Maintaining

[mallorys_camera]

Grey day. Rain is predicted all week.

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BB, Flavia, & I showed up yesterday at the mall where the Middletown demo was supposed to take place, only to discover it was one of those curbside protests where you stand valiantly at the side of the road, breathing in automobile exhaust for a couple of hours while drivers (mostly) ignore you.

As one, our eyes met: No-oo-ooo, thank you!

Not a total loss: We scurried off to Tranquili-Tea for an hour and enjoyed home-churned ice cream & thunderstorms on the drive home.

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On the phone with Ichabod, I had a revelation.

Ichabod was saying something about always wanting to be his authentic self, & I was thinking, What a drag that would be—when it occurred to me that that might be because I spent so much time when I was slightly younger than Ichabod is now maintaining.

Maintaining was something you did when you were high on drugs & didn't want anyone else to know. But sometimes you maintained when you were feeling social anxiety or stage fright, or just had to be somewhere you did not want to be. You did not reveal (let alone exhibit) your inner quailings. There was a fair amount of honor involved in maintaining.

Of course, I don't know all that many Millennials except for my kids & their friends. And I know no Gen Z-ers.

But I do watch a lot of television with Millennial & GenZ characters, and if the representations are correct, they never maintain! Millennials & GenZ are constantly talking about how nervous they are or how incapable of functioning because of some incapacitating internal state. They have absolutely no concept of fortitude. Oversharing is their idea of virtue.

It's a manifestation of privilege when you think about it—(a) their belief that other people really care about what they feel and (b) that the world is a safe enough place that what you feel won't get you into trouble.

Maybe that's the true rift between Boomers & Millennials: We maintain; they don't.

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Other than that, I tromped and read more Tess of the d'Urbervilles.

Gotta say—Tess's passion for Angel Clare is rather annoying. Angel Clare has a big stick up his ass.

Alec Stoke-d'Urberville seems like he would be a lot more fun.

Comments

[asakiyume]

You're so right about point a and b regarding the oversharing! Hadn't thought about that before, but definitely! I think of that sometimes when I'm talking with the healing angel, who will say something like, "I had a bad night's sleep so I'm not going to work today." And I'm like, okay. I can see not going to work when you're actually ill--staying home when you're ill keeps others from getting sick. But .... sommmmmmetimes maybe you can inconvenience yourself, or put up with a little bit of unpleasantness, for other people's sake (in this case, the other employees, who will be short staffed). (The healing angel's getting better at this as she gets older. And it's funny: the older of my two kids *don't* do this and never have. Hmmm....

[mallorys_camera]

Yah, it can get crazy. There's a running joke in my family that you never ask Ichabod, How are you? because he'll actually tell you. 😀

[fuzzilla]

I listen to/watch a podcast on YouTube called "So True" with Caleb Hearon. It's Gen Z standup comedians talking about the biz, touring, acting gigs, etc. The host is usually pretty good friends with the guests, so they have a decent amount of rapport/knowledge about each other's lives.

One thing I really love about it is that they genuinely call each other on their shit but can laugh it off and actually understand each other better for having had the conversation. Not avoid the issue or just give a throwaway answer for laughs. (Like, I dunno, "you're always late" or "why'd you miss my party again?" "You're right, I didn't have a good excuse, but I'll make the next one!" It's like he manages to make my inner anxiety voice sound funny and endearing, if that makes sense. Like he says things I want to say and actually gets a good result. And people own their behavior like, "yeah, I did that, you're right" instead of explosively denying it).

But in general, I suppose I keep things pretty bottled up. I look for signs that someone is safe to open up to and proceed accordingly.

[mallorys_camera]

I have to be pretty intimate with a person to say what I am really thinking. And I don't give strangers permission to "call me on my shit"—though I might pretend to in front of a YouTube Audience.

"Bottled up" is a pejorative way of saying "discreet." I think being discreet is good. 😀

[fuzzilla]

I think the "calling on their shit" is mostly interpersonal stuff (like, "I'm mad you didn't make my party" and not, "you're such a hypocrite!" Something that affected their relationship, not just going off on them about anything and everything). And they seem to be pretty close if they talk like that, often even knowing each other's parents and whatnot ("shout out to Janet!"). He's more reserved if they're not as close.

[lookfar2]

Ah, but I think admitting that you are nervous or saying "I'm so awkward," mayn't that also be a form of maintaining? My experience of that is that admitting to it calms me down, so it's just another item on the list of which maintaining is also a member. What's not on the list is losing control, gibbering, fainting and vomiting.

[smokingboot]

It's a manifestation of privilege when you think about it—(a) their belief that other people really care about what they feel and (b) that the world is a safe enough place that what you feel won't get you into trouble. Perfectly put.

Angel Clare, what a ridiculous prig!

I never finished Tess of the d'Urbervilles. Just too depressing.

[mallorys_camera]

And yet among Thomas Hardy novels, it's one of the ones with the happiest endings! I mean, true: Tess dies. But Angel Clare gets to marry her sister. 😀