Wishing for a source of news that is unbiased and accurate.
Recently I was talking to a coworker about how we consume news. We both feel like we should at least have a clue what is going on at a local, state, national, and international level. Ignorance is not bliss for most of the people I associate with. I guess it’s culturally ingrained, not that there’s anything wrong with being from another subculture within the US that isn’t as concerned with knowing true from false, news from propaganda, etc. There have always been folks who are just fine in a local/family bubble; it’s sort of understandable, especially lately.
So many of us just want to know what’s happening beyond our doorstep. Photo by @madelinerosephoto via Twenty20
Anyway, my coworker and I found we were in really strong agreement about how we liked to get information, and agreed that things we see on social media platforms take too much energy to figure out whether to believe or not. We both just skip that stuff and are members of the “don’t make or read any comments” group.
A good local newspaper!
I have a source for international news that I like, and I am aware of the biases of the US-centric sources I use and that they play into my confirmation bias. I am able to weed out obvious slant-y things, but it gets tiresome! Surprisingly, I find have found local Austin and Cameron news sources (radio and newspaper) that are quite helpful and not too hard to get factual information from. I guess that’s what helps keep my head from exploding. That and NOT reading their Facebook pages.
Honestly, though, I miss being able to read a news source or watch the local news and just get a summary of things that have been happening, with no hidden commercials, obvious slants, and repetitive hype. I can’t stand the local news channels (all over the US, not just where I live) that repeat the same hyped-up snippet of a news piece repeatedly to get your attention, then present something totally bland. I’m smart enough to take information and run it through my own biases and interpret it myself. I don’t need help. Thus, I can’t make myself sit through any television news.
I don’t know how anyone manages to figure this stuff out, no matter what your biases are. Photo by @andreyyalansky19 via Twenty20
I’m aware that anything written by a person has biases, but I do remember when I was a kid we were trained to try to eliminate that as much as we could, and to clearly label opinion pieces. I wish ratings and ad revenue weren’t the actual reason for news content these days. But, it sure looks that way to me. The more incendiary content is, the more it sells.
Incendiary news sells, if you can read it before it goes POOF! Photo by @foto.privet via Twenty20
I’m wary of cutting myself off from all news sources, because so much affects me directly. Where can I find some simple statements of facts to learn from? Tell me! I’d buy some crap from a company or organization that sponsored accurate, unvarnished, information.
It happens. Happened to me. I was trying to be a good friend, but didn’t use good judgment. Did it go unnoticed?
Nothing goes unnoticed today, and by the end of the day, numerous people had reported to my spouse that I had made a mistake. Small town living at its finest.
Can I climb out? Photo by @gafutch via Twenty20
That kind of thing can make you feel paranoid! Or, in my case, a lot of the work I’ve been doing on my “stuff” can fall away, and I end up acting like teen Suna with all the negative self-talk bubbling up.
I’ll take that as an educational moment, and one that can provide helpful insight into how my inner workings work, and maybe how many of us work. We may work to change ingrained patterns and know what our triggers are, but every so often, we’ll fall back into that hole.
What’s important is to learn to quickly pick ourselves up, reflect on what we can do differently next time, and (most important) shake off that self criticism and crawl out of the hole more quickly each time it happens.
She did it; so can I. Photo by @paigeinrealife via Twenty20.
I even DREAMED I was climbing a rickety ladder, trying to get out of a hole. Like I’ve said before, my dreams contain very un-subtle metaphors.
Hug yourselves, friends. Our imperfect selves are here to learn to love and forgive not only others, but ourselves.
Wondering
How do you forgive yourself? Through prayer, meditation, invoking a higher power, or reading? Searching the internet for quotes by your favorite healing author?
What are some useful things to tell yourself (asking for a friend, ha ha)?
Because my employer gave us the day off in honor of Juneteenth (good for them), Kathleen and I decided to do something fun. We went to the little local nursery in Cameron to get some plants for the new office, since it’s pretty smelly in there from floor finishing (another post).
New plants!
It was hard to decide what to get, because they had so many lovely things. I got myself a spider plant for my office, because the ones in Austin got aphids or something. Boo. She got a pothos for hers, but I’m going to make one out of the plant in my bedroom (and Mandi May have made me one, too).
We found our company on a poster! Kathleen is wearing her Thelma hat. I happen to have Louise.
I also got a peace plant, and because I messed up Mandi’s, I’ve made it the Mandi’s Mom Memorial Peace Plant. That pleased her. That’s it for indoors.
The peace plant, before watering. Before planting.
Kathleen got three roses for in front of her office and a hibiscus for the patio on the other side. She also got a fern and a corn plant. For now, they are on the front porch, but one is really for the reception office.
The hibiscus. It will be red.
She picked three pretty plants for the area around the mailbox. One the young man at the shop said was a Mexican honeysuckle. The others are purple. I had to look it up. PlantSnap said it was a golden dewdrop. Okay. Duranta erecta is its name and it will be big and thorny. Oh my. But it’s native to Mexico, so it may not make it through the winter.
Golden dewdrop, purple type.
Well, the nursery mostly has Mexican plants, so that makes sense! The people who run the place are very nice and take such good care of the plants. I’m very glad they’re here in our little town.
The Mexican plant collection.
After I went to the farrier visit, we planted the ones that go in the ground. I admit Kathleen did the hard work. I weeded. Then Chris also helped. It was fun, and the weather wasn’t too bad in the shade.
Thelma plants a foundation plant.
It all looks quite cheerful. Tomorrow Kathleen is going to work on the grass, and we are going to get some cheerful Mexican pottery for the indoor plants. Fun times. It’s feeling like a real, cared-for, old house!
Today is the first day of the next phase of our Hearts Homes and Hands project. We closed on a pretty big piece of property in Cameron, the Ross house we’ve showed you a couple of times.
It’s ours! Let’s get that tree out of the entry.
Now Hermits’ Rest Enterprises owns the cute house, the land around it, and a lot across the street.
Look! It’s a lot!
After the closing, which was nice and smooth, we met the heirs of the previous owner. Then Lee, Kathleen, and I ran to the house and gleefully pulled up ALL the many For Sale signs around the property.
Happy Not for Sale Day!
It felt good. If Kathleen wasn’t recovering from some medical stuff, she’d have turned cartwheels. Her dream house is ready for her to have a wonderful future in it…well, as soon as it has a functioning kitchen and bathroom. Details, details.
Kathleen is trying not to run in the house and start moving stuff around.
We’re all enjoying dreaming of Victorian decor, that is when we aren’t working on the current project! the end is near!
Some people say you can’t teach an old dog new tricks, and I am definitely an old[er]…person. I’ve always thought of myself as a realist, in that I see the beauty and good in the world, but I don’t deny the sadness, sorrow, injustice and pain that’s around me, either. Life is suffering, after all, says the Buddha.
Top that off with a healthy dose of empathy and sensitivity to the moods of others around me, and I end up not being the biggest little ray of sunshine in Central Texas. I have even railed about “toxic positivity” and “non-toxic positivity” right here in this blog, not that long ago.
For me, there’s room for each.
However, in the last few months, life has been conspiring to teach me new ways of walking through life, thanks to some people who just sorta showed up, or I just started paying closer attention to them. And it’s not just reading all those Buddhist articles that help you see that living in the moment is key.
You see, I used to avoid the relentlessly optimistic if at all possible. Always seeing the bright side of things, ugh. “Oh, no, I have the flu.” “That’s great! You can catch up on your reading!” I also got tired of the relentlessly negative, too. I know people who can suck the life out of any conversation by pointing out the negative consequences of anything: “It’s such a pretty day!” “Yeah, but you’ll get skin cancer if you stand in the sun.”
Depending on how you look at life, this may well be true.
I probably have mentioned before that I loathe being told to smile when I am, at the moment, not actually happy. Sure, I’ve read that forcing yourself to smile can make you happier, but sometimes there’s good reason to be unhappy, at least temporarily. Okay, fine.
Look at that happy face!
I’ve been watching the positive people in my life more closely, though. Here’s one you can watch yourself: go follow Emma G on Facebook. That is one positive woman. I happen to know that she’s faced some challenges in the year I’ve been reading her posts, but she never fails to find something good, some way a challenge has helped her grow, or a way something she’s learned can help others. I look forward to that smiling face every day, as she shares how she’s working on her musical career while minimizing danger from COVID-19.
Here, wine is helping us stay positive.
Living with Kathleen the past few months has also been a lesson at looking on the positive side of things. I have never seen anyone post so many cheerful memes in my entire life. Sometimes I’m like, geez, you have insomnia and are sick to your stomach, but you’re still posting “everything’s GREAT” all over Facebook. I see, though, that she’s trying to draw in the good stuff by sharing it (guessing it’s the power of attraction or something). Whatever it is, even when it irritates me a little, I can’t HELP but be reminded to look at what’s good in my own life, which is leading me toward a more positive outlook. She’s another person who’s had some real challenges to deal with in the past year but is finding ways to see the good. She’s never afraid to go talk to someone about our business and get some sort of positive outcome, too. Also, she’s one amazing idea generator. Now she wants me to have a donkey ranch.
This was taken just after Pam gave me a positive pep talk.
Another beacon of positivity is my friend Pam B. from the Breakfast Club here in Cameron. She’s another person who just radiates happiness and works hard to cultivate good in the world. Every time I talk to her, she says something about wanting to “elevate the good” or find joy or something to that effect. She is amazing at bringing people together for the betterment of this small but quite vital community (and is really fun to watch in community theater). Seeing how she works so hard to bring happiness to her friends, neighbors, and families is a real inspiration.
Here’s Eva with the sun behind her, making her even sunnier.
A final source of positive vibes is my coworker, Eva. I’ve known her since I started working at Planview, so I’ve had plenty of time to soak in her attitude. Especially in the past few years, she has provided a great example of how to take feedback that might upset someone or get them down, and turn it into an opportunity to learn more, find a new way to present information, or create a better product. She’s confident in the skills she has, and doesn’t take it personally when I mess with her grammar, because she knows perfectly well that the actual ideas are great. But it’s not just about work, but all aspects of her life that she brings along a sunny attitude and a lot of gratitude. It’s rubbing off, slowly but surely.
Here’s one of Kathleen’s memes.
People like this have been in my life before, some for many years, but I must be in a position to be more open to their input and to learning from them (thanks to those Enneagram books, I guess). I’ve been told that people come into your life for a reason, which is hard for someone like me, who has mostly been convinced that life is random. But, maybe there’s something to it, and something to the idea that if you surround yourself with positive people, you’ll be more positive, even if there’s a pandemic going on.
Another thoughtful meme that I have taken to heart. Some people may wish I hadn’t.
Do you know a relentlessly positive person? If you do, THANK them, and see if you can let a bit of that attitude rub off on you. Things in the world won’t change, but you may be better able to cope with it. I am, thanks to Emma, Kathleen, Pam, and Eva (and all you others I didn’t mention).
Okay, let’s all be SUPER HAPPY! Be a ray of sunshine like Emma, Kathleen, Pam, and Eva!
Let’s just have a little nature story, shall we? Why not?
The past month or so we’ve had a family of mockingbirds working on raising a family. Every time we went in or out of the Hermit Haus office, an angry bird or two would fly by and make that mockingbird screech of warning. I never found the nest, but I know it was really nearby and that they spent a LOT of time in the lantana bed.
I can fly! Just not very far, so please bring me a bug.
I also got to watch one of the adult birds using the pipe where the air conditioning condensation comes out as a water dispenser. I wish I’d gotten a picture! I should put a bird bath under there or something.
Last week the little ones fledged, and they certainly are not afraid of us humans who they’ve grown up with. I had the best time last week watching one of them on its first day out, still with a little topknot of baby feathers.
I love these flowers.
Today I came in to work for the first time in a few days, and heard all sorts of peeping, even from inside the building. A while later I had to take a phone call in the driveway. When I went out, there, peeping continued. I watched an adolescent bird flail away and make it on top of one of the air conditioner units. Then it gathered ALL its courage and jumped to the OTHER one! It seemed proud.
I can see farther thanks to these convenient steps.
After a little flapping it calmed down and opened its mouth. In flew one of the parents, who stuffed some kind of bug down its little gullet. When I looked over by the lantana bed, I saw the rest of the family had gathered. There were both parents and three babies, who are just about the same size as the parents, but still have little streaks on their chests.
The parents are on the left, and the babies are on the right.
I sure enjoyed their antics as they munched on berries and flopped around. I’m hoping that the house finches who have built another nest in the carport area manage to get babies this time. Between these guys and the swallows at the Pope house, I have had a great baby bird year.
Getting ready to chow down on lantana.
Tell you what, watching birds raise their young is a wonderful way to remember that you are part of a much larger world of nature that doesn’t give a darn about what country they are in or what diseases are afflicting humans.
Next week, the refinishing of the floor in my new office will start. That means I’ll need a desk. Chris really wanted to make one, as I e mentioned before. We both wanted to re-use old materials for it. We found doors we wanted to use as the desk top and sides among ones we had to remove in the renovation.
The future desk doors
But, we didn’t find suitable framing stuff, even when we looked at various antique shops. Then, one day, Chris was at our friend Mike’s woodworking shop, borrowing a saw. He noticed some old pipe, and asked Mike what it was. It turns out it was the old gas lines that got removed when we were working on the Hermit Haus.
Parts of the pipe he didn’t use.
Mike hadn’t wanted them to go to waste, so he took them home. He was happy to give them to Chris for the desk project!
So, today was welding day. I’ve never watched anyone build with metal before, so I hung around and watched Chris as he worked. Numerous dogs helped until sparks started flying.
Everyone was happy while he was just selecting pipe to use.
We did the work under the shady roof over our shipping container (future tack room and stalls for horses). Alfred dug himself a nice hole to sit in.
Happy Alfred
First, Chris cut all the pieces from the old pipe. It was really exact. He marked the cuts with a soapstone marker. Interesting!
Firing up the welder
Heating up pipe
That’s hot
Fire!
Welding time!
I kept watching the little fires that came up, ready to throw my cup of water on them. But it was fine.
After that, Chris put on his helmet and put everything together. It didn’t take long at all! It was like magic! I enjoyed seeing how he leveled the legs and attached all the parts securely.
Finishing the main frame
It’s a rectangle!
Support bar in
Adding more bars
Building the legs
Getting things square
Complete desk frame.
Building the desk
The highlight was when he put the old door on the rustic frame. Wow. So cool. It will look amazing with the big piece of glass on top.
The door fits!
I even got to practice sitting at my desk. What a fun thing to do on a Sunday!
It seems to work!
Thanks to Chris for his willingness to make this one-of-a-kind example of using what you have!
There’s a big difference between anxiety (see earlier post from today) and being anxious. For example, I’m really anxious to be able to move out of my current dungeon office at the Hermit Haus and enjoy my cozy new office over at the Pope house. That’s a good kind of anxious.
I am very tired of looking at these paneled walls, and sitting in this dim room I’ve tried to cheer up with paintings and flowers. The bird hanger will hold my purse in the new office.
I am waiting, as patiently as I can, because the floors need to be re-finished, and we couldn’t do that this week. Next week, though, baby, sanding will occur. The old floors will look really cool, and we are going to have some fantastic little touches in my office. Ooh, I’m excited, and that is helping me have something positive to focus on.
Today Chris came by the beautifully cool Pope house to pick up a very important item: the door that’s going to be the base for my new desk he’s making. While we had it downstairs, we decided to see where it will look best in the room. We first tried it lined up with the window in the center of the room, so I could walk around it from all sides. One thing that occurred to me when we did that is that when I’m in Zoom meetings, the camera will be facing the bathroom. It’s a cool bathroom, but…
You can see here how a camera pointing from the center of the desk would look into the bathroom.
It would have looked pretty good from this angle, though.
So, Chris suggested we try angling the desk. With a little shuffling around, I saw that I’d have a better view out the window, a nice view of my wood stove and interior window, and it just felt good. Plus, my computer’s camera would be looking at either the barn door and the wall, or just the wall, which will have either a bookcase with nice objects on it, or a big painting. Ahh.
Pretending to sit, I can see everything pretty, the stove, my chairs, my interior window, the door.
This is what you’ll see looking in the door. Zoom will show either that barn door or the brick it covers when shut, like it is here.
It doesn’t look too weird from this angle, either.
There’s one more decision made.
Mmm, lilacs. I assume the paint won’t smell like them.
Meanwhile, Meghan came up to us and showed us colors she’d like for her upstairs office. She wants a nice lilac color. The color she chose will look great with the dark trim that we’re leaving up there (it’s in great shape). All we have to do to get her up and running will be clean well, paint the walls, and run a 220 outlet up to the office so she can have a window air conditioner that will actually keep her cool.
Felix says that when we are ready to finish out the rest of the upstairs, it will be really easy to put in an upstairs HVAC unit in the attic. That’s for another day, though!
What’s this? We found Tubby’s sibling WITH feet in a house near the Pope house. Ooh, if we buy yet another Victorian house, we might have another project.
Goodness knows, we are living in unprecedented times of stress. But, they are also times of opportunity for positive change. I’ve actually been feeling encouraged by some events in the past week or two. Even my most pessimistic coworker had to grudgingly admit that that there ARE positive trends (though he stuck firmly to his trademarked pessimism).
Anxiety, while in a Zoom meeting.
So, why have I been dealing with an onslaught of anxiety symptoms for the past couple of days? Why was I unable to get to sleep last night thanks to pesky thoughts about potential issues popping into my head (totally unbidden; I was relaxed and ready to sleep). Why am I having my least-favorite symptom, big ole chest pains? Why is my head all fuzzy and buzzy?
The answer is that at the moment I have no idea, but I know well enough that these symptoms are a part of my makeup and that I need to listen to them when they make their presence known. It’s like, “Hi Suna, are you doing the things you need to do to maintain your mental and physical health? Is there something going on that you are choosing to ignore and not deal with? Are you concerned about someone else?”
So, I’ve been sitting here thinking about what my conscious mind may be trying to hide from me that I need to address. I know there are three family members with health issues that concern me. They’re very important to me, and it’s hard to see people you love in pain. One is getting better, but two are struggling (physically or mentally).
As I type this, AHA, I get the idea that a lot of the anxiety is about my struggling family members. In the past week or two I have tried to help out and really not had much success. So, I’ve stepped back. For one of them, matters are becoming more pressing. I know I tend to get anxious about things I can’t do anything about, especially when I really NEED to do something.
Thanks, weird anxiety friend. You have told me in no uncertain terms that I need to not keep hoping issues will go away if I don’t think about them. Some part of me is concerned and it’s causing physical symptoms.
What a good lesson this is for me, and perhaps you, too. Like I realized when the Enneagram book helped me embrace my inner sloth, the problematic parts of our makeup have a place in our whole selves. My anxiety is my messenger. I’ll listen.
Still embracing that inner sloth. Image by @jandall via Twenty20.
It’s worth thinking about what parts of yourself that you may not be thrilled about actually are serving a useful purpose. I hope you enjoyed reading how I worked out what was going on in my head. What do you find? How do you figure things out?
I just read that WordPress has come up with a method whereby you can have “premium content” in your blog. The idea is that people sign up to be a supporter of a particular blog, and for X dollars a month (or year) you get access to blog content that those poor regular readers can’t see.
Examples that I read about included recipes, photos, art, etc. Maybe a poet would write a poem just for the paid customers.
Perhaps adorable dog photos would entice followers to pay up. Hmm.
This reminds me a lot of the Patreon site, where you pledge some number of dollars in support of an artist, musician, crafter, or writer, just so that they can have some time to work on their artistic avocation and not have to hustle so much for cash to pay the rent. It worked for Michaelangelo, sort of.
Bouquet of the day? Well, I bought this for Kathleen, so mine would not look so nice.
The people I support on Patreon send out an occasional postcard, or share a drawing/cartoon just with their supporters. I’m guessing most artists get a little money each month, while ones who are very popular may get a good amount. I would assume you wouldn’t want so many patrons to please that you once again have no time to be creative.
Anyway, it got me thinking. What on earth would I do for “premium content” that anyone would actually want? Photos of the animals? Tarot card of the day? Identify a bug or snake? Honest, I am grasping at straws here. I think my little introspective creations are fine for myself and for others to read for free, but it’s not the kind of thing people pay for.
Art! That’s it! I call this “Giant peach and laptop background,” by SA Kendall
So, I’m asking: If Suna were to offer “premium content,” what would you like it to be?
Answer in the comments (or on Facebook, or in person). If the answer is “nothing,” don’t worry. I agree with you!
The Hermits' Rest 