On Vacationing: Questing vs. Toes in the Sand.

We just returned from a week in Jamaica. Which brings to mind the question:

What kind of vacationer are you?

Three amazing words: Swim-up Bar. Or is that two words?

It seems to me that there are many different kinds of vacationers - everything from folk to climb Annapurna to those who actually enjoy a Staycation. But in thinking about it, I've come up with a spectrum of vacation-ness, the extreme ends of which are occupied by these types: The Toes-in-the-Sand-ers and the Quest-ers.

The Toes-in-the-Sand-ers are the kind of folk that generally go on cruises, or go to all-inclusive resorts, all needs taken care of, little planning work - having just enjoyed one of these (at the Jewel at Dunn's River Falls in Jamaica) I can certainly recommend PARTS of this experience: The continuous food, and the swim-up bar, for instance. Seriously, is there a better combination of words than swim-up bar? However, all-inclusives can be tricky; there can be a lot of 'forced fun' in which the resort's Ambassadors of Fun try to get everyone involved "Limbo! Everybody LIMBO! No, TRIVIA! Everybody PLAY TRIVIA!" Another discovery was that for a booze hound like myself, I have realized that the simple economics of 24 hour free drinks generally means that all the liquor is mostly bottom shelf, with only brief references to the middle. Boo. 

Angel's Landing in Zion National Park. An actual death-defying hike. For real.

The Quest-ers on the other hand, are all about DIY– they set up their own arrangements, take pleasure in the down and dirty work of creating a vacation, (and then are ultimately responsible if it succeeds or fails). Also, while on said vacation, they're always doing activities– they're out climbing waterfalls, renting bicycles and riding around town, backpacking the whole trip, interpreting maps, and at the end of the day are generally exhausted. Not that there's anything wrong with that! Seriously –I have Quest-ed with the best of them and very much enjoyed most every moment. Sometimes that kind of exhaustion is exactly what you need to recharge your batteries.

I've backpacked across Michigan; I've driven cross-country. I've stayed at all-inclusives, and I've built my trip from the ground up and Quested to exhaustion. So what's my perfect vacation like?

This might not have ended well.

I guess I would say that it includes a little bit of both extremes. I like to have control over my experience, and I like to be able to go places when I want to. Sometimes an all-inclusive, or definitely on a cruise, you're stuck on board– you go where they go, and you stick to their itinerary - or you get left behind. That's not my favorite. However, due to a website fail I also don't really enjoy turning corner to where I'm staying that night and seeing a broken down hostel where I thought I was going to have a nice hotel. That happens. Basically a successful vacation means that I've had some control, I've had some rest, I've used my muscles both mental and physical, and I come home not needing a vacation from my vacation.

What about you? How do you like to vacation? What does a perfect trip sound like?

A Dead Man's Facebook Page.

I've quit Facebook. I've deactivated my account and 'scheduled it for deletion' - turns out that you can't just snap your fingers and disappear from FB, it takes a while and quite a bit of hoop-jumping. Whether I stay off forever will be seen in due course, but my intention is to stay off. 

Full disclosure: I'm no Luddite. I love social media. I tweet, I manage an Instagram feed, a Pinterest page, Google Plus... but for some reason, Facebook has always been especially thorny for me. I'll gleefully admit that I've spent weeks, perhaps months of my life on Facebook, and enjoyed much of it. I loved the ability to reconnect with people I hadn't seen since high school, and I loved the vaguely voyeuristic way you could sneak into other people's lives. And the other night when I got home, I received a Facebook message from a friend asking if I'd heard the news about a certain person... 

And I realized that FB, for me, was no longer tool for expression, but an agent of censorship.

Let me explain:

In 1961, Stanley Milgram conducted a series of psychological experiments detailing how much cruelty human beings are willing to inflict upon others based on whether an Authority figure is present.

The set-up: The test subject took on the role of a 'Teacher', asking questions of a 'Learner' who was actually an actor in another room, disconnected physically, only heard over a speaker. If the Learner answered a question incorrectly, the Teacher was told by the Authority Figure (the Experimenter, who was in the room) to administer a punishment in the form of a small electric shock. This sounds somewhat unsavory but generally harmless... but it would escalate; the more wrong answers, the stronger the shock. Milgram found that as the wrong answers built up (as the experiment was designed to do), if the Authority figure told the Teachers to continue to punish, they would follow orders - and in fact, a huge percentage would shock until the 'Learner' was screaming, and many would go so far as to deliver shocks that were lethal.

Turn that over in your mind, folks; these perfectly normal people, if told to do so under these circumstances, would follow orders... and KILL someone.

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So how does this connect to social media? One condition of this experiment that I believe is important, especially to our social media world, is that the 'Teacher' was disconnected from the 'Learner' - the Learner was in the next room instead of sitting in front of them. They only connected with them through the sound of their responses on a speaker. And we all know that lack of physical connection decreases empathy, and thus makes it easier to be cruel.

Here's my thing: 'Social' media is a total misnomer. In many ways it actually takes us further away from each other, not closer. I know that sounds crazy, but consider how empathy disappears in places like Facebook. I have witnessed people say/type things to others on social media that they would never, EVER say to each other face-to-face. They just wouldn't, both because of empathy for another human being, and simply to avoid getting punched. And because of this free-for-all, lately I've found it very difficult to be myself, to be simple and honest in my communications (on Facebook in particular) and true to my values; because I despise the kind of cutting remarks, cowardly trolling and dumbshit behavior that makes you see red and keeps you up at night.

Which brings us back to the other night: It turns out this person I was being asked about on Facebook had unexpectedly died, and in an utterly, utterly tragic way. I went to this person's FB page, and saw post after post about how wonderful this person was, what a tragedy this was, and how awful the world can be. It was touching, it was inspiring, and it made me slightly ill.

Because here's the kicker: In my experience (and I can only speak from my own perspective), this guy was a douchebag. I'll spare you the details that I witnessed personally, but the truth was that he was a guy with issues, who at times laid waste to those who challenged his issues. In fact, I rarely unfriended people on Facebook, but I had recently unfriended this man.

And now he's dead.

And I feel terrible. I feel terrible because I'm very very sad that anyone should die the way he died; and I also feel awful that because I have found it impossible to participate in the outpouring of love over his passing, because of the kind of person he was.

I wanted to post that - to say my truth about this person, my truth, from my experiences. But how do you get such sentiments across in a forum that is actually so disconnected from empathy, so far from 'Social'? The sad truth is that posting my feelings about that on FB that would earn me a clear conscience...and an endless, endless river of shit. So I'm taking the advice of Pat Morita: "Best way avoid punch? No be there."

I want the truth, I want real congenial discussion; and if these things were water, FB would be the Sahara.  So Facebook...I'm done with you.  

On injury: What does it teach us?

I have developed a cranky back.

Where I wish I was right now.

Specifically, my L3-4 joint is a klooge-filled sh*tshow. An inflamed junkyard of sneaky stabbing pains. 

Because of this back, I pulled out of the NYC Marathon this year, and I've been off (and back in, then off) the road since mid September. For those of you who know me, you know how much running is a part of my life. This SUCKS. 

However, in an effort to cut thru the frustration of all this, I've been trying to use my noggin for something other than negativity.  Thus:

Every time we have injuries, we re-learn some things. Here's my list:

I'm a terrible patient. It's in my genes; my Dad is a surgeon, my Grandad was a physician; they both got into trouble by not taking advice that they themselves would give to others. Many of us ignore things repeatedly when it comes to health. And this bad back is driving me up the freaking wall and all I want to do is take a long run...but if I want this to be anything other than a chronic condition, if I want to beat this massive knot, I have to do follow orders and rest, do my PT, etc, and not try to 'force things', as difficult as that can be.

It's okay to be angry.  I'm pissed, pissy, cranky, you name it. The point (and I have varying degrees of success with this) is not to let the anger lead you to stupidity: Like saying f*ck it and going out for a 10 miler because you've missed your endorphin drug of choice for days and weeks. 

As with everything else in this life, it's a journey. PT, MRI, a needle full of steroids into that joint between my vertebrae: Better living thru Chemistry. How many times? How long is this particular trip? We'll see.

Update: So far, so good not back on the road just yet, but things are looking good. Even though this feels like a long way to go, I'm glad I started down the treatment path and am battling my various demons. 

BIGGEST LESSON: Ignore medical conditions at your peril. I'm not saying be a hypochondriac by any means; but if something persists, even if you think the treatment may suck nearly as much as the condition, Get. It. Checked. 

Thoughts?