That I haven’t written much here is a good sign – busy cruising and enjoying it,
Some days not so great, but others that are amazing.
Our visit to Civitavecchia (Rome) turned out to be not so great. I don’t like cities, and we’ve already been to Rome, so we didn’t bother to bus into the city. Doug did plan to visit Ostia Antica (sp?) on his own, — always an opportunity for photos. But it turned out the directions he received on how to get there had been correct two years ago, but not now. So he and his camera wandered on shore for a while. In the meantime, I got some work done on “My Father’s House,” (Writing, that is. Not carpentry.)
And Gibralter was no great shakes either. We had been to the top of the mountain on our previous visit, so this time we planned to walk into town on our own. I returned to the ship when I found nothing but high end jewelry stores with some equally high end leather for sale. Got a little more done on “My Father’s House.”
But then came our stop in Cadiz. What a joy! We visited beautiful white villages –“white” because the buildings are really white. Much to photograph partly on guided tour and partly free time. Now that’s the kind of pleasure that traveling is all about.
The next day in the town of Obidos, outside Lisbon, Portugal, we enjoyed equal beauty, though not with equal spirits of adventure. Doug climbed the ramparts etc., collecting photos. I stuck closer to the main route. I’ll just have to include some pictures when I get back home. Unfortunately, as I think I told you earlier, I forgot to bring the cable connector to my computer. Doug has been downloading them for me onto his PC, so, once I come into possession of a thumb drive, I’ll be able to get to work at editing. (“editing” = mostly deleting the disasters.)
I can’t share the same sense of excitement about our free time visit yesterday to Santiago de Compostelo outside Vigo Spain. It’s my own fault, I guess, but I got bored with the expensive and not so expensive shops of jewelry and religious souvenirs. And I must confess, I long ago reached the point where I feel that “I’ve seen one cathedral I’ve seen them all.” (See what I mean. My fault). It was fun, though, eating lunch at a restaurant there. Lovely food, beautifully served.
I loved what I saw of Spain – and it was really Spain. Like the early days of traveling where people felt no need to Kow-Tow to Americans’ limited ability to understand languages other than our own.
The best part of that day was a cappuccino at an outside café in the company of three lovely young Irish women.
And that, nutshell style, brings us up to date. This is our last full day at sea. I love it, though I wish there were more.
And I look forward to the rest of our days before winding up in Amsterdam for a three- day stay there before heading home.
A sea day yesterday. I love sea days. Another sea day tomorrow. I love sea days.
And today no scheduled excursion so I’m staying on board while Doug goes off to enjoy an independent journey here in Civitavecchia. He’ll bring back interesting photos. I chose to stay behind, I have a lot of years on him and can easily be a drag, though he won’t say so.
I’m lovin’ every minute – happy we still have more days ahead to enjoy.
e-mail access costs an arm and a leg, so I don’t do as much as I’d like to in the way of specific responses. Let me just say a big “Thank you” here to the folks on Twitter who have been tweeting and re-tweeting the stuff about my “Figs & Pomegranates & Special Cheeses.” And by the way, the Kindle price is now $0.99 – a great opportunity to enjoy a good read and, if so moved, write an honest review on amazon.com.
Happy to say I’m back to my traveling self and enjoying every minute.
First, thanks to all of you who left me such kind messages when I wasn’t doing so well. They all really helped.
Now I’m too busy having fun to write in much detail, but a quick run-through. 4/28/16 in Naples, not feeling so great, but still enjoyed the eight-hour drive along the Amalfi Coast. Silently, but still as loud as silence requires, I repeatedly sent out the message that Carol was sending enthusiastic greetings to her relatives in the area. I hope they caught the vibes.
Other standouts: the catacombs in Palermo on the 29th. Fascinating. And on the 30th the Phoenician/Roman ruins of Nora.
Then, whew!, a breather at sea on May 1 – a recuperation, get sort of settled-in day. I love days at sea, but still no time for gambling.
May 2 found us “strolling” on the upper rock – Gibralter. Other’s call it a “stroll.’ For me it’s hurry up to catch up with the crowd, but I didn’t get left behind, and I did enjoy the experience. And walking is so good for my back.
Then Oh My! What a beautiful city is Seville. I mean, really as stunning as advertised. Major beginnings of my musings about the way one culture gets built upon the fading, conquering, and/or destruction of the one before it. Such beautiful Moorish buildings which the conquering Christians re-utilized as their own. Starting with the Romans (or earlier), one can only be aware that each culture thinks it is the never-ending height of culture. The “living end,” until they learn they are not the ultimate. Can’t help but think of our own assumptions about the permanence of our current culture.
Than came the amazing visit to the Picasso museum in Malaga with a super knowledgeable guide. I even came away with an understanding and appreciation of Picasso – working right up to the last day of his life, with still so much left to do. How very short is our individual span.
May 5 made even more concrete the awareness of cultures building on cultures with the beautiful – and fairly recent –excavation of the Roman theater. So many lives; so many cultures; so much confidence in one’s own importance, built one level atop another. What’s next?
Yesterday and today we’ve been in Barcelona, with a city tour yesterday highlighting the fascinating and unusual architecture of the city’s hero, Gaudi, like structures I’ve never seen. Unfortunately, I wasn’t pushing the button hard enough on my camera, so I didn’t get lots of photos I thought I had. Doug has promised to gift me with a couple of his, though.
And today was a visit to the Black Madonna at Monserrat. Spectacular views at the top. Amazing bus drivers in whom we put our trust. ( I remember reading “The Black Madonna.” I can’t remember if Monserrat was one of the sites the author visited in her pilgrimage.)
And tomorrow, a day at sea. One of my favorite things, but a frustration for Doug who likes to be on the go.
Celebratory things are coming up as the maiden voyage of our ship the Koningsdam is recognized, with Christening activities toward the end. I’ll try to get better about reporting.
Once again, thanks for all the nice messages you sent. And believe me, it does feel good to be back to my self.
No, not seriously ill, but miserable enough to render me basically good for nothing. So I’m writing this now to explain why none of you wonderful people have heard from me. My intentions were good. I had promised my house sitter to post regular accounts of this trip. Instead I was exhausted from coughing myself out of sleep for at least a week and a half. Closest thing I can remember is whooping cough as a child, tho’ not officially that. Then followed a period of sleeping constantly and feeling lousy in between. My nutritionist won’t like it, but I finally saw the ship’s doctor for an anti-biotic.
I have managed to squeeze in some excursions which I hope to blog about later. (But both my cameras needed a battery recharge, so no great videos to offer.) I think I’m recovering. Planning later today to participate in a walk on the Rock of Gibralter. Pushing it.
So I just finished going through almost a thousand e-mails. Presumably every room on the Koningsdam has WiFi access, but our cabin is the last one in the rear of the ship, and it doesn’t quite reach us, so I have to travel to other parts of the ship to log on (to my very expensive package.)
By the way, with all the wonderful food, my appetite has gone underground. Oh well, I expect things will pick up, and I’m glad I’m here.
My real purpose is to tell all you who have tweeted and re-tweeted things about me and “Figs & Pomegranates & Special Cheeses” that I greatly appreciate it and would, under ordinary circumstances, be thanking you. So please accept this as my thanks.
And thanks, too, to you who have commented on my blog who haven’t yet received a reply. And the newsy folks who have sent me interesting e-mails to which I may never get to respond.
Life is good. I have to be grateful that being sick is such a rarity for me. I think the last time I felt this awful (except, maybe, for the accident) was when my daughter was two and I taught through a bout of viral pneumonia until my Doctor finally ordered me home and to bed. What a relief!
Anyway, thanks. I hope this reaches you, and the next blog will be much more joyful.
Figs & Pomegranates $ Special Cheeses is getting nice exposure these days on Twitter. Now I’d like to know more people are reading and enjoying it. So, if all goes as intended, the Kindle version should be available in a day or two for $0.99.
I’d be overjoyed to see your review on amazon.com. In the meantime, you might enjoy reading the reviews that are already there.
And thanks!
One big truth behind caring about the use of “I” or “You” is the question of responsibility. For a simple example, the difference between “Did you understand me?” and “Did I make sense?” is the attribution of responsibility.
And attribution is a wiggly thing. When I stumble, I look for the crack in the sidewalk that I can blame. When you stumble I may look for the crack, or I may wonder what you did to cause you to stumble? We see the same action differently when it’s “you” doing it rather than “me.”
Some of us are really good at depression, so we may be quick to blame ourselves for things that we really had no control over. We may even be quick to blame ourselves for things that happen to other people.
But more generally, the tendency is to find an outside responsibility – luck, or other people, for example — for unpleasant things that happen to ourselves and claim our own responsibility – competence, for example –for good things that happen. With others, quite the other way, we aren’t so quick to see that bad luck caused the problem for the others, but rather we look for the fault in them.
It’s really handy to do things like blame the working poor for their own poverty rather than to recognize the social/economic truths at work. It’s equally handy to look at our own success and pat ourselves on the back for the good work we’ve done rather than appreciate the social/economic gifts we’ve been given.
This is tough business, but if the goal is to save therapy expense, or even just to like ourselves better, it’s a good idea to look at the rationality of our attributions. Problems don’t get solved until our attributions become more accurate.
So now, when it comes to selling my books, it’s not that I’m poor at marketing, it’s your fault for not buying them.
I’m delighted to kick off a series at Auburn Homes and Services here in Chaska at 6:00 p.m on Thursday, April 14. It will be a challenge to do something useful with such a complex topic as forgiveness in such a small amount of time, but I think I’ll provide something worthwhile. And providers can collect CEUs by attending these offerings.
I’d love to see you there.
When, as in my last post, I advise people to avoid using “you” because it is so blaming, I encourage the use of “I” because it is honest. But just like the pitfalls related to “you,” there are hazards in using “I.”
Consider when I say, “You make me feel so angry.” It’s good to recognize a variant on the thought attributed to Eleanor Roosevelt. “No one can make you angry without your cooperation.” It’s more honest to say, “I feel angry when you say/do things like that.”
It’s that basic issue of control again. “I” am the one responding with anger. “I” can decide how to handle my anger. “You” can control what you do. “You” can decide to refrain from such behavior in the future in order to avoid contributing to my angry feeling. Or you can choose to decide that I’m being ridiculous. Or you can realize that what you said/did was appropriate, and maybe there’s some conversation needed between the two of us. Or whatever. The point is, “I” am responsible to myself and “you” are responsible for “you.”
Whenever “I” hold you responsible for my reactions, “I” am not only being dishonest; “I” am ceding my power and control to you.
As a general rule, I prefer the “I” word.
But, of course, there are other things to consider. “I” can be a very selfish word when it attempts to turn the focus of attention on “me” and away from “you.” Consider a few examples. There’s the sympathetic listener whose first response is, “Oh, I know just how you feel.” — No, you don’t!
Or maybe there’s the “sympathetic” response that goes like this. “Let me tell you about my accident/operation/breakup/whatever.” No, I want you to listen to me! I’m hurting and I need someone to hear about me. When you start your “I” comments, you are not showing support for me.
Another example of the undesirable use of “I:” We’ve all experienced it, I’ll bet, like when we have – or overhear – a conversation between two people on a date and one person is doing most of the talking, with lots of “I”s.
So yes, “I” puts the focus on the speaker, with all the aspects of honesty and control mentioned at the beginning. Or “I” puts the focus on the speaker with little concern for the “you” of the other person.
For all these reasons, I developed the practice when teaching a class never to ask “Do you understand?” (potentially blaming) But rather to inquire, “Have I made myself clear?” (acknowledging my responsibility as teacher/lecturer.)
Whew! “I’m” finding it hard to make my point clear. Only “you” know whether I have.
In general, I suggest to people that they never use the word “you” except to say something positive like “I love you,” or “You did such a great job on that project.” But there is another way that “you” becomes a positive word, as in “I’m so interested to hear your opinion about that,” or “Please tell me what interesting experiences you’ve had around that issue.”
But I still advise caution with that word “you.” Too often it’s a shaming word, as in “Why did you fall for that scam,” or “You should have known better.”
Worse yet, it’s a blaming word, as in “I lost because you gave me bad advice,” “Everything would have worked out OK if you hadn’t interfered.”
Sometimes it’s a blaming word even when it’s meant to be inspirational. I heard recently of a lecture session in which the speaker recounted the historically bad ways in which an ethnic group had been treated. At the end he suggested to the audience something like “You have a chance now to go out and rectify this situation.” Many were heard as they left saying something like, “Why should I be blamed for something I didn’t do?” It’s that word “you.” All by itself it’s heard as an accusation.
Maybe the most annoying use of the word “you” is when it’s intrusive. I’d be willing to bet each of us has experienced the negative effects of this, and done our share of “you” intrusiveness in speaking to others. It happens most often, I think, when people are trying to be helpful. The person in financial, emotional, or other difficulty is bombarded by friends and other helpers attacking with, “Have you tried … ?” Why don’t you …” “You should …” “If you’d only … “Had you thought of … ?” Put them all together they amount to shame and blame. The victim of the unsolicited help is usually too polite to say, “Come off it. Do you think I’m stupid? Of course I’ve tried everything I could think of. Get off my back.”
The promise of “you” is a matter of respect. When I ask to learn more about you and what you did or do, it may come through as intrusive. Or, well presented with genuine interest, it may be experienced as a neat opportunity to share oneself with someone who cares.
Now I’ve told you what you ought to know about the word “you.” Are you sufficiently annoyed yet?
OK, now that my “Crash” is out of the way, I’m back to offering rules that – should you decide to accept them – will save time and money devoted to therapy. Well, maybe not, but I hope they are helpful.
So, what is “cognitive dissonance?” Well, first of all, lets go back to the issue of control. One thing control requires is a feeling that things make sense. Cognitive dissonance refers to the times when things don’t make sense, because we are trying to hold and/or act upon two (or more) conflicting beliefs. In order to restore a sense of order, we’ll change one or the other (or both) so the two are no longer in conflict. The other alternative is to avoid recognizing the conflict and basically give up trying to make sense. Let’s try a couple of examples.
Representative Donaught (obviously a made-up name) ran for office because he believed that to establish economic equity in the community is a basic moral requirement. Once he was involved in the political game, he discovered that the only way to stay in office to fulfill that moral requirement was to accept large financial contributions from people who expected him to support causes which would ultimately undermine his goal of economic equity. The stage was set for cognitive dissonance. It might be stated this way: the moral responsibility to work toward reducing inequity vs. the need to commit himself to causes that would maintain inequity. What might he do?
In order to stay comfortably in office, he may change his opinion about the morality of his contributor’s causes and vote to support them because he now sees their cause as good. He may decide that he was being too rigid in his earlier beliefs. Or he may stick to his original moral view and refuse the contributions, potentially being voted out of office. Or he might accept the money without modifying his moral convictions, consequently maintaining a high stress level resulting in psychological symptoms like perpetual anger, or maybe depression, or perhaps physical stress symptoms. And his constituents might complain that he is a do-nothing representative.
Maybe the potential for cognitive dissonance is a reason to prefer public officials who are super wealthy in their own right.
And don’t forget, this will all become more complicated if he isn’t wealthy and needs to stay in office in order to support himself and his family.
Or maybe changing his moral standards vis-à-vis the reason for public office will spill over into other issues, leading, perhaps, to formerly unacceptable personal behavior like sexual affairs. Now poor Mr. Donaught is really in a potential mess. I hope he had a back up plan before he decided to run for office in the first place.
Anticipating cognitive dissonance might be a very good idea before making an important behavioral decision.
Oh, but, most of you who have had the patience to read this far have no plans to run for public office, though it may be a good idea to increase understanding of those who are already there.
So, why read on… ?
How about parenting?
Try this. “I’m punishing you only because I love you.” Cognitive dissonance. “The person who is hurting me says it’s love.” Which is it?
The child may conclude, “She doesn’t really love me. If she did, she wouldn’t hurt me.” Or, “hurting me is part of loving. Love hurts.” Or, given the superior power of the parent, the conclusion may be, “She must be right. There’s something wrong with me. I am bad.” Or how about this, “If this is love, I’ll try to avoid it.” One way or the other, the child has to modify the understanding either of love, or of hurt. Or maybe this could contribute to denial. “It isn’t really love,” or “It didn’t really hurt.”
Maybe one of those conclusions is one the parent really wants to encourage
(I hope it’s obvious that just one event isn’t going to change the child’s whole understanding of love, life, and relationships. I’m way oversimplifying here.)
How about applying this to spousal abuse?
And then there’s the cognitive dissonance some of us pick up in some churches. “God is love, but some things you do are so bad you may spend eternity burning in hell.” Personally, I’d rather give up the belief in hell. But maybe the best move is to get away from the church that’s delivering cognitively dissonant messages. (Again, oversimplifying for the sake of making a point.)
“Mona is good at making things clear; Mona has just messed with my brain. Mona has just created cognitive dissonance.”
monagustafsonaffinito 