Grown-Up Bullying

There is a tremendous amount on the news and in talk shows lately about the epidemic of bullying going on in the United States today. The things that children are doing and saying to each other are horrifying, and yet we can't seem to put a finger on the causes of these horrible behaviors. Also, there is no shortage of people who will complain about the behaviors, but entirely too few who are willing to step in and put a stop to it when it is happening.

I have spent a lot of years studying and teaching psychology, and way too many years being the parent of a child who was bullied, almost to the point of suicide. I was lucky, I guess, in having the knowledge that my local school district would do nothing to help, so I quit wasting my time trying and transferred both of my children to a tiny private school, where there was zero tolerance for any form of bullying. It drained us financially, and got rid of any college funds we might have had, but we were rewarded with healthy kids who are doing well as adults. Thank you, scholarships and loans!

This essay, however, is not at all about the failings of our school systems, and the inability of adults to intervene when desperate help is needed. Those are problems being dealt with on an enormous scale right now, and I hope some corrective measures will develop as a result. What I find myself angry about at the moment is based on a psychological maxim that most adults have yet to learn - that children don't do as you say, they do what you do.

Now I will break one of my most basic rules in the design of this blog, and that is to never talk about politics. I am completely fed up with the way we "adults" practice politics in this country, and in the way the current candidates for office have run their campaign advertising designs into a bullying contest, may the meanest liar of them all be elected!

Where on earth do we get the idea that we must teach our children to treat each other with basic courtesy and understanding, even if we do not agree on some point or other, while at the same time we are name-calling and back-stabbing at our fellow adults in nonstop election TV ads, posters, radio spots, or speeches. This candidate calls his opponent an "ignorant airhead," while she fires back that he is a money-grubbing tax hog.

Another one insists that his opponent has misused public funds and lost thousands of jobs (Gee, it seems the economy had nothing to do with it - I wonder where he put them?). Then that ad is answered with the accusation of harboring aliens. Personally, I thought all of them had been corralled into Area 51.

I have heard more taunting, character assassination, name-calling and truth twisting in the last couple of months than I would expect in an average lifetime. The candidates have done a magnificent job of showing our young people that the one with the most capacity to bully is the one most likely to win. Every election season we make a big deal out of the problems with negative campaign ads, but every time that season rolls around again, we don't make it clear to our candidates that we won't tolerate that kind of behavior in the adults we are supposed to respect.

There are only a few days left in this election, and voting is already underway for this year's races. It may be too late to do anything about it this time. The next time there is an election, why don't we try something really radical - the first time we see a negative campaign ad, call the offices of the candidate running the ad and let his campaign workers know that you will not vote for that candidate unless he/she stops that kind of campaigning. Encourage everyone you know to do likewise. Tell them you don't care what the other guy did, you want to hear exactly what this candidate is going to do to make things better.

If an ad does slip through the radar and appear when the youngsters in your household are watching, take the time to let them know what a despicable thing it is to dump one's insecurity and small-mindedness on another human being instead of learning to deal with it in a positive and responsible fashion. Explain that only those with a very poor opinion of themselves try to belittle anyone else, to try to make themselves feel better.

Children are way smarter than we are. Without our bad behavior as an example, they might just learn to get along with one another instead of looking for any differences as a reason to bully. Political meanness is just as poor a behavior as schoolyard meanness. We all need to take a quick look in the mirror to see what types of grown-up activities we silently condone. Those are the behaviors the kids will learn to copy.

Leaves and cool breezes

I love fall. It is probably my favorite season of the year. As soon as the temperature dips into the low 70's and 60's, I come alive. After this summer, when it was above 90 in Philadelphia for 53 days, it would be a relief to sit in the shade and have 80-degree breezes wafting over you. I can't remember a summer when I was less productive. Anything I could get done while sitting in an air-conditioned house on a nice, comfy sofa was all right with me.

I did crochet four baby blankets, for various new babies in our circle of friends and family. It did get warm, as they were in my lap while I was finishing them off, but at least I didn't have to move very much. I also worked on and finished three small paintings, so I guess I was more productive than I felt.

But now that is over, and now fall is beginning to set in. I have energy to get up and do stuff. That is, to do stuff that takes a certain amount of physical exertion. The paint cans will come out and I will finish the painting of walls and doorway that I started last fall in my sun room, which is also my front porch. When I am done there, I will head up the stairs and paint my bathroom, even tackling the sponge effects that I am determined to get on those walls. I am equally determined to not have to pay someone to do this.

The other stuff I have been doing is the best stuff for my mental well-being, and that is the task of throwing out. I recently found boxes in my garage labeled "Halloween," and knew that if I opened and inspected the contents I would find something to keep, but I did it anyway, throwing out two of the three boxes and their contents. For me that is a major victory, and one which will continue through other containers and their mystery contents until it gets too cold to spend time on the porch or in the garage.

On days when cabin fever sets in, and it does at least once a week, I am determined to get in my car and drive out into the country, looking for mountains, rivers, and lakes touched with yellow and gold and the deep green of evergreens. I am happy to have a nice new camera, so my internet friends will get a glimpse of fall in Pennsylvania, which can be pretty spectacular.

Fall is also a great time for walks. I am thoroughly annoyed that I have to deal with nerve damage in my legs, making it less than comfortable to go on any long treks. However, short walks and walks in the woodsy and lake-dotted areas not far from my home are still a possibility. I find myself wishing I had my wonderful Irish Setter that accompanied me through middle and high-school years, as she loved fall walks and playing in piles of leaves, looking for whatever live toy might be lurking.

The true sign that fall is setting in is the bringing inside of the first large canvas bag of firewood. My neighbor has a wood-lot way up in the mountains, and supplies us, for a fee, with perfectly aged oak logs, cut to match the interior measurements of my wood stove. Soon it will be stoked, kindled and lit, and the neighborhood will catch the scent of burning wood and household warmth. Then, of course, we have to think about winter.

Outside the Lines

I seem to have been in one of my more philosophical moods today, actually for a few days. It is probably due to the cloudy and wet weather we keep having. I have also had the occasion to be in quite a few lines over the past week or so, which got me to wondering about them, and observing how different folks handle the process of being in line.

I have come to the conclusion that our lives are indeed made up of a series of lines, literal and theoretical. The most literal, right from the start, is that line which initially attaches you to your female parent, known as the umbilical cord. Even though it has been shown many times on TV and in educational films that either the physician or the midwife or the male parent makes a show out of severing that particular line, for some families it seems that the scissors never completely worked. I have had personal experience with individuals who are still firmly connected to their "original line." They are not considered well-adjusted.

We learn in preschool or kindergarten to wait in line, whether to get into the classroom, go for recess, get lunch, use the restrooms, or be dismissed for the day. This is also the first place we learn about another, paper-associated line. That would be the thick black line drawn around everything that exists for the application of color in art class. It is the line within which we must always keep our creativity, according to the art teacher. Some unknown disasters await the poor soul who dares to venture outside those lines with a wayward purple crayon or too-wet paintbrush.

Later in school the lines of people take on more significance. We line up for every activity with our best friends, or with friends we would like to acquire of the opposite sex. We line up at school dances: boys on one side and girls on the other, and most of them stay in those lines for the entire duration of the dance. At late-teen and later adult events we are introduced to "Line Dances," which seem to be specific for each song played by a knowledgeable DeeJay. There is always one person in these lines who has perfected each dance, and shows off that perfection with a real flair. The rest of the line is inevitably confused and conflicted, feeling out of line physically and emotionally.

As adults we are introduced to a few too many lines, from the movie theater to the drugstore to the sale at the department store, to the acquisition of groceries on a Saturday afternoon. Those lines are sacrosanct, with firm unwritten rules about maintaining the exact place one has in the line. Anyone choosing to invade any one of those lines is in for a battle.

A recent line I experienced was a reminder of an earlier time, when I had first stood in line at the Motor Vehicle Bureau and waited to take my driver's exam. I passed the first time I took it, so there should have been no anxiety about standing in that line again, but I felt the walls close in on me as I was waiting, not for a test, but to get my license renewed, and a new photo taken. Somewhere in another place I am certain there is someone who is pleased with the photo on their driver's license, but it has never been me.

I was in line this time, however, with an interesting group. I went to a small, out of the way office, thinking there would possibly be no line, but what I found instead was a group of six or seven folks waiting for new photos, all over 55 years of age. I haven't a clue why we all ended up together at the DMV on the same Tuesday afternoon, but we formed an instant friendship and told funny driving and photo stories for the twenty minutes or so I was there. I do know people my age who hate lines, and hate waiting, but I really think the majority of us are just pleased to have an opportunity to stand among friends, waiting for whatever is in store. The prevailing attitude is as follows: as long as we are stuck with it, we might as well make it enjoyable.

As for those other lines, the paper-based ones, I have to let you know that in the first formal drawing class I ever took, at a real art school, the instructor made a loud and definitive point that there was never, never, never a line around anything we might see in nature or the world around us, so he was not ever to see a line around any single object we might create in pencil, charcoal, pen and ink, or any other medium he could recall. The result of an outline was to be a failing grade.

This came as a shock and a relief to me. I was always the one with the wandering crayons, purple or otherwise, and I was thrilled to know that I was right in following the edges of my objects outside those claustrophobic lines. Needless to say, I got an "A" in that class!

I like to find morals in things, and by now you have probably figured out that most of my little meanderings here have some sort of point to them. This one is simple: when learning about lines as a child, the people lines are flexible, while the art lines are not. As an adult, the reverse is true: people lines are absolute and not to be tinkered with, but they can be fun if the right people are in them. Art lines, however, have all but disappeared, leaving a free-formed beauty to nature and our surroundings.

Something to mull over in your spare time, possibly while standing in line?