It's Time

I have decided to close my blog. I want to thank all the wonderful people who have visited.
Gary

Letter To My Garden

Dear Garden,

I know you must be feeling very distressed right now, with all the things I have been doing in the last few days to mess you up. I know your grass needs mowing, but I have been pretty busy.

And I know all this wood I have been storing on you, and all the other litter, can’t be making you happy.

But just bear with me for a while. Everything will be completed soon, and you will be looking even better than before.

I promise. Really.

Best regards,
Gary

Strange

All my life I have heard about people who pretend to be someone they aren’t. I guess I never thought I would meet one but this week I did.

I was having coffee with a friend at a fast food place. We were talking about sports when a man nearby overheard us and came over to join us. We talked with him for a couple of minutes, though he was a bit of an interruption. I was hoping he would leave to tell the truth.

That’s when he hit us with a bombshell. He introduced himself, and the name he gave was familiar. He was pretending to be a very famous professional football player. We talked a while about his playing days, and he had some fairly elaborate stories to tell. He was very convincing.

When I got home, I got on the internet and checked the biography of the famous player. Some of it, like his age, and where he went to high school, didn’t match.

If I see the imposter again, maybe I should correct him. If he’s going to impersonate someone, at least he ought to get his story straight.

Shyness

A few years ago, when I decided I didn’t want to be shy any more, I started reading about shyness, and today I am posting about what I learned. I can’t guarantee that what I am saying is correct, but it is a synthesis of what I have read and it has proved to work in my own experience, so I believe it to be true.

Basically, shyness is caused by wrong focus. In a social situation, people who are not shy don't focus on what other people are thinking of them. Instead, they focus on the other person. Or something about the other person. Or something the other person can help them with. Shy people are totally the opposite. They are focused almost entirely on what the other person is thinking about them.

I started to learn some techniques for changing my focus, and they worked. They worked very well. I would go into them here in this post, but then it would be longer than I want it to be. Maybe I will discuss them more in another post.

One of the questions I got in the comments section of my last post was about how overcoming my shyness might be connected to my blogging, and I had never thought of it before, but now I have and here is my answer: I blog exactly the way I have learned to relate to people in person. When I blog, my focus is entirely on the reader, not myself. I like to blog about things that will entertain my readers, or amuse them, or give them something to think about.

Or just point out that we are all in this world together and we are all one.

I hope you all have a nice week.

Shy Me

I was getting gasoline yesterday and ended up talking to a man at the next pump. A few years ago, that never would have happened because I was a very shy person. I never, ever started a conversation with a stranger.

People say that making big personality changes is hard when someone is no longer in their youth, but for me losing my shyness wasn't hard at all, even though I was trapped inside of it all my life. Basically, I just decided I didn’t want to be shy any more and started taking steps to learn how to break out of it. And now I’m not shy at all.

The thing that got me wanting to strike up a conversation with this fellow at the next pump was that I noticed the name Selena written on the side door of his pick-up truck. In case you don’t remember, or never knew, Selena was a famous singer who was murdered by the president of her fan club. Strange but true. A well known movie of her life was made about fifteen years ago. It’s the movie that made Jennifer Lopez famous. She played Selena.

Selena grew up here in Southeast Texas, and she’s a legend. Her music is still often played on the radio here. On a hunch, I asked this fellow if she was the person he was referring to on his truck. He told me that he was referring to his granddaughter. Still on a hunch, I asked him if his granddaughter was named after the singer, and he told me she was. He also told me that he had once worked for Selena for several months, and that she was an incredible person. Everyone who knew her loved her.

If I hadn’t given up my shyness a few years ago, I would have never met this fascinating man. And it would have been a shame.

There are so many people in this world with great stories to tell.

Postal?

A preacher’s wife is on trial for shooting and killing her husband in Tennessee. Normally I don’t pay much attention to crime stories, but this one really interested me.

She shot and killed him in the parsonage, then left town with their three young daughters. All crimes are bad, but to me crimes like this are especially sad.

Apparently he had a very critical spirit. She was quoted as saying “I love him dearly, but gosh, he just nailed me in the ground. My ugly came out.”

One part of this story really has me wondering. The woman said that after she got a job with the Post Office, she learned to stand up for herself.

I wonder if this is another case of someone “going postal”.

What'n New?

I was in a supermarket yesterday that had two express lanes and several self service stations. One express lane was closed, and the other one, the one which I was in, had a fairly long line.

An old man came to check out and he was upset. He wanted the second lane opened and no one would do it. A couple of the self service stations were open and an employee directed him to them, but he refused to use one. He just got in line behind me and quietly fumed.

I offered to let him go ahead of me, since I wasn’t in a hurry. He thanked me but refused the offer, and we chatted a bit while we were waiting our turns. And I discovered why he wouldn’t use the self scanner. The reason is the one I expected. He was intimidated by the technology.

I don’t think it was a coincidence that he was old. I think older people are more intimidated by new technology, new ways of doing things, than younger people are. I have observed this phenomenon many times, and I suspect that it is true pretty much all over the world. I think it probably fits in the category of human nature.

I recognize this in myself at times, and it really doesn’t please me. I try to fight against it.

Maybe I should try a little harder.