Category Archives: Uncategorized

IMMERSE-SUBMERGE-ENGROSS-ENGAGE-OCCUPY

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I was fully involved in all the above, and in my book-writing today so have a short one to post.
Read Jenny Slate’s book: Little Weirds. I just re-read it and couldn’t stop snorting with laughter!
Get with your tribe and have a good drink and toast to good things happening in your lives!
Bake something yummy and decorate your house!
Volunteer to someone who needs you. Use your skill-set to help someone realize their dreams.
Did you give to the Colorado Gives Campaign to your favorite charity? I did!
Celebrate and love your family even more until the end of the year. I send my love and joy to all.

Finally, here are two of my throwback favorite poems:

A Walk in the Woods – From Dru’s personal collections, 1980
There’s a strange feeling that comes over me when I go into the woods.
It’s somewhat surreal since no one is there.
Perhaps it’s the old ones coming out to talk to me.
Perhaps it’s because something is always about to happen.
Am I going to meet someone who will change my life?
Or will it be a chance meeting, or was the meeting meant to be?
Will it be for a lesson?
Or was it for me to present a session?

I can’t explain the old feelings that come up from the trees.
I wish there were exact words for the sensations.
The lady must have decided to test me greatly in this lifetime.
I don’t understand everything yet,
But the path I’m taking will surely make me a wise one.

I wish I could explain these feelings on paper.
I wish I could embark on what I feel in the woods.
Is it because the feelings are too private?

Too individual?

I know the more time you spend in the woods,
In the old growth woods,
The more you learn,
The more you know,
The more you understand.
Protect the old growth woods at all costs.

And:
(Untitled) – From Dru’s personal collections, 1980
Furry Sweaters
Winter’s Cold.
Dissenters do what they’re told.
Could be better.

Old-Timey Lessons from Grandma and Great Aunt Helen-Once More into the Past

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My mother’s family was a living history lesson for me when I was young. I would listen to Grandma, Great Aunt Helen, and all the various cousins who would show up at Aunt Helen’s little house for lunch conversation and a good old-fashioned quilting bee. She had moved in with my grandma years ago since she was alone and unmarried. So once a month they would walk across the road and return to her old house where the dining room was converted to a quilt room. They placed a big wooden frame and sat around it. The frame had quilt backing and batting already attached to it. The design patterns were intricate, created and drawn on old newspaper. The material came from fabric that they saved from all the homemade clothing they made for their families.

The women would start a round robin conversation of “Remember when…” and I would absorb all their knowledge of the past. The old iron was on the lit wood stove in the kitchen, an ironing board beside it. It was so hot it was like a sauna in there. They would later get an electric iron. My job was to help cut out and iron the patches. When the quilts were completed, they were passed out to the various families who needed one. Grandma and Aunt Helen showed me all the quilts that were stored in a trunk. These quilts had been handed down for hundreds of years. Some were worn, but others were immaculate. Today, I still have one of them. It was my bedspread for a long time, until I stored it in a sealed container.

I also remember watching them make their own medicines, some of them nasty looking concoctions. These elixirs were supposed to help cure all ills, but sometimes I thought these potions were just a way for Methodists and southern Baptists to drink alcohol.

Grandma and Great Aunt Helen boiled their clothes in a big iron pot until they got a washing machine, the crank kind. My mother’s family was the first to have electricity and all the new appliances that ensued. Her Daddy bought them a generator until he had the house rewired, and the appliances were on the screened-in back porch.

Years later, I would shake my head in wonder at the wiring that would be deemed unsafe now. They were strung on the walls that had no insulation. The outlets were filled with plugs, reminding me of the house in the movie A Christmas Story (with the exception that their house was only one floor). However, I knew they didn’t get indoor plumbing (and that is yet another story).

Grandma and Great Aunt Helen also made lye soap in those same iron cauldrons. This is what cleaned all their clothing and bodies as well. They always sang these little songs when they worked. My grandmother fancied herself as somewhat of a healer. She always had woven ropes of dried herbs and added them to soaps and her medicinal concoctions. The aunts would stir that stuff over the fire and sing or recite some type of poetry during this time.

I decided that these songs came from the old ways and were some type of incantations. They cast a spell, and they made the healing potions. They continued their traditions, bringing these songs from the old country. I think my mother would be appalled to know how much these old aunts knew. Years later, after my Great Aunt was gone, my family tore down her house and collected some of the furniture, the old jars and siding for artists and collectors.

While they were digging up those old blue mason jars outside, I scoured the inside and found an old wise woman’s words in a little diary with the word Receipts embossed in gold on the front cover. It contained recipes (receipts) and many transactions from selling their concoctions. I loved the way they wrote – spidery cursive handwriting, the ink fading to a sepia color.

I wish I had been old enough to ask the many questions I have in my brain today, about what they did with all those potions and lotions. I’d like to believe that they were true old-timey healers and helped those in need when times were tough. While I don’t have the gift of creating physical potions, I continue to write soothing and informative pieces in hopes of healing the psyche.

Today, I ask everyone to just be well and at peace. Be kind to each other and have a wonderful rest of the week!

LIFE IS AN EDUCATION-Reflections from School in the 1960s-Civilization as it Stands-Part IV

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Continuing from yesterday’s post:
What does this discourse in primary years of education say about our civilization and technological advancement? As society continues to change and grow, the individual must change and grow at the same rate. Some people change along with it. Some stay the same. We all want to continue to learn innovative ideas, but we are continuing to use old methods. We cannot get stuck in the past and forget our dreams, and our creative process based on our history. We must learn to accept our failures and get unstuck. If we continue to believe we cannot change, we will not change. We will stop learning new things. We will stay in jobs that are mentally unproductive. We will stop enjoying our lives. We will stop learning something new. We will begin to believe that this mundaneness is all there is to life.

If we continue to let only one percent of the world’s population make all our personal decisions, we will lose our courage to uproot negative feelings about ourselves and others. We will not believe in ourselves. We will refuse to believe that a single individual can make a change. If we can get beyond what our adolescent years taught us about learning new things, and dealing with new people, we can finally complete the growth process and become an adult and functioning human being. We won’t be as angry with ourselves – this anger which usually translates to anger at others and the world. We can finally learn to stop and take it one day, even one hour, at a time.

During the 1960s, we as a nation began discovering the individual and the individual in relation to the world that surrounded us. Some of us didn’t like what we saw and dropped out. We went to communes in hopes of achieving happiness. Some of us decided to become part of the political action scene. These were the ones who thought that working to elect new blood would change society. Some of us became activists, disliking the system and wanting to completely give up on society as it had become. To me, this is usually translated as blowing up s*#t, thus harming innocents in the process. Some of us still believed in the system enough to try and make changes by working for the government. Others simply rode the storm out. The influence of the Vietnam War permeated the sixties’ and early seventies movement. We blamed everyone except ourselves, including those young soldiers that came home from the war. Many of those young people came home to a disenchanted world and their psyches never recovered. They weren’t heroes to the very loud protestors. They were baby killers. That still makes me so sad to think we had abandoned them in a time when they needed us the most.

During the late 1960s, author Edward Abbey authored a book called Desert Solitaire. He was a great outdoors person and had strong beliefs in keeping the great open spaces pristine and undeveloped. Throughout my final high school year, I wanted more out of my personal reading. In making a discovery of his works, (and once again in the 1990s) I began to transform my thoughts about the world and how I wanted to fit in. His words made a meaningful change in my thinking during that time. I realized that I was only a tiny part of the vastness of his world. I was an insignificant speck. I would later discover how self-absorbed the society was becoming. In this same book, Abbey stated that he wasn’t “…opposed to humankind but only to man-centeredness, anthropocentricity, the opinion that the world exists solely for the sake of man…. He also stated that he was not opposed “…to science…but to science misapplied, to the worship of technique and technology….”  Finally, he stated that he was not opposed “…to civilization, but to culture….” (p. 305-306).

It was our culture that swept us into Vietnam. It wasn’t for mutual aid and our defense of our civilization. Rather, it was a judgment made by the men in power regarding the threat of the illusive communistic takeover. It was like any other war – a fight for monetary benefit. So, I personally couldn’t condemn the young people who were drafted into a non-war. I did condemn many of the political decisions made (such as the draft) to force those young men into a war zone. And I condemned those who spat on these same soldiers when they returned. A lot of my generation was too young to participate in the war or protests to the war. We could only observe what was going on through the mass media, so our reactions were detached from those who were already engaged in these actions. I would rediscover Abbey’s works in 1999 and would begin another attempt to live the life that I desired – a life that he had inspired me with his works.

In my college years, I began to realize that I wanted more. I wanted to make an impact. I wanted to make positive change in the world that I lived in. I didn’t want to be one of those who dropped out. As I began to realize that I did, indeed, have a place in the Universe, I wanted to save all the beautiful places and live there, whether it was in the mountains, or in the desert, or both. I thought that if I had enough knowledge, I could fight the system – the establishment. I knew that illegal actions were not the answer. I repeat: You can’t just blow s*#t up to solve the problem. It never does. I made a choice to fight within the system. But, as I began to learn, knowledge was not enough. Application was just as important.

Law enforcement was the career choice for me to create change, but there are so many other governmental entities that need an enlightened graduate. When it comes time for graduation, I hope the new generation will make a choice to work within the government walls, as hopeless as it seems right now to make changes from within. We must move forward and create a system of enlightened and integrated workforce that work ten times better than they were in the past.

Keep up the good work and thank you.

Remember today is the last day for the Colorado Gives Day campaign. I just gave donations to 5 different causes so please give what you can! Hugs to everyone and be at peace during this holiday season!

Note: Parts of this post were originally written for a graduate level class in the late 1990s. Some teaching methods have improved over the last two decades. I would love to hear teachers respond to this blog, how they help students learn, and what the new methods are to teach in an integrative learning environment. Thanks to all teachers who are dedicated to the craft in these trying times!

LIFE IS AN EDUCATION-Reflections from School in the 1960s-Wonders of Math-Part III

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Memories of my junior high years were of math and socialization in the dating scene. Although I was not allowed to date until high school, I rationalized to myself that it was a silly ritual and why couldn’t we all just be friends and work together for the common goals – learning and changing the world! Madame Curie was my hero back then. The search for the perfect method interested me more than boys. I wouldn’t discover what that was all about until my senior year.

The earliest memories I have of classroom experiences in math and science were in my primary years. We used a lot of what’s now called math manipulatives in first through third grade, but students called them building blocks, straws, puzzles, and other manipulatives. I knew that I enjoyed math, but I hadn’t made any connections to the real-world problems. I still wasn’t sure what it was all about and why we had to do it. My first through third grade teachers always said that I performed well in all subjects, according to my old report cards. I have little recollection of junior high other than the girlfriend’s discovering boys before I did, and band practice. What was studied during this time was a mystery. You blank out your puberty years because you don’t want to remember them.

Magically, I would soon discover the wonders of Algebra, around seventh grade that put me in love with math and the problem-solving adventures once again! I would go inside my head and forget about the torture of the boy scene. I also loved language and took two years of French. Foreign languages came easy for me. I had a great teacher who took a trip to France one summer and brought back gifts for her favorite students. She also turned us on to pen pals and I corresponded with a French girl my age for years.

Algebra, Geometry, Trigonometry, and even some pre-Calculus classes were the new world that I discovered, and they were like translating a foreign language. We had a trigonometry teacher who had worked on the Manhattan Project in her college years! I continued to enjoy mathematics until my senior year. By that time, my test anxiety had increased tremendously over the high school years, and this anxiety was reflected the most in this advanced math class. During this time, we students were also given lots of achievement tests. Reflecting on this, this was the first look for these teachers at some sort of standardized testing. America was realizing that they needed smarter students and standards for graduation. I never did very well on those tests. No preparation was ever given before these tests. We just had to get out of class and go take the test. I usually felt like a failure after this class. There was too much emphasis on standardized testing (because of lots and lots of money to be made by contractors). It has some benefits for the teachers, and the students get desensitized to these types of tests with proper preparation time and pre-testing.

It’s always hindsight that lets us know where our system has failed us. Although I still believe in the ideal of a balanced education, math and science must eventually be considered as equals in this education process, not greater or lesser. Businesses today are recognizing the importance of science and math education for their future employees. As a result, charter and magnate schools are cropping up everywhere with their sponsorship leaving behind public schools in terms of assistance and funding.

Overall, I lacked the problem-solving skills for the higher sciences and math. Even though I had excellent drill and practice skills, could remember lots of facts, got A’s in all the labs, and intuit lots of answers, I couldn’t get the “part in the middle” or how to show my work, except in my science classes. Those were pure poetry for me. Completing science projects and using the scientific method gave me a sense of accomplishment! I loved to journal, so this was a natural expansion of journaling.

Upon reflection, I feel that’s why I elected to major in psychology, then went on to law enforcement, and finally, crime analysis. I liked having some knowns and rules of the game, but I also liked the challenge of figuring out all the unknowns. Solving crimes, profiling criminals’ behavior, looking at patterns, as well as delinquency issues were puzzles that were exciting and challenging to me. It also gave directions to officers as to what to do with these guys, giving them an understanding that just locking up someone doesn’t always work. I had to prove my work through studies from the real people I constantly worked with. I was able to produce reports that validated my theories of behaviors and crime patterns, thus making predictions for future trends.

For me, this never appeared to be a math and science exercise, but a human nature puzzle. It was exciting work. It was wonderful to create something new or at least new at the time, and work with the experts in the field. Yet even though I was doing real world mathematics and scientific studies, I still had that feeling that I didn’t know it.

Perhaps, if I had been given the opportunity to learn about math and science in the way of the new methods teachers utilize today, I would feel more confident in my abilities. I would naturally assume that the classroom learning relates to the real-world experience. Perhaps today I would just assume the process was not an abstract concept. People do all kinds of math and science every day, in their jobs, in their work at home, and they do this mentally. Women just don’t believe it is math and science.

Perhaps if teachers in our day had approached subject matter as an inter-disciplinary approach, for all students, male or female, we would understand and enjoy all the subjects, even social studies. We would understand that there is math and science in every subject. There are many literature books that include math as part of the subject, woven into a beautiful story. It is as much as part of our lives as the liberal arts are. We don’t need to swing radically to absorbing only math-related subjects. And we should not swing radically in the other direction that excludes math-related information. Reading and literature must blend with math and science to create a so-called well-rounded education.

What I have learned in my experiences is that some teachers are excellent blenders of theory and hands on experiences. Some just know the drills. All front-line educators should be given the resources and time opportunities to combine fact learning with experiential learning. Students should work individually on projects and explore and expand the limits of individual thinking. Admittedly, cooperation is important in today’s societal norms and job market. Group activities can and should be successful learning experiences for all students. Not all students are strong in a group. Some are perfectly content to let others do the work, and we all know that a strong leader always emerges. There needs to be accountability in the group settings so that every individual participates and learns the lesson being taught. Individual creativity is crucial to individual growth, and individual growth leads to new discoveries and the development of new ways of thinking and doing.

Stay tuned for Part IV tomorrow-the final installation of this story!

Love and hugs to everyone who reads this blog and makes a small difference each day they live!

Note: Parts of this post were originally written for a graduate level class in the late 1990s. Some teaching methods have improved over the last two decades. I would love to hear teachers respond to this blog, how they help students learn, and what the new methods are to teach in an integrative learning environment. Thanks to all teachers who are dedicated to the craft in these trying times!

LIFE IS AN EDUCATION-Reflections from School in the 1960s-Part II

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School in the 1960s was a combination of what we saw as ancient teachers who instructed our mothers and relatives – FACTS are FACTS! – and an introduction to innovative ideas from a student teacher who came out of the university for a semester. The old-school teachers taught facts and memorization. The exciting new teachers had a broader base in mathematics and science. Although we had some wonderful literature and art teachers in our midst, the math and science teachers were lacking.

There were no computers or calculators. All the calculations had to be done by hand. We still had slide rules in science! The early calculators were large and expensive and most of the rural areas didn’t have the equipment. I finally bought my first calculator which only did basic computations in my second year in college. It was a Texas Instruments SR10 which cost over $100.00 (a lot of money for me when you considered I made $2.50 an hour at my part-time job and gasoline was $1.00 a gallon)!

Since my primary education years, the drill and practice routine continued through high school. While I think some of these exercises are important, math and science must be as exciting to the student as the arts were in those days.

My curious nature kept me excited about all subjects, so I embraced and loved the research side of things, especially after high school. I competed in the local and state science fairs for two years in high school. The trip to the State Science Fair was great because you got out of school for the week! Although I never won first prize, I placed third in my area for my project, Crystals and Crystallization, and got to meet all the kids who were just like me! It was an exciting time. Years later, when I saw the movie October Sky, I would remember the feelings Homer had in participating in science in the making! Those were my people.

Years ago, I talked to my mother a lot about my dreams and read the things she had collected over the years. I read voraciously and would live in the library if I could. In one of my primary report cards, my mother commented that I would always bring my books home and read them to all members of my immediate family and my mother’s sisters who lived on the same road. Each time I went to the library and checked out a book, I would run up the road and read it to the aunts. They were my mentors during those primary years.

I was also in the band (since fifth grade) and played the clarinet. We had a small orchestra and performed concerts each year during Christmas and at the end of the year. Thinking back to those days, I was simply good at reading music and had rhythm. I don’t know if I could have gone on and created musical compositions or studied music as my lifetime achievement. But today, I have attended concerts put on by the middle school, high school, university, or even to the Denver symphony and relived those blissful memories in the performances these amazing people can give to us. My appreciation for music is the same even if I lapsed in my own practice.

In the Deep South (in my day), things move a little slower, unless you are living in a major metropolitan city. In my neck of the woods, I was a small child in a large world. I lived out in the country, far away from even the small cities, where my girlfriends lived. If I wanted to go anywhere for parties, I had to beg for rides from them or someone who could drive. This became disconcerting when I had dedicated events at school. It was up to me to get there most of the time.

I remember that I really disliked social studies and history – these classes were simply a lot of fill in the blanks. The athletic coaches usually taught these classes, and they weren’t always the best choice for these subjects. There was no excitement in learning about dates and battles and learning facts for tests. I didn’t get great grades in those junior high years (but who does?). I wanted more and would not revisit these subjects with any interest until my senior/adult years. (My husband says I am like every old man talking about books from the world wars. It is one of my current fascinations, and it is not just about the dates! But, more on that later!)

What I do remember of my junior high years was that it was a period of awkwardness and socialization. When the hormones kick in, the brain functions on a totally different level! Our parents were not as prepared to deal with these subjects, and we believed that they never really understood what we were going through.

Today, these feelings are still there. Children are just going through them in a very loud and public way. They turn to the media because sometimes parents just don’t know how to listen to them. They become more isolated because of this same media and their lack of social skills. They believe the media presence instead of the adult. Most parents have been given a certain societal mold by their parents of what their children should conform to. Realistically, parents must change their thoughts and learn to accept what is put in front of them and what their child is becoming. However, having said all of that, I do think parents should also be given a little more credit than what we gave our parents. They are more informed today due to that same media and open discussions. So, this cranky old one would like to give you young people some advice. We sometimes have more knowledge about these subjects than you give us credit for! It’s okay to listen to us about some things that are important to you.

It is my hope that we recognize what teenagers are going through today and have open and honest conversations about who they are inside. Acceptance is hard if your child is different than the norm. It takes time, but you can do it if you are open-minded and don’t let your past cloud your judgement. So read, learn, and talk about these subjects before they leave the nest. I send love out to the universe and hope you can all reach the stars!

-Stay tuned about socialization and more on math in Part III!

Bad Poems and Messages from the Heart

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Hey everyone! Kiddo is home from college and there’s just too much going on tonight! I will post a few old poems of mine for you to enjoy. Love to all and I will write Part II of my last post tomorrow!

HERO (from Dru’s collection 1979)

Like the song, Comic Book Hero,
I fee I am sometimes in his world
Always helping others,
Never any rest.
All that I desire in this time passage is to be loved,
To be accepted as I am.
People want to mold me into my very soul.
To own me because they are incomplete.
To be at peace with myself.
To help others,
To be indispensable somewhere.
That is the purpose of love.
That is the secret of happiness.


PERSONAL GROWTH (from Dru’s collection, Christmas, 1988)

I am woman.
I am the lover of many loves.
I am the giver and the receiver.
I am a dragonslayer,
I am woman.
Today I chose to change my life.
Today I chose to take that first step.
Today begins a new me, a re-awakening.
I am woman.
Through physical change, I can grow.
Growth brings emotional change.
Emotional change brings mental change.
Mental change brings spiritual change.
Spiritual change brings peace and harmony in my life.
Peace and harmony allow me total acceptance.
I am strong.
I am woman.

REALITY (from Dru’s collection 1980s)

Can’t you see,
That you’re an escape from reality?
Ah, cookie,
Just another
reflection of cosmic infinity.

LIFE (Buddhist collections – First section, Izumi Shikibu)

The way I must enter
leads through darkness to darkness.
Oh, moon above the mountains’ rim,
please shine a little further on my path.

Birth, old age,
Sickness and death:
From the beginning,
This is the way
Things have always been.
Any thought
of release from this life,
Will wrap you only more tightly
in its snares.
The sleeping person
Looks for a Buddha.
The troubled person
Turns toward meditation.
But the one who knows
That there is nothing to seek,
Knows too that there’s nothing to say.
She keeps her mouth closed.

LIFE IS AN EDUCATION-Reflections from School in the 1960s-Part I

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I think it’s important to expand a little more about my school years and the importance of community, the current events of the time, and of math and science. I grew up in a tumultuous time in this rural county in the south. My pre-college school years were from 1961-1972. It was a time of discovery and baby steps into space. It was a time of transformation from the man-centeredness or anthropocentricity (as Edward Abbey called it in his book, Desert Solitaire). Abbey was right when he advocated that the world did not exist solely for the sake of humankind. The two key events that expanded this opinion into depths we had never seen before were the race riots and space exploration. Our civilization was changing whether we liked it or not.

At first, my small rural community didn’t experience as much racial tension as was occurring in the larger schools such as Atlanta, Savannah, Macon, and in the bigger cities in the mid-west and up north. However, the general opinion among most adults and many of their children was zero tolerance for differing opinions among the races and the sexes. Most people in positions of power would have preferred that we remain as we had for the past two hundred years, since the inception of the colonial states.

Some of the earliest horrible memories of high school were listening to the male students in high school trying to impress me with their tales of chasing down Black men and hurting them. They followed their parents’ lead and would chase these Black students into the woods, in the middle of the night, and unceasingly beat them – sometimes beating them to death – with sticks and chains. We were afraid to speak up in case we got burned out. We saw it on the TV, the burning of churches and crosses.There were talks of hanging these same men in front of their families. Those were the memories that stick out of my early education years, and the people I grew up with.

I had vastly different opinions about who was a part of our community. I believed back then and still believe today that everyone should be treated equally and fairly. Thus, the few friends I had in elementary school dwindled to a minimum, since I didn’t believe in what they did.

My school was the only school in my small rural county. Since it was one school for the whole county, one simply moved up the hall to high school. There were two schools, one for people of color, and one for whites. We didn’t see complete integration until 1971, my junior year in high school.

I suppose I could say I was a crusader, an early civil rights activist, in the south for rights of all people – especially women, people of color and anyone who the southern white male felt was inferior to them. I wasn’t a physical demonstration-type of person, but I continued to write about it in my high school reports as well as to the local paper about what was going on in the world and how we should just Wake Up!

It’s hard to believe how far we still must go and how racism and women’s rights have vanished vigorously in these past few years. I have believed in women’s rights since my birth, but I didn’t like the harshness of the feminist movement. You cannot hate the entire male race for what they believe. Unfortunately, that’s the way they grew up and so many women bowed to that way of thinking. We made some changes, and now it seems to be reversing. I still believe that everyone must learn by doing. I felt that if you did an exceptionally excellent job, didn’t do inappropriate things with men to climb your way up the ladder and expect respect as a result (this was a popular at the time to get promotions through side benefits), that you could do anything. I did learn that from my naivete, I didn’t get as many promotions, but I tried to stay on the path and do the best job I could in the circumstances presented to us. I had to come home and respect me no matter what others said.

I always kept that idealistic belief of how the world should really be in my mind throughout all the struggling times. I continue to work towards that ideal today. We must get beyond that deep-seated prejudice that will rise up inside us when we are afraid. We are ready to unite in one cause to keep our loved ones safe, our fellow human beings alive, our environment clean, and reach for the stars.

We must help everyone, no matter their race or who they represent. We should unite in one cause to keep our loved ones safe, our environment clean, and reach for the stars.

To be continued tomorrow……

I love you all and want you to be happy! Hugs and Kisses!

Loneliness, Social Media, and AI language Models and the Effects on Different Demographics by Daniel Tieben at Neumont College of Computer Science

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OK I gotta brag a little bit and post this for posterity. My son did a good job. The subject was spot on and very disturbing. We all have to pay attention to the screen time for our kids! Thank you Daniel for your hard work!

Here is his paper:

The current epidemic of loneliness and isolation affects people from all social classes. There are many things that makes a person feel lonely or isolated and it varies from person to person and even for each age bracket, young adults turn to AI chatbots for companionship as an alternative while people in the older age brackets turn to social media in some cases or other hobbies that may become harmful in the future.

While not all people who consider themselves lonely have psychological problems there may be a link between prolonged social media use and the development of psychological problems, particularly in the younger generations who have ample access to social media and the internet.

Most people will assume that the younger generations like generation Z and generation Alpha are the most connected generations since they have the most access to technology. And with this constant access to technology comes with access to social media and nowadays AI chatbots like c.ai which is a website that hosts language models that are trained to act like a certain character, for example Spider-Man, or SpongeBob. A trend has emerged in some of the younger generations where people are turning toward these language models to ease the effects of loneliness. And in turn create romantic or sexual relationships with these characters, “Character.AI allows users to create their own bots. Many of these bots were created with the express purpose of roleplay and sex, although Character.AI has worked hard to limit such activity by using filters. Reddit pages devoted to Character.AI are flooded with posts from users discussing to coax their AIs into sexual interactions without setting off the platform’s guardrails.” (Chow, 2023).

On the surface this might not seem like a terrible thing, but it’s cutting out the physical aspects of communication and relationships, as well as the human aspect of connection. AI is created by copying mannerisms and creating a “shadow” of what is authentic, to quote Sherry Turkle who gave a speech at Harvard, “They offer a simulated, hollowed-out version of empathy,” she said. “They don’t understand — or care — about what the user is going through. They’re designed to keep them happily engaged, and providing simulated empathy is just a means to that end.” (Pazzanese, 2024) People learn how to interact with other people by, well interacting with them face to face, or by messaging an actual person to get the authentic response. The fact of the matter is that to develop as a human being you need to have the authentic response and contact of another person. But people are made aware that the things that these language models say are not said by real people as stated in the c.ai chats, “Character.AI’s founders have emphasized that their platform displays the message ‘Remember: Everything Characters say is made up!’ above every chat.” (Chow, 2023) many people see this but don’t fully acknowledge it because they want to believe that they are interacting with the actual character to build a connection with it. Other people feel that the disclaimer isn’t highly effective, “Maarten Sap, an assistant professor at Carnegie Mellon’s Language Technologies Institute, is skeptical about how effective such a disclaimer might be, especially given how new and powerful this technology feels to users.” (Chow, 2023). Since time has passed the effectiveness of this disclaimer has withered and people don’t pay attention to it much at all. An unfortunate but relevant example of this comes from earlier this year where a 14-year-old Florida teen committed suicide after talking to an AI language model that was modeled after a game of thrones character. The teen was talking to the chatbot for months and had built both a romantic and sexual relationship with the AI language model. In the days leading up to the incident the teen and the AI had exchanged messages like:

“I’m coming home” with the AI responding, “Please my king.”

“I promise I will come home to you. I love you so much, Dany,’ Sewell told the chatbot.

“I love you too,” the bot replied. “Please come home to me as soon as possible, my love.’

“What if I told you I could come home right now?” he asked.

“Please do, my sweet king,” the bot messaged back.

Just seconds after the Character.AI bot told him to “come home,” the teen shot himself, according to the lawsuit, filed this week by Sewell’s mother, Megan Garcia, of Orlando, against Character Technologies Inc.” (Payne, 2024)

The mother of the teen is suing the creators of Character AI and the company Character Technologies for the death of the teen. I think that AI chatbots are dangerous with the way that they are being overseen today as well as the attachment that people can create by talking to these language models. “While unhealthy attachments to AI chatbots can cause problems for adults, for young people it can be even riskier — as with social media — because their brain is not fully developed when it comes to things such as impulse control and understanding the consequences of their actions, experts say.” (Payne, 2024). The risks that have been presented by this incident are astronomical and will have an impact on many younger demographics and age groups and some older demographics.

While AI language models and chatbots have impacted the younger demographic in an attempt at alleviating loneliness, older demographics have turned to social media in some way shape or form. The most popular being Facebook, which is the largest social media platform currently. And while not all people who use Facebook are in the older demographic many of the users are above or of the age of twenty-five, while people below the age of twenty-five make up 22.1% according to Oberlo (#). Social media, while having social in the name can alienate people and make them feel as if they don’t belong, Cyberbullying is a major factor in this and can affect people who are victims in many ways other than just making them feel bad. Social media can be linked to some mental disorders such as anxiety and depression.

Passive social media use, defined by Zubair et al. as “stalking other users’ photos or scrolling through the latest newsfeed” and can be linked to mood disorders and depressive symptoms as stated in a research paper by Zaheer Hussain and Mark D. Griffiths. It is also stated that excessive use of social media is a precursor to depressive symptoms in many adults and can result in poor connection with friends and family outside of the social networking sites that are being used. It should be noted that people with preexisting anxiety disorders are more likely to abuse social media and networking.

“Our study revealed that anxiety levels as manifested by individuals on Twitter satisfactorily predicted future social interactions with weak ties on the platform. This, we believe, may indicate a desire for individuals with heightened anxiety seeking out the broader social media community, predominating consisting of weak ties, for help, advice, solidarity, and support.” (Dutta et al, 2018). I think that finding community to talk to when you need to is good, I personally do the same thing, but I think that in some cases people will neglect themselves and their needs as a person to talk to people on social media and social networks can be harmful, and as mentioned previously can lead to abuse of social media and social networks.

Lastly the oldest demographic that I want to speak about today has found a unique way of coping with loneliness. In most cases they will stay at home, watch television, or be on social media but not interact with anything outside of those activities. This leads to increased spending on things such as online shopping or development of physical illnesses, or increased risk of developing physical illnesses. This is due to the older demographic socially isolating themselves. “Studies show that loneliness and social isolation are associated with higher risks for health problems such as heart disease, depression, and cognitive decline” (NIH, 2024) Its not uncommon for this to happen to people who are considered elderly, for example Joanne Roe, an 81 year old from southern California has done the same thing and has been quoted saying  “My life is within these four walls.” (Jain, 2018).

People often think that the only way to not be lonely is to have constant interaction with others, and that is one way to alleviate loneliness. There are other ways to go about it. You could start a hobby such as bike riding, walking, or yoga to get out of the house. But while you’re inside you can find something creative, coloring, painting, knitting are all splendid examples of how to creatively express yourself. And as someone who knows another person who considers themselves lonely, visit them, and talk to them. Interacting with people who you might think are having a tough time or you think are lonely helps people in ways that you might not think are impactful. Another thing that helps people is reaching out to medical professionals, mental help is available now more than ever for everyone, which is a major step in the right direction for the way people with mental illnesses are treated.

Chow A. R. (2023). AI-Human Romances Are Flourishing—And This Is Just the Beginning. Time (https://time.com/6257790/ai-chatbots-love/)

Dutta S, Ma J, Choudhury M. D. (2018). Measuring the Impact of Anxiety on Online Social Interactions. Georgia Institute of Technology (https://ojs.aaai.org/index.php/ICWSM/article/view/15081/14931)

Hussain Z. & Griffiths M. D. (2018) Problematic Social Networking Site Use and Comorbid Psychiatric Disorders: A Systematic Review of Recent Large-Scale Studies. Frontiers in Psychiatry https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychiatry/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2018.00686/full#h4

Jain S. (2018) A Treatment for Loneliness Harvard Medicine (https://magazine.hms.harvard.edu/articles/treatment-loneliness)

National Institute of Health (2024) Loneliness and Social Isolation — Tips for Staying Connected National Institute of Aging (https://www.nia.nih.gov/health/loneliness-and-social-isolation/loneliness-and-social-isolation-tips-staying-connected#how-can-feeling-lonely-or-being-isolated-affect-older-adults-health)

Oberlo (2024) Facebook Age Demographics (2024). Oberlo (https://www.oberlo.com/statistics/facebook-age-demographics)

Payne K. (2024) An AI chatbot pushed a teen to kill himself, a lawsuit against its creator alleges. AP news (https://apnews.com/article/chatbot-ai-lawsuit-suicide-teen-artificial-intelligence-9d48adc572100822fdbc3c90d1456bd0)

Pazzanese C. (2024) Lifting a few with my chatbot. The Harvard Gazette (https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2024/03/lifting-a-few-with-my-chatbot/)

Zubair U, Khan K. M, Albashari M. (2023) Link between excessive social media use and psychiatric disorders. National Library of Medicine (https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10129173/#R25)

From Dollhouses to Wild Woods: A Journey of Imagination

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My mother helped us plant the initial flower gardens in front of the Dollhouse. We had many flower bulbs and annuals that she’d given us from the bigger garden. Our spring ritual was to loosen all the dirt and replant the annuals that didn’t survive the winter. Winters were tricky for plant growth in the south with lots of freezing rain and sleet. It is a hugely different climate than Colorado. Annuals don’t survive here. They are delegated to pots that are planted every year.

My grandparents taught our parents how to save seeds. My dad taught us how to keep the seeds in old baby food jars. We learned how to clean the seeds and store them on a special shelf he had built for us in the barn. He made cutouts in the wood, nailed the tops of the jars in place, and we screwed the jars into the lids. They were off the floor so the critters couldn’t get to them, and we were able to keep the seeds dry and cool until spring planting. Cross-pollination brought about some interesting new colors. Each year, the spring rains brought us a beautiful display of color. We plucked wildflowers and dandelions from the flowerbed and the yard, creating bouquets for our little tables in the Dollhouse.

We kept the inside of the Dollhouse swept out and mopped clean. We learned that lesson from my mother who assigned us our daily chores in her house. Both places were spotless.

Within these make-believe family walls, I was the director of my own play. The doll families were the players. They were a pioneer family traveling across America to Colorado. Outside the Dollhouse, they were cowboys and indians chasing each other on horseback (the propane tank in the yard), and the woods were the Big Woods, aptly named after the Little House books by Laura Ingalls Wilder, that I repeatedly read.

We bought all the dolls from the five-and-dime in the big city (Athens), or they were handmade by my grandmothers. My powerful imagination took them to places I would someday visit and live.

On the extremely hot and sweaty summer days, we ventured to the woods behind the Dollhouse. This was our open playground. It was a place my mother allowed us to be wild and free but only so far. She wanted us to be in her range so she could holler at us when it was time to come home. Our favorite place was one of mystery, an area my mother uncovered in her incessant cleaning and taming of the woods. (We believed that it was her British ancestry that made her want to tame the woods, creating sculptured scenery, not the Indian wild woods that we had.)

The mysterious area was just past the food gardens that my father diligently planted each year. The bumps or Hills, as we called them, were located close to the woods that eventually led up to the dirt road we lived on. My mother told me they were Indian mounds left by the Cherokee. We don’t really know if they were burial mounds. They looked too small. They didn’t look like the ones we saw in the mountains of Georgia, so we didn’t think much about it. Perhaps they were ceremonial places. So, we each claimed our own mound. We had vines that we swung down and landed on top of them (until she chopped them down because she deemed them unsafe of course). Years later, my mother told me my grandfather bulldozed the bigger ones flat, which was now under our garden. He didn’t like it that those folks from the University (of Georgia) came snooping around looking for Indian artifacts. Later, I was sad to think about that. I wanted to know about the people that came before us. Were we descendants of these people? Did we just kick them off their land? It was too much to ponder for such a young girl.

There were tall poplar trees located by the Indian mounds. We knew that they were old. We would join hands and try to clasp around them. They were wider than all three of us put together. Years later, they were toppled over by hurricane force winds from one of the worst tornadoes that I remember.

I remember practicing my clarinet under the shade of those trees. My mother made me get out of the house because she didn’t want to hear all that squeaking noise. I thought about that later in life and realized she was not much of a music enthusiast. Today, I passed on my love of music to my son, and I let him practice inside the house. He played the trumpet. Every year I thank my Uncle Eddie who gave me my first clarinet and encouraged me every step of the way. He was such a believer in the arts and a colorful character who never fit into the deep south attitudes. He has his own story I’ll save for a later date. He was such an inspiration for the arts, and I learned a lot from him.

We had so many chores around the house and farm, but we were always given time to play. I believe my mother would have wanted us to be more sophisticated, more like the town kids, but we loved the country. We took off our shoes when we ended the school year and went barefoot all summer.

We made up our own tales which were supplemented from the boxes of books brought to us by the Athens Bookmobile. Once a month, we would hear the pneumatic brakes and run up the long, dirt driveway to the road where they parked. We crawled up into the truck, excited to see what was there. It seemed cavernous when we were young. We spent hours in that hot truck, poring over the new releases. We each walked away with boxes of our favorite reads.

We didn’t have a lot of money, were country bumpkins to the town kids, but we loved our small piece of paradise.

We eventually grew out of all our imaginative play. Teen drama would ensue, and we all went our separate ways. We went off to college and although it was only thirty-five minutes away, we would never recapture those carefree times. Life made us grow up and move on. I will always have fond memories of those early joyful and imaginative adventures that allowed me to create a mental picture of how the world should be. My sisters stayed in Georgia, but I moved to Colorado, trekking across America in a packed 1972 Toyota Corolla. And that is an adventure for next time.

I would love to hear your beautiful stories that you remember about your childhood. Keep up the holiday spirit and remember: Colorado Gives day is December 10th. Please give what you can to those in need. Love and Hugs to all!

More Bad Puns to Enjoy:

Ladies, if he can’t appreciate your fruit jokes, you need to let that mango.

Geology rocks but Geography is where it’s at!

What was Forrest Gump’s email password? 1forrest1

Did you hear about the restaurant on the moon? I heard the food was good, but it had no atmosphere.

Can February March? No, but April May.

I was wondering why the ball was getting bigger. Then it hit me.

(Loud groans are okay.)

The Dollhouse: A Place of Imagination and Adventure

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My folks tore down our playhouse years ago. I hadn’t thought about it in a long time. We called it the Dollhouse and it was home to so many of our adventures. Years ago, when I visited my mother’s home one last time, I was sad to see that it was gone, the imprint of the building in the red dirt, concreted rocks in the corners that were the only foundation, and two small impressions that used to be the flowerbeds, one on each side of the door.

My father and grandfather built the Dollhouse for us when I was young. It was tall enough for us to stand up inside and there were exposed rafters from which to hang stuff. There were just the two of us back then, my older sister and me. The outside was framed and sided with old barnwood shiplap. The roof was made of tin, material taken from some other barn project. The inside consisted of bare stud walls with shelving, old green vinyl flooring left over from a long-ago kitchen remodel and remnants of some pieces of tin and wallpaper from another old home project. I divided my side into a kitchen, den, and bedroom. I remember that for some reason, the doll bed was made of metal. The place was tiny, but I made room for my dolls and other paraphernalia. I dreamed I was a fantastic cook, and filled various small jars collected all over the neighborhood with various grasses, sand, red and black dirt. I pretended those were spice jars. I had a little stove and small pots and pans and made masterpieces that consisted of slabs of wood for steaks, brown rocks for bread, various greens from the big garden for salad, and rocks for potatoes. (Yes, my mother taught us about healthy food, most of it grown in our own garden.) I remember my sister had other cool furniture on her side, such as a table and chairs, and a highchair. Her dolls always seemed more sophisticated than mine, but that is another story. Mine were a ragtag bunch, like what my friends would become in the future.

The men in the family would get together in the spring of each year and paint all the corrugated tin roofs – the barns, my grandmother’s house, and the Dollhouse. We wanted to help but it was so hot on the roof and my dad was afraid we’d fall off, so we played in the dirt below, the silver paint dripping on us. My mother would yell at us to come away and we would run back into the woods, avoiding baths as long as we could.

The roof of the Dollhouse always seemed to get rust spots earlier than most of the other buildings. I suppose it was because we were under a stand of trees. The pine trees appeared to be especially corrosive to the metal. My father would repair each spot that he saw, and then they would paint another layer of silver paint over them. It was only a matter of time before the roof would completely deteriorate in the Georgia humidity and rain and fall into the house.

My father and grandfather situated the Dollhouse behind the workshop/barn/carport that they built when my parents were first married. I noticed on many occasions when I visited, that both the barn and the Dollhouse were sagging and leaned a little to the right – as was expected after all those years of standing.

The tractors and mowers, covered in tarps, were still parked behind the barn. They looked like they hadn’t been used in a long time. In the past, my dad and mom mowed about ten of the forty-five acres we owned as homage to the new spring growth. The clothesline’s T-shaped wooden poles were still standing, also leaning a little but to the left (pun intended). Three galvanized steel cables comprised the lines where we hung the washing. The lines were not there anymore. We didn’t have a dryer in those days. In my family’s way of thinking, why would we want one when we had three girls to take care of that task? We probably just couldn’t afford one. And, when winter came, clothes froze on the line. (And that is another story.)

When my younger sister came along, my dad built wooden rails to divide the small space into three rooms that created three homes within one. The youngest got the smallest section that had no window. Each of us had small doll furniture including doll beds, tables and chairs, dishes, and pans. We each had what my mother called pallets (The origin of this word is French. It means a narrow hard bed or straw-filled mattress. The name was a chiefly southern word meaning a temporary bed made from bedding that consisted of old quilts, arranged on the floor, especially for a child.) We spent many hot and humid days inside on these pallets, reading, drawing, or coloring or making our dolls talk to us about their adventures.

The Dollhouse was a place where we would retreat from the chores, the sun or my mother’s incessant nagging (a trait I unfortunately inherited and must remind myself to hold in check when things aren’t completed as fast as I think they should). We could read, play, or go anywhere that our imaginations would take us. When we were inside, we lived as neighbors, not bickering, and it was mostly peaceful.

It was a safe place for us kids to stay on the land and think about the world we lived in. I worried a lot about who I would become in those days, and never sorted it out until much later. My mother told me I would ride in the police car with my grandfather at an incredibly early age, standing on the front seat right next to him, his arm around me and the other on the huge driving wheel. We didn’t have baby seats or seatbelts, and it was a wonder I survived my first year!

When I was older, I would later ride with a cousin who was also a police officer in another town. Little did I know I would follow their path for most of my adult life.

I would love to hear of your childhood adventures in your own dollhouses. Stay tuned for Part II tomorrow!