Thoughts for the day.
Mar. 27th, 2007 10:34 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
alpharaposaIt was a lovely day out today, so I took a walk. I've been taking walks from time to time- not every day, yet, because we've had some cold and miserable days when I've just not wanted to- but I've gotten out.
It's not a very scenic area to walk around in. I'd have to drive to a park if I wanted scenery. But I can put on some music in the iPod and walk around on the sidewalks and enjoy myself.
It's nice to live in a neighborhood where I can walk by myself out in the sunshine while wearing a moderately expensive toy like an iPod without having to fret over it too much. I certainly wouldn't be doing that if I lived in, say, the area of Newport News where we go LARP. I'd want a group to be out and about with, there. Or a gun. Maybe both.
On a different note, I've been reading Mary Shelley's Frankenstein between bouts of anime. It's a lot more detailed and convoluted than any of the popular versions of the story. And I've been thinking a lot about Frankenstein himself. These days, somebody would probably peg him as bipolar. He seems to have manic episodes and depressive episodes.
What gets me about reading that and other stories from earlier eras (Jules Verne's stuff, for example) is that the expectations on people are different. Frankenstein's disposition is described as refined, not neurotic. The fact that he spends several weeks delirious after a serious shock is not treated as anything bizarre. From the way the author writes and the way the narrator tells it, it's just part of life. The treatment he gets is the same as anybody else suffering a temporary illness. It really hit me how much more human it is than the way people treat this stuff now. There's a kind of gentleness to it, an acceptance that people can be fragile and sometimes need to be nursed back to health mentally and socially as well as physically.
It's odd in our society- anybody who's been through a manic or depressive episode or dealt with somebody who has knows the reality of the recovery time. But it's mostly talked about and dealt with in our culture in terms of pills and therapy- professionals simply treating it with whatever is necessary, then you go on about your life. It's not really treated like a regular illness. If you spend five weeks unable to leave your house because you're depressed, people react to it differently than if you spend five weeks unable to leave your house because you managed to turn a case of the flu into pneumonia or something. And even when doctors talk about it as an illness, it's very cut and dry- this is what's wrong, this is what fixes you. Talk to the nurse at the desk about therapy and come back if anything goes wrong.
And when ordinary people talk about depression or similar things- grief, exhaustion, stress- they do the same thing. But really, often it's a lot more help to have people offer you the same things you need to get over the flu- make you soup and give you time to rest. Where did that go in our culture?
It's not a very scenic area to walk around in. I'd have to drive to a park if I wanted scenery. But I can put on some music in the iPod and walk around on the sidewalks and enjoy myself.
It's nice to live in a neighborhood where I can walk by myself out in the sunshine while wearing a moderately expensive toy like an iPod without having to fret over it too much. I certainly wouldn't be doing that if I lived in, say, the area of Newport News where we go LARP. I'd want a group to be out and about with, there. Or a gun. Maybe both.
On a different note, I've been reading Mary Shelley's Frankenstein between bouts of anime. It's a lot more detailed and convoluted than any of the popular versions of the story. And I've been thinking a lot about Frankenstein himself. These days, somebody would probably peg him as bipolar. He seems to have manic episodes and depressive episodes.
What gets me about reading that and other stories from earlier eras (Jules Verne's stuff, for example) is that the expectations on people are different. Frankenstein's disposition is described as refined, not neurotic. The fact that he spends several weeks delirious after a serious shock is not treated as anything bizarre. From the way the author writes and the way the narrator tells it, it's just part of life. The treatment he gets is the same as anybody else suffering a temporary illness. It really hit me how much more human it is than the way people treat this stuff now. There's a kind of gentleness to it, an acceptance that people can be fragile and sometimes need to be nursed back to health mentally and socially as well as physically.
It's odd in our society- anybody who's been through a manic or depressive episode or dealt with somebody who has knows the reality of the recovery time. But it's mostly talked about and dealt with in our culture in terms of pills and therapy- professionals simply treating it with whatever is necessary, then you go on about your life. It's not really treated like a regular illness. If you spend five weeks unable to leave your house because you're depressed, people react to it differently than if you spend five weeks unable to leave your house because you managed to turn a case of the flu into pneumonia or something. And even when doctors talk about it as an illness, it's very cut and dry- this is what's wrong, this is what fixes you. Talk to the nurse at the desk about therapy and come back if anything goes wrong.
And when ordinary people talk about depression or similar things- grief, exhaustion, stress- they do the same thing. But really, often it's a lot more help to have people offer you the same things you need to get over the flu- make you soup and give you time to rest. Where did that go in our culture?
no subject
Date: 2007-03-28 04:51 pm (UTC)This culture desires movement, and especially money-making action, over all things. It tries to hide that mental and spiritual illnesses even exist, prizing as it does only physical and financial prowess; all its focus is on physical weakness, presuming that all other kinds have a physical base with a repair as simple as replacing a light bulb in the kitchen, or repainting a bedroom.
Oh, I am learning how loved is money (and a show of wealth), but the things truly worth prizing are hidden and unappreciated except by individuals. We must seek a culture which treasures them, and it will not be that of the dominant Western paradigm, but of the cultures hiding beneath its nose.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-28 05:27 pm (UTC)Heck, as kids we've lived in a place or two where that feeling and tendency was still there, even if it wasn't commonplace. Places where people give you gifts from their gardens and other things.
no subject
Date: 2007-03-28 05:39 pm (UTC)