imagined-community

Hurrah Hurrah. Oh Happy New Year. Finally, I can breathe again; my annual holiday trip to Florida is over. As always, after a few days with my controlling mom I returned to the Northeast angry and frustrated, disappointed with myself, exhausted, depressed, and all too acutely aware of how my least favorite ways of interacting with people were born in my relationship with my mother. On the positive side, I often responded to my mother as I would to any other person (centered, kind and detached) rather than in one of my mom communication styles: the know it all or the withdrawn teen.

Florida itself was a trip. Mom lives in one of those planned retirement communities where everyone drives around in a golf cart. I think the minimum age to live in the golf cart community is 55. Whenever two people under the age of 55 pass each other on the street it is customary for both persons to gently nod their head and make some companionable “You too, huh” eye contact. The “you too,” signifying something like, “You’ve got relatives living here? Yeah, me too.” I personally think there is something fundamentally bizarre, like inbreeding, about any place that is defined by a single age group, be it high school or a retirement community (at least the university has graduate and non-traditional students). But I suppose these holding tanks, I mean communities, are easy and fun. Though every time a golf cart sped by I swear I heard the voice of Rod Sterling intone, “your moving into a land of both shadow and substance…you’ve just crossed over into the twilight zone.”

Mom

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Yeah, I made it! Even though I was a total curmudgeon the last few days. NaBloPoMo has definitely given me a new appreciation for people that post every day, especially the single working moms & dads out there that blog regularly. I definitely did not enjoy posting every day and I am SO glad that I don’t have to post tomorrow. =) In a way, this month has caused me to ask myself why I am blogging. I read many new blogs this month (new to me) and have been impressed by the writing and whatnot that bloggers are doing on their plots of virtual space. I’ve been inspired by some of the stuff I have seen and I have a feeling that my blog will be getting a revamp in the future, but not tomorrow…or even the next day! Thank you to everyone who has been reading and commenting this month! I appreciate your support! And congratulations to all the NaBloPoMo bloggers out there that made it the full 30 days!

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Here I am, stuck in bed, watching night after night of dismal health news. I don’t usually get upset when the weekly “new cancer culprit” story breaks, but over the last couple of days scientists have uncovered some unexpected sources of ill health. First there was the news that working at night increases a person’s cancer risk because the body doesn’t make enough melatonin when it sleeps during daylight hours. Yesterday, we learned that doctors are inappropriately using CT scans, a habit that is increasing cancer rates (I had a CT scan two months ago. Didn’t think twice about it). And today we have a study from the University of Michigan that claims that exposure to violent media increases a person’s risk of aggressive behavior at close to the same rate that smoking cigarettes would lead them get lung cancer. (Can I just say that I have been arguing that violent media promotes aggressive behavior for 20 years. It’s common sense people. Humans are imitative creatures. I also find it interesting that the concept of violence in /violence out is only credible when framed as a medical problem). In the last year we have seen studies showing that long commutes cause high blood pressure, increased heart rates, back and neck pain, short-term memory loss, chronic frustration, and illness. Once you arrive at your job, after that long commute, your body is in for even more abuse. According to the Mayo Clinic, sitting on the job all day is harmful to our health. For a society so attached to the notion that we are improving our quality of life through technological advancements, it seems like culturally we are heading toward barbarism. We are building lifestyles that damage our minds and our bodies. Wine appears to be nature’s cancer fighter, but our decade seems to be unwittingly raising our wine glasses in a toast to the grim reaper.

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