Some Little Things

I've had a series of small thoughts recently that I wanted to share but none of them seemed to be worth their own post.  As such, here are some vignettes.

• I took a slightly different path than I usually do on the way home from one errand or another and happened to pass by the Meijer off of College Avenue.  The last time I had passed by this way, I noticed that there was a new building popping up.  As I was driving past it this time, I had the distinct thought of "I wonder what new restaurant we're getting."  And I was very confused, then, to read "Sherwin Williams" on the side of the building, at which point I had a good laugh at myself.  Only in Bloomington-Normal, with more restaurants per capita than anywhere else in the world  is it such an easy assumption that all new things that are not obviously residential are new restaurants.  However, the more I tried looking for a quick source for "Most restaurants per capita," the more disappointed I was.  I really couldn't find anything that backed that up for Bloomington-Normal.  We show as "dense" but definitely not in the top much anything.  That was jarring, too, in its own way.  I had heard it from many, many different sources and believed them collectively.  This was and is a point of quirky pride in our big-small town.  It was almost as jarring as when I learned that antibiotics don't do anything against viral infections or that the weird, backwards "G" shape in "Disney" was actually a stylized "D."  There are many, many pieces of common knowledge that I know we as a culture in the Midwest or as Americans or a number of other sub-groupings repeat as fact without thinking much about.  I'm glad this was, at least, a rather innocuous one, but it definitely has my brain going on a few more tangents, asking what other things am I spreading without verifying, particularly after vilifying the online equivalent in a recent post...  We like a good story--so many pieces of "common" knowledge perpetuate because they make an interesting story.
• And speaking of that post, I was using our program the other day to view a client's screen at work so that I could help him through a problem that they had run into.  The program took a little longer than usual to load and show said screen, and it became apparent immediately why that was the case:  they had at least 26 tabs open (yes, I started counting) and every available space on his desktop had a shortcut on it, some with titles indicating that they were at least two years old.  He apologized that his computer was running slowly today, and I bit back any kind of retort, not trusting what I would say, and made some kind of non-committal grunt.  After we saw a successful report and I closed out the program, I took quick stock of how many programs I had open and how many shortcuts I had on my desktop.  How many desktop icons are "acceptable" or at least non-cringeworthy?  This, I think, is one of those lighter faux pas, one that's not a big deal the older you are, but a bigger deal the younger you are, or maybe it's about organizational preferences.  In any case, at least close out any damning material--a friend of mine this last week saw some unsightly images on a client's Twitter (pointedly ignoring them) before they settled into the problem.  If you know that someone is going to be seeing your screen, at least close your Facebook and ANY questionable content.
•  My cousin Neil loves a good villian.  That makes me ridiculously happy.  If the hero isn't "edgy," they're often flat and we're supposed to like them for the sake that they're good.  How boring.  But a complex villain?  That's where things get interesting and is better reflective of the world we live in--nothing is so cut-and-dry.  What breaks a person outside of their moral code?  How did that individual form their morality in the first place?  Why is it so fascinating to know the backstory of the bad guy?  There's all kinds of good psychology to help explain why it fascinates us.  More and more, though, I look at it as a place to practice empathy.  The people that we see as villains in our own lives are the heroes in their own; in fact, people aren't usually against us, they're just for themselves.  So, seeing elements of that kind of thinking, well, that's a good thing to see.  A few years ago, I was watching him play Minecraft, and he showed me a house he built.  The outside looked to be made of wood, but the inside was entirely covered in black wool.  He explained to me:  "See, the outside looks normal but inside there's a deep, dark secret, just like real life."  What a wonderfully profound thought.  I still think about this from time to time.  How much of that we choose to share, the color of our own secrets (are they only black because they're hidden away from the light?), how do others decide what to share and what not to share, etc.  I mean, I've only talked about wrestling with this kind of vulnerability in a half-dozen blog posts...
• My older brother had an interesting encounter the other day.  Now, an important thing to know about David for this story is that he doesn't pick up well on social signals, but he does pay attention in his own ways.  For example, I have needed a couple of blood transfusions over the course of all my Crohn's treatment.  David put together that we have the same blood type (AB+ is pretty rare) and continues to do a beautiful, selfless thing:  David is an active blood donor.  As in, watching the intervals and scheduling when he's able because that was one way he could theoretically help me and consequently others like me.  This touches me very deeply.  And I still smile to get another phone call where he reports another visit to the vampires.  As such, he has a collection of blood donor t-shirts.  Whelp, he happened to be wearing one of these shirts the other day when he answered the door to some Jehovah's Witnesses.  For those not aware, Jehovah's Witness will not give nor accept blood transfusions for religious reasons so David (and I, when he shared the story with me) had a laugh on how that might have been a little awkward.  And then, I wonder, too, about all of the bacon paraphernalia must feel like to our Muslim and Jewish community members.  In trying to think of a good example for something that make the stereotypical Christian feel awkward, I started thinking of evolution.  If someone was wearing a Darwin shirt when a church member hands them a tract, what kinds of thoughts happen in that moment?  For the record, I myself see no contradiction between evolutionary theory and the Bible--I'm of the opinion that God wants to us to think and is not anti-science, that exploring the secrets of our world makes it all the more miraculous.  So, I know that I would look at a t-shirt like that and say, "Right on;" I know a few other people that would take it as an invitation to try and brow-beat the individual into submission.  In the end, both sides can be gracious and allow the other to carry on without "winning."  Let's take this a step further:  there is a difference between choosing not to drink alcohol for yourself because it is against your religious beliefs and refusing to let other people drink because it's against your religious beliefs.  The former is great, making a choice for yourself is expressing your own freedom to do so; the latter is not okay, forcing others to adhere to your choices infringes on the rights of others.  Similarly, laws cannot be made purely on one group's religious beliefs, because that is enforcing one group's beliefs--even a small sect of that group--on the rest of the population.  A number of folk might jump immediately to manufactured fears of Sharia law, but I'm more worried about "the Religious Right"  trying to dictate their perspective on homosexuality on people who don't have that religious belief (i.e. denying equal marriage rights to our LGBTQ community members) or neonazis demonizing non-white people and being excused for hate crimes.  These are happening and are not okay.  

The shirt in question, by the bye

I could stretch any of these into their own post, I suppose, but it didn't seem right to do so today in any case.  Or perhaps I'm thinking about little incidents a little too hard...but it's so fun to do on a rainy afternoon.