Talking and Listening– The Art of Conversation by Benedetta Craveri, translated from the Italian by Teresa Waugh

There was a time when formal conversation was a highly respected and desirable art. For the rich upper class with nothing better to do than entertain themselves with their own exclusive company, being interesting, inoffensive and, if you can manage it, witty, seemed just about the epitome of human grace.

The period of the salon it was, an era described in The Age of Conversation by Benedetta Craveri, translated from the Italian by Teresa Waugh. My heart squeezes with envy at the thought of those drawing rooms. There is a reason they called that time the age of enlightenment. Conversation is one of the very best ways to learn anything. To be exposed to new ideas and perspectives.

America was born during the enlightenment. Interestingly, the age of conversation and enlightenment was a thing that suggested its own demise. America’s crazy ideas spelled the end of the upper class. The concept of a class who did not need to produce anything but conversation was rejected by the conversations that ensued.

America had work to do. America, and everywhere, had projects to start and research to do and the world to change. They did not have time to merely sit and converse. That has continued forward to this day.

But that didn’t mean the conversations had become unnecessary. Humans need to talk. They need to clear their psychic buffers and build on half conceived ideas. I think it might be nearly as essential as sleep.

It might be time to take a page from those salons again. Craveri writes “talent for listening was more appreciated than one for speaking. Exquisite courtesy restrained vehemence and prevented quarrels.”

I, for one, would like to prevent quarrels. World peace would be a little closer, if we take this idea as true, if listening could have that effect.

There are two people who have been working on this exact issue. I don’t know if they have read Craveri’s book, but Bill and Liz have taken a chunk of their lives to bike around the U.S. and wear a sign that says:

Talk to Me

These guys knock my socks off. I first heard about them on “This American Life”, the “Say Anything” episode. Bill and Liz sat on a busy Manhattan street holding their sign. People just came up and talked to them about anything.

Imagine my shock and delight to actually see with my own eyes these two fabulous people at the Los Angeles Book Fair last year. They sat with their sign and I walked over and talked to them!

I asked them about TAL, what they thought of Ira Glass, and barely restrained myself from asking for their autograph. They did, however, ask for mine, and my email address.

They surprised me with their sweetness. They really seemed sincere and interested in what people had to say. How could people maintain that kind of interest after so long?

I really wanted to get them to talk to me, actually. I thought they were fascinating. When I told them where I lived (Glendale), Liz told me she was part Armenian and had promised to go visit Glendale on their trip(Glendale’s population is more than 50% Armenian). I recommended some busy spots and a bus line to take to get there.

I tore myself away, at last. These guys are so great! I can barely get my mind around what they have chosen to do. I asked them about what was “next”, what they wanted to make of their experiences. They seemed not to have concrete plans.

In some ways, I think that’s good. Commercializing their endeavor could ruin the integrity of it, and they seemed to be so sincere.

I got an email from them. They have circled the lower 48 states on their bikes with their sign. Check out their website: http://www.nyctalktome.com

Ponder this, my friends. What does it mean to really listen?

Deja Vu

I sleep hard, but sometimes I dream things. Things that haven’t happened yet. Sometimes I remember them, wonder about the dream. Then I go on my way and forget them.

Until they come true. They call it déjà vu. But I know I dreamed it. Stupid, everyday, unimportant things. Like looking for a notebook when someone is walking down a hall towards me. Or holding a conversation, when in the middle I realize I know exactly the next thing I am going to say. I would step into the now that had already happened months ago, years ago, in my dream.

It feels like a spell; I am split in two. The me who dreamed the conversation, or should I say, the me in the dream from the past, was fully engaged in what she was saying.

But the present me, the one living in the event which had already taken place, became distracted by the memory of the present.

How do I dream these future scenes?

How could I possibly see what hadn’t happened yet? What let me see the future? And why such irrelevant ordinary scenes from the future?

This makes me wonder how time works. Am I in time? Like I am in the universe? Or am in time like a fish in water?

A fish can jump out of water. Leap up high and dive back in.

For that matter, am I traveling through my life like a fish through a stream? Where the direction is laid out, only I can’t see far enough ahead to know that the biggest choices I have are whether to swim on the left side or the right.

Or maybe I am the stream. Maybe I am flowing for the first time. Perhaps my journey from the heights to the sea is unmarked. I, the water, flow because I must, but minute by second by future moment the way is chosen. Each obstacle changes the whole course. Over that pebble, pool below that hill, rapids here, waterfall there. Something new under the sun.

My dream moments might be telling me something. Who knows which moment is the decisive one? What choice is the fulcrum for an irreversible direction? Is some extra-temporal being trying to draw attention to the unnoticed as the start of some fork in the road?

But if that’s so, what am I supposed to do with this?

When the spell of a dreamed scene comes over me, and I am split between the layers of the dream memory and the identical present, I shift.

If the dream turned right, I go straight.

Who knows what’s at stake? Nothing? Everything?

But illusion, delusion or otherwise, I choose where to plant my feet.

Where’s your pride?

Sticks and stones will break your bones
but names will never hurt you

…that’s a crock of bull…Names are extremely painful. All kinds of words can conspire to hit you in the middle and throb.

Each person has a sense of themselves. I am not the only one to have a way that I wish to be seen, a presentation of myself projected to others. I want to be seen as clever, or funny, or good-looking. All three even.

But when others poke a hole in my bubble, when they dash my polished surface… They could show me up as stupid. Or not laugh at my jokes. Or something much more embarrassing.

Something that makes me feel like everything about me is undesirable and even despised.

Uhhll. That’s a horrible feeling.

I want to be loved. I want to be accepted and cherished.

That doesn’t always happen. There are times when I am very NOT.

It’s ironic, because I know that I am not always desirable and lovable. I live with me every day. I know my flaws.

Then again, it is especially painful when I hear from others about a flaw I was unaware of. How withering to learn that they outfit I thought so cute has a big hole in it. Or the speech habit I thought endearing was percieved as condescending.

It’s a sick, skin-crawling self-loathing feeling. It’s the sort of feeling I want to be rid of as soon as possible, but it lingers.

I remember one particular embarrassing moment. I was in a new town, and had been embraced in a new friendship–possibly romantic!–which was all the more exciting because there was no one else vying for my attention.

He had loaned me his guitar, a great trust, and told me where he lived so I could return it after a while.

It seemed appropriate to me to bring it back after a few weeks. Still warm from his attention, and not wanted the friendship to fade away, I followed the directions he had given me to his apartment, where his lived with his family. I brought the guitar back, hoping for a little visit.

I came to the door and was greeted with a wall of hostility. His sister left me in the hall, and went to get her brother. He took his time. When he finally came out he asked why I had come.

To return the guitar.

He looked down at the guitar and took it from me at last. Then he said I should not have come.

I left as soon as I could. I was mortified. I felt like a bug that narrowly escaped death, only because I would have soiled the shoes it would take to squish me.

I was reeling. I wanted to find some comfort somewhere. But I had no one I could go to. I wanted to have some friend–someone!–tell me, “hey, don’t listen to them. You’re okay.”

But I was new to the town, and I had no way of communicating with any of my old friends. It was all me. And I felt like a pimple on the butt of the world.

That part of me that stays on the side tried to think of something. Some way to comfort myself. I began to realize that the thing that was hurting was my pride.

What is Pride? “… it’s not a hand, nor foot, nor arm, nor face, nor any other part belonging to a man…”

And yet it can be hurt. Was it important? or was this pain like the hiccups, something uncomfortable that was not serious and would pass?

Pride…Pride is the original sin. Lucifer was proud and he screwed everything up.

In that case, pride SHOULD be hurt. Pride should be ignored, torn down, attacked. It was a good thing to have my pride damaged. I should be humble, not proud.

And yet…There is another meaning of pride. Pride in opposition to shame. I will not be ashamed. If I am ashamed, it means I have done something wrong. Something shameful.

But if I am proud, I am proud of myself, I am living right. I should strive to be proud of my work. I should preserve my pride.

How can this be? Two things that mean the opposite.

Here is how I have determined the difference:

For the false, destructive pride, the source comes from external things. If I am proud of what I did not create, what I did not work for, then this is false. If I take pride in my appearance, my status or how people regard me, then that’s wrong.

But if the source of my pride comes from my own work, and the affirmation comes from myself, then it is good pride. Yes, I should work hard and take pride in my work. I should be careful to be honest and have integrity. I can be proud of that integrity, but my pride can be an internal affirmation. I don’t need to broadcast my good deeds, it is enough to know them myself.

A shameful pride would be trumpeted and draw from other peoples’ opinion.

But a humble pride would be quiet and only need affirmation from oneself.

That is basically the litmus test. And it places my pride, my self-worth, inside my sphere of control. I don’t need anyone else’s opinions to know.

I can hold my own with pride.

It’s your Duty to uphold tradition

Once of the things that parents must do when raising their children is give them a sense of right and wrong, and a sense of the values of their culture.

This is important! If kids are not guided and molded, how can society maintain its vital traditions?

Parents, I say to you now, it is your DUTY to take your children trick or treating. Haloween depends upon it.

In years past, there were hordes of costumed waifs parading down the block after dark. It has slowed! It is merely a trickle when once it was a mighty flood.

But we, the childless members of society depend on the children to uphold the tradition. Where would we be if the children abandon Halloween?

Do not go only to the businesses and the malls to gather candy! Fie on you, you parents who deem it convenient or ‘safe’ to do so!

No, we depend on the children to provide us with a reason to buy large quantities of our favorite candies.

It is your DUTY, parents and children, even if you don’t feel like it. Even if you don’t like candy or aren’t allowed to eat it.

You are the carriers of the torch. If you do not pass it forward, we are lost.

Can you imagine the grim future, the barren and dry future of an America with no more halloween? No sweets, no costumes, no flirting with evil or badness?

Let it not be so! Keep halloween thriving! Dress your children and yourselves!

It is your unhallowed duty.

a decade

America…since…Gosh, I don’t know…But we started to think in decades.

The 50s…the 60s…the 70s…the 80s…

The 80s are coming back, don’t you know?

But, what’s up with the arbitrary emphasis on the ‘0’? the 80 to the 90. Or the 1950 to the 1960.

We have an extra zero now, and we hardly know what to do with it. We don’t have a cute term for the now…The fifties, the eighties, the nineties…and two thousand five…or worse, two thousand and five.

We’re kind of drifting until we get to call it the teens. Then it’s back on solid ground, the twenties, the thirties and the forties.

But at this moment, we are half way. 2005.

And for me, that concludes my own personal decade. On October 15, 1995 I flew from the Anchorage airport to Sacramento California.

My first decade of California living has passed.

I have a geeky reason for remembering that it was 1995. That was when it went from Windows 3.11 to Windows 95

A big year, to be sure. And the decade that followed has been justly monumental. I am so happy to be where I am and to have the skills that I have.

limitations

You know, I have had quite a year. SO MUCH has changed. I quit one job, neary completed writing a book, remodeled my condo, bought a new home, and got a new and better job.

All in the space of six months.

I am in the throes of moving. And I am trying hard to understand the nature of my new job, which is not readily apparent.

And I am frustrated at how slowly the writing of my book and the settling into the new house is going.

But…

I am coming to terms with my own limitations. I think that is something I took away from my last [hideous] job.

It turns out I cannot do everything. At the very least, I cannot do everything AT ONCE.

And there is nothing wrong with that.

I hope I am learning to have a little patience with myself. Some things just take time. There is no way around it.

How to have an open-minded discussion regarding deeply held convictions

1. Always remember the purpose of the conversation is the exchange of ideas and experiences. The point of the conversation is to hear others’ point of view and to share your own.

2. Kindness and respect should be the mental stance throughout. If another person is listening to your convictions, they are doing you a kindness. If they are sharing their own convictions, you are receiving the reflected light of their revealed truth. Respect is appropriate at such times, and indeed, necessary for the exchange to occur.

3. Be secure in your own convictions. Do not be needy, asking for affirmation during the conversation. If what you think it true, no one needs to tell you so. You should not try to convince the other person to agree with you.

4. Ask questions and listen to the answers.

5. If you don’t understand something someone is saying, ask them to clarify: “When you said X, I’m not sure what you meant. Can you explain?”

6. Don’t press too hard for explanations. New ideas may take some time to get your mind around. By pressing too hard for evidence, you may cause them to feel defensive.

7. Should your conversation partner be persistent in trying to get affirmation from you when you don’t feel in agreement, do not answer insincerely. A soft answer, for example “I really need to think about that, I can’t answer right now” might help to get past the sticking point

8. If you begin to feel angry, disrespected or cornered during the discussion, try to direct the conversation toward a less sensitive area.

9. If your conversation partner expresses a racist, sexist, or violent idea, SPEAK OUT. If you let such ideas go unchallenged, you are lending support by your silence. Say something like, “I heard what you just said, and I disagree. Every person deserves respect as a part of our shared humanity.” If violence is mentioned, say, “It’s really not right to hurt anyone. There are better ways to handle the situation.”

10. If you feel close to responding in anger or otherwise behaving unkindly, excuse yourself. Try saying “This conversation is bringing up a lot of feelings for me. I really can’t keep talking about this. I’m sorry. Excuse me.” Abandoning the conversation is much better than hurting someone.

Not from around here

I need to talk for a little bit about where I come from.

I come from Alaska. I did not live in the absolute wilderness, but then again, the wilderness is never far from anywhere in my motherland. Moose wander through the streets, and the streets are literally ice for many months of the years.

The brand-new subdivision that I lived in as a teenager was virgin forest. I mean to say, a lawn was something of a futile absurdity. It made much more sense to leave the trees and bushes alone, and 99% percent of the homes in our area left their acre+ lots in their natural state.

We had a natural well that gave us water. It was ‘hard’ water which meant that the minerals coated our bathtub and left a funny taste when we drank it.

We lived outside a munincipality, the only police where the state troopers and they were seldom seen.

There was a lake full of fish a half mile a way, and our front window showed us a forest reserve that stretched for hundreds of miles long. We liked to pick berries and mushrooms there in the summer.

My parents drove to Alaska. They went their twice from their motherland in the golden rolling hills of California. First, in the 60s before Alaska was a state. Then again, for much longer, in 1972. During the new year’s party, Mom went into labor and produced me in a now-defunct Anchorage Hospital.

Now I live in the golden rolling hills of California. And only very recently, I realized:

Mom and Dad thought Alaska was exotic.

I never never never thought it was exotic. It was home, with all the boringness and familiarity that means. But for them, it was almost like living in a foreign country. It was exciting and new and unexpected almost every day.

Now, Mom and Dad live in Sacramento. They talk a lot about remembering different places around there. Things are the same for them. Things are a lot like how they left them when they went away. Not exactly, time takes its toll, but enough the same for them to remember.

But me, I feel like California is a very exotic place. With its short snowless mountains and lush vegetation, fruit trees and warm nights, its population density and freeways, California never quite fits. It’s always not home.

Not to say I ever want to live in Alaska. I am a permanent ex-patriate.

But I chafe at the expectations. I demand to know “WHY?” and resent every rule or expectation as irrational and irrelevant.

When I bought my condo, as part of the forest’s graveyard of paperwork required, I was given the Rules of the Condo Association. Chris read them with me.

“WHAT?! I can’t put my bike on the balcony.”

“No Pool parties? Who do they think they are?”

“No dog over 40 pounds? Why is that their business? IF I want a dog, it’s my problem.”

Every rule was an imposition. I was buying the home, I should be able to do whatever wherever I wanted. Every rule made me suspicious.

Chris told me, “That’s the price you pay to live in a condo with other people. If you had your own home, you could do what you wanted.”

I signed, muttering and rebelling, but I signed.

Now, I am looking to buy a home! HOoray! I can paint the outside, I can have a BIG dog, I can put my bike wherever I like and all the rules are gone.

Chris and I are buying it together, so, he wants to live in his hometown Claremont. A little tiny city that gives me the jeebies. Back to that in a moment.

We’ve picked a house, made an offer, and are waiting. Chris was telling me what to expect from his home town.

“Claremont does not allow parking in the street overnight. Between 2 am and 6 am, you can’t be on the street without a temporary permit.”

What is this? WHAT?! THEY ARE PUTTING RULES ON ME AGAIN.

See, I am feeling crowded about this already. This town is full of all kinds of customs and ways of doing things. Where I come from, independence is prized and conformity is despised. There is no set way that everyone should be or do.

And yet, this little city has all sort of rules and permit requirements.

But here’s the creepy part that gives me the jeebies:
Everyone from there or associated with that city, thinks that the city is great. They all say what a nice place it is, how wonderful it is for kids and for creative types. It is a college town after all.

And even more than that, everyone I’ve met from there is excruciatingly nice. I mean it! They are smart, and kind, and usually benignly humorous.

Is anyone else hearing the jeebie music in the background? I’ll admit, I’m probably scarred by too many church youth groups. They specialize in niceness, while holding the dagger hidden until your back is exposed.

But I’m uneasily assured of the Claremont niceness. I mean, Chris is more Claremont than anyone, and I’ve been in daily observation of him for more than 5 years. He remains nice.

I just am afraid I will tresspass on the customs or BBQ the sacred cows of this little town of Trees and PhDs. I know there are all these expectation that I am oblivious to, like being colorblind. And I value my independence. I cherish my non-conformity.

They expect me to wash my car whenever dirt is visible on it. Hey, where I come from, you are ahead of the curve if both headlights are working. What do they expect from me?

They will expect lawn maintenance. Lawns! And if there are weeds, I would have to pull them up. I’ve never had anything to do with a lawn. I will probably fail at this.

I could offer lots of advice on removing a car after it’s high-centered on a snow burm. But that is not useful in my exotic new home.

I recognize, intellectually, that with all these people crowded together on paved streets and highways, some rules are needed. But I don’t like it. Rules feel categorically repellent.

It will take some time. I’m not from here.

what were they thinking?

I remember learning about church history in my protestant church school. The time line went something like this:

God created the earth
God picked Abraham to father the jews and be the chosen people who wrote down what he said
God send Jesus to die and save everybody from the mess humanity had gotten into
The disciples became the apostles, started the church and wrote the new testament
Martin Luther wrote the 95 theses

Sometime after I learned history that didn’t come from born-again-authored textbooks, I realized that things had happened in the church between the first century and the 15th.

The protestant revisionist history had the catholic church sort of erased. As if, before the “real” church, the protestant one, there had been this big empty dark spot.

As I learned more I realized, that’s not true. There were all kinds of things happening, acts of faith and struggles. There were hundreds of years that the faith was preserved by the faithful. I was kind of surprised to realize that.

Now, from 1917 to 1991, communism was in charge of Russia. It was a totalitarian government, and here in the Democracy-loving west, we saw them as gray and robotic. They produced propaganda, and their biggest newspaper was called TRUTH, and they made it the truth by stamping out any other voices.

But I found this amazing book in a used book store: Writers in Russia: 1917-1978
This book explains what the writers were thinking. It talks about how they were excited and embraced the Revolution. That at first, they were inspired and producted good writing regarding their hopes and dreams for the new order.

And then, well, things got funky. All the intelligentsia revolutionaries had envisioned a utopia, a place where everyone would have everything they needed and be free to create.

As it turned out, people sort of had what they needed but they were less and less free to create.

But creative people will create. Their creativity compels them. And what things were happening behind that iron curtain?

THe official story was lockstep uniformity. But unofficially, the Russian people were as hungry for beautiful culture as ever.

This book tells of a really healthy underground publishing community. They would sent out the stories, the poetry, type up multiple copies and mail them out like chain letters. In this way, one officially unpublished poet was once able to pack out a soccer stadium to hear him read his poems.

PACKED OUT A STADIUM FOR POETRY.

I remember how we would hear of the strength of the first century Christian. HOw they were so vitallly involved with their faith. They went to their death in the jaws of lions.

The lack of something makes it so much more precious. THe lack of freedom makes the desire for it unbearable.

Here, we have so much freedom. And what do we do with it? We hardly know what to do with it. We are dilletantes with our freedom of speech. Toying with it…Childishly experimenting.

And yet, would we have it any other way? Freedom means contempt. I can toss off the most foolish nonsense with my power of speech, because it is free. Free is not important, doesn’t require any thought.

The Soviet writers were not automatons. They had truth that tortured them to be told. THey had the highest of formalism to deal with. Leave iambic pentameter aside, try working within the bounds of a capricious and murderous dictator. Stalin was no joke.

And yet, they did it. They worked and crafted and wrote. What an amazing history. It’s blowing my mind to get a glimpse of all these creative minds struggling with their surrounding and how to express themselves.