Author: madmuser

A butcher, a baker, a candlestick maker, and a few things in between. And so that road less traveled has brought me here to follow my dream and my muse.

What’s Your Social Media Style?

What’s your social style? And I don’t mean relative to the office cocktail party or neighborhood barbecue. Nowadays, we must all be concerned with our “social media style.” Whether we like it or not, social and business engagement, discourse, networking, book clubs, support groups, and everything that involves what we’ve always known as social interaction is now occurring online.

I admit it, I am of the Boomer generation. But I was a lucky Boomer because I entered a technical field (photofinishing) and worked with the very first computers. I setup and balanced digital printers, I helped fix customer QC problems using a then revolutionary computerized photo system. I developed document on Wang word processors. Anyway, you get the gist.

So, technology came naturally and easy to me – until …

I’ve been struggling with how to become socially adept because right now, I am a social media clod. I have Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+ and several social bookmarking sites. But I’m all over the map and, to say the least, ineffective with it from both personal and professional standpoints. This, then, has led to frustration (lots).

Frustration tends to make people ugly and angry, and this is where I’ve been, until I started having conversations – offline – and reading – real books, but still about developing a social media style. Right now, I’m still in rags, but I am on an odyssey to develop a purposeful and productive style of my own.

Here are two things I recommend for you if you’d like to know more about this.

“9 People Who Have Influenced My Social Media Style”:

Net Smart: How to Thrive Online, by Howard Rheingold,

Perfect Pen or Holy Grail?

It all depends on the paper – how the pen works, that is. This realization comes from many years and many journeys in search of the “perfect pen.” For me, this odyssey is the search for my personal Holy Grail – that ever elusive thing that promises health, wealth and happiness (and eternal salvation)!

In truth – I have no illusions about health and wealth unless a gliding pen serves as a secondary sort of salve. Makes sense, right? Health as a side effect from the glee of finding and using that pen; wealth from the bestselling novel that follows!

In truth, my lust is about simpler stuff. I search for that perfectly balanced, correctly weighted, optimal tip and a “smooth-as-butter” ink flow that writes “first time every time!” In addition, this, the ultimate recorder of text, must magically transform my unreadable, ugly script into something  beautiful and swan-like. All of this for less than $50.

Does such an instrument exist? No. Well  …. Sort of, and here’s why my equivocation. After many sweaty treks through the hottest days of summer and slippery slogs on the snowiest days of winter, I finally arrived at the answer. And this is it: it’s not just the pen. It’s the symbiotic relationship between pen and paper that makes the magic.

For example – I recently purchased two really wonderful pens – one a Levenger, the other a Lamy – both fountain pens. I then bought a notebook at Staples to use as my journal. I then sat down for a long writing session with my new pens and my new notebook only to be thwarted with tremendous disappointment. First one, and then the other, fountain pen bled right through the paper – seeping through to the other side as well as yielding veritable ink blots  that cut a far bigger swath of spreading ink than I intended.

Back to the original question: is there such an instrument? I have my top  10 favs, but the pen du jour is a shifting sand that balances precariously on paper, type of pen, my coffee consumption, and purpose in writing. In other words, I think I might have better luck seeking the Holy Grail!

 

Willa Cather, My Antonia

My creative juices have been subjugated by grading papers, heat, family stress, heat, financial stress, and more heat this summer. However, I have read some wonderful books with prose as refreshing as the ocean breezes I am yearning for.

So instead of writing for the sake of writing (poorly), I’ve decided to share some of these refreshing breezes with you, all from a lovely little book, My Ántonia by Willa Cather.

From http://www.buffalohillsrvpark.com/local.htm

“I felt motion in the landscape; in the fresh, easy-blowing morning wind and in the earth itself, as if the shaggy grass were a sort of loose hide, and underneath it herds of wild buffalo were galloping, galloping…”

From Become a Healthier You.com

“Perhaps we feel like that when we die and become part of something entire, whether it is sun and air, or goodness and knowledge. At any rate, that is happiness; to be dissolved into something complete and great.”

“In that singular light every little tree and shock of wheat, every sunflower stalk and clump of snow-on-the-mountain, drew itself up high and pointed; the very clods and furrows in the fields seemed to stand up sharply. I felt the old pull of the earth, the solemn magic that comes out of the fields at nightfall. I wished I could be a little boy again, and that my way could end there.”

“As I went back alone over that familiar road, I could almost believe that a boy and girl ran along beside me, as our shadows used to do, laughing and whispering to each other in the grass.”

Memories of Summer Camp

During this unbearably hot summer, I keep dreaming of my camp days, wonderful, exciting, and challenging days at a place called The Elms Camp for Girls on Keuka Lake. The camp no longer exists, I’m sad to say, but many of the buildings are still there, converted into summer homes that still whisper of songs sung after yummy meals capped with favorite desserts such as homemade puddings and pies. And of course there was the infamous “Bug Juice”: nothing quenched quite like this mysterious conglomeration of fruit-flavored liquids.

Last summer many of us gathered for a reunion and tour of our beloved camp. Magically we stepped through the boundaries of space and time to find ourselves in a dimension where we were delightfully drowned in an onslaught of memories brought to us by ghosts of summers past.

We yakked about the canoe trip down the length of the lake when we got caught in a vicious thunderstorm and had to be rescued by Mr. George, camp owner, in his classic wooden Cris-Craft. How embarrassed we were pulling into camp, all strung together in a long lineup of canoes, looking like human drips. We reminisced about the campfire circle led by Mr. Randall, our tough as nails swim team coach with a subtle gentleness that made us all feel loved. We sang, we played games, and we pondered the meaning of camp life. We laughed about our sailing exploits – coming towards the buoys with our beloved K-boats way too fast, unable to come about to tie up properly, and landing on shore to the chagrin of our counselors. We chatted about water skiing, being mortified as handsome Butch held us as we attempted to get on skis for the first time, or smashing into rough waves, having water shoot up various orifices in our bodies and needing to get to a bathroom — FAST!

The Pagoda on the Point
Finally — the pagoda! This was the enchanted place of the entire camp, the place where we went to watch sunsets and fireflies, the place we went to cry after an argument with a bunk-mate, or a reprimand from one of the counselors on whom we had a terrific crush. It sat stalwart on the very tip of the point that extended out into the lake, a landmark for sailors and boaters all along the lake shore. I was afraid it wouldn’t be there anymore. I was afraid it fell victim to storms, floods, or human hands of destruction. But it was there. I ran to it, alone, to ponder the past and celebrate the present.

So many wonderful memories I could write a book. Perhaps I shall. In the meantime, please enjoy these photos of a day gone past but kept current and alive in the minds and hearts of over 100 former campers of The Elms Camp For Girls.

<img src="http://madmuser.files.w

Canoe Trip
The K-Boats Moored
Camp Logo on Coveted Sweatshirt
All Campers

Guest Blogger John O’Connor

I feel so lucky to have been contacted by John O’Connor who has submitted this well-written and compelling article about hearing loss. Do enjoy!

Preventing Hearing Loss Through Healthy Lifestyles

Some people experience hearing loss from listening to their iPods and MP3 players. Some people know that listening to these players can make them develop hearing loss, but few of them are doing anything about it. Some teens who are advised to turn down the volume on their players, do what teens do — actually turn the volume up!

A study conducted at Colorado University and Children’s Hospital in Boston followed 30 iPod users. Unsurprisingly, they discovered that teens play their music much louder than adults. They also found that most teens were not aware of how loud their music actually was. They do not appear to understand the risk they are placing themselves in regarding potential hearing loss.

It has been shown that listening to ear buds for an hour and a half daily at 80 percent volume is likely safe for long term hearing. However, softer is better. You can, for example, listen safely at only 70 percent volume for four and a half hours daily. According to the study, the risk of hearing damage can rise with as little as five minutes of music exposure at high volume. This level of noise can damage the tiny, delicate hairs inside the ears that translate sound waves into brain signals that emerge as sound.

Adding to the risk of hearing damage that may lead to hearing aids is the fact that today’s batteries allow people to listen to music for greater lengths of time than before. In fact, batteries can play music for 15 hours or longer for many players.

The good news is that most music listeners do not listen to their players at full volume. Only 7-24 percent are listening at levels considered risky. The danger depends upon how high the volume is and for how long.

There are a number of things you can do to help prevent hearing loss and avert age-related hearing loss that steadily grows worse. One thing you can do is be sure your ears are protected in your workplace. The workplace is one of the most common causes of hearing loss. Loud equipment combined with little or no protection can damage tiny hairs in the inner ear and lead to progressive hearing loss.

There are earmuffs that are specially designed to dampen sound or prevent it from reaching the ears altogether. They can attenuate sound or bring it down to a safe level. These earmuffs are made of various materials, like foam or metal. They may contain things like gel to effectively disrupt sound before it reaches the ear and has a chance to do damage to hearing.

Be sure to have your hearing testing if you suspect hearing loss or are concerned you may suffer hearing loss in the future. Your doctor will be able to diagnosis the problem and give you various solutions to protect your hearing or may even suggest the use of hearing aids.  This also will allow doctors to establish a baseline of hearing for you. Then, if there is a deviation from that baseline in the future, you will know some hearing loss has occurred and be able to take preventative measures.

Crayons, Coloring Books, and Maps

It’s no problem to figure out the link between crayons and coloring books, but how do maps fit in?

“My father would call what I was doing ‘coloring maps.’ That was what he called it when I filled in time and wasted effort, in his view, by taking lots of trouble to do something wholly unessential, as when I had colored maps in high school for geography, feathering blue round the shorelines and shading in valleys and hills. But he always said it fondly, as though he knew and understood that there were times when what the brain most needed was to simply color maps.”

This passage from the book I am reading now, The Winter Sea by Susanna Kearsley came at me like a Mac truck in heat, finally legitimizing the box of Crayolas, 64 count no less, I’ve been harboring for the last year. Summer in my childhood was coloring time. I used to sit on the front lawn, under the shady elm tree, coloring book in my lap, crayons in my stubby-little fingers. I remember how my mind would get lost in the colors in the box and the need to pick out the absolutely perfect ones, the challenge of ‘staying in the lines’ (I was never as good as Stacy Fidler at that), and  the pride engendered by the finished product.

Coloring like that was a process that was pure Zen. I lost myself, totally. I stuck my tongue out, unconsciously, I hummed nursery rhymes, unintentionally. Coloring was about being and it was really cool and vibrant!

My 62-count box of Crayolas is now anxious to be dusted off, opened, and used. Or, shall I say, my brain is anxious for me to dust off my 62-count, find a map, and start coloring.

Anyone care to join me?

Baby Boomers and Hearing Loss

I’m working on a book called The Muffled Echo:  The Silent Health Issue Facing Baby Boomers: Hearing Loss. I became motivated to write this book because I am with a man who is deaf and we are Baby Boomers. I post short selection below and I’d love to hear your comments. I hope you enjoy it.

Recently your family has been telling you that you say “what” all the time. Really? You hadn’t noticed. Last week you went to a cocktail party or some other event where a large group of people is standing, sipping, and chatting away, only – you got maybe, MAYBE, a quarter of what was said. So instead, you smiled a lot, nodded a lot, and hoped you didn’t smile if someone was talking about their dog that just died. Ah, yes, and then there’s the television at home. Do you find that when someone else comes in to watch it, they complain about how loud it is? Do you then try to turn it down, only to become frustrated because you can’t get everything that’s going on? And here’s another one, do you have trouble hearing when you don’t have your glasses on? (This is really for near-sighted folks). People laugh at me when I say, “Hold on, let me put my glasses on so I can hear you.” My theory on this one is that I’m doing a lot of lip reading without even realizing it.

Signals of Possible Hearing Loss

Clearly our Boomer ears are not what they were back at Woodstock or at a Doobie Brothers concert. That doesn’t mean we need suffer in silence, so to speak. The Hearing Loss Association of America presents the following as signs of possible hearing loss.  You:

  • Ask people to repeat things – a lot
  • Can’t hear what people in another room are saying to you anymore
  • Get that someone is talking, but not what they are saying
  • Feel like everyone (except you, of course) is mumbling
  • Really have trouble hearing when there is other noise around
  • Crank up the volume on your television
  • Can hear some people fine, but have trouble with softer voices
  • Find you’re always turning to one side to hear things
  • Need to see the speaker’s face to really get what’s being said
  • Move closer to things or people you want to hear
  • Become frazzled and stressed when you’re in a situation where people are gathered
  • Become exhausted after spending time listening – it’s hard work!
  • Misunderstand things and sometimes respond inappropriately

All of these are things that YOU notice about your hearing. How about what other people notice? Do people tell you …

  • You don’t turn around when there’s a loud noise or when you’re called
  • You turn the television on too loud
  • You talk “too” loudly
  • Your speech is changing

Spend time pondering all these signals and clues and make an appointment with your doctor and ask him/her to arrange for you to get a hearing test. Actually, everyone should start getting screened for hearing loss once they reach the age of 50.

Miss Manners, Where Are You?

Image courtesy Datelinenews.org

I’ve been noodling around with this piece for over a week, haggling with myself over what angle to take, when Providence (not R.I.) pummeled me with the story of the kids right here in Greece, NY who relentlessly, savagely, and ruthlessly bullied their school bus monitor, 68 year old Karen Klein. Captured on video by one of their gang, these kids were 7th and 8th graders – old enough to know better, old enough to have been taught some manner by their parents, and old enough to bear significant consequences for their actions. Parents? I heard a report, though I cannot find the source, that one  parent thought the whole thing was blown out of proportion.  Are you kidding me??? This morning on Today, Matt Lauer said he wished he could say the names of these bullies right there on national television, which, of course, is not (unfortunately) possible.

In my early-week noodles, I wrote this:  “Okay, I admit it. I’m of the older (and wiser) generation dubbed Baby Boomer. I am proud to wear the label thusly. I am especially proud because I grew up in an age where manners and gracious behavior were taught, practiced and observed with MUCH more frequency than they seem to be today.”

What I really wanted to say when I wrote that was that kids today have neither the manners nor respect that any infractions thereof in “ancient” (our) time would have resulted in dire consequences. But see, I didn’t write this because I felt like an old judgmental frump, worried about losing my clout of voice amid a mass of poorly mannered young boobs.

Okay. The fact is that not every kid bullies or has poor manners. Many are socially adept, respectful, and comparatively mature. Kudos to you kids, and may you be on thresholds of great success. Perhaps the issue is that the poor mannered ones are louder and more evident that their gracious counterparts. On the other hand, and sadly, perhaps there are just indeed more of them.

So when every news medium in the country blasted this story, and when a global collection to send Mrs. Klein on a “little” vacation reached over $100,000 in a single day (it’s not over $200,000), I knew I had my angle all along: manners are a dying breed, outrageous behavior (bullying and unspeakable rudeness) is alive and thriving. I also knew that beau coup people of all ages are sick and tired of a generation that simply doesn’t give a rats ass about inflicting pain on other people. I knew, therefore, I am not alone.

A Short Note To Madonna Badger

Dear  Madonna,

I see you’re in the news again. I’ve thought about you with a heavy, heavy heart many times over these past months. Back in late December, I could not get my mind off what I knew were the depths of darkness and unfathomable agony that must have tortured you with every breath you took.

It is good, this thing you’re doing, suing the officials in Stamford. With the horror of your family’s loss, I never thought about this additional nightmare, this further violation, this unauthorized devastation of whatever of your possessions from Shippan Avenue were left in the charred rubble. Hopefully this action will give some vent to your pain as well as reassert the rights that were stripped from you, as was everything else you owned and loved.

I hear you are gone from Stamford, the area that can do nothing but bring you pain with every view, every encounter, and every cloud in the once-blue sky. It was everything once safe and familiar. But that which was safe was nothing but a sham and everything familiar became unbearably monstrous. I hope you are somewhere very different from Stamford: different climate, different geography, maybe even different hemisphere.

As a woman, as a mother, I embrace you, as do countless others who have never met or even seen you beyond the photos in the media. Wherever it is you are, I pray you are being comforted with strong and caring hands and hearts.

In the meantime, know that thousands of us are here with hearts that ache and souls that only wish they could put back the pieces and turn back the hands of time.

With love,
From All of Us

About Writing and Louis L’Amour

For years, with imperious and quite faux intellectualism, I by-passed the shelves in libraries and bookstores that homed the Western genre. The books on those shelves were akin to the ones packing the Harlequin romance shelves, or so I presumed as I marched by, head held high, to more scholarly selections, until …

One name, one author, in particular began to intrigue me: Louis L’Amour. I was struck, and initially turned off, by the number of books on the shelves by this author. I figured they were all about cowboys and Indians, the written versions of Apache Rifles or Bullet for a Badman. Well, they’re not.

Here’s the short version of how I became acquainted with Mr. L’Amour. First, I always read when I’m at the gym. I have a routine – first thing is to retrieve the book holder, second thing is to mount my machine, and third is to get in gear, start swinging along while reading. This has initiated various conversations relating to ‘what are you reading,” and such. In one of these conversations, a gent mentioned  Mr. L’Amour was one of his favorite authors. By the caliber of his other favorite authors, I began to wonder if my previous assumptions were off. Then  I was discussing books with someone in my online book club, and she too mentioned L’Amour as a very good author, naming two or three specific favorite titles. Wasting no time, I got on Amazon and ordered those titles.

They came, I saw, they conquered!

Louis L’Amour is a compelling writer with numerous passages of profundity about life, and these below, about his craft of writing. These passages are from Fair Blows the Wind.

“You may well ask, if I know so much, why am I not writing successfully … well, I know what should be done, and I can talk well of it. But … I have not the will to persist. I tell myself I shall change, but I do not. I try to hold myself to a schedule, but I am diverted by the flights of fancy in my own mind. I dream of it, want it, talk of it, think of it, but I do not do it. Writing is a lonely business and must be forever so, and I am a social being. I want and need others around me and the loneliness of my room is a hateful thing.”

“My old master… used to say that writing was not only talent, but it was character, the character of the writer. Many are called, he would say, but few are chosen, and it is character that chooses them. In the last analysis, it is persistence that matters.”

It’s writing season for me. Always in late spring, since a girl in high school when I’d lay dreamily on my white chenille bedspread, windows wide open on steamy sultry evenings, the intoxicating scents of honeysuckle and roses bewitching me into writing truly AWFUL poetry!  Ah, though I do view that work with fondness and a certain level of respect (yes, I still have it), it was full of adjectives, superlatives, and drama, just as this passage. It also weighed heavy on the dark side, my way, I suppose, of dispelling the demons that lurked within.

But I DID IT! I wrote, just as I am now. Truth be known, I am not at all a disciplined, organized writer who sets by the day and the clock, X-number of pages punctuated by endless cups of coffee that could hold a spoon upright by the end of the “set” writing period. No, I am a write by the muse sort of writer – one who goes about the business of living until I find a thought, issue, or passion about which I simply must expound. To be honest, I do wish my Muse would stop by and visit more often, but, as they say, it is what it is.