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Another Day After [message #47764] Fri, 20 January 2012 20:32 Go to next message
Robin  is currently offline Robin
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[Hellgoddess]
http://robinmckinleysblog.com/2012/01/21/another-day-after/
Re: Another Day After [message #47770 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 00:26 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Angelia  is currently offline Angelia
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Take care of your health, mourn the bells (you're going to do it anyway, so give yourself permission--that's how you will get past it), love the hellhounds a little extra (they'll wonder what is going on!), and write your book. You have a lot of people out here who care for you.
Re: Another Day After [message #47771 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 00:31 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Diane in MN  is currently offline Diane in MN
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But I think it’s possible that my desire to have the work I’ve done both recognized and accepted is being translated as the insane vanity of an author, and they all know what authors are like.

Well, anything is possible, but I think you're being more than charitable here. Anyone who offers to make a major donation--any donation, really--to an organization or a cause wants to have it recognized and accepted, even if they'd want to appear as "Anonymous" on the donor list. That's not vanity*, it's an expectation of good manners. I wouldn't be surprised if your singeing letter-writer was so defensive because he or she knew that you had been treated rudely.

* Wanting a prominently-displayed big brass plate with your name on it in six-inch letters is vanity. Wanting someone to say "Thank you, that will help a lot" isn't.



"The point of books is to have way too many but to always feel you never have enough . . . " Louise Erdrich
Re: Another Day After [message #47772 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 01:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Besunami  is currently offline Besunami
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Lately I have been wishing for a Facebook-esque "Like" button on each comment so that I may easily express my complete agreement with and kudos to the writer. I want a "Like" button for Diane in MN's comment because I wholeheartedly agree.

I am so sorry this is happening to you, Robin. It takes a great deal of inner strength to walk away as you have done - to do the right thing for you instead of the socially determined thing. I have also gone through a similar situation with my local sorority. I was forced to leave for my own health and sanity. I was lucky that I was able to later return once the powers that be changed in my favor and become a beloved alumna. Reflecting on my own experience, it's important to decide what relationship you want to have with the New Arcadia tower in the future, if any. If the Powers That Be ever change to a more welcoming set, would you return, or are you oath-sworn to Never Darken That Door Again? What are the chances that the tower leadership will change in your favor? Are there any friendships with bellringers in that tower you want to continue outside of New Arcadia and how will you do that? You've already got a plan to feed your bell ringing addiction and to keep yourself from turning into a puddle (finishing SHADOWS by deadline should work admirably). That said, this is a big loss and you need to mourn it.
Re: Another Day After [message #47773 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 02:21 Go to previous messageGo to next message
danceswithpahis  is currently offline danceswithpahis
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Quote:

But as soon as you do manifest change, any and/or everyone around you who is invested in the status quo is going to start giving you change back! messages. People who care about you will go with what you need to do. People who prefer you crippled, subservient, non-stroppy, silent, whatever makes their lives easier, will not like it at all, and will let you know they don’t like it at all.


Such a good way of putting it. People get into relationships with us for all sorts of reasons, and some of them are not healthy ones. If the thing they wanted from you was the unhealthy behavior, this will be threatening. I'm glad you can take it for what it really is, and I hope there will be some of the others in the group that are able to support your decision. Good luck and may you have good progress with Shadows, much chocolate, healthy hellhounds with good appetites, and other good community in your physical "real life" world (not just us) who can surround you right now.


"Oh good! My dog found the chainsaw!"

-- Lilo ("Lilo and Stitch")
Re: Another Day After [message #47774 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 03:17 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Stardancer  is currently offline Stardancer
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Quote:

Sigh. Unfortunately this may be part of it. There’s a contingent of the population—and I met it in America too, it’s not a British peculiarity—who believes that all authors are either egomaniacs, nuts, or both^, and behave accordingly.


I actually had a college class (for my Creative Writing minor) called "Mad, Bad, and Dangerous: Images and Roles of Writers in Society." It was an experimental class taught by a lady who was trying to convince us that, as aspiring authors, we DIDN'T have be the popular perception of Le Artist--which we defined, more or less, as ranging from "oddball" to "someone who lives in deep and constant emotional pain in order to produce Le Art." Unfortunately, she went about it rather the wrong way. We studied the lives of a number of famously strange authors and watched movies about artists so we could analyze how they were perceived. I still believe you don't have to be off your rocker to produce quality work, but the class itself was terribly unconvincing (Byron, Hemingway, Gertrude Stein...all pretty much as weird as they're made out to be).
Re: Another Day After [message #47775 is a reply to message #47771 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 03:47 Go to previous messageGo to next message
CathyR  is currently offline CathyR
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Diane in MN wrote on Sat, 21 January 2012 05:31

But I think it’s possible that my desire to have the work I’ve done both recognized and accepted is being translated as the insane vanity of an author, and they all know what authors are like.

Well, anything is possible, but I think you're being more than charitable here. Anyone who offers to make a major donation--any donation, really--to an organization or a cause wants to have it recognized and accepted, even if they'd want to appear as "Anonymous" on the donor list. That's not vanity*, it's an expectation of good manners. I wouldn't be surprised if your singeing letter-writer was so defensive because he or she knew that you had been treated rudely.

* Wanting a prominently-displayed big brass plate with your name on it in six-inch letters is vanity. Wanting someone to say "Thank you, that will help a lot" isn't.


Yes!!


Just when the caterpillar thought the world was over, it became a butterfly.
Re: Another Day After [message #47776 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 05:15 Go to previous messageGo to next message
judith  is currently offline judith
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My god. You've been slapped in the face -- big time. After all those hours of work, and all the effort and thought behind the entire project, and dedicating your blog to the thing for weeks...

The worst of it has to be the bewilderment. It's completely inexplicable. If it had happened to me I'd be hurt beyond belief and would probably weep thinking about it for years afterward.

Quote:

People who care about you will go with what you need to do. People who prefer you crippled, subservient, non-stroppy, silent, whatever makes their lives easier, will not like it at all, and will let you know they don’t like it at all. This letter is a big fat change back! message.

*snort* Sounds like your view of the situation is suddenly quite clear. Brava!
Re: Another Day After [message #47778 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 10:13 Go to previous messageGo to next message
EMoon
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Registered: March 2009
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Yes, the "change BACK" message comes from those who want the victim back on the rack so they can continue to elicit moans as they play around reshaping the anatomy.

I second Diane's comment, esp, "Wanting a prominently-displayed big brass plate with your name on it in six-inch letters is vanity. Wanting someone to say "Thank you, that will help a lot" isn't."

Moreover--in insulting you by refusing the donation, they have also insulted every one of your online friends who learned through you to care about ringing, about bells, about your home tower. They didn't just smack you in the face: they smacked the rest of us. Doesn't hurt any of us the way it hurts you--we're upset with them on your behalf, not our own--but I'm sure it's been in the back (or front) of your mind. (So don't worry about us: take care of yourself.)

If you will supply the exact coordinates, I will deliver the rocket-propelled GRUMP. I would gladly deliver it in person, toe-to-toe with the rude ungrateful bovine-of-no-breeding in terms even a bovine-of-no-breeding would understand. (Bovines of good breeding know when to ignore the departure of the stunningly gorgeous horse from their herd. They're still bovines, but they're outwardly mannerly bovines and go back to chewing their cuds with self-righteous smugness. It's only bovines-of-no-breeding that moo wildly, chase after, and stick their crooked horns into the departed.) YOU have behaved well. THEY have behaved with incredible rudeness, cruelty, and stupidity.

For your sake, because you love those bells, I have to hope that their bake sales raise enough to do the necessary repairs...though what the bovine herd deserves is to find themselves, two years hence, with no bells at all because they never could raise the money.

Meanwhile: take care of yourself, and remember, in the darkest hours, that you have friends ready to do battle for you.


E
Re: Another Day After [message #47780 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 12:16 Go to previous messageGo to next message
HorsehairBraider  is currently offline HorsehairBraider
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This whole thing reminds me of these crabs that live on the West coast of Africa. The people there go out and collect these crabs for food, and to collect them, they just throw them in an open basket - no lid or anything. "Aha!" you might say. "Why don't the crabs just crawl back out and escape?" Well, all you need are two or three crabs in there, and you are never going to lose one. The very second a crab tries to get out of the basket, all the other crabs in the basket grab the one trying to crawl out, and pull it back in. The people who live there think that these crabs are the stupidest creature on Earth. But I can think of at least one that has the potential to be even stupider... Wink

I think it's pretty rotten that in addition to treating you shabbily, they then wrote you a nasty-gram when you *dared* to not take their shabby treatment. And I agree, Diane in MN nailed it. They KNOW they did the wrong thing, and now must try and justify it to themselves.

Sad, really.


They say princes learn no art truly, save that of horsemanship. The reason is, the brave beast is no flatterer. He will throw a prince as soon as his groom. Ben Jonson
Re: Another Day After [message #47788 is a reply to message #47771 ] Sat, 21 January 2012 20:42 Go to previous messageGo to next message
anne_d  is currently offline anne_d
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Diane in MN wrote on Fri, 20 January 2012 21:31

But I think it’s possible that my desire to have the work I’ve done both recognized and accepted is being translated as the insane vanity of an author, and they all know what authors are like.

Well, anything is possible, but I think you're being more than charitable here. Anyone who offers to make a major donation--any donation, really--to an organization or a cause wants to have it recognized and accepted, even if they'd want to appear as "Anonymous" on the donor list. That's not vanity*, it's an expectation of good manners. I wouldn't be surprised if your singeing letter-writer was so defensive because he or she knew that you had been treated rudely.

* Wanting a prominently-displayed big brass plate with your name on it in six-inch letters is vanity. Wanting someone to say "Thank you, that will help a lot" isn't.

This. All of this. Squared.


"The creative urge can come out in any form: in embroidery, in... cooking, in painting, drawing and sculpture, in composing music, as well as in writing books and stories... the artist's inner satisfaction was probably much the same." ~ Agatha Christie
Re: Another Day After [message #47794 is a reply to message #47764 ] Sun, 22 January 2012 04:26 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Mrs Redboots  is currently offline Mrs Redboots
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I am wondering whether they misunderstood and thought you'd raffled your work - some churches won't take money raised by raffles (nor would they accept National Lottery funding) as they consider it gambling. I don't quite see how they could consider an auction that - and even if they could, a lot of it was plain selling, which they couldn't possibly object to in a zillion years, I would have thought.

Very, very strange - and very hurtful, too. If there's one thing that boils my blood good and proper, it's so-called Christians who are more concerned with doing things right than with loving their neighbour....


Mrs Redboots
I love my computer because my friends live in it!
Re: Another Day After [message #47806 is a reply to message #47772 ] Sun, 22 January 2012 16:55 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Robin  is currently offline Robin
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If the admin changes, I'll be back like a shot. Is it likely? No. Sigh. And I've been ringing in this area for seven years--there are still people who will talk to me. Smile
Re: Another Day After [message #47807 is a reply to message #47778 ] Sun, 22 January 2012 17:02 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Robin  is currently offline Robin
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*I'd* be scared if you were mad at me. Smile

And, because I'm Not A Nice Person Really, what I'm hoping is that they'll have trouble getting their beautiful shiny new bells rung. I've told you this area is hurting for ringers anyway, and New Arcadia rarely manages to ring all eight bells on a Sunday, and some Sundays are *really* short. If the local community have £12K (which is only the current estimate--it could still go up again, as it already has once) extracted out of them for the bells . . . and then they don't hear much bell ringing, at that point someone IS going to start asking embarrassing questions. Which might finally do something about shifting the current admin. I would like to hope.

But really? Probably not. Inertia is strong.
Re: Another Day After [message #47808 is a reply to message #47794 ] Sun, 22 January 2012 17:09 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Robin  is currently offline Robin
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[Hellgoddess]
If they'd turned me down for gambling, they would have told me so with great glee, because it would give them a citable REASON, however ridiculous.

If there's one thing that boils my blood good and proper, it's so-called Christians who are more concerned with doing things right than with loving their neighbour....

Yeah. I'm afraid this bites me big time too. In America I don't think I had any close friends who were committed churchgoers; over here, for some reason, I have several, including one involved with this mess, although not as a bell ringer, and who has been a GREAT source of sense and sympathy. But ALL the admin who are involved in doing me down . . . are hand-on-heart, holier-than-thou dedicated Christians. Grrrrrrrr.
Re: Another Day After [message #47814 is a reply to message #47808 ] Sun, 22 January 2012 20:10 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Corellia  is currently offline Corellia
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(I really shouldn't try to write when I'm this tired, if this doesn't make any sense, blame it on the late hour).

I'm wondering how much this is about power, and whether certain admins feel threatened by you and think that if you donate a huge amount of money, you will step out of the niche called "a steady, middling ringer" and into the "should have something to say about the running of the tower"-area...

Do I make any sense? If not, please ignore.
Re: Another Day After [message #47843 is a reply to message #47814 ] Mon, 23 January 2012 17:31 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Robin  is currently offline Robin
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Yes. This hadn't occurred to me till claning said something similar on one of the other threads about this. Unfortunately I think this *is* possible. The admin hangs on to ALL POWER ABSOLUTELY.

I met an adorable dog at the pub tonight. (It was a LABRADOR. I keep telling you I don't hate all labs, I've just met too frelling many huge aggressive off lead ones.) Once it discovered I was a friend, it was all over me. I asked its owner if it was a puppy, and she said, no, it just THINKS it is. I said I have two lurchers at home like this--they're five and a half, and they think they're puppies.

Like dog like owner. It's both charming and appalling to be this naive at this age. It has its bennies . . . but it sure the frell leaves you vulnerable.
Re: Another Day After [message #47845 is a reply to message #47843 ] Mon, 23 January 2012 18:48 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Corellia  is currently offline Corellia
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Nothing ruins a group faster than power hungry people Sad

We had some similar trouble at one of the knitting groups I attended. One or two people decided that they wanted all the say in how the group was run, and who was admitted (that this was an OPEN group was obviously something they ignored). The core of the group finally got the power crazies out by doing the "ignore all power games until they stop"-thing.
Re: Another Day After [message #47873 is a reply to message #47845 ] Wed, 25 January 2012 15:02 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Mrs Redboots  is currently offline Mrs Redboots
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Corellia wrote on Mon, 23 January 2012 23:48

Nothing ruins a group faster than power hungry people Sad


Tell. Me. About. It. I've recently been invited to take a couple of services at a church a little distance away. Said church is dying on its feet - largely, I suspect, because one man "does it all" and nobody else gets a chance to look in or exercise their gifts.


Mrs Redboots
I love my computer because my friends live in it!
Re: Another Day After [message #47885 is a reply to message #47873 ] Wed, 25 January 2012 21:02 Go to previous messageGo to next message
b_twin_1  is currently offline b_twin_1
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Mrs Redboots wrote on Wed, 25 January 2012 15:02

Corellia wrote on Mon, 23 January 2012 23:48

Nothing ruins a group faster than power hungry people Sad


Tell. Me. About. It. I've recently been invited to take a couple of services at a church a little distance away. Said church is dying on its feet - largely, I suspect, because one man "does it all" and nobody else gets a chance to look in or exercise their gifts.

Sometimes this situation arises too because the other 99% are too lazy to get up and pitch in themselves.


I've got a plan so cunning you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel ~ Blackadder
Re: Another Day After [message #47905 is a reply to message #47885 ] Thu, 26 January 2012 14:36 Go to previous messageGo to next message
Mrs Redboots  is currently offline Mrs Redboots
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b_twin_1 wrote on Thu, 26 January 2012 02:02

Mrs Redboots wrote on Wed, 25 January 2012 15:02

Corellia wrote on Mon, 23 January 2012 23:48

Nothing ruins a group faster than power hungry people Sad


Tell. Me. About. It. I've recently been invited to take a couple of services at a church a little distance away. Said church is dying on its feet - largely, I suspect, because one man "does it all" and nobody else gets a chance to look in or exercise their gifts.

Sometimes this situation arises too because the other 99% are too lazy to get up and pitch in themselves.


Not so much lazy, as not quite liking to put themselves forward. But if you go up to them and say, "Will you bring rice and peas to the church lunch?" or whatever, they are more than happy to.... they just needed to be asked.


Mrs Redboots
I love my computer because my friends live in it!
Re: Another Day After [message #47907 is a reply to message #47905 ] Thu, 26 January 2012 16:20 Go to previous message
Robin  is currently offline Robin
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[Hellgoddess]
Well, it does vary! There are the power-mad ones who shut anyone out who isn't a member of their clique, which is my present problem, and there are the ones who don't like to put themselves forward but are happy to be asked . . . and there are also the lazy sods who want to have the fun/glory but don't want to have to do any work for it. (There's a sub group of this last category which likes to hold meetings and TALK. And then delegate everything that isn't hot air and big ideas to someone else. I'm pretty sure these are the same people who are willing to split the money 50/50 with you if you write up their fabulous story idea, because the idea is the hard part and you have the friends in publishing.)

People = snake pit. I'm going to stick to fiction after this. Smile
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