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Tag Archives: Brenda Tobias

Grand Old Ivy

18 Mar

Families around the country are (hopefully) beginning to wade through college acceptance letters.  The conversations are getting a bit strained, and perhaps a few bedroom doors have been slammed.  For the teen, deciding on a college feels excruciatingly personal, and one that her/his parents should really not influence.  For the parent (who may be footing the bill) the decision feels as important (if not more) than any 17/18 year old is equipped to tackle.  If we open our windows and listen very carefully we can probably hear strains of; “Fine! Then I won’t go to college at all.”  “Don’t think you’re going to live here (we’ve promised your room to your 30 year old brother.)”  Okay, you probably didn’t hear that last part, but it was implied.

A million years ago, the school selection ritual was a bit easier.  High school students applied to less than a handful of schools.  What they could afford dictated where they applied.  Schools differed in their disciplines and robustness of research, but not on their housing and dining and extra-curricular activities.  Support services (of any kind) were few and far between.  Parents often never even saw the school of choice until graduation.  It was a different time.  Today there are so many choices and so many people involved in the decision.

Complicated aid packages, unlimited special interest programs (i.e., public service, study abroad, merit scholars, etc.) luxurious living accommodations, and multiple support services are just some of the changes that parents may not recognize.  These same parents are expected to visit the school (before enrollment) and sit through Q&A designed just for them.  They are expected to deliver their child to school and stay for days for an orientation designed just for them.  No sooner do they get home and gas up the minivan, than they are expected back on campus for “Family Weekend” (previously known as “Parents Day.”)  And that’s just the first two months of freshman year.  For better or worse (and who are we kidding?) parents are also attending the college their child chooses.  Just walk through any campus bookstore (or online store.)  There is as much apparel and paraphernalia for parents as there is for students.

Adding to this dramatic change in the landscape is that many students are attending college who might not have fifty years ago.  As a group, freshman are not as self sufficient or mature as they once were, but there are also many freshman with specific qualities that need to be addressed and supported.  Students with; learning disabilities, physical disabilities, emotional disabilities, chronic diseases, and eating and substance abuse issues, may have stayed closer to home in the past.  Many colleges have invested in a multitude of support services, but there will always still be reason for concern.  Sending a child away to an institution with new academic and social demands and little behavioral oversight, can be a treacherous formula.  Parents of these students have every reason to be very involved in every step of the college process.

So once the tempers subside, and everyone comes out of their respective rooms, it’s time for rational decision making (caution: charts might be involved.) Might I suggest a framework for the discussion:

  • What are the student’s interests/goals
    • Rate the school as to its ability to successfully deliver the student to the next step (i.e., medical school, engineering job, stage and screen)
  • What are the financial needs (include traveling to and from home and any and all fees for supplemental programs)
    • Rate the school separately as to their contribution and the student/parent contribution (e.g., “A” for grants “A” for loans, but “F” for no work-study program)
  • What are the support/living needs the student has
    • Rate the schools accordingly

An attractive, and perhaps color-coded chart should result.  Of course this analysis is only relevant if plenty of homework is done.  Hhmmm, who amongst those sitting around the dining room table, is well versed in homework?  The student should have done as much (if not hopefully much more) legwork before this discussion can occur.  Yes, it is all quite confusing and complicated, and even the most well executed chart is no guarantee.  And yes, this is all very expensive and important, but there is no race.  Leaves of absence, transfers, community colleges and the like exist for a reason.  We learn from experience and from our mistakes, but making informed decisions, makes the learning much more profitable.

 
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Posted by on March 18, 2012 in Education

 

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Where The Boys Are

16 Mar

St. Patrick’s Day, Mardi Gras, Spring Break.  What do these springtime festivities have in common?  Alcohol and ensuing wantonness.  There are other events that involve excessive drinking as well (New Year’s Eve, sporting championships, four years of college, etc.) but without as much (ahem) carousing. Perhaps it is due to the time of year, but the trinity of St./Mardi/Break also seems to entail disrobing.  Of course the wearing (or not wearing as the case may be) of the green can occur in rather chilly clime.  But a green beer/whiskey induced snogging marathon knows no geographical boundaries (and can be accomplished while wearing a jaunty plastic green derby.)

There is nothing new about springtime debauchery, or drinking and impromptu romantic entanglements.  MTV didn’t create the bacchanalian beaches, they just filmed it.  (Cameras may alter people’s behavior, but when people are that far gone, it’s probably just incremental changes.)  Phone cameras, social media, and youtube didn’t create opportunities for regret.  Ruining a reputation has always been as easy as pie.  People love to talk about other people; it’s simply what we do.  We don’t need technology or tabloids to do so, we just need a willing listener.  It’s neither bad nor good, it just is what it is.

What is bad and not good, is that it is only women whose reputations we are discussing.  Since the dawn of time (or at least since the first caveman slurred; “take off those pelts baby” and flung a string of purple stones at her – which probably really hurt) it has been women whose bodies have been the entertainment and who have been punished for their cooperation.  Even when a woman has kept her bikini top on and engaged in the same overindulgence of spirits as her male companions, it is her reputation that is at stake.  Almost any (absurd) behavior a drunken male engages in is followed (in the clear light of day) with slaps on the backs or guffaws of; “Dude, you were off the hook” (or some other vernacular which also makes no sense.)  The male’s behavior is seen as “normal” and a way of blowing off steam.  His random romantic interludes (if there were any) are heralded. While in the girl’s hotel room next door…The kinder mascara smudged friends are unconvincingly cooing; “everyone does it. don’t worry about it. in a couple of weeks no one will even remember.”

One could argue that branding a woman was an effective deterrent to behavior that in fact could have had dire consequences.  Effective birth control is a relatively new invention.  Women died in childbirth on a somewhat regular basis.  A girl/woman could fall pregnant and have absolutely no means of supporting herself or her child.  She would no longer have access to the only acceptable profession; matrimony.  Her matrimonial chances might be diminished if there was even a hint of behavior that could render her unsuitable.  Whether she did anything or not, she could be ruined just the same.

Women now support themselves and (hopefully) have access to reliable birth control.  What possible reason, anthropologically speaking, do we still have for branding women who drink in excess and physically exploit themselves and/or others?  While our culture has ratcheted up the sexualization of girls and women (to extremes never before experienced) we have remained stalled in our judgments.  Fashion, celebrities, video, film, television, and music have not just progressively disrobed women but have objectified them to cartoon proportions.  Through modern science (and photoshop) women now look more like Betty Boop and Jessica Rabbit.  When women are depicted engaging in acts of romance, they are almost always done so from the perspective of what pleases a man.  Girls and women in videos (and real life) dance to simulate an act that can only pleasure their gentleman dance partner.  The objectification of women is, shall we say, off the hook.  Yet, we cling to our scarlet A ways.  Could it be that at our core, we are not comfortable with our cultural objectification of women?  Are our judgments a way of saying; “No, go back, we’ve led you astray?”  The alternate explanation; that we are in a backlash to the second wave of feminism that simply knows no bounds, is more likely, but far more disturbing.

 

 

 
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Posted by on March 16, 2012 in Cultural Critique

 

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And The Beat Goes On*

14 Mar

Have you heard the news?  The Encyclopedia Britannica is stopping the presses (see: changing marketplace.)  No doubt this is quite the blow to Britannica employees and door-to-door salesmen (see: Fuller Brush, Willy Loman.)  But perhaps this is actually not all bad news.

The encyclopedia had a hallowed place in many homes and hearts.  The (wonderful) film Ball of Fire (1941) updated the 7 dwarfs and their mighty leader, Gregory Peck, into encyclopedia wizards.  The quirky little brainiacs toiled for years, documenting every subject known to humankind.  It was a noble undertaking, and one made all the more enjoyable with the arrival of Barbara Stanwyck.  For decades, real-life families across the country paid for one volume of encyclopedic knowledge at a time.  The books; with their hard covers and lush pages, were displayed with pride in living rooms and dens.  For better or worse, schoolchildren used these volumes to complete homework assignments.  Those without (and there were/are plenty of those) made the trip to the library or relied on source material (a.k.a. parents) or turned in homework destined for less than an “A.”

Encyclopedias are a great source for cursory understanding of a subject, but there are now so many more of those.  With a few keystrokes endless source materials are at our fingertips.  Students (and others) can go directly to the U.S. government sites or the American Medical Association.  The very act of searching (a.k.a. researching) broadens the understanding of a subject.

Will some people confuse wikipedia with an authoritative (and fully vetted) source?  They already do.  Does the cessation of printing encyclopedias put disadvantaged students at a disadvantage?  Not in this day and age.  It’s a pretty safe bet that if a library has an up-to-date version of the encyclopedia on the shelves, they have computers and access to the internet as well.  I would posit that the elimination of the printed encyclopedia evens the playing the field a bit for students, if it weren’t for the fact that having them in the home is no longer a sign of special access to information.

Why is it even worth note you ask (assuming you don’t work in the printing or door-to-door sales professions?)  For the simplest of reasons: progress is sometimes quite progressive.  The shuttering of a theatre, restaurant or nightclub to make way for a food court or Sephora, is not progress, it’s just sad.  The erosion of demarcation between public space and private space is not progress, it just means I have to throw my body over my entree as the woman at the next table styles her hair.  The memory of salesmen, diaper service, milk delivery, Sheriff Taylor and his son Opie, fill us with a warmth and sense of safety.  Change (and growing pains) are always just a bit frightening and our instincts are to cling to vestiges of the past.  For proof, one need only witness an adolescent girl’s bedroom festooned with equal parts stuffed animals and mascara.

There once was a dizzying amount of New York (daily) newspapers, some of them having more than one edition a day.  It took awhile, but with technology we have that once again.  The insatiable human desire for information is part of our charm.  As long as our innovations keep pace with that need, we can say farewell to the past without too much angst.  For those who will miss those smooth, hefty burgundy books, just consider how much fun you’ll have convincing children that you used to have to walk to the library (in the snow, uphill, both ways) to learn who invented the printing press.

*Sonny Bono (1967)

 
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Posted by on March 14, 2012 in Cultural Critique, Media/Marketing

 

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New York State Of Mind

12 Mar

I’ve always fancied myself the Carnac of human behavior and motivation.  I admit, I’ve been known to get flummoxed by habitual bad behavior (tantrums and bullying in the workplace, obliviousness of others in public, etc.) but by and large I find most behavior and/or language to be easily decipherable.  In truth even the bully at work is pretty simple; he fears being discovered, (it’s just difficult to remember that when the behavior takes on science fiction proportions.)  People grooming themselves in public or throwing their garbage at the feet of others, or talking at full volume (on the phone or at a baby) or polishing their nails on an airplane, aren’t evil they probably could have just greatly benefited from a firm swat on the behind at some point, as a gentle reminder that they are not in fact all alone in the universe.

I really do believe that there is very little we say or do that doesn’t speak to how we feel.  We may not know it at the time, but that doesn’t mean it’s not happening.  Of course this isn’t to say that everyone in our realm can read our minds.  A future mother-in-law asking a bride if she can wear black to the wedding, might feel very overweight and not in fact be planning a stealth boycott of the nuptials.  But I assure you there was some feeling behind the query.

So here I sit with my Dr. Nick’s Academy certificate in peopleology and I feel my training/talents ebbing.  I find myself less adept at reading intent.  It’s not slang or inflection or even means of communication that has me floundering.  I can see through all that as if it were mere cement and I engaged my super-x-ray vision.  I am beginning to suspect that my kryptonite, if you will, is the proliferation of snark.  I am fluent in the Don Rickles wannabe variety of snark (for the motivation of this genre of snark see bullying above.)  But there is a subtler variety, one that might even be categorized as “whining.”  On the street, and in the media, I keep hearing these urban whines: People complaining about the livability of the city.  It is objectively bizarre to begin with (ahem, have you ever heard of the 1970s?! you think Disneyfied NYC is hard?) but it also is completely illogical.  Unless you are in a witness protection program, presumably you are free to leave.

I suspect that these grumblings and mumblings are not the noise coming out of a jilted resident on his way back to Indiana.  I have a feeling that what all these complaints really mean is “I thought it would be different, and before you can point out how I’m not where I thought I’d be in life, I’m gonna shoot the first shot.”  But as I mentioned, I’m not entirely sure.  What I do know is that there is something cloyingly adolescent about the negative Nancy natterings.  Snide remarks about paying huge amounts to live in a tiny box, have a certain; “I meant to do that” element to them.  (By the way, when did people decide that what they were paying for in urban housing was somehow related to square footage?)  Speechifying about the dirty tiles in the subway station is reminiscent of a teenager kicking the gravel at the Colosseum and complaining to his parents; ‘it’s really dusty here.”

Negativity is every bit as contagious as happiness.  It also feeds itself like a cruise ship passenger.  It doesn’t make someone hip to hate, it just makes them a bit toxic.  If it’s too loud, too crowded, too hot, too cold, too pricey, too smelly, toodaloo.  It’s a big world, surely there’s someplace for everyone.  If in fact, the grumblings, whining, pithy-esque condemnations are not geographically specific and just a new hipster affectation/slang; ack!  Please let it run a swift course.

 
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Posted by on March 12, 2012 in Cultural Critique

 

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Spring Is In The Air

10 Mar

The first signs of spring can make the heart soar.  Spotting a crocus or blue jay for the first time, feels in fact, like the first time.  The air is rich with the scent of new growth and we envy the dogs their unselfconscious sniffing.  People walk with their heads up, faces tilted towards the sun, no longer hunched to gird against the wind.  The world feels hopeful, forgiving, on the cusp of new beginnings.

But (cue crashing car and shattering glass sound) like dirty snow on a daffodil, there is the debacle of dress.  Fluctuating temperature, clothes in storage, and winter weight gain, leave people floundering like newborn colts.  Granted, it is the only seasonal change that involves such radical rethinking.  We seem to ease into fall, and winter can often only be discerned by the calendar.  Once it’s cold, it’s cold.  The weight of a sweater is not nearly as daunting as the peeling off of layers.

If you find yourself a bit flummoxed, I offer these friendly little pointers:

  • Buy a thermometer, get a weather app, turn on the radio/tv.  We don’t live in a science fiction movie, we actually know what the weather will be during the day.  If it’s going to reach 70 degrees, leave the parka at home.  The same for the wool hat.  Wearing a wool hat on a nice day screams; “outpatient.”
  • Unless you have neuropathy (and my condolences if you do) you do not need to wear snow boots when there is no snow.  The same is true for fleece lined clogs (which have no business being a “thing” anyway, what is that? the front of your foot gets cold but your heel is made of steel?)
  • Dig out the ballet flats and keds, they’ve missed you and have been pining for this reunion.
  • Hemisphere dressing (in which the top half of your body seems to be from an opposite climate as the lower half) says to the world; “do not make eye contact” “the airline lost my luggage” “ask me about my cult.”
  • Have at least one pair of pants on hand that, well let’s just say is more generous than the others.  Presumably this is not your first time transitioning from winter to spring.  It can’t be a total surprise that those extra glasses of champagne or (boxes of) truffles actually took up residence somewhere on you.  It’s not the end of the world, it’s just a reminder to start moving, and moving away from the table.
  • A fabulous lightweight jacket (cotton, light leather, etc.) is key.  Slip a cardigan underneath in the morning, and a silk or cotton scarf.  By afternoon you can strip down a bit.
  • Do not underestimate the power of a lightweight sweater or jacket in disguising a bit of temporary bulge.
  • When it gets warm enough, and it will, reintroduce your legs to the light of day.  Do not slather them with orange self-tanner for that is a sin (which can be seen from space.)  Pale legs do not look odd in spring, fake tanned ones do.  If you do nothing else for humankind, I implore you to stay away from the self-tanning aisle.  If you are over 3 feet tall and do not have green hair, it is not a good look

Once you’re dressed, get outside.  Spend every moment you can just taking it in.  Soon enough it will be summer and the flowers will become a backdrop instead of the wonder they are at this very moment.  Taking a meal outside will become the norm versus the novelty it is today.  As adults we don’t often get to experience overwhelming feelings of newness.  This is one of those times.

 
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Posted by on March 10, 2012 in Style

 

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