Six degrees

Usually when we think about six degrees of separation, we try to think of the famous and/or powerful people we're within six degrees of. For me, this includes Robert De Niro, Elton John, and Marilyn Manson.

What about the others, the ones who are extraordinary in dark ways? This week, I found out I was just two degrees of separation from a sex offender. I say was, because the man last month jumped off a bridge.

Epiphany, again

I've long been bitter bitter bitter about the education I received (and, more critically, did not receive) from my public schools and my university. I realize that this bitterness is my problem, not anyone else's, though despite that understanding I still look for somewhere else to lay blame (for my shitty education, not my bitterness). I'm weak that way. Just a moment ago, though, I came to a realization that explains a lot about the education I got.

My parents had entirely different goals for my education than I did. The public schools, and my state university, had entirely different goals for my education than I did. I never clearly stated my goals to anyone but myself, and I only did that at the beginning of my high school career. When forced to change schools (and districts, city, and state) mid-stream, when my new school didn't even offer the things I'd been reaching for in my previous school, I gave up, created a non-academic goal (i.e. I wanted some friends) and just floated along through the rest for the next several years.

Wandering the Blogosphere, I gather hope like golden poppies

A few weeks ago my mother sent me a link to a Wall Street Journal article. She loves the Journal, has been reading it for decades, and delights in sharing articles she thinks may be interesting or useful to others. A few days later, on the phone, she asked if I'd read it, and I said I had, but I'd found it extremely poorly written.

"Yes, I noticed that, too, the writing is really going downhill at the Journal," she said. "I've thought about sending them a letter complaining about it, but who am I?"

"Mom, you've been a Journal reader for thirty years. That gives you some authority, you can own that."

"Pssh," was her response. And the subject changed.

My mother is deeply perplexed as to why I spend time reading blogs and participating in Delphi discussions. Her ways were set in a time when authority came from above -- doctors, politicians, CEOs, editors, professors, writers...all of them carrying a sort of authority she could never approach. She might disagree with them, disregard them, even disrespect them, but the concept of her own authority never was considered. She can't really begin to comprehend the respect I have for the people I meet online, most of whom are in a socio-economic strata at or below my own, most of whom have the same level of nearly useless schooling as I. "Why would you want to read that stuff?" she says. Because the people I have found online are my peers. They're average like me, they're weird like me, they're *like me* and *not like me* at the same time. They show me ways to improve myself, they show me sides of myself I hadn't known, they reveal themselves for their own purposes, but to my benefit. They challenge me, reassure me, complain with me, hope with me. We commisserate on the state of things, celebrate the joys and sorrows of our days, and strive for a better world. We all believe that saying something, writing something, makes a difference. We all believe in our own authority, whether we're feeling particularly powerful with it or not.