Name and Title, Please.
Job titles are an interesting cultural phenomenon. For centuries, position titles have made it easy to identify the responsibilities of someone who works in an organization. Positions, specifications, and classifications are carefully adjusted with titles to ensure a smooth traffic flow and control over disruptive lane changes. How do we evolve as some professions fade to extinction while others emerge shapeless like caulk, germanely, magically filling unnoticeable cracks and crevices?
The Perfect Middle Child is Central Kentucky
As we study this commonwealth, what consistently strikes me is the good-natured, gracious, almost neighborly quest for progress and prosperity in a state with three distinct regions. It's like the weird family where all the siblings seem to get along, and you can't help but wonder why. And where central Kentucky is the perfect middle child in a family of odd parts and shady reputations.
Should We Shelve the Elves?
I feel sorry for the parents of young children today. As if fielding sanctimonious questions about why mommy is kissing Santa Claus, whether or not the fake-bearded mall Santa is on Ozempic, or “you're sure there's just one sleigh?” from the second-grader who can multiply and divide four different ways is not enough; now, after balancing work with clandestine online shopping, schlepping the kids to basketball, ballet, church, and holiday concerts, parents have to remember to move the scout elf AND make it clever.
Which Love Would you Like for the Holidays?
I was talking with a friend about her new love interest. After years of post-divorce self-subscribed abstinence, she met someone, and he was perfect, but for one thing. They had been together for a year, and he had not said the big three words. But he was always doing things for her. Every weekend, he blew off her yard. The other day, she found him changing the air filters and replacing a rotted fence board she did not know she had. He even cooked for her, her kids, and her extended, wildly insane family. But he had not said I love you. I shook my head as she talked. "You had me at leaf blowing," I said. "Have you considered his love language is different from yours?" She shrugged and said she liked hearing it. I reminded her that the former husband was excellent with words but not so much with actions. "Love is a Verb," I said.
Part Two: An Appalachian Epiphany
The theme of leaving and returning is strong in Appalachia; it is difficult to make a living without the coal jobs. Many people must travel hours to work each day in Georgetown, Somerset, wherever industry has jobs with wages enough to feed their families. It is easy to see why they must move away, and it is easy to see why they yearn to come home. The mountains pull them in, wrap them up, a warm fleece that safeguards them from unfamiliar winds; they nestle in, scrapping to sustain the foothold of their common connections.
Appalachia Part One: The Common Wealth of Kentucky Heads East.
Mayor Stapleton sat in a portable chair across from Kelly. She started her outline while he pointed overhead at a perfectly-timed bald eagle and said, "when people came here, they were looking for independence. Not necessarily independence from the government, but yes, not necessarily independence from religion, but yes. They just wanted to be independent, period. They wanted to be left alone wanted to do their thing. That gave them a strength that's second to none. At one time, right here on this point on the side of the mountain, there were cornfields so they could feed their crops and feed their families." Farming on the side of a mountain "that takes determination and ingenuity.
Awkward-Ass Year
We, like everyone else in the world, toasted a goodbye to 2020 this week. Some people said goodbye to an awful year. I said goodbye to an awkward, two-right-footed slippers kind of year.
The Truth About the Herd
Thank God for Tik Tok. You won't find many Gen Xers who agree with me generally, but more specifically, how could we have survived the shutdown without the memes and stories we furiously forwarded to our friends and family? They engendered an ounce of levity during a freakishly "unprecedented time", and they connected us with others effortlessly. That connection was really, really important. That connection is the premise of this blog.