In Praise of Non-Difficult People

We all know at least one truly difficult person in our lives (or perhaps more)—the one who leaves a train wreck in his or her wake more often than not, saunters on, leaving those around them to deal with the mayhem and/or to clean up the mess. They are the drama kings and queens of this world. I know we can all behave as difficult people sometimes; but I’m talking about those people who make it their life goal to be truly difficult, no matter what the situation. They are defiant in situations where defiance is not called for, rude or aggressive in situations where rudeness or aggression are unnecessary, and demanding and selfish in situations where to give in and to be unselfish might have been the better path. Advice is wasted on them. They do what they want, when they want. They are nearly impossible to deal with. Nothing is ever good enough for them; they are chronic complainers. They voice their opinion about everything, usually at a decibel level that drowns out other voices. They always want more, or want what the others have. Envy seems to be a big part of who they are, as well as a huge ego and a lot of self-confidence. They are somehow so special that they take offense if the world around them does not notice them and pay attention to them all the time. They’re not good at sharing the spotlight with others, or giving up the spotlight when it’s time for someone else (often younger) to step into it. They need to be the centers of attention no matter what. I believe too that they need to feel slighted in order to exist. They live their lives in fighting mode. The words compromise and listening are part of a foreign language to them.

I grew up with the false notion that difficult people were somehow more creative or gifted than non-difficult people, thus it might be worth my while to try to be more understanding of them. I don’t know where I got that idea from, perhaps from the society around me at that time that worshipped all things counter-cultural. Of course, when I was younger, it would have been difficult or nearly impossible to discover that non-difficult people were creative or gifted, because they were simply overshadowed by their difficult counterparts. So I used a lot of energy in my younger years trying to understand difficult people. Because of my understanding nature and ability to listen well, I attracted my share of them. Along the way however, I also attracted my share of non-difficult people. And it is the latter I prefer to be together with now. It is the latter who have enriched my life and inspired me. I suppose I could add that truly difficult people have inspired me as well—to not be like them.

I have learned a lot from non-difficult people. I have learned the value of compromise, of calmness in communication with others, of keeping an even tone when talking, of not flying off the handle when confronted with truly difficult people. Non-difficult people teach you from a very young age how to fit into society and how to be a valuable member of it. They teach you the value of contributing to society. That’s important because the truly difficult people are often the ones who want to dismantle the society they live in because they just know they’d be the better leaders or have the better solutions. But all they do is mostly complain rather than act. Most of the non-difficult people I admire have learned how to deal with the truly difficult people they know. Not always of course. But they have over the course of a lifetime learned to stand up for themselves in an assertive way, without clobbering or destroying the truly difficult person. They limit their interactions with them, they listen but have clear boundaries as to how much they will listen to. They have learned the art of placation, which is to say they do not hand their power over to the truly difficult people (placation is not loss of power and can often be a tactic that infuriates truly difficult people). They ignore them when necessary, deflect them when necessary—all done in a kind way. Their kindness is not weakness; it is in fact an extraordinary strength. They have a strength of character and an inner calm that inspires me. And I’ve discovered that many of them are very creative and gifted people, because I turn my head away now from those people who shout the loudest, and instead focus on those who do not. I find the latter more interesting, both in workplace situations and outside of them.  

My father's reading list from 1938

As promised, a list of some of the many books that my father read in his lifetime. His book choices continue to inspire me; I know they will do so for many years to come. In 1938, when he was twenty years old, he started to note the specific year in which he read the books he listed. These are the books he read during that year.

• The Wind from the Mountains                                   Trygve Gulbranssen
• The Deserted Village and Other Poems                    Oliver Goldsmith
• And So—Victoria                                                       Vaughan Wilkins
• American Dream                                                         Michael Foster
• The Outward Room                                                     Miller Brand
• Anna Karenina                                                             Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy
• War and Peace                                                             Lev Nikolayevich Tolstoy
• The Turning Wheels                                                    Stuart Cloete
• Invasion                                                                       Maxence Van der Meersch
• Northwest Passage                                                       Kenneth Roberts
• Rogue Herries                                                              Hugh Walpole
• The Stars Look Down                                                  Albert Joseph Cronin
• The Thing: Why I Am a Catholic                                Gilbert Keith Chesterton
• Inheritance                                                                    Phyllis Bentley
• Why Rome                                                                   Selden Peabody Delany
• The Sisters                                                                    Myron Brinig
• Judith Paris                                                                   Hugh Walpole
• The Fortress                                                                  Hugh Walpole
• Vanessa                                                                         Hugh Walpole
• The Ordinary Difficulties of Everyday People            John Rathbone Oliver
• D’Annunzio                                                                  Tommaso Antongini
• Parnassus On Wheels                                                   Christopher Morley
• The Haunted Bookshop                                                Christopher Morley
• The Wall                                                                       Mary Roberts Rinehart
• The Citadel                                                                   Albert Joseph Cronin
• Jamaica Inn                                                                   Daphne du Maurier
• The Rains Came                                                            Louis Bromfield
• Opera, Front and Back                                                  H. Howard Taubman
• Wolf Solent                                                                   John Cowper Powys
• Dawn In Lyonesse                                                         Mary Ellen Chase
• Appreciation                                                                  William Lyon Phelps
• Tess of the D’Urbervilles                                              Thomas Hardy
• To Have and Have Not                                                  Ernest Hemingway
• More of My Life                                                            Andrea Majocchi, MD   
• For the Honor of the School                                          Ralph Henry Barbour
• Murders in the Rue Morgue                                          Edgar Allan Poe
• The Telltale Heart                                                         Edgar Allan Poe
• Doctor Bradley Remembers                                          Francis Brett Young
• Green Mansions                                                            William Henry Hudson
• Wuthering Heights                                                        Emily Bronte     

Reading lists and a love of books

My father was an avid reader from the time he was a young child. He kept a list of the books that he had read, and they were not few. The first book on his list was Quo Vadis: A Narrative of the Time of Nero by the Polish author Henryk Sienkiewicz; it was first published in 1895 in Poland as a serialized novel in several Polish newspapers. In 1896, it came out in book form and was subsequently translated into more than fifty languages (according to Wikipedia). My father would have read it in English since he did not speak Polish (he did however speak Italian, and studied Latin and Greek as well). He did not annotate his book lists, so I don’t know why he started with Quo Vadis; perhaps his father suggested this book to him. This was followed by Fortitude: Being a True and Faithful Account of the Education of an Adventurer by Hugh Walpole, published in 1913. And so on, until the last book that he read shortly before his death in 1985, which was Cal by Bernard MacLaverty, which came out in 1983. By the time he died, he had read close to a thousand books. It was not clear from his book lists when he started to keep them, but I’m guessing he started when he was around twelve years old. Since he was sixty-seven years old when he died, that means that in the space of fifty-five years of reading, he read about seventeen books per year on average. Many of the books were loaned from the Warner Public Library in Tarrytown; both my parents were frequent users of the library.

It struck me while going through my father’s book lists that he was already interested in organizing and systematizing books as a child, in preparation for his career as a librarian. He did not know that he was to become a librarian when he was twelve years old, but the signs were already there when you take a look at his lists.

Both he and my mother loved to read, and they instilled their love of books in us children. My mother did not keep extensive lists of the books she read like my father did, but both of them encouraged us to do so. So I have done so, all these years. I started keeping a list when I was around twelve years old, like my father. The first book on my list is The Hundred and One Dalmations by Dodie Smith, which was first published in 1956.

My father read widely—fiction, non-fiction, biographies, history, Catholic literature, and children’s literature. He shared what he read with me especially, since I would often sit at the dinner table with him in the evenings after dinner and discuss what he and I were reading. As I got older, we would often read the same book, sometimes at the same time, more often right after the other person had read it. We suggested books for each other; my father would cut out book reviews from the newspaper to share with me, or we would find a few books of interest in the weekly supplement The NY Times Book Review. As I get older, it strikes me that growing up in my family was a special experience. I learned to love books and to love discussing them. Nothing makes me happier than when I can sit and discuss the book I’m reading or have read with someone (I feel the same about movies). Some people would call it doing ‘post-mortems’ and don’t like to do this. In fact, most people I know don’t discuss the books they read. I respect that. We all have our own reasons for why we read and for reading the books we read. As long as the world continues to read, we’ll keep evolving and growing as human beings. That’s what is most important. But I’m glad I have my father’s reading lists, because as I peruse them, I see that we have a lot of the same tastes in literature. And that makes me feel close to him. In a future post, I will list some of the books he read as a teenager and young adult, and will include some of my own.  

Easter quotes

• The great gift of Easter is hope - Christian hope which makes us have that confidence in God, in his ultimate triumph, and in his goodness and love, which nothing can shake.   --Basil Hume
• It is difficult to say what is impossible, for the dream of yesterday is the hope of today and the reality of tomorrow.   --Robert H. Schuller
• Easter is meant to be a symbol of hope, renewal, and new life.  --Janine di Giovanni
• People respond when you tell them there is a great future in front of you, you can leave your past behind.    --Joel Osteen
• The symbolic language of the crucifixion is the death of the old paradigm; resurrection is a leap into a whole new way of thinking.   --Deepak Chopra
• A rule I have had for years is: to treat the Lord Jesus Christ as a personal friend. His is not a creed, a mere doctrine, but it is He Himself we have.   --Dwight L. Moody
• There is only one secure foundation: a genuine, deep relationship with Jesus Christ, which will carry you through any and all turmoil. No matter what storms are raging all around, you'll stand firm if you stand on His love.   --Charles Stanley
• Easter is reflecting upon suffering for one thing, but it also reflects upon Jesus and his non compliance in the face of great authority where he holds to his truth - so there's two stories there.   --Michael Leunig
• It is at Easter that Jesus is most human, and like all humans, he fails and is failed. His is not an all-powerful God, it is an all-vulnerable God.   --Michael Leunig
• We were old sinners - but when we came to Christ we are not sinners anymore.   --Joel Osteen
• I think we need to do some deep soul searching about what's important in our lives and renew our spirit and our spiritual thinking, whether it's through faith-based religion or just through loving nature or helping your fellow man.   --Louis Schwartzberg

Two more songs

So much energy in this song--Runaway (U&I) by Galantis. Galantis is a Swedish electronic music production and songwriting duo (info from Wikipedia). These days, I find myself needing some extra energy, and this is one of the songs that gives it to me.......



 And here's another good one:

Songs I really like these days

A poem by Joy Davidman

Waltzing Mouse               

Impaled I was when I was born,

Caught upon time’s nether horn,

Murdered through and through with birth,                                                                

Cankered with corrupted earth …

Slick between my fingers run

Sands of time from sun to sun,

Grains of hunger and delight,

Diapered with dark and bright;

Kisses and confusions pass

Dribbling through the fat hourglass ….

And I skip from minute to minute

Each one with me buried in it,

And I see my bridges burn

Gold behind me as I turn,

And I see my painful track

Blotted out behind my back

Till I die as I was born,

Slain upon time’s other horn.

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written by Joy Davidman

CS Lewis and A Grief Observed

CS Lewis wrote A Grief Observed after the death of his wife, the American poet and writer Helen Joy Davidman. It is a book that is well worth reading. He offers his personal insights into the mystery that is grief, what it did to him and how it made him feel and act. Some of what he says resonates with me, like when he talks about how difficult it is to focus or to start anything. Or running on autopilot at work. Lewis became impatient with people who said that death doesn’t matter or that there is no death. But I am not impatient with people who say that to me, because I know that they are just trying to do and say the right thing, and it isn’t really possible to do that. There is no one right thing to say to someone who has lost a loved one. It is not easy to talk about death or to deal with it in our society. I appreciate their caring and the thoughts involved. 

Here are some excerpts from his book, A Grief Observed:

• We cannot understand. The best is perhaps what we understand least.
• Grief is like a long valley, a winding valley where any bend may reveal a totally new landscape.
• It is hard to have patience with people who say, ‘There is no death’ or ‘Death doesn’t matter.’ There is death. And whatever is matters. And whatever happens has consequences, and it and they are irrevocable and irreversible. You might as well say that birth doesn’t matter.
• I thought I could describe a state; make a map of sorrow. Sorrow, however, turns out to be not a state but a process.
• For in grief nothing 'stays put.' One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats. Am I going in circles, or dare I hope I am on a spiral?
• Feelings, and feelings, and feelings. Let me try thinking instead.
• Do I hope that if feeling disguises itself as thought I shall feel less?
• Grief ... gives life a permanently provisional feeling. It doesn't seem worth starting anything. I can't settle down. I yawn, I fidget, I smoke too much. Up till this I always had too little time. Now there is nothing but time. Almost pure time, empty successiveness.
• No one ever told me that grief felt so like fear. I am not afraid, but the sensation is like being afraid. The same fluttering in the stomach, the same restlessness, the yawning. I keep on swallowing.
• And no one ever told me about the laziness of grief. Except at my job--where the machine seems to run on much as usual--I loath the slightest effort. Not only writing but even reading a letter is too much.
• At other times it feels like being mildly drunk, or concussed. There is a sort of invisible blanket between the world and me. I find it hard to take in what anyone says. Or perhaps, hard to want to take it in……
• Aren't all these notes the senseless writings of a man who won't accept the fact that there is nothing we can do with suffering except to suffer it?

'Bloom where you are planted'

So many random thoughts lately, about personal life changes and work life changes, and how the two often overlap. Sometimes the life changes are painful, like divorce or death of a loved one; other times they are joyful but still stressful—marriage or the birth of children. Work changes can involve a new job in a new city, a promotion, being fired, or being moved to another department. I spoke with a friend last week who recently moved to another part of Norway to begin in a new job. I also know of a couple who have moved their business from New York State to another state in order to get a fresh start in life. Sometimes we end up liking the changes we’ve made; other times not. It’s not always easy to predict how we will end up feeling about the changes we’ve made. And if the changes are inflicted upon us (e.g. death of a loved one or being fired), we will often not like how we end up feeling about them.

It thus seems to be of some importance to be able to land on your feet no matter what happens, no matter what life throws at you, no matter how difficult the circumstances. Change, whether self-chosen or inflicted, happens to all of us. One day, we wake up and the circumstances of our lives are suddenly no longer safe, predictable, or comfortable. Much has been made of the expression—‘moving out of your comfort zone’. That expression implies a certain amount of self-insight when it comes to choosing to make the changes that may be necessary in one’s personal and/or work life. But sometimes an unexpected death or the end of a relationship move us out of our comfort zone as well, whether we like it or not.

So what happens when you end up choosing to make a change that plants you in a situation or in a geographical location that you end up not liking or wanting? What happens when you want to go back, but you cannot go back, because the circumstances of your life do not permit that? Perhaps you are financially-bound by your new choice—you’ve invested a lot of time and money in moving to another location, and you cannot just up and leave. In a recent conversation with a friend, the expression ‘bloom where you are planted’ came up. It triggered many feelings in me, and I decided to explore it further.

I found that this quote is for the most part attributed to the Bishop of Geneva, Saint Francis de Sales (1567-1622) in his writing about charity. I’ve thought a bit about it, and have some questions. What if it is not possible to bloom where we are planted, because the ‘soil is not fertile enough’? What if we waste our energy trying to get seeds to grow in rocky soil; what if we ‘cast our pearls before swine’? But also, what if we do get the seeds to grow in rocky or unfertile soil, let’s say by removing the rocks or adding fertilizer to the soil? Is this quote really a means to motivate us to find ways to get around what appear to be insurmountable difficulties? I’d like to think so. I’d like to think it is telling us not to give up, to stay strong, and to find a way to survive and flourish. For all those times I’ve thought that living abroad has been too difficult, especially early on, I’ve found a way around those feelings. Something happened to make one of the many aspects involved in living abroad, easier. Someone was kind to me, opened a door (literally and figuratively), or someone listened and showed empathy. Someone did unto me as I have done unto others countless numbers of times when I worked in Manhattan and was introduced to new co-workers from Europe who felt like fish out of water. I was kind to them, I included them, I made them feel welcome. Through the years, I’ve learned how to make myself feel welcome in a new place, by making sure that my traditions and ways of doing things are honored and respected in my home. You can bloom where you’re planted if you have respect for where you come from, if you honor what you bring with you to a new situation, and if you approach your new situation/location with an open mind. It is possible for all these factors to co-exist inside an individual such that an individual can bloom. I cannot and would not dare to speak for those who have been physically and/or psychologically forced into their new surroundings (imprisonment or upheaval due to war). But in normal life/work situations, it seems to me to be possible to bloom where you are planted, at least after a certain period of time and adjustment.  

Quantum Bloom published

A nice update--my fourth collection of poetry entitled Quantum Bloom was published yesterday and is available on Amazon at: 

http://www.amazon.com/Quantum-Bloom-Paula-Mary-Angelis/dp/1505211166

Angel wings and pink clouds

On the morning of February 18th, I was lucky enough to witness cloud formations that immediately brought to mind angel wings. I'd like to think that a guardian angel is watching over me, those I love, and the city of Oslo. During the late afternoon of the very same day, I witnessed pink-colored clouds, very unusual and very beautiful. I went online to read a little about the color pink, and wouldn't you know, the meaning of the color pink is unconditional love and nurturing. If I was looking for divine signs that everything is going to be ok again after my brother's death, perhaps these are them. I'd like to think so.

I'd also like to include here an old Eskimo saying that was written in a sympathy card that I received from three of my colleagues; it is beautiful and it made me cry. It's a nice way of thinking about the stars.

Perhaps they are not stars in the sky, but rather openings where our loved ones shine down to let us know they are happy. 

Another friend wrote that when her brother died, the priest at the funeral mass said that her brother was now divine. I liked that too. 

There is comfort in every word, conversation, phone call, email, card, and hug that all the wonderful people in my life have offered me and us. There is also comfort in nature and in solitude. In the midst of sadness, there is also peace. And there is love. 

Quantum Bloom--my new poetry collection

I am very close to publishing my fourth volume of poetry entitled Quantum Bloom. I just need to check the proof book to make sure that we're good to go, and then it will be published and available for sale on Amazon.

This is the book cover (a fractal flower) for those of you who might be interested in seeing it. I'm pleased with how it looks.

Rockwood Hall State Park in winter

Rockwood Hall State Park on the Hudson River, in Sleepy Hollow, New York, is a beautiful park to walk around in. I have mostly photographed it during the summer months, but when I was in NY last week, I visited this park to find some peace during a difficult and sad time, on a beautiful sunny winter day. As these photos show, the park is lovely in all seasons, and all those who frequent this park know that they are lucky that it exists.

Rest in peace, Ray

Raymond C. De Angelis, of Riverdale NY, passed away suddenly on February 1st. He was fifty-four years old. He was born in Tarrytown NY and attended Transfiguration School and Sleepy Hollow High School. He graduated from Fordham University in 1982 with a B.A. degree in History and Economics. He is survived by his wife Elizabeth and two children, Tamar and Eli. Both Mr. De Angelis and his wife were co-founders of Adventure Center, Journeys of Wonder, Inc., a nonprofit creative learning center for children in Riverdale NY. Prior to this, he worked in the insurance field for many years. He was a dedicated triathlon participant in his younger years, as well as an avid fisherman; he enjoyed hiking and the outdoors and was very supportive of environmental conservation issues. He will be remembered as a loving father to his two children and as a supportive husband and brother.
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When I was in New York during this sad time, I had a free day, and walked around Rockwood Hall State Park, on the Hudson River. This was a place that we used to frequent as teenagers, and was one of the many places where my brother enjoyed walking around. He also enjoyed walking around the Croton Reservoir, Rockefeller State Park, Wave Hill, and other parks and nature preserves. He was eager to show his children and other children the wonders of nature, just as he had discovered them as a boy fishing around the Tarrytown Lakes. Rockwood Park was full of snow on the day that I was there, but the day was beautiful and sunny, and I 'buried' my brother in spirit in this beautiful place. Rest in peace, my brother Raymond.

A poem about death

My brother passed away suddenly this past weekend. He was fifty-four--too young to leave us. I will always remember him as my friend from our teenage days, when we had long talks about life and love and finding our way in the world. He and I used to bike a lot, and he went on to become a triathlete who competed in a lot of triathlons. My mother and I used to attend some of them, and we marveled at the positive spirit that the athletes had. He was also an avid fisherman in his youth, something that he did not pursue into his adult life, unfortunately. He worked on Wall Street and in the corporate world after college, but was never really happy in it. Later on he married and had a family; his two children were the apples of his eye. He loved his children and they loved him. That was always so clear whenever we were together. Unfortunately, life deals out bad luck at times, and he and his family had their share of it during the past few years. He always remained upbeat despite the problems, but I think the stress just did him in at the end. He will always be in my mind and heart. And I will carry the happy memories of being together with him and his family for always. 

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Do Not Stand At My Grave And Weep

by Mary Elizabeth Frye

Do not stand at my grave and weep

I am not there; I do not sleep.

I am a thousand winds that blow,

I am the diamond glints on snow,

I am the sun on ripened grain,

I am the gentle autumn rain.

When you awaken in the morning's hush

I am the swift uplifting rush

Of quiet birds in circled flight.

I am the soft stars that shine at night.

Do not stand at my grave and cry,

I am not there; I did not die.