Perspective, perspective, perspective
Posted by Richard Mankhey
In an recent Facebook message exchange with a very intelligent and very insightful friend of mine, he made a comment about my personality that resulted in the following message back to him:
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FRIEND’s Facebook message sent at February 2 at 12:34pm:
You’ve had my attention since I first met you, obviously you are different than most of the boys of the city I’ve come across. Quite the complex character.
MY Facebook message reply:
That is one of the best things anyone could ever say to me, especially someone like you. I sense a desire for introspection and connection to those around you deeper than most people ever achieve; I like to think I have similar aspirations. I have many mottoes and am constantly striving to better myself but my two favorites are: “The Unexamined Life is Not Worth Living” and “We dont’ see things as they are; we see them as we are”. They help me focus inward as well as outward.
I often get the impression that it’s not something a lot of people do; especially not gay men who can be so vulnerable, so easily distracted and so often led astray.
When I think about my life from this perspective it’s no mystery at all as to why I’ve been single for 8 years.
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It might not seem that profound but it did help me feel a little bit better about my current situation as well as to underline what I’ve already believed for a long time about myself…that the way I see things…the way my mind works and the way I interact with others is very different from someone typical of my age, sexuality and peer group.
So if I’m so special why am I so lonely sometimes? What am I looking for? What do I want? All good questions. I wish the answers were in the back of the book.
Retraction
Posted by Richard Mankhey
A friend of mine recently posted a blog entry asking for opinions about a certain situation. Below is the original post and my response. What do you think about this?
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THE ORIGINAL BLOG POST from http://www.subwaystate.com
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To Retract Or Not To Retract?
After over 920 blog posts on www.subwaystate.com I have finally been asked to take one down! It is a re-posting of a conversation with some commentary. Names were NOT included, nor were any indicators thereof. But the person with whom the conversation was had wants it taken down, asking “why did you”, “how could you” and saying that after this I can’t possibly be trusted. I disagree to the reactionary stance and declaration of my trust being unfit and have not yet responded. Note: the person only contacted me online – didn’t call me. What do you think about this? I’m not telling you which article it is. I want your point of view from the unwashed perspective. Give me your journalistic opinion. I already have my own and I am gonna let this sit awhile before responding to them, I want this person to thoroughly think about what they are asking me to do.
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MY RESPONSE:
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This is an interesting question.
My first thought is: You have a right to free speech as long as it doesn’t conflict with the rights of others.
My second thought is: The person in question feels that their rights were somehow violated (right to privacy it seems?) because you published an electronic conversation you had with them that they ‘assumed’ would be kept private.
Well we all know what happens when we assume things. There is nothing that says you can’t take a conversation someone voluntarily has with you in an electronic medium and publish it to the world. HOWEVER, and I could be mistaken here, but there seems to be an unstated agreement between two people communicating that their conversation will remain private (barring actually *telling* a third-party what was discussed). Actually taking the conversation verbatim to the public, in my opinion, is a violation of that unspoken agreement.
Perhaps I shouldn’t base my opinion on the subjet of ‘unspoken agreements’ but there is a part of me that still believes that some things don’t need to be explicitly laid out for them to be understood. For instance, I never would have thought it necessary to explicitly question potential boyfriends/partners as to whether they are actually single and if not to further inquire into the details of their arrangement with their boyfriend/partner. I have been singed too many times to go any other route than full disclosure even if I have to be the one leading the interrogation.
I’m angered and upset by the fact that I have to question other peoples’ motive and intentions, but I’ve come to understand that’s just the way this sort of thing works.
That said, I do NOT believe that I should start out every electronic conversation with the phrase: “You’re not going to post any of this conversation where it can be read by the public, are you? I shouldn’t have to say this but it’s happened to me before and even though most people understand that isn’t how this goes, some don’t, so I want to make sure by getting it out into the open.”
That’s my opinion, journalistic or not.
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On being a people pleaser
Posted by Richard Mankhey
I remember growing up and having people say they’d “See me on TV” someday or something and I felt this huge desire to do just that. I guess to some extent I was always a people pleaser…but I also knew I had the potential to be on TV someday if I really wanted to be. It turns out that I didn’t really want to do that, but I still felt guilty I didn’t achieve *that* particular marker of excellence.
I’m since over that because I realized it’s *my* life and I have to do what makes *me* happy. Sounds simple, but definitely not easy. *laughs* It seems the most important of life’s lessons can be classified exactly that way, eh?
On fighting inertia
Posted by Richard Mankhey
It seems to me that things…most things if not all of them in life…go best when they aren’t fought. That is to say you can push and push against something that’s pushing back and you won’t make any progress until you realize which way the Universe is really wanting things to move in which case you stop pushing…your adversary falls flat on their face, and you step right over them and continue on your way.
MacGyver, how do I love thee? Let me count the ways…
Posted by Richard Mankhey
Who in their right minds didn’t absolutely love MacGyver? I, for one, had a bit of a man-crush on him (and still do, truth be told; we *do* have the same first name [Richard Dean Anderson]).
This is a fun list of clever tricks that he certainly would have approved of (if he didn’t already do them himself):
http://lifehacker.com/5342899/top-10-tricks-macgyver-would-be-proud-of