asked to put me on hold again just in case. After listening to 15 more minutes of doom and gloom monologue (it must take a particular type of person to be a fan of such a downer program), the producer came back on and said I could hang up. He was obviously clueless about his host’s master plan.
A final note. In a previous Adventures in Radioland post, I wrote about banging steam pipes in my office and my other unwanted noises that have interrupted my radio interviews. On this progressive radio occasion I escaped the banging pipes for the full time I was on the radio, despite very cold temperatures, but halfway through my interview, the college grounds people decided to use an enormous sucking machine to pick up piles of leaves directly under my office window. For much of the 20 minutes I was on, my rambling comments were accompanied by high-pitched vacuum cleaner noises. Yet another audio problem to be added to the list.
I agreed to be on the show because—why not?—perhaps I could do some good and promote a book at the same time. In addition, I figured his audience would be politically liberal. Undoubtedly from the paranoid, conspiracy theory wing of the progressive camp (for example, the host is an HIV denier who suggests that HIV is harmless and is not the cause of AIDS), but liberal and, as a result, receptive to some of my ideas about commercialism and the economy. I felt a little better about my decision when I later heard the host say that Joe Stiglitz, the Nobel Prize winning economist, had recently been on the show.
As is often the case, I was approached via email by a producer who told me to be available in my office at 12:30, but on the appointed day, he called me about 15 minutes early and put me on hold, where I was able to listen to the show while waiting. What became obvious was that the producer did not communicate well with the host. The show had started at noon, and the host had been rambling on about doom and gloom with little sign of letup. Once on the line I listened and waited. And waited. Finally, at about 12:40—by now I had been listening to the monologue, uninterrupted by commercials, for 25 minutes—the host’s lecture turned to economic doom and gloom and he threw the ball to me.
The host asked no specific question. In effect, he was saying, “With that introduction, please take it away, Stuart....” Caught a little off guard, I began to ramble myself, but the question was, how long should I ramble? For most radio interviews, there is an expectation of a back-and-forth conversation. If there is time, the guest is allowed to go on for a minute or two if so moved, but monologues are discouraged. Not so in this case. When I paused to see if the host wanted back in, there was dead air for a few seconds. Finally, he came back with another languid, amorphous question, and it became clear that he wanted me to drift on for as long as possible. He had a two-hour block to fill and hoped I would do my share. Unfortunately, neither he nor the producer had given me any guidance about this. For all I knew, this was a six-minute interview, for which sound bites would be most appropriate, but in the end we went on at least 20 minutes, arriving safely at the top of his first hour.
Eventually the host thanked me for being on the show, repeated my name, title, and the name of my book and went on to talk about other things. So, after making certain I was not going to be called upon again, I hung up. In a couple of minutes the producer called back to ask whether I was supposed to return in the second hour. I said I didn’t know but it sounded to me like the host had sent me on my way. Uncertain, the producer—who should have been the one telling me just how long I would be on, instead of the reverse—asked to put me on hold again just in case. After listening to 15 more minutes of doom and gloom monologue (it must take a particular type of person to be a fan of such a downer program), the producer came back on and said I could hang up. He was obviously clueless about his host’s master plan.
A final note. In a previous Adventures in Radioland post, I wrote about banging steam pipes in my office and my other unwanted noises that have interrupted my radio interviews. On this progressive radio occasion I escaped the banging pipes for the full time I was on the radio, despite very cold temperatures, but halfway through my interview, the college grounds people decided to use an enormous sucking machine to pick up piles of leaves directly under my office window. For much of the 20 minutes I was on, my rambling comments were accompanied by high-pitched vacuum cleaner noises. Yet another audio problem to be added to the list.
Saturday, December 06, 2008
Garbled by the Web
Here is a wonderful example of what computers can do. This incorrect book title and incoherent quote--both by me--were found on an anonymous website in an entry with the amusing title: “American Consumers Are Abbreviate On Conduct If It Comes To Departing With Their Income.”
This is probably a case of inadvertent back-translation. An actual quote from me was translated into an unknown foreign language and then translated back into this broken English. Undoubtedly both translations were done automatically by computer, which explains the wonderfully inaccurate result here.
It does give me the idea, however, that the sequel to Going Broke might be a guidebook called Traveling Broke.
"Never accept Americans, who accept consistently admired their toys, been faced with a bearings area their impulses are so harder to control," says Stuart Vyse, a assistant of attitude and columnist of the accessible book Traveling Broke: Why Americans Can't Hold on to Their Money.
This is probably a case of inadvertent back-translation. An actual quote from me was translated into an unknown foreign language and then translated back into this broken English. Undoubtedly both translations were done automatically by computer, which explains the wonderfully inaccurate result here.
It does give me the idea, however, that the sequel to Going Broke might be a guidebook called Traveling Broke.
Thursday, November 20, 2008
The Pajama Phenomenon
I have been teaching at the college level for over twenty years, and I have seen many styles of student attire come and go. Black-and-white photographs of college students from the 1950s or earlier show men in jackets and ties and women in dresses, but those days are long gone. Jeans, sneakers, sweatshirts, and t-shirts are now the norm, but sweatpants, track suits, and other forms of workout clothes are also common. Some of my colleagues were annoyed when their students started wearing baseball caps to class. More popular with men than women, these head coverings are often worn backwards with the bill going down the neck, but they also commonly appear frontwards, straight on or at a variety of listing, half-twisted angles. The hats-in-class trend has persisted for over a decade with little hint of decline, and most college professors hardly notice anymore.
But over the last couple of years I have witnessed a new development. Students have started coming to class wearing pajamas. In most cases, flannel pajama bottoms are worn with some kind of conventional, non-sleep attire top. My first encounters with this fashion were with male students, but I have also seen women dressed this way for a Psychology 101 lecture.
I am a casual dresser myself. I often wear jeans and running shoes to class, generally with an oxford shirt and/or a sweater on top. I rarely wear a jacket and almost never a tie. Furthermore, I consider myself fairly accepting of the fashions worn by students. I was young once, too, and what matters most is the student’s attentiveness and motivation to perform.
But something about the pajama thing bothers me. Perhaps it is an artificial distinction, but it seems to me that pajamas were not intended for use outside the house. I know that at the small liberal arts college where I work, students sometimes feel like they live in a bubble. The classrooms are just steps from their beds, and it must feel like they have tumbled down the stairs to a class at the kitchen table. Furthermore, many adults are comfortable wearing a bathrobe to drive their kids to school or to go through the drive-thru window a Dunkin’ Donuts. In addition, pajamas seem to be a general college-age phenomenon not limited to small residential institutions. On a recent trip to the University of Massachusetts I watched a pair of red and blue flannel Red Sox pajamas stride through the student union building.
I have never before felt the need to introduce a dress code for my classes, and I probably will not do so now. But here is the problem. I recently had a good student start wearing pajama bottoms to a small seminar class, and then midway through the semester he asked me to recommend him for an internship at a prestigious university. To make matters worse, his academic performance—which was usually quite good—had recently dropped off. I told him I would provide the recommendation, but I urged him to consider what effect the pajamas combined with his recent decline might have on my impressions of him. Undoubtedly, the bubble clouded this student's view of the future. He probably had not considered that advancement almost always requires that people who know you be willing to vouch for you to people who don’t. At least in my case, wearing pajamas to class does not enhance the image of students I send forth to future employers.
But over the last couple of years I have witnessed a new development. Students have started coming to class wearing pajamas. In most cases, flannel pajama bottoms are worn with some kind of conventional, non-sleep attire top. My first encounters with this fashion were with male students, but I have also seen women dressed this way for a Psychology 101 lecture.
I am a casual dresser myself. I often wear jeans and running shoes to class, generally with an oxford shirt and/or a sweater on top. I rarely wear a jacket and almost never a tie. Furthermore, I consider myself fairly accepting of the fashions worn by students. I was young once, too, and what matters most is the student’s attentiveness and motivation to perform.
But something about the pajama thing bothers me. Perhaps it is an artificial distinction, but it seems to me that pajamas were not intended for use outside the house. I know that at the small liberal arts college where I work, students sometimes feel like they live in a bubble. The classrooms are just steps from their beds, and it must feel like they have tumbled down the stairs to a class at the kitchen table. Furthermore, many adults are comfortable wearing a bathrobe to drive their kids to school or to go through the drive-thru window a Dunkin’ Donuts. In addition, pajamas seem to be a general college-age phenomenon not limited to small residential institutions. On a recent trip to the University of Massachusetts I watched a pair of red and blue flannel Red Sox pajamas stride through the student union building.
I have never before felt the need to introduce a dress code for my classes, and I probably will not do so now. But here is the problem. I recently had a good student start wearing pajama bottoms to a small seminar class, and then midway through the semester he asked me to recommend him for an internship at a prestigious university. To make matters worse, his academic performance—which was usually quite good—had recently dropped off. I told him I would provide the recommendation, but I urged him to consider what effect the pajamas combined with his recent decline might have on my impressions of him. Undoubtedly, the bubble clouded this student's view of the future. He probably had not considered that advancement almost always requires that people who know you be willing to vouch for you to people who don’t. At least in my case, wearing pajamas to class does not enhance the image of students I send forth to future employers.
Monday, September 15, 2008
Simple Pleasures: Taking Group Pictures for Tourists
Amateur snapshot photography has been popular since the introduction of the Kodak Brownie box camera in 1900, but the recent emergence of digital photography seems to have greatly increased the popularity of picture-taking. Most of the developing and printing costs have been eliminated, and pictures can be distributed over the internet with a click of the mouse. Many—myself included—believe the average quality of snapshots has decreased, but this flaw is overshadowed by the benefits of digital pictures. Nowadays, many people seem to bring their digital cameras wherever they go—just in case something memorable happens.
Lately, I have taken great pleasure in a simple act of photographic kindness. Couples and families who are traveling together often find themselves in front of a scenic backdrop, unable to create a photo of the entire group. They go through the ritual of assigning one member after the other to be the photographer, but unless they are assertive enough to ask a stranger to take a picture—and willing to hand over their camera to someone they don’t know—they never get the shot they want. Recently, particularly if I am traveling, I have begun to be much more forward with offers to take photos of couples or families together.
Many of my most cherished family photos were taken at distant locations by strangers recruited on the spot. Naturally, the quality of these photos is quite variable, but having a record of the entire group is very important. For any couple or family, the sights and sounds of traveling are an exciting experience, but encountering them with others is a memorable part of the event. The group photo records that sense of shared travel in a way that separate photos cannot.
In the summer of 2007, I spent a few days in Seattle alone. It was a nice trip. The city is quite beautiful and exciting, but at various points I felt a little lonely. One day I took the ferry to Bainbridge Island and back, an inexpensive excursion that affords beautiful views of Seattle across Puget Sound. This is a West Coast equivalent of using the Staten Island Ferry as an inexpensive Manhattan tour boat. On the return trip, I wandered around the large, modern vessel, and when I arrived at the bow, I found several couples and families taking photographs of themselves with Seattle in the background. Without hesitation, I began to offer to take pictures of several of the groups. Naturally some people were a bit hesitant to accept my offer, but no one turned it down. In several cases the travelers were very appreciative as I patiently took multiple shots when necessary.
It is just a simple act: offering to take a picture. But knowing how much I value my own family photos, made it seem important, and for a few moments far from home and work, taking those pictures gave me a much needed sense of purpose. I stepped off the ferry in a far better mood than I when I got on.
Lately, I have taken great pleasure in a simple act of photographic kindness. Couples and families who are traveling together often find themselves in front of a scenic backdrop, unable to create a photo of the entire group. They go through the ritual of assigning one member after the other to be the photographer, but unless they are assertive enough to ask a stranger to take a picture—and willing to hand over their camera to someone they don’t know—they never get the shot they want. Recently, particularly if I am traveling, I have begun to be much more forward with offers to take photos of couples or families together.
Many of my most cherished family photos were taken at distant locations by strangers recruited on the spot. Naturally, the quality of these photos is quite variable, but having a record of the entire group is very important. For any couple or family, the sights and sounds of traveling are an exciting experience, but encountering them with others is a memorable part of the event. The group photo records that sense of shared travel in a way that separate photos cannot.
In the summer of 2007, I spent a few days in Seattle alone. It was a nice trip. The city is quite beautiful and exciting, but at various points I felt a little lonely. One day I took the ferry to Bainbridge Island and back, an inexpensive excursion that affords beautiful views of Seattle across Puget Sound. This is a West Coast equivalent of using the Staten Island Ferry as an inexpensive Manhattan tour boat. On the return trip, I wandered around the large, modern vessel, and when I arrived at the bow, I found several couples and families taking photographs of themselves with Seattle in the background. Without hesitation, I began to offer to take pictures of several of the groups. Naturally some people were a bit hesitant to accept my offer, but no one turned it down. In several cases the travelers were very appreciative as I patiently took multiple shots when necessary.
It is just a simple act: offering to take a picture. But knowing how much I value my own family photos, made it seem important, and for a few moments far from home and work, taking those pictures gave me a much needed sense of purpose. I stepped off the ferry in a far better mood than I when I got on.
Friday, September 05, 2008
John Gardner's Ghost
When I went to my mailbox at work today I found a book that was sent, as the slip of paper tucked inside indicated, “With the compliments of the publisher.” Textbook publishers send college professors many books we never ask for in the hope we will adopt one as a required text. But this unsolicited book was something different. It was a copy of John Gardner’s novel, Mickelsson’s Ghosts, originally published in 1982, just months before Gardner was killed in a motorcycle accident.
John Gardner was a wildly talented American novelist and medieval scholar, and I was briefly his student in the mid-1970s. At that time, I was a graduate student in English Literature at Southern Illinois University, where Gardner was a professor who had just achieved national acclaim for Grendel, his retelling of Beowulf from the point of view of the monster, and The Sunlight Dialogues, a New York Times bestselling counterculture novel. I have written about Gardner’s brief and controversial career in an op-ed piece “John Gardner’s Lesson about Teaching.”
After Gardner’s death, many of his novels went out of print. Grendel remains very popular because many college professors assign it as a companion to the study of Beowulf, but all his other novels faded away. Because I knew Gardner and took his graduate-level Chaucer seminar, I followed his career long after leaving school, read most of his books, and collected copies of almost everything he published.
I’ve enjoyed many of the Gardner books I’ve read, but for years, I avoided his hefty final novel Mickelsson’s Ghosts. Then in 2006 I read Barry Silesky’s biography, John Gardner: Literary Outlaw, and was inspired to take on Mickelsson. It was wonderful. My favorite Gardner novel to date. In an Amazon.com review I wrote:
This book is a gem. The main character is a troubled philosophy professor who is sometimes difficult to like, but the book itself is one to love. It is philosophical work, but it is also part ghost story, part mystery, and part romance. The pages just keep turning, and the ending does not disappoint.
In the meantime, I learned that New Directions had committed to bringing back into print paperback editions of four of Gardner’s novels. Soon the word came out that three of these titles had been decided. The first would be Gardner’s National Book Critics Circle Award winning, October Light, followed by the bestseller Sunlight Dialogues, and Gardner’s pastoral romance, Nickel Mountain. The final novel had not been chosen, and I took it upon myself to contact New Directions by email to urge them to give serious consideration to Mickelsson’s Ghosts. I pointed out that Mickelsson’s average Amazon readers rating was higher than the other three novels they had chosen to publish. Elsewhere in my Amazon.com review, I wrote:
I am hoping New Directions will choose to reissue this novel, along with the other Gardner books they are bringing back into print. To overlook it would be a big mistake.
An editor at the press wrote back to assure me that Mickelsson was being given serious consideration.
When Nickel Mountain was reissued last year, I bought a copy and was delighted when I found a page among the front matter with the heading ALSO BY JOHN GARDNER from New Directions. Of course, the other reissued novels were listed, but at the bottom of the page were the words “Forthcoming MICHELSSON’S GHOSTS.” I was thrilled.
Then today a copy of the new edition of Mickelsson’s Ghosts came in the mail. The book is nicely constructed and includes photographs by the author’s son, Joel Gardner, that illustrated the original volume. The US Postal Service envelope containing the book had been addressed to my office by hand, but inside there was no letter of explanation. I did not need one. I am a psychology professor, and although I receive many books “compliments of the publisher,” I am never sent novels. This was one of John Gardner’s ghosts, sent as a thank you.
Friday, August 22, 2008
Adventures in Television Land: Dry Lips and Echoes
Last Monday I appeared on The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer. The six-minute interview was taped the week before, but based on my prior experience (see Adventures in Television Land: Osama bin Laden and Me ), I told almost no one that the appearance was in the works. I thought the taping had gone pretty well, but once your interview has been recorded, you never know for certain that a radio or television show will use the material until they do. Fortunately, this time they did, and the reviews from family and friends have been quite good.
Being a pure talking head—a face in a box on the screen—is a daunting experience. In this case, I was in a small studio in New Haven, CT with bright lights shining in my face, staring at the black eye of a TV camera, and Jeffrey Brown, the correspondent for The NewsHour was in a studio in Arlington, VA. The video and audio of me were going to VA via satellite to be recorded on that end, and Brown’s questions to me were coming north over a phone line. There was no video signal coming back to me from the Arlington studio, so I could not see Brown. I just had his voice in my ear.
To be a successful talking head, you have to learn to make eye contact with the camera eye, or else you look like you are not really paying attention. This turns out to be a somewhat challenging skill, and the technicians at the Yale University studio reported that some inexperienced interviewees have spent the whole time looking at their shoes.
So under the best of circumstances, being recorded for television in this manner is a challenge, but I had two additional problems. First, I got dry lips. This is a problem I had once before while being interviewed for a video, and I learned how deadly it is to get caught licking your lips on screen. But my worst problem did not become evident until it was too late. The interview started very suddenly, and as I listened to Jeffrey Brown’s questions and tried to construct intelligent responses, I discovered that I could hear myself in the earpiece. However, because what I was hearing was my own voice playing in the Arlington studio and coming back to me over the phone line, the sound was delayed. So my powers of concentration, already strained by the demands of the situation (“...stare at the camera; don’t lick your lips....”), were further challenged by having to ignore my own voice echoing in my ear.
Somehow I managed to get through it without looking like a complete fool. After hearing the report of my ordeal, my brother gave me a great piece of advice for the future: lip balm.
Being a pure talking head—a face in a box on the screen—is a daunting experience. In this case, I was in a small studio in New Haven, CT with bright lights shining in my face, staring at the black eye of a TV camera, and Jeffrey Brown, the correspondent for The NewsHour was in a studio in Arlington, VA. The video and audio of me were going to VA via satellite to be recorded on that end, and Brown’s questions to me were coming north over a phone line. There was no video signal coming back to me from the Arlington studio, so I could not see Brown. I just had his voice in my ear.
To be a successful talking head, you have to learn to make eye contact with the camera eye, or else you look like you are not really paying attention. This turns out to be a somewhat challenging skill, and the technicians at the Yale University studio reported that some inexperienced interviewees have spent the whole time looking at their shoes.
So under the best of circumstances, being recorded for television in this manner is a challenge, but I had two additional problems. First, I got dry lips. This is a problem I had once before while being interviewed for a video, and I learned how deadly it is to get caught licking your lips on screen. But my worst problem did not become evident until it was too late. The interview started very suddenly, and as I listened to Jeffrey Brown’s questions and tried to construct intelligent responses, I discovered that I could hear myself in the earpiece. However, because what I was hearing was my own voice playing in the Arlington studio and coming back to me over the phone line, the sound was delayed. So my powers of concentration, already strained by the demands of the situation (“...stare at the camera; don’t lick your lips....”), were further challenged by having to ignore my own voice echoing in my ear.
Somehow I managed to get through it without looking like a complete fool. After hearing the report of my ordeal, my brother gave me a great piece of advice for the future: lip balm.
Saturday, August 02, 2008
Simple Pleasures: Soft Ice Cream
A while back I wrote an op-ed piece (“In Praise of Cheap and Local Eats”) extolling the virtues of eating at local diners, pizza places, and other inexpensive neighborhood eateries. No matter the venue, I consider eating out a luxury, and my appreciation for simple forms of restaurant food has been expressed in earlier blog posts.
Now that summer is well underway, I am reminded of one of my most abiding simple pleasures: soft ice cream. Soft serve is an odd product. I am not sure that the mix it is made from is entirely food, and then there is the wafer cone. What is that made of? I’m not sure I want to know. As a teenager, I worked at a Dairy Queen in Urbana, Illinois, and things went on there that I would rather not describe.
But I love the stuff. Vanilla just plain or dipped in that waxy chocolate coating. Chocolate soft serve or a chocolate vanilla twist is also very satisfying, but I steadfastly resist the new methods of injecting exotic flavors into the standard vanilla cone. This is soft serve trying to be something it is not, and I prefer the simple purity of vanilla and chocolate.
Soft ice cream is a less pretentious dessert than hard or gourmet ice cream, and it is strongly associated with summertime vacations and automobile travel, in particular. Here in the East, most soft serve is found at the roadside seasonal clam shacks and take-out ice cream places that close when the warm weather and tourists disappear. Your cone is likely to be handed to you by a high school or college student working for tuition money, and in my case, each lick conjures up memories of summers past.
Monday, July 21, 2008
More Thoughts on Tattoos
A friend of mine has a small tattoo on the inside of her ankle. She got the tattoo many years ago, and although it is relatively discrete and in the shape of a flower, she now regrets her tattoo. My friend has a young daughter, and whenever the girl remarks on her mother’s tattoo—or anyone else’s tattoo—my friend says, “Big mistake.”
Today I saw a man who had large black tattooed marks all over his arms. It was as if he had painted most of his forearms with a wide brush. It took me a moment, but I soon realized the man had tattooed over older tattoos he no longer wanted to display. It was impossible for me to make out what was underneath, but my mind raced as I imagined all manner of embarrassing or offensive images.
Those who turn their bodies into works of art and make indelible strokes upon that pallet risk growing tired of their creations. No action can be undone, but some decisions are particularly difficult to reverse.
Today I saw a man who had large black tattooed marks all over his arms. It was as if he had painted most of his forearms with a wide brush. It took me a moment, but I soon realized the man had tattooed over older tattoos he no longer wanted to display. It was impossible for me to make out what was underneath, but my mind raced as I imagined all manner of embarrassing or offensive images.
Those who turn their bodies into works of art and make indelible strokes upon that pallet risk growing tired of their creations. No action can be undone, but some decisions are particularly difficult to reverse.
Friday, July 11, 2008
The Great Child Divide
Here is my latest op-ed, which appeared in the Providence Journal yesterday. The title I gave it is above, but in the newspaper business, titles are the editor’s prerogative.
Having children: A way to learn tolerance
01:00 AM EDT on Friday, July 11, 2008
STUART VYSE
STONINGTON, Conn.
SCREAMING BABIES on airplanes don’t bother me anymore. It’s an odd thing. Years ago my teeth would clench, my blood pressure rise, and, more often than not, I would turn to the person next to me and make a malicious comment about the bratty kid, the irresponsible parent, or both. But today I remain calm. If anything, I am filled with a sense of relief in the knowledge that, yes, that kid is making a terrible racket, but it isn’t my job to do anything about it.
The difference between the old me and the new me is, of course, that I’ve done my time. I’ve had my own children and suffered the stares of irritated fellow travelers who were hoping for a quiet airplane, train, or bus ride. I’ve scurried out of restaurants, grocery stores, and theaters carrying an infant who suddenly and inexplicably decided to erupt into shrieking peals of terror. These are humbling experiences, and once you’ve had them, you have a far more understanding attitude toward those who carry on the tradition.
Years ago when my wife and I were considering whether or not to have children, a friend gave me a small gift. This woman had a daughter who was the center of her world, and yet when I told her what was on my mind, my friend said being a parent had not been the measure of her worth. This woman believed that had she chosen not to have a child, her life could have been equally meaningful and valuable.
Hearing this from a devoted parent, just when I was considering becoming one myself, was somewhat liberating. This mother was saying, “Either decision is fine. Just find the right one for you.” In the end, we had two children before we were through, and looking back, I like to think that my friend was right. Being a parent may be one of the most important and difficult jobs you can take on, but it isn’t the only way to give your life purpose.
But having kids changes your life forever. I did not have much money when I was young, but what I had could be spent freely, with little concern for anyone else. Once the children came, huge sums of money, time, and energy went to them. Entering into the parental contract commits you to a certain level of selflessness. You are forced to accept the principle that you are not the most important person in the world.
Parenthood also makes you a member of a unique society. When parents socialize, the conversation invariably turns to kids. Non-parents sometimes ask me about my children, but I often feel like a foreign correspondent, doing my best to communicate with someone who doesn’t quite understand the language and customs. In contrast, speaking to another parent means you can adopt a familiar short hand without concern for losing your audience.
The different dialects of the parental divide can subtly but powerfully alter the course of your life. Looking around me I notice that many of my closest social relationships are with people whose children are about the same age as mine. In some cases, these are not people I would have otherwise sought out. Our kids chose each other first, and eventually the adults also became friends. Now, as my children get older and leave home, I can see that many of these friendships will carry on. What we shared during our children’s formative years continues to provide momentum in our adult relationships.
In addition to cherishing the children themselves, I am thankful for what parenthood has taught me. There are other ways to learn to be more tolerant of other people, to learn the value of service to another, and to learn that friendships can grow across any number of barriers. But being a parent has done it for me, and every time I hear a screaming baby, I am grateful.
Stuart Vyse, an occasional contributor and a professor of psychology at Connecticut College, is the author of the new book Going Broke: Why Americans Can’t Hold On To Their Money (Oxford University Press).
Having children: A way to learn tolerance
01:00 AM EDT on Friday, July 11, 2008
STUART VYSE
STONINGTON, Conn.
SCREAMING BABIES on airplanes don’t bother me anymore. It’s an odd thing. Years ago my teeth would clench, my blood pressure rise, and, more often than not, I would turn to the person next to me and make a malicious comment about the bratty kid, the irresponsible parent, or both. But today I remain calm. If anything, I am filled with a sense of relief in the knowledge that, yes, that kid is making a terrible racket, but it isn’t my job to do anything about it.
The difference between the old me and the new me is, of course, that I’ve done my time. I’ve had my own children and suffered the stares of irritated fellow travelers who were hoping for a quiet airplane, train, or bus ride. I’ve scurried out of restaurants, grocery stores, and theaters carrying an infant who suddenly and inexplicably decided to erupt into shrieking peals of terror. These are humbling experiences, and once you’ve had them, you have a far more understanding attitude toward those who carry on the tradition.
Years ago when my wife and I were considering whether or not to have children, a friend gave me a small gift. This woman had a daughter who was the center of her world, and yet when I told her what was on my mind, my friend said being a parent had not been the measure of her worth. This woman believed that had she chosen not to have a child, her life could have been equally meaningful and valuable.
Hearing this from a devoted parent, just when I was considering becoming one myself, was somewhat liberating. This mother was saying, “Either decision is fine. Just find the right one for you.” In the end, we had two children before we were through, and looking back, I like to think that my friend was right. Being a parent may be one of the most important and difficult jobs you can take on, but it isn’t the only way to give your life purpose.
But having kids changes your life forever. I did not have much money when I was young, but what I had could be spent freely, with little concern for anyone else. Once the children came, huge sums of money, time, and energy went to them. Entering into the parental contract commits you to a certain level of selflessness. You are forced to accept the principle that you are not the most important person in the world.
Parenthood also makes you a member of a unique society. When parents socialize, the conversation invariably turns to kids. Non-parents sometimes ask me about my children, but I often feel like a foreign correspondent, doing my best to communicate with someone who doesn’t quite understand the language and customs. In contrast, speaking to another parent means you can adopt a familiar short hand without concern for losing your audience.
The different dialects of the parental divide can subtly but powerfully alter the course of your life. Looking around me I notice that many of my closest social relationships are with people whose children are about the same age as mine. In some cases, these are not people I would have otherwise sought out. Our kids chose each other first, and eventually the adults also became friends. Now, as my children get older and leave home, I can see that many of these friendships will carry on. What we shared during our children’s formative years continues to provide momentum in our adult relationships.
In addition to cherishing the children themselves, I am thankful for what parenthood has taught me. There are other ways to learn to be more tolerant of other people, to learn the value of service to another, and to learn that friendships can grow across any number of barriers. But being a parent has done it for me, and every time I hear a screaming baby, I am grateful.
Stuart Vyse, an occasional contributor and a professor of psychology at Connecticut College, is the author of the new book Going Broke: Why Americans Can’t Hold On To Their Money (Oxford University Press).
Saturday, June 28, 2008
Simple Pleasures: Folding Clothes and Washing Dishes
I am a lover of simple domestic life, and two of its common chores are favorites of mine: folding clothes and washing dishes. Interestingly, I am not particularly good at either one of them. I regularly discover—or more embarrassingly, someone else discovers—smudges on glasses and bits of dried food on plates that I am supposed to have cleaned. When I am folding, oddly shaped clothes, undergarments, and smaller items often resist my efforts to flatten them.
Over the years, I have known two women who were very skilled folders. In their hands, piles of t-shirts looked like neatly stacked playing cards, and laundry that was naturally inclined toward chaos and entropy was soon molded into cloth monuments to order and efficiency. One of these women taught me how to fold one of the the laundry worker’s biggest problems: the fitted sheet. I stand in genuine admiration of people who show such masterful command over clean laundry. I have tried, but I am unable to match their skills.
Particularly in light of my meager abilities, it is curious that I like these activities as much as I do. I can think of several reasons. First, they are domestic chores. Daily chores. Small parts of the business of making a home. When you live—or, at least, eat—with others, these chores also represent service to another, which can be very gratifying. In addition, dish washing and folding have something in common. They both involve dipping your hands into something warm and clean: dry—and often warm—clothes from the dryer and wet, sudsy water in the sink. These are very pleasant sensations for me. Finally, both these chores are most often done alone, which allows the worker to recede into his or her own thoughts while engaged in a mantra-like, repetitive task. If there is a window at the sink, the dish washer’s contemplations are accompanied by scenery.
My habit of daydreaming while washing and folding is undoubtedly part of the explanation of my poor performance. If I gave greater attention to the job at hand, I might produce cleaner dishes and more neatly folded clothes. True enough. But I am not likely to change. Daydreaming is a large part of the appeal, and I am unwilling to give it up.
Over the years, I have known two women who were very skilled folders. In their hands, piles of t-shirts looked like neatly stacked playing cards, and laundry that was naturally inclined toward chaos and entropy was soon molded into cloth monuments to order and efficiency. One of these women taught me how to fold one of the the laundry worker’s biggest problems: the fitted sheet. I stand in genuine admiration of people who show such masterful command over clean laundry. I have tried, but I am unable to match their skills.
Particularly in light of my meager abilities, it is curious that I like these activities as much as I do. I can think of several reasons. First, they are domestic chores. Daily chores. Small parts of the business of making a home. When you live—or, at least, eat—with others, these chores also represent service to another, which can be very gratifying. In addition, dish washing and folding have something in common. They both involve dipping your hands into something warm and clean: dry—and often warm—clothes from the dryer and wet, sudsy water in the sink. These are very pleasant sensations for me. Finally, both these chores are most often done alone, which allows the worker to recede into his or her own thoughts while engaged in a mantra-like, repetitive task. If there is a window at the sink, the dish washer’s contemplations are accompanied by scenery.
My habit of daydreaming while washing and folding is undoubtedly part of the explanation of my poor performance. If I gave greater attention to the job at hand, I might produce cleaner dishes and more neatly folded clothes. True enough. But I am not likely to change. Daydreaming is a large part of the appeal, and I am unwilling to give it up.
Friday, June 20, 2008
Kakutani, Canin, Judaism, & Me
Ethan Canin is a wonderful writer. Along with Alice Munro and Tobias Wolf, I think he is one of the great short story experts working today. The Emperor of Air is a dazzling collection to which I often return, and the story “Where We Are Now” is one of my favorites of all time. Some of the longer stories of The Palace Thief are also breathtaking.
Canin has a new novel out, and Michiko Kakutani reviewed it in the NY Times today. As usual, Kakutani pulls no punches. Although she praises Canin’s many talents, she again criticizes his skills as a novelist. This is Canin’s consistent fate. His short pieces are gems, but his novels receive relatively cool reviews. In this case, Kakutani points to unskilled plotting and “tired tropes” about social class and paternalism.
But as I read the review I found myself searching for something else. I found myself asking, “Yes, yes, but how Jewish is this book?” When I first started reading Ethan Canin, I was probably unaware of his Jewishness. This is not surprising because Canin describes himself as an atheist and seems to have deliberately avoided the Jewish literature category. This quote is from an interview in the Atlantic:
Of course the irony here is that I am not Jewish. Indeed, I am not, in any conventional sense, religious at all. But the love of a Jewish woman has made Jewish things important to me. I have learned the pleasures of shabbat; I have worn a kippah; I have learned to bake challah; and I am becoming familiar with the annual cycle of Jewish holidays. I have always had a sense of affinity for the Jewish people, based on their minority status and their long history of oppression, and as an academic, I came to appreciate the traditions of study and debate. Although I remain a goy, I have several Jewish friends who say I am now more Jewish than they are, and I smile when they say it.
So I find myself in the funny circumstance of being a non-Jew and a fan of Ethan Canin who wishes Canin’s writing were more Jewish. I find myself wishing that a man of his enormous talents would display his Jewishness a bit more. And, oddly enough, I see nothing contradictory in this. Perhaps I am more Jewish than I think.
Canin has a new novel out, and Michiko Kakutani reviewed it in the NY Times today. As usual, Kakutani pulls no punches. Although she praises Canin’s many talents, she again criticizes his skills as a novelist. This is Canin’s consistent fate. His short pieces are gems, but his novels receive relatively cool reviews. In this case, Kakutani points to unskilled plotting and “tired tropes” about social class and paternalism.
But as I read the review I found myself searching for something else. I found myself asking, “Yes, yes, but how Jewish is this book?” When I first started reading Ethan Canin, I was probably unaware of his Jewishness. This is not surprising because Canin describes himself as an atheist and seems to have deliberately avoided the Jewish literature category. This quote is from an interview in the Atlantic:
I've been conscious of not being a Jewish-American writer or a Young Urban Male writer. In a way I wish I were, because it seems easier. I grew up all over the country, moving from town to town when I was a kid, so I never felt a very strong sense of place. My parents were Brooklyn and Queens Jews -- and I was a child in Ohio. I didn't live in a ghetto and yet I had ghetto history in every word my parents said. I remember the first time I set foot in New York: I was twenty years old, and the first time I heard a New Yorker open her mouth I thought, Oh my God I'm home. I realized I'd never been truly comfortable with the outside world before I got to New York. I still think New York is the friendliest city in the country.
Of course the irony here is that I am not Jewish. Indeed, I am not, in any conventional sense, religious at all. But the love of a Jewish woman has made Jewish things important to me. I have learned the pleasures of shabbat; I have worn a kippah; I have learned to bake challah; and I am becoming familiar with the annual cycle of Jewish holidays. I have always had a sense of affinity for the Jewish people, based on their minority status and their long history of oppression, and as an academic, I came to appreciate the traditions of study and debate. Although I remain a goy, I have several Jewish friends who say I am now more Jewish than they are, and I smile when they say it.
So I find myself in the funny circumstance of being a non-Jew and a fan of Ethan Canin who wishes Canin’s writing were more Jewish. I find myself wishing that a man of his enormous talents would display his Jewishness a bit more. And, oddly enough, I see nothing contradictory in this. Perhaps I am more Jewish than I think.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Adventures in Television Land: Osama bin Laden and Me
My experience as a television personality is quite limited. I have appeared as an expert on various cable television documentaries about superstition, and I had brief talking head stints on a book show on CBC Newsworld (described to me as “Canada’s CNN”) and a CNN International news program that was beamed to Europe and beyond but not seen in the United States.
However, my experience with television has been sufficient to expose me to one of this fast-paced medium’s particular disappointments: being bumped. Yesterday it happened again in the classic manner. At around 11:00 AM I received a call asking me to be on a local newscast to comment on the current epidemic of personal debt. A film crew would come to the college to tape me at 3:30 in the afternoon for air later that evening. It was a very sunny day, humid and in the 90s, and at the moment I got the call I was headed to a lunch date in a pair of shorts and a ragged polo shirt. I quickly grabbed a dress shirt and a pair of khakis to change into later and jumped in the car. As luck would have it, I got a call just as my lunch was ending: a large fire had broken out in a condominium complex somewhere in the state of Connecticut. The reporter was very sorry but her film crew had been diverted to this breaking news story. If it bleeds it leads. I felt a little like one of those Tonight Show guests who was last in line and never made it to the couch.
But my most heartbreaking bump experience was at the expense of what would have been my greatest media achievement. In October of 2000, the thirteenth day of the month fell on a Friday. This was three years after my book on the psychology of superstition was published, and the paperback edition had just been released. I got a call from CBS inviting me to appear on The Early Show on Friday the 13th as a live guest in the New York studio. Arrangements were made. CBS booked a hotel room for me for the night before, and a limousine was scheduled to take me to the studios, where I would meet Bryant Gumbel (recently recruited from NBC), Jane Clayson, Mark McEwen, and the rest of the gang. It was all very exciting.
When Thursday the 12th arrived, I planned to leave for New York relatively early in the day. It is a three-hour trip, and I hoped I would have time for some meandering and a nice dinner in the city. But an hour before I was to leave, the phone rang. The USS Cole, a destroyer harbored in Yemen had been bombed, killing 17 crew members and injuring 39 others. The CBS people were very sorry but the following day would be devoted to coverage of the Cole. I was disappointed at being bumped—my segment was never rescheduled—but I understood completely. This is the nature of the news media. They were doing their job, and periodically we should acknowledge how important a job it is.
Looking back, the USS Cole bombing was an even more momentous event than we realized at the time. It was later discovered the suicide mission was conducted by al-Qaeda, the terrorist group headed by Osama bin Laden, and it would be less than a year before Osama bin Laden next attacked the United States—in a much more disastrous fashion.
However, my experience with television has been sufficient to expose me to one of this fast-paced medium’s particular disappointments: being bumped. Yesterday it happened again in the classic manner. At around 11:00 AM I received a call asking me to be on a local newscast to comment on the current epidemic of personal debt. A film crew would come to the college to tape me at 3:30 in the afternoon for air later that evening. It was a very sunny day, humid and in the 90s, and at the moment I got the call I was headed to a lunch date in a pair of shorts and a ragged polo shirt. I quickly grabbed a dress shirt and a pair of khakis to change into later and jumped in the car. As luck would have it, I got a call just as my lunch was ending: a large fire had broken out in a condominium complex somewhere in the state of Connecticut. The reporter was very sorry but her film crew had been diverted to this breaking news story. If it bleeds it leads. I felt a little like one of those Tonight Show guests who was last in line and never made it to the couch.
But my most heartbreaking bump experience was at the expense of what would have been my greatest media achievement. In October of 2000, the thirteenth day of the month fell on a Friday. This was three years after my book on the psychology of superstition was published, and the paperback edition had just been released. I got a call from CBS inviting me to appear on The Early Show on Friday the 13th as a live guest in the New York studio. Arrangements were made. CBS booked a hotel room for me for the night before, and a limousine was scheduled to take me to the studios, where I would meet Bryant Gumbel (recently recruited from NBC), Jane Clayson, Mark McEwen, and the rest of the gang. It was all very exciting.
When Thursday the 12th arrived, I planned to leave for New York relatively early in the day. It is a three-hour trip, and I hoped I would have time for some meandering and a nice dinner in the city. But an hour before I was to leave, the phone rang. The USS Cole, a destroyer harbored in Yemen had been bombed, killing 17 crew members and injuring 39 others. The CBS people were very sorry but the following day would be devoted to coverage of the Cole. I was disappointed at being bumped—my segment was never rescheduled—but I understood completely. This is the nature of the news media. They were doing their job, and periodically we should acknowledge how important a job it is.
Looking back, the USS Cole bombing was an even more momentous event than we realized at the time. It was later discovered the suicide mission was conducted by al-Qaeda, the terrorist group headed by Osama bin Laden, and it would be less than a year before Osama bin Laden next attacked the United States—in a much more disastrous fashion.
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
Humor in the Physical World
Tonight I closed a kitchen cabinet door after fetching and replacing a box of tea. For reasons inexplicable, the door would not close again.
Earlier in the evening, while preparing dinner, I’d been rummaging around in the cabinet, and I must have subtly rearranged the tightly packed contents. Now, each time I closed the door it popped open. I couldn’t readily see what was causing the problem, and because I was in a hurry, I just kept trying to close the door. No luck. Each time I closed it, it just popped open.
So, still in a hurry and unwilling to devote much attention to this problem, I hastily reshuffled a few items at the front of the cabinet, closed the door, and turned away. For a moment, things seemed fine, but after what felt like a five- or six-second pause, I heard the click of the latch. Turning quickly, I watched as the cabinet door slowly swung open again.
It felt like I was in a movie or a comedy sketch where a haunted house is bent on tormenting the main character. It was just a moment in the physical world, where objects do what comes natural to them, but because I am a human being with a certain history, it made me laugh. The delayed opening of the door after several previous failed attempts seemed deliberately designed to frustrate me. As if I was experiencing something more than just Newtonian objects in space. So I laughed. No one was there to share my enjoyment, but I took pleasure in the moment nonetheless.
Earlier in the evening, while preparing dinner, I’d been rummaging around in the cabinet, and I must have subtly rearranged the tightly packed contents. Now, each time I closed the door it popped open. I couldn’t readily see what was causing the problem, and because I was in a hurry, I just kept trying to close the door. No luck. Each time I closed it, it just popped open.
So, still in a hurry and unwilling to devote much attention to this problem, I hastily reshuffled a few items at the front of the cabinet, closed the door, and turned away. For a moment, things seemed fine, but after what felt like a five- or six-second pause, I heard the click of the latch. Turning quickly, I watched as the cabinet door slowly swung open again.
It felt like I was in a movie or a comedy sketch where a haunted house is bent on tormenting the main character. It was just a moment in the physical world, where objects do what comes natural to them, but because I am a human being with a certain history, it made me laugh. The delayed opening of the door after several previous failed attempts seemed deliberately designed to frustrate me. As if I was experiencing something more than just Newtonian objects in space. So I laughed. No one was there to share my enjoyment, but I took pleasure in the moment nonetheless.
Tuesday, May 20, 2008
Adventures in Radioland III
Two more radioland episodes:
In my previous reports from radioland I omitted one of the classic problems encountered while appearing on the radio: gasping, choking, or otherwise losing your voice. I was reminded of this today as I heard Steve Roberts, guest host of the Diane Rehm show, coughing in the background as he let a guest go very long with an answer. On a few occasions I have had a cold or a dry throat while doing a live radio interview. In my recent series of interviews for Going Broke I had only one difficult moment, and in that case, I was lucky enough to have a host who, upon hearing my voice begin to fail, launched a long monologue that allowed me sufficient time to get a drink of water and recover my composure. A shaky moment averted.
The other adventure was actually in audioland, not radioland. A surprising number of sites on the Internet are little more than content shells put up to provide a vehicle for advertising. Almost all the material on these pages is pulled from other sources on the web, often news sites, and recently I discovered that an op-ed piece I had written for the Providence Journal was posted on a page called PE.com (The Press-Enterprise). Stranger still, a “podcast” of the op-ed was included, but clicking the play button released a bit of music and then....what is that sound?...a robot! A computer voice, admittedly a pretty good quality computer voice, was reading my op-ed back to me. Strange. Here is the page if you want to listen for yourself.
In my previous reports from radioland I omitted one of the classic problems encountered while appearing on the radio: gasping, choking, or otherwise losing your voice. I was reminded of this today as I heard Steve Roberts, guest host of the Diane Rehm show, coughing in the background as he let a guest go very long with an answer. On a few occasions I have had a cold or a dry throat while doing a live radio interview. In my recent series of interviews for Going Broke I had only one difficult moment, and in that case, I was lucky enough to have a host who, upon hearing my voice begin to fail, launched a long monologue that allowed me sufficient time to get a drink of water and recover my composure. A shaky moment averted.
The other adventure was actually in audioland, not radioland. A surprising number of sites on the Internet are little more than content shells put up to provide a vehicle for advertising. Almost all the material on these pages is pulled from other sources on the web, often news sites, and recently I discovered that an op-ed piece I had written for the Providence Journal was posted on a page called PE.com (The Press-Enterprise). Stranger still, a “podcast” of the op-ed was included, but clicking the play button released a bit of music and then....what is that sound?...a robot! A computer voice, admittedly a pretty good quality computer voice, was reading my op-ed back to me. Strange. Here is the page if you want to listen for yourself.
Monday, May 19, 2008
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