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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!

Finding Strength in Michelle Obama’s Insights

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I finally got back to Michelle Obama’s book The Light We Carry and wanted to share a few thoughts with you. In the beginning of the book, she talked about her time on the presidential campaign with her husband Barack. She talked about the four words that plague even the most powerful people she knew. And those words were: “Am I good enough?” Her answer was “I don’t know.” The interesting part about this dialogue is that when she took it to Barack, “…he helped me (her) remember that anxiety was a natural part of doing something new and big….”

She recognized how the previous years leading up to the 2020 election had left people “wobbly”- unsettled, watchful, less connected, and anxious about the future. This is the gist of what we are feeling today; that we have no control over what is to come, and the hatemongering has spread to anyone who doesn’t tow the party line. Currently, equilibrium isn’t possible, but we can evolve individually if we stop asking when this will end. Instead, we must ask: How can we adapt to create a space we can live in and with until we make it better by educating the people who don’t understand what they’ve done? If I believe that nothing can be fixed, and take the “why bother” attitude, I will go down a dark hole and never come out.

Mrs. Obama’s analogy about knitting hit home to me. If I start the doom and catastrophe thought loop, I can at least put on some music and knit. It is the small stuff that will get me through the big stuff. The little projects and actions make my brain say: “I’ve got this!” Just remember, it still takes time to change even the little stuff.

In Chapter 7 of the book, Michelle Obama listed and detailed the points her mother gave her regarding how to create the best in their children. I encourage you to read this chapter carefully so you can help create a better environment for your child or grandchild to grow up in.

1.         “Teach your kids to wake themselves up.”

2.         “It isn’t about you. Good parents are always working to put themselves out of business.” (emphasis mine)

3.         “Know what’s truly precious.”

4.         “Parent the child you’ve got.” (Not someone you want them to be-interpretation mine)

5.         “Come home. We will always like you here.”

There will always be people in the world who think they are more powerful when they belittle and make people feel unwelcome. By breaking down people into the have and have nots, the “have” people feel superior. If we do not challenge the old narratives, we will internalize our unworthiness as the truth. If they put you down, all you must do is: “Don’t Listen.”

There is so much more to read in this book that may help you sort out the world into a livable place. I know I haven’t done justice to the book, so I encourage you to read it today!

You are all wonderful people. You just forget about that sometimes. Be happy and love yourself for who you are today.

Lessons from Childhood: Embracing the Good and Bad

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Sometimes I wish that I had taken the time to write down all the stories about my eccentric and interesting relatives. My mother and father told me some of our rich history, and yet I only remember bits and pieces. That’s why I’m taking this time to dredge out memories from my past and write them down. I want to leave these stories with my child where I came from versus what my story is right now. I worry that I won’t meet up to his expectations, but at least he will know who I am, the good, the bad and the ugly of it all.

When I was home that last time, at my father’s funeral, my mom wanted to show me our old, covered bridge, the one we drove through to go to school every day. So, we walked down that long, dirt road. She also wanted to show me our favorite summer fun place. The covered bridge looked good. It had been restored and blocked off to traffic. The creek and river, however, were incredibly overgrown and polluted. The road did not go through the bridge anymore. The state had fenced it off and rerouted cars to a concrete bridge that crossed the river further down. We spent many hot summers down here my mother told me. All the kids would float on those old yet still inflatable truck inner tubes down the river.

I told her I remembered our two older boy cousins driving down to our house in their old pickup truck, honking the horn for us to come with them. The inner tubes were piled up in the bed and we would climb up and sit behind them. Then, they would fly back down the narrow dirt road as we bounced around in the back, screaming all the way up and down that hill past their house. Tires screeching, they would whip around at the covered bridge and park on the side of the road.

My mother laughed at the picture I painted and told me how I ran after them if they didn’t pick me up. We all loved the older cousins, and they took me everywhere, especially when they rebuilt that old red convertible. (Everyone knew about the beloved and fully restored, red convertible (and that is a story for another time).

Little did my mother know that I often ran down to the little creek that we called the spring on those long afternoon days that were so hot and muggy. It wound around and merged with the big creek that flowed under the old, covered bridge. It scared me to go there by myself and at the time, it seemed so far away, and yet I craved that solace. There were lots of water moccasins swimming in the depths, but I avoided them and never got bitten by one. Once I got there, I would pull off all my clothes and jump in to cool off, frogs and snakes scattering, birds squawking.

As we walked home at dusk, the whip-poor-wills started up, and this would be the sound I remembered, one that lulled me to sleep each night in my childhood.

Today, I regret not being able to say goodbye to my dear mother in person one last time. She died six years after my dad, but I couldn’t make it back home. She had so much influence over me, and I have accepted the good and bad of both my parents’ teachings. I try to hold onto the good parts, and I have forgiven all the bad parts.

I know that my childhood was my innocent time. I had everything that I needed. I cared about the entire world, especially the war (Vietnam), or the politics and racial tensions, but knew I couldn’t do anything about it. I would read the newspapers and books and learn about all of this, and draft essays about all the injustices for school papers, but I always dreamed of faraway places, both on earth and beyond. I looked at the stars every night from our porch until my mom called me inside. I thought to myself: “That’s where I’ll be someday. I’ll make a difference!” (I haven’t made it into space yet, but I can still dream!)

I have tried to take my good childhood memories and blend them with adult memories to make a better life for my family and me. I have embraced change yet cling to the lessons that were given freely to me. My unbidden advice is to take the wins of your earlier life lessons and let go of the rest. Embrace the future in a positive way, no matter how bleak it looks. Remind yourself that you are alive right now. Be happy, appreciate your life the way it turned out, and spread love to the universe. We never know what’s ahead of us, but we can try to have those daily moments of peace and kindness.

Hugs and Love to all.

Childhood Memories: Exploring Life Beyond Barriers

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I flew back home for my father’s funeral over 18 years ago. It brought back memories of my childhood. Some were good and some were poignant. I never knew if I had a normal family. I suppose we were normal for the 1950s, but I’ve always lived outside the box. Before my father died, he told me about his one regret regarding me. “I’ve always felt that I didn’t do enough for you,” he said quietly. I was quiet for a moment and then replied, “Well, maybe that’s what made me who I am, that independent woman who could do everything for herself; I am that woman who doesn’t need barriers.” Dad seemed satisfied with my answer and that was probably the deepest conversation we’d ever had.

One of my fondest memories of my father was reading the National Geographic Magazine together.I saved all the map inserts, and we would spread them out on the rug in the living room. I would peruse them all night and spontaneously ask him questions about places he had been. The huge black and white console TV would be blaring in the background, turned up loud because of the static (we had an antenna back then). And, with only three channels to choose from, sometimes there was nothing on that I wanted to watch. Well, unless it was reruns of My Favorite Martian, Lost in Space and later the first Star Trek series.

I pointed out the great deserts and wondrous mountains on the map to him. When I was about eight years old, I realized that my father had traveled the world but had never been out west. I remember telling Dad that I was going to live in Colorado. I told him that somehow I knew that I belonged there, maybe had lived there in a past life or something like that. My father who was a true southern Baptist would shake his head, make harrumphing noises, and ignore that train of thought. My mother often agreed with me but would never discuss these past-life recollections if my father were around. Of course, Mom always had trouble with the thoughts that one day all her children would leave her. She encouraged us all to go to college and get good jobs. “You can do anything you want,” she’d tell each of us. She wanted us to join the world, but at the same time she wanted us to stay close to home, able to see her at a moment’s notice. Two of my sisters did just that. Me? I wanted an adventure. So, I traveled the country in a 1972 Toyota Corolla, over deserts and mountains, and finally settled in the place I should be: Colorado.

Stay tuned for Part II tomorrow.

Love to all!

Revisiting the Past to Plan for the Future

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The 1980s brought about a decade of new conservatism in social, economic, and political life. The years were characterized by the policies of U.S. President Ronald Reagan and U.K. Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher. The Soviet Union was breaking down and the economy was booming.

A lot of us grew up in the 1960s and 1970s and we thought those had been a troubling time that undermined confidence in ourselves and the government. The 1980s, often remembered for its materialism and consumerism, also saw the rise of the yuppie, a young, urban professional, or “yuppie,” a baby boomer with a college education, a good-paying job and expensive taste. Consumerism soared and suburbia became all about one-upmanship.

Computers and cellphones became available for everyone; however, they were bulky and extremely expensive. The internet was created, and people were now able to access so much more information at their fingertips. Everyone started getting more interconnected and dependent on devices.

Throughout the 1970s, computers were expensive devices that remained the province of a handful of garage tinkerers and multibillion-dollar entities like IBM and NASA. but all that changed during the 1980s, the decade that introduced the world to the video game, Pac-Man.

The 1980s also brought about an explosion of blockbuster movies and the emergence of cable networks like CNN and MTV, which introduced music videos and launched the careers of many iconic artists who sought global change. Health issues such as the AIDS crisis would go on to kill more than 700,000 people in the United States alone. 

The Reagan years brought about the inauguration of a conservative president who was no great friend to the arts, or to marginalized groups, including immigrants, the poor and those who fell outside of the conventional all-American family unit. The period was defined by how people responded to their circumstances — how they lived, partied, railed against authority and, most importantly, what they did.

Unfortunately, I was a boomer but was never a yuppie, because I didn’t have a lot of money to spend. I was too busy trying to make a living as a public servant to pay for things I needed. I did, however, spend quite a bit of money on huge hair, and on clothes with huge shoulder pads (having given away my bohemian hippie clothes of the 1970s). After all, we had lots of big important meetings in those days.

And now that we are revisiting this era once again, with the incoming administration, I am worried that we forgot about all those traumatized by those years. I am worried that we have forgotten that not everyone made lots of money and spent lots of money during that time. I am worried that those downtrodden who might have been starting to rise are just going to get downtrodden once again.

It is my hope that we take one person or worthy cause into consideration this holiday season and make our mark for change. Keep being. Keep reading. Keep doing. Thanks everyone! Hugs and love to all!

For more information on the early years of the 1980s, see:

https://www.history.com/topics/1980s/1980s

History Channel documentary on the 1980s; and,

New York Times Style Magazine publication.

Grateful for Turkey and Loved Ones

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We were just the two of us today, but we had a great feast! Some was it prepared by others, and some was homemade: Whole, smoked turkey (courtesy of Costco), mashed potatoes and gravy, teriyaki green beans (a new twist!), baked sliced apples, baked sweet potato souffle, and cornbread. Kept it simple and now I need a nap! There are leftovers that will last forever or until we just get really, really tired of eating them. I don’t freeze leftovers anymore, they just turn into chunks of ice. I am grateful to keep some of our old traditions alive (sweet potato souffle courtesy of my mother), but I try one thing new every year (hence the teriyaki green beans). So, for today, be happy with your food coma, and binge on Disney+ shows. Create your own traditions and love the one you’re with.

Tomorrow is another day of laughter and fun, practicing with our senior choir. We are in top form, and we are getting ready for all our December concerts for the folks in Memory Care.

I found this great site you might like. Don’t know the guy and hope he is a sweetheart, but he made me laugh today! For some fun and humorous stories and tips on writing go to https://tonysbologna.com/.

Love to all!

The Art of Storytelling: Unleash Your Inner Writer

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Writing is always about your personal discipline. Many people do not want to commit to taking time out of their lives when it comes to writing. Everyone has a story to tell about their life and the life of others they know. A human life can go in so many different directions. But you do have choices. You can lock yourself up in your house away from the world and fear the unknown. Or you can take time out each day to explore the world you live in and speak the truth. You can embrace the world, whether you fear it or not, and be involved with every aspect of nature and humans and their interactions with nature. Sometimes nature is the enemy. Sometimes humans are the enemy. It’s all those little interactions that make a story a wonderful experience for the reader.

People don’t seem to be brave these days and that’s sad to me. They pursue various artistic endeavors, but don’t consider that writing is also an art. If we could just face our fears, write them down and process our thoughts on paper (or computer), we would get a little better every day. So…. stop talking, create a practice and write every day. Stop saying to me, “I could write a book,” or “I started a book a long time ago.” The simple solution is to sit down and draft your own story. Finish what you have started. Tell us how you deal with the turmoil and strife, the love and the hate, and your view of the world today. Write about things you see and love every day. Write about the beauty of the world. Visualize dreams you want to happen and make them happen, first in story form, then in the real world.

I once read that a university student asked a well-known writer, “Do you think I could be a writer?” The writer responded, “Well, I don’t know…. Do you like sentences?” The writer/author was Annie Dillard, author of The Writing Life. She also wrote one of the best books I’ve read in a long time: Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (and so many other beautiful works). She is an incredible person who posed these and other questions to students. She posited that like painters, they paint because they like the smell of paint. So, of course, you must like sentences! “Can the writer isolate and vivify all in experience that most deeply engages our intellects and our hearts?” she asked her audience. And, finally, she asked, “Can the writer renew our hope for literary forms?”

Another fantastic book to read to give you a beautiful storyteller’s step by step process for writing is Anne Lamott’s book Bird by Bird. This has been my writing bible for decades.

I implore you to start your journey today. I’ll leave you with an incredible quote I try to embrace each day, authored by novelist Joyce Cary:

“The truth is that life is hard and dangerous; that he who seeks his own happiness does not find it; that he who is weak must suffer; that he who demands love will be disappointed; that he who is greedy will not be fed; that he who seeks peace will find strife; that truth is only for the brave; that joy is only for him who does not fear to be alone; that life is only for the one who is not afraid to die.”  Or if I may simply put it: “It’s a good day to die, so let’s live life to the fullest!”

Everyone has a story to tell. I would love to hear yours. Have lots of food and fun this weekend and write about it, then publish it! Love and hugs to all.

Latitudes and Attitudes – An Homage to Jimmy Buffet

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Jimmy Buffet’s song Changes in Latitudes, Changes in Attitudes was released in 1977 and has been a mainstay of his songs for several generations of Parrotheads. It is that kind of song that every radio station plays, and it sticks in your head for days. It is that type of song that helps you reflect on where you are in your daily life. It is that type of song that is needed in today’s world. His song reflects his life of travel to places and people who are different and more laid back than us North Americans. His life of traveling and learning about diverse cultures is something I aspired to when I was young. I haven’t made it to all those places he visited, but I will someday.

I first saw Jimmy Buffet in a concert at Fiddler’s Green in Denver. The boats were parked all around and people brought the party to him. We didn’t have an ocean, but we had the lawn. In the tropics, Jimmy would always acknowledge all the people out on boats, who didn’t have the expensive prime seats, but were a part of the happening. He would shout: “Hello, Boat People!” and those people would go wild. At Fiddler’s Green we were in the cheap seats way up at the top of the lawn, and he would shout: “Hello Lawn People!” and of course we would stand up and go crazy. Years later, we attended one of his last concerts in Denver which was at the Pepsi Center (now Ball Arena). He didn’t like that venue as much and a bunch of us were at the very top or behind the band. He would still shout up to us and even turned the band to those behind him for a few songs. He was an amazing and loving performer, and tried to give us all a wonderful performance, even in the cheap seats. His philosophy was to create a fun show and educate people on the importance of the oceans and the creatures and people that live there.

As many of you prepare to take off to islands with warmer climates for the holidays, I hope you will remember to change your emotional and mental state and become as laid back as the islanders do while you are there. I hope you relax and take in all the beauty that surrounds you. I hope the people on the islands can help you escape your daily grind and find a new perspective on life. I hope you can come back refreshed and ready to freely give to those in need, like most islanders do for you, no matter what your differences may be. I hope you bring a little of that island love and culture and Margaritaville lifestyle back to your neighborhood, especially to those mental and physical midwestern and northern cold climates. I hope you can break out of your comfort zone and give your heart freely to others who are different than you are.

If you are interested in learning more about Parrotheads, as well as his philanthropy, here are a few sites that caught my eye.

What is a Parrothead?
What Is A Parrot Head ?

https://www.jimmybuffett.com/philanthropy

We love and miss you, Jimmy. You lived a great life, and we want to follow in your footsteps. Rest in Peace. Happy Holidays everyone!