Do I need Social networking?

I have been using  myLot and to a lesser extent Facebook for a few months now.  Up until I "discovered" myLot I would have said social networking was a waste of time and for those with enormous egos only.  Of course I know differently now - or do I?  I treat myLot as a place where I can let off steam in a measured (usually) way.  I think that others do too.  There are some large egos out there without a doubt.  There are people that strut about like the place is theirs.  When they post, they assume that we will always jump to it and respond.  Often we do.   I have had a dry spell and have had the temerity to let my ego run loose and post a discussion saying that I am "dry".  To date, I have had forty responses.  That's rather more than I thought, but as someone suggested, it was a clever ploy that has resulted in a successful discussion.  That genuinely wasn't my thought at the outset.  But is is good that someone thinks that I have been clever.  So my ego rises and I am increasingly likely to be a "strutter".

Do I need this applause though.  I like it certainly, but what effect is it having.  The fact that I have some self esteem issues is widely acknowledged, so having a higher profile on myLot must be therapeutic mustn't it?  Maybe.  But perhaps I am likely to let this go to my head and start to show off.  That's not good for me.  But if I don't post at all then how will I let my feelings go? After all, it's only a computer board, nothing critically important.  I have managed 50 years without it, why has the last 5 months been so different?

I said to someone earlier today that I feel very safe on myLot.  Cuddled, but not smothered. This whole friendship thing still puzzles me.  I have friends on myLot that have said things to me that barely any real life friends have.  All related to love and affection.  They come from countries and walks of life that I would never have encountered otherwise.  I often ask myself why social networking should produce such good friends.  Do we have something in common?Are we are all looking for friendly ears because we have something going on in our lives that makes us uncertain or because our personal circle of friends is restricted for some reason. 

Whatever the reason, we have become closer in a few months than some people that call themselves "friends" do in years.  Is this good?  or are we just deluding ourselves?  Can this level of friendship be sustained?  I have no answers, what will be will be.  There is an intensity in these friendships that I have not experienced before.  I liken it to a child with a new, all absorbing toy.  He runs home from school and plays with it until he is dragged away to bed.  I am like that with myLot and Facebook.  I dare not join any other boards otherwise I would spend even more time than I do in front of the screen.  I do know though, that there is no subject that I cannot raise with my social network friends.  I have often wondered what sort of reception I would receive from some real life friends about the subject of stress and depression. Most would be sympathetic, but the urge to run would be firmly reflected in their eyes.

Shortly I shall meet someone in a restaurant that I have known on myLot almost from the start.  We are friendly, and I have an affection for her based on the discussions and messages that we have had.  Will this meeting enhance or damage our relationship?  There is safety in maintaining our anonymity behind the computer screen, but a real life meeting might change all that and move us onto a different level that is altogether more serious.  Potentially, it might kill our whole relationship.  Obviously I don't really think that this is likely, but like the bride and groom often  have last minute doubts; has my social networking taken me to a different dimension that is starting to make the intangible, tangible.

But back to my original question.  Do I need social networking.  Currently, my answer has to be a resounding yes.  I don't really know how long it will go on for.  But I love it right now, and I guess that the present is the best that we can hope for.  I have wondered "what if my friends leave me?".  After all, a simple WWW change and they could be off to pastures new leaving me behind.  But that happens in real life too.  Maybe it is better for now to just accept that life is good in the friendship stakes and see the pluses and not the "what if" minuses.

    

Damn these tears

My eyes are moist again.  I am feeling very low today, not very cheerful at all.  I can give you no explanations why, but everything critical that I see or read seems to be aimed at me.  Nonsense though I know that is.  I am surrounded by so much love and affection and I am trying to think positively but it's not working today.  I shall probably be OK tomorrow.  At least the sun is shining so we are getting some washing dry.  I don't even know why I am writing this drivel.  It is self-indulgent.  I think that I need chocolate.  I shall go and find some.

So What's Next?

I have been giving some thought about what I should do now.  This is the start of a new year for me - May 13 will always been a little private new year.  Many years ago someone read my palm and told me that she saw that I would have a major upheaval in my life and that I might well kill myself.  At the time I thought that she was ridiculous.   However, I have had the upheaval, but fear not, I am not considering ending it all just yet.  You've got me for a day or two longer.

I have several projects that need to be finalised.  I really do need to knuckle down to the family history again and I despair of the book.   But that's not all down to me.  Summer is just around the corner and the house will start to buzz with the chattering of teenagers.  My trips to the beach will increase - they swim and sunbathe, I mooch about.  It also means al fresco eating, doing stuff in the garden (my poor bones) and digging out the BBQ for Clare's annual shindig that her parents enjoy too.  We don't camp out like them though.  On a myLot discussion I explained that I have an Orang Utang and a crocodile in the garden.  They may put a slight dampener on this years party.  Should be fun though.

Pumpkin has found a new house for her and her family.  That is fantastic news to me.  She works so hard for them all and I am delighted that she will have a great new kitchen to work in as well as being more convenient for her SO's work etc.

I am thinking about looking for a job.  As I said in my last post, I don't want a high powered, BMW driving, look at me aren't I important because I earn more money that you and more stress than I can handle job.  Nope, all I want is something that will provide a little service to people and get me out - and bring me a pound or two.  Any thoughts?  Apart from a mobile library driver I cannot think of anything.  I shall have to start searching.

Happy days are here again......

The Truth and Nothing But The Truth

I am writing this at the exact time that a year ago my adventure with mental illness began.  I was in my office when I felt an overwhelming need to get away.  To close my mind to any external distractions and leave.  For nearly two years I had been ignored, undermined, belittled and humiliated and suddenly it didn't seem important any more.  I could no longer cope.

I had been delighted in March 2004 to be appointed to the most senior operational position in an organisation whose purpose was to deliver employee HR advice and support to a major Government Department.  I had an international role and a large staff based across the World.  I was given no support staff and expected to provide a 24/7 on call service which I shared with a colleague.  My days were largely spent traveling, meeting corporate clients, and helping staff resolve their client lists as well as managing the staff as well.

All went well, except we knew that we were to be taken over by a new organisation that was run in the main by ex-bankers who had little grasp of people dynamics and no idea at all about what it was that we did.  But that was OK, we were there to help them.  I met the new Chief Executive and his deputy.  The latter was fairly dismissive of our worth and it was clear that he felt that we were really a distraction to his main business which was creating a "People Centre".

He left us alone for a few months, but did invite me to the senior management strategy meetings, but never acted on any points that I raised, but he was at least polite.  The CEO even bought me lunch once and impressed on me how vital I was to the whole effort.  Then he brought in a former financier from a major UK bank as my new boss and that was where the fun really began.

Initially things went well.  He had a "Vision" for the future, he wanted us to offer a wider reaching service; things that I could live with quite happily.  He wanted to spread my role amongst a larger number of managers - my first alarm bell rang - but if it benefitted the organisation who was I to complain.  We had already had a "rationalisation" and a number of staff had left, but we were a sharper service as a result.  He also wanted to merge what we did with another HR activity.  I was less sanguine about that, but he was determined to carry on, and so long as there was no negative overlap I was happy for it to happen.  Then the new managers started to appear and he drifted away from me.  In fact he never contacted me again unless he wanted something.  I would try to contact him, but usually got his voicemail - we worked in different parts of the country and he very rarely called me back.

He devised and set up an strategic implementation team that consisted of all the newly appointed managers.  I wasn't invited and when I enquired of one of them why I never got invited to their meetings was told because they had been instructed not to.  To say that I felt upset by this was an understatement.  In fairness the other managers, hearing that I had made that enquiry, did invite me to subsequent meetings.  I then discovered that there was a whole host of things going on that I was not even aware of.  Conferences, recruitments, training of people that I didn't know had been recruited and who I was expected to, in part, manage.  I went to one meeting and my boss came up to me, he was just passing through, he rarely attended the meetings himself, slapped me on the back and said that he thought that I was on a steep learning curve.  Another understatement.

I returned to my own staff and explained to them what was going on and how I thought the new organisation would look.  The record of that meeting somehow found its way to my boss.  Who waited until we were at a conference in the Midlands, having lunch, to express his annoyance with me, in full view of others, including several that worked for me.  He also told me that he had decided that I should not longer have my senior welfare title and that he was passing that to someone else who at that time was working abroad!  Happy I was not.

From then on I could do not right.  He would barely speak to me, and glower at me like I was an itch he couldn't properly scratch.  He was never wholly impolite, but he let his thoughts show clearly enough to me.  Of course there was more than this, but my aim in writing this is not to give a blow by blow account.

That brings me to this day 12 months ago.  I was writing a report that he hadn't called for, but that I knew that he would.  Suddenly the message came on my e mail that he wanted it immediately.  He'd forgotten about it until reminded himself and was now panicking.  So I let him.  I closed down my office.  Had a privately tearful session and left.

The following day I went to the doctor who signed me off work for a fortnight.  But I resisted any drug treatment.  My wife rang my boss who spent most of the conversation telling her about his own breakdown a couple of years earlier!  Perhaps that explained some of his behaviour.  I don't know.  I didn't hear from him again for a total of 11 weeks.  When he wrote saying words to the effect "when are you coming back?"  In the meantime I was allocated a psychologist and signed of for many more weeks.  The psychologist challenged me in many different ways and for the first time in a long time I started to see that there was a life outside of work.

My staff were wonderful.  I received many letters and cards and felt hugely appreciated by them.  But my bosses didn't bother to contact me - ever - apart from when I wrote myself to the CEO, and my own boss's "hurry up" call at 11 weeks.  I attended weekend sessions at the local mental hospital - I was always surprised to see how many faces I recognised at those - and I began an internet therapy course that was also first class.  I cannot criticise the NHS.  They were wonderful.  Eventually I did start drug therapy and it helped hugely.  I wish that I hadn't resisted for so long.

Initially I suffered from enormous guilt about being ill.  I felt that I should pull myself together and get back to work; but I knew that could not.  I would spend hours lying on the bed, either sleeping or feeling very inadequate.  There was a concern that I might be suicidal - I never felt that way once in fact, but I understand why they might have had that worry.  I was not allowed to spend too much time alone.  I was terrified that I might meet someone that I knew so I literally hid myself away either at home or at my parents. Eventually the psychologist persuaded me to go to a local supermarket for an hour each day.  I would spend 15 minutes walking the aisles and then go to the coffee shop for the rest of the time.  But it forced me out and I gained some confidence.  But still I couldn't face work and I started to think that maybe I never would.  I also stopped missing it, so resolved to leave and take some time off.

My employer had agreed to give me full pay for six months - at the end of that time I resigned and found myself without work for the first time in 33 years.  As a final parting shot I was sent a valedictory letter.  It was written by somebody that I had never heard of but thanked me for my 31 years work.  That was good of them.  I expect my name came up on a database reminder somewhere.  Being without work is not scary, but that is maybe because we have a little money and can afford my "holiday".  I want to start doing something soon, but I don't know what.  I don't want to be a senior executive again.  Every day I receive an E mail from an HR recruiter - it's full of "exciting" opportunities doing things that I can do standing on my head.  But I should be bored before I'd completed the application form.  I have been there, done that and hated it. Why go back for more?  Something part-time appeals.  I'd love to drive a mobile library.

What is a little sad to me is that several of my friends haven't so much dropped me, as don't know what to say.  We are of a generation where we don't give up, we pull our socks up and battle on.  I didn't do that and possibly, in their eyes, have let the side down.  Many are the same though, but we don't see each other as much as we did before.  Such is life.

The really wonderful thing is that I discovered social networking.  I am not very good at it, but I have made so many wonderful friends.  They know who they are and how I feel about them.

Onwards and upwards.  It's the only way to go.

I am desirable again

Blogger has freed me from my pariah status and I can get on and write my book.  Thank you Blogger.

Apparently I am an undesirable

I decided at the weekend to set up a parallel blog to this one to act as an ongoing story.  The intention is that I shall start writing and only stop once I have reached a conclusion, or my friends have had enough and tell me the thing is too awful to read any further.  I also hope that they they might give me editorial thoughts and pointers.

I thought that this was pretty innocuous and could not imagine that anyone might take offence at the idea.  But Blogger has!  S/He has told me that my Blog may be a "Spam Blog"  whatever that means.  To say that I am unimpressed is an understatement.  There are barely any words there and I am unable to post for now.  I have raised an appeal, but I am pretty annoyed.

I am going away for a few days.  Back on Friday.  If my blog is still there and functioning again I shall try to make a start.  I am slightly afraid that I shall lose both that blog and this.  Clearly I am an evil subversive undesirable.  You just thought that I was a fish with a penchant for conical bras!

Sunday Roast

I have popped back to myLot a few times over the past 12 hours.  Bella thought that the time was right to salute our friends which we have done royally, most of us have been there - except for Cyn!  Where is that girl?

Roasting is not something that we do in the UK - except on a Sunday usually when we carnivores like nothing better than to get to grips with a joint of beef or similar.  Alternatively, being roasted is not something that we relish.  In the UK it means that we have been told off. 

The whole concept of saluting ones friends by means of an irreverent but affectionate discussion seems on the surface, rather shallow and cloying.  In fact, it has been a wonderful experience, at least for me.  Now there are parts of this blog where I have made clear how I feel about my myLot friends. But the opportunity to say what we feel about each other in an organised manner in front of the whole myLot audience is quite unusual and I for one welcome it.  I am also delighted to have the opportunity to acknowledge the debt that I owe to my friends without whom my life would lack so much.

So as I get to grips with my Sunday roast I give thanks for the Sunday myLot roast too.  Cheers.

Do we "Overshare"?

Eh?  Do we what?  Overshare?  What's that then?  Those of us that spend what seems like an increasing part of our days on sites like myLot, Yuwie or the myriad of similar sites have become used to sharing our secrets with each other.  But how far should we go.  The lure of such sites is that they expose us to a far wider variety of thoughts and perspectives than we might otherwise discover from within our own close circle of family and friends.  The anonymity of the internet gives us a sense of security that allows us to reveal intimate details and receive confirmation that we are not so unusual; that ointment X will help that embarrassing spot, that someone else slept with his wife's best friend too etc.

But why do we want to share this information in the first place?  Is it because we are sad, lonely, morbidly curious, exhibitionists, what?  I think that it has something to do with the pseudo psychotherapy approach to modern life, at least in the West.  For years now we have been actively encouraged not to bottle it up, letting go is good.   We are comfortable therefore, with the thought that it is permissible to ask for opinion about almost anything.   We are happy to parade all that ails us in front of our peers.  I belong to a generation that grew up believing that family problems stopped at the garden gate.  You never ever washed your dirty linen in public.  But that approach has now been all but dashed and I, along with thousands of others, seek the comfort and solace that sharing my agony with a strangers brings. I have mentioned elsewhere here that a number of those strangers are no longer viewed in that light by me.  They have become friends, some of them very close.  They know things about me that my family are not necessarily aware of.  I have posed in women's underwear for their amusement.  I would never do that in my local newspaper.   Neither would that be information that I would share with a prospective employer.  But I am happy to share that comedy image with the World!   I feel safe simply because I have placed myself on the global scene rather than the parochial one in which I live.

If we show a willingness to share, then where does the line get drawn?  I am not sure that it does.  I have sat on trains listening to the most personal details of family life as someone finishes his breakfast conversation on the 7.10am to Waterloo (London).  "Darling, I have said I won't see her again. What do you want me to do?  She works in the same building for goodness sake.  Cutting up my suits isn't helpful my love.  You're getting this all out of proportion" and so forth.  Great entertainment, but is it healthy?  We all like a gossip and to know who is doing what and then feign shock and indignation that there should have been such a lowering of morals.  You have to look no further than Oprah, Montel, Jerry Springer to see people happily trotting onto the TV to bare their souls for the delectation of the wider community.  And we love it don't we.  We act as amateur counsellors to the legion of men and women that parade their problems in the hope that somehow we will make it all better.  We receive our 15 minutes of fame too.  Andy Warhol was not so far off the mark then.

Look at the other public things that we do.  To start with, there's this blog.  I have written this for myself but I hope that you will read it too.  Some people put their diaries on-line, others their art and literature.  What about a film, I'll stick it on Youtube.  The possibilities are endless.  Do we feel happier for doing this?  In the old days someone's diary was intensely personal and rarely shared; at least while they were alive.  Now we leap to the internet to share.  We pronounce ourselves happy.  Only time will tell if we really are.

But our happiness to reveal our innermost thoughts comes at a price.  We look for benign, uncritical responses and live in hope of affirmation that what we think, do or believe is acceptable to others.  If their response is less than enthusiastic we sulk, scream or abuse the very people that minutes before we were asking for their help.  But having received this brush off what do we do?  Why, we rush off and ask another question, hopeful that this time the replies will be more generous.  Perhaps we are addicted.  

I don't think that we will return to the days when discretion ruled.  The advent of the internet has brought a freedom that allows us to express ourselves in ways hitherto unthought of.  I can even publish a book myself now abut anything that I want.  No agent, no publisher, just a few words, $20 and I am published.  

So with all that in mind.  I will see you out on the lot.  I've got a very nasty rash somewhere sensitive that I just want to share.

Facebook

I am on Facebook.  Have been for a while.  I didn't want to be, but my sister, Lis, not to be confused with my wife Liz; we are a close family but not that close!  Anyway Lis went on a hotshot holiday to South Africa with her husband and wanted to show off not just her tan, but her holiday snaps as well.  Years ago we had slides.  Little pieces of negative images packed into plastic cases that you lost down couches etc.  We'd get back from wherever, invite all Mum and Dad's friends round, eat cheesy things on sticks and drink cheap wine, cider for me if I was lucky, switch on the slide projector and sit through hour after interminable hour of: "Here's the hotel".  "Here's the coach before we left on the trip to the glass blowing place where p1kef1sh was sick after drinking too much Coke". "Look there is Dad having a pee!"  Hah blooming Ha.   You know the score.

Anyway, Facebook.  I opened my account and soon became entranced by its spell.  I uploaded my Profile picture.  Added an album and started to have friends join in the spectacle.  Soon I started to receive gifts from people.  I have karma, muppets, film and music quizzes - all of which is wonderful I am sure.  What I really want though is to see what it is that somebody has sent me.  For example, my sister sent me something green today.  No, not  a photo of her on that sail boat on a very choppy sea, but something that by the simple act of sending it will save the planet from all its environmental ills.  Fantastic.  I want one of those.  I shall be Chair of Greenpeace tomorrow!  But can I actually see this wonder?  Can I heck.  First I have to download an application.  What?  I have to apply for this thing.  Will it be considered by an earnest group of conservationists.  Are my sandals open toed enough.  My clothes sufficiently homespun? Oh.  Not that sort of application.  This one will enable it. Enable it to do what? To enable it to allow you to send the green thing to all your friends too.  But I don't want to do that.  Why should my friends be lumbered with this thing too.  Can't I try before I buy?  

At this point my friend Karen in Canada came to help me.  Karen is another of my loves.  She has always been there when I am in trouble.  We first met when she was looking for the male G spot.  Not on me I hasten to add.  I am not averse to Canadian ladies, especially ones as attractive as Karen, seeking my G spot.  But there are limits to a computer relationship.   Karen is bright as well as beautiful and she kindly offered to help me sort the problem out. Unfortunately I am terminally stupid.  My ability to navigate something like Facebook, which my neighbour's dog can manage is beyond me.  Apparently I am one of a very large group of people that are stymied by Facebook applications.  There are help groups, probably employing counsellors and therapists available to help me regain my confidence after a particularly nasty attack of Facebook applications.  But for all that, there is no known cure.  We have to live with it.  The upshot of this is that I still haven't seen what it is that Lis has sent me.  I have just had an IM conversation with her.  I explained my problem and after several abortive attempts to solve her brother's stupidity she signed off with a cheery "That's life boy".  I thought that was a soap.

Karen had previously sent me a Facebook Anthem.  It is worth looking at if you suffer the Facebook malaise too.  

Here it is: www.youtube.com/watch?v=boPhG9dtGfo

Thank you USAF

I have just been to Lidl.  Now don't all fall of your seats laughing.  Fish have to eat and frankly, ants eggs pall after a while.  So I resolved to be like the Yummy Mummies and take my Waitrose bags and shop at the cheapo place.  (Waitrose is a superior UK supermarket - sort of like Dillards but with food.  Actually Dillards might well do food.  I don't know).  Now my nearest Lidl is about 12 miles away.  There are at least four supermarkets within two miles of where I am sitting right now so why did I choose one that far away?  Simple.  It's cheap.  "But think of all money that you will spend on petrol getting there and back" you cry.  "I've got a hybrid car.  That's at least a third of the cost saved."  Don't roll your eyes.  I have been thrifty, in a not very efficient way.  This is the point where Pumpkin, my lovely surrogate daughter comes in and ticks me off.  Have I mentioned  her?   She will tick me off for this I just know it. She is so good at making her money stretch and I just fling it around, despite trying to manage on a, for me, low budget.  We haven't made £25 once.  But we are "only" spending about a tenner more.  Thats still £50 a week less than we used to.  But I love her so.  She'll have to forgive me the waste.  Please.

What has this got to do with the USAF then?  On my drive up there I went through a small village, just a strip of houses really, called Shipton Bellinger (SB).  As I drove into the village I burst into tears.  I have done a lot of that this week.  Not screaming my head off the end is nigh stuff. Just silent eye watering ones.  Close to SB there is a large military airfield - Boscombe Down.  Just as my tears started to make me wish that I had taken my rain coat the entire US Air Force (well three of them) flew over to check that we are all still here.  As the last aircraft flew over the sun came out, my tears dried, and I felt the most cheerful that I have done in a while.  I carried on to Lidl and did my shopping.  Of course I didn't have a £1 coin which is a requirement if you want a trolley, so I had to carry my purchases round the shop.  Have you ever tried to carry a frozen lobster, 40 dishwasher tablets, assorted other fishy items and a bottle of red wine in your hands?  Well don't if you can avoid it.  I did think of stuffing the lobster down my trousers and then whipping it out at the checkout.  However, firstly inserting a frozen lobster into your trousers is a risky business; secondly, once there it will drip freezing water over your unmentionables causing intense discomfort and a need later for nappy rash cream; thirdly, at the checkout itself making a lunge for your trousers saying "I'll just get my lobster out for you to see", is going to involve a nasty scene involving not only the checkout assistant but the store Manager too. 

As I drove back home the USAF, plus a smaller British aircraft (everything is bigger in the US of A) flew off again leaving the sun shining.  Happy and safe flying, take my love to America.

Squabbling

Have you ever watched small children squabbling with each other.  Usually a deliberate act starts the fight.  A toy is snatched or a crayon stolen.  The response is invariably swift and just as spiteful.  I have just dropped into myLot - I cannot keep away - and it's going on there right now.  The children all look grown up.  They have families, houses, jobs, in all respects they are utterly respectable; but they love to squabble.  "That's my opinion and you are a  big fat fink for thinking differently"  "Ha.  At least my opinion doesn't depend on something that you can't see or prove"  and so on.  Why do we love to be right all the time?  Why must I lash out the minute that I read something that challenges my belief or mindset.  Am I so convinced in views that I am unable to accept a differing opinion might at least be worth looking at.  It is said that you can ask for advice but you don't have to take it.  What's different here.  I ask a question, someone gives me their thoughts, I weigh it up, I accept or reject.  But, if I reject I have a choice.  I can reply, and if I do so, I must say that I am of a differing opinion, but let it not lead to a fight.  I must state my case and encourage thoughtful and careful discussion.   Alternatively of course, I can choose to ignore the reply,or post a simple "Thank you".

What actually happens though is that the red mist descends.  I feel threatened and must retaliate.  I lash out, often missing the principal focus of the reply and give my own, unexpurgated opinion of not only the reply, but the belief behind it.  Religion is a common one.  Sexuality another.  I, it would appear, am also the cause for altercation.  I have already said that I am catching my breath, but that is clearly not how some see it.

So we can squabble about anything and anybody; and probably will.  Fighting and competition is a human condition and we do it in a minor or major way daily.  None of us is immune.  But it would be nice (when I was at primary school my teacher banned that word - nice.  "Find another adjective" she'd say.  How right she was) if we all gave just a little more thought to our responses to things.  We don't have to agree, but we don't have to be nasty in our disagreement either.

Coffee time I think.

Comments

I have had this Blog 24 hours now and have managed to accrue a few comments from friends.  Of course deep down this is what I want.  The approval of my friends and the constructive thoughts of others.  However, I shall have to be careful because the comments are all better written than the writings on which they comment!  I am touched and humbled, that those that I have received thus far are not only extremely welcoming to a new blogger, but charming, witty and loving too.  I continue to be a lucky man.