This blog is an attempt to do something I have wanted to do for a long time. WRITE!! But I’ve realized that I am more motivated if I write for an audience, real or imagined, as I am more of a storyteller than anything else. So, now that I have an imaginary audience (hopefully not for long), the writing begins.
My blog will be like a tree with many branches. Some will be substantive and weighty like the main trunk of a large oak and others will be smaller branches or little shoots. I’ve wanted a forum to tell stories. And this seems as good a forum or medium as there is going. Storytelling continues to be a powerful way to convey multi-level meanings. And whether it is Hollywood, or Anime, or real life drama for adolescents in high school or any of us along life’s spectrum, stories universalize our human struggles.
I also want a forum to do social commentary. I am concerned about how isolated people have become in the broader culture. And you can include this blogger along with many others who work too long and hard, take little time for reflective thought for the things that matter, which is my family broadly defined and my family of hu”man”ity (no gender bias intended).
So, you should be asking yourself by now, why would I want to read some dumb blog by some guy I don’t even know? My answer for that is in my history, experiences and perspectives. Let’s begin with the demographics. That may clue you into some of the lenses through which I see life and the possible biases I have. I’m a middle-age, white male from a blue-collar background. I’ve been married for over 30 years to the same wonderful woman who loves me in spite of my failings. We’ve raised three great children. We have a married daughter and two sons. The youngest will graduate with his undergraduate degree this spring. And as of this past January, our daughter and son-in-law made my wife and I grandparents.
On a career and education level, I have been a marriage & family therapist for over 30 years and am currently teaching undergraduate courses on human development and family relations these past seven years. I have two masters degrees, one in clinical psychology and the other in marriage & family therapy. And I have a PhD in sociology from the University of Southern California. At the intersection of my academic pursuits, therapy practice and personal life is where the social commentary spills out.
Another layer of my personal lens is my active Christian faith. As part of that social commentary, I hope to talk about religious matters in a way that enlivens the important discussion of faith rather than polarizing everyone.
On a sociohistorical level, I was raised as one of five children from just outside Pittsburgh in a working-class steel mill town. Poor schools, violent neighborhood and alcoholic father made for more than one’s share of challenges. But like many that came before and after, I made it out. My brothers weren’t so fortunate at first. Both dropped out of high school, but managed to complete their doctorates in the summer of 2004 as well. What are the odds that three scruffy boys would make it out and end up with such an education? We’ve been meeting trying to figure this out. Links to some recent newspaper articles are below.
Growing up in my family and neighborhood, I’ve always been interested in gender and gender roles. My published dissertation from USC, “The Voices of Men” is the culmination of that interest. When I was a child watching my father literally break apart our home with his violence, I promised myself that I would remember everything and some day figure it out. Well, I didn’t figure everything out, but I definitely explained some important dynamics especially what I called the “mystery of masculinity.”
As far as hobbies and interests that I may comment on, I’m an avid Pittsburgh Steelers fan. And my biggest passion is music. I’m partial to blues, jazz and motown. And my favorite is black gospel. I had the privilege of singing in a gospel choir when we lived in southern California. The choir competed and although we never made it to the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, the music and choreography were heavenly in an exuberant way.
Please don’t hesitate to ask questions or start a discussion about an issue that is embedded in one of the stories or commentaries.
thank you and enjoy!
tmatta
9 Comments
April 7, 2008 at 9:51 am
Congrats on your new blog!!
Lets start the discussion by stirring the pot. You mention:
I am concerned about how isolated people have become in the broader culture.
Wouldn’t you think that internet has provided a greater access to the broader culture by effectively connecting people that years ago would actually be isolated? I somewhat feel that isolation is actually a reaction to this forced and inevitable integration…
April 7, 2008 at 10:02 am
Here are a couple of links of recent articles chronicling my brothers and I.
http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07333/837561-56.stm#
http://www.goerie.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?Date=20071210&Category=NEWS05&ArtNo=712100316&SectionCat=
April 7, 2008 at 10:11 am
I mentioned my love of music. Well, this last year my son put me up to auditioning with the Mercyhurst Jazz Ensemble. So, I got a solo and immediately ordered a mint green Zoot suit from Italy in honor of Saint Patty’s Day, gangster style! Here’s a link to the youtube site if you want an earful of Cab Calloway’s “Minnie the Moocher.” I’m kind of a cross between the Blues brothers and Jackie Gleason. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vcjeeoz32oA
April 8, 2008 at 6:45 am
What a wonderful question!
Globalization’s impact, whether through the economy or the internet is a mixed bag. On the positive end, you are correct in stating that people have endless opportunities for contact with people they never would have made connections with even 10 years ago. But, then one has to look at the kinds of contacts and quality of those relationships that result from this “information superhighway.” My guess is that as norms regarding the etiquette of internet relationships solidifies, the quality may be enhanced. But I don’t think we are there yet. Now, from my perspective, on the negative end, the social world of the internet has gaps. As intimate as the written word and webcam videos can be, there are important dimensions missing and distinctions to be made. Let’s refer to the internet as a two-dimensional medium as participants may share thoughts, feelings and in the case of pictures and videos some conventional gestures. But participants do not share living space. Sharing three-dimensional space in close proximity permits participants to access other levels of communication not available in two-dimensional formats. The receiver of a message has fewer contact points to verify the authenticity or congruence of the message and its sender. It is difficult enough in three-dimensional space and time to make this determination. In a two-dimensional medium like the internet, it is more difficult. In a 3-D medium, one can compare the communicator’s intonation, facial gestures, affect and words chosen to determine the relative truthfulness of a message. And affect is not just what is felt inside, but co-created between relationship participants. Through the internet, this becomes a bigger challenge. So, I would argue that in the end, the internet may increase neighborhood propinquity that enhances relationship opportunities, but using this medium in the absence of a pre-existing relationship will not result in relational intimacy. In instances where a substantive relationship existed prior to using the internet as a social medium, participants will use prior knowledge to reconstruct the relational nuances. So, in this instance the limitations may be minimized or no longer remain.
From my perspective, the same kinds of issues that plague long-distance relationships will surface with the Net user looking for connection and belonging through this medium. As a marriage & family therapist, I’ve had to counsel my share of couples that came in crisis over one partner’s internet affair. At a point in the chat room chatter, participants who have pledged their undying love to one another wants the validating and reassuring presence of the person in real space and time. Many people succumb to the temptation to find that the reality is more akin to a blind date than anything else. Blind dates can be successful, but more often than not what was communicated does not match the image created. On more than a few occasions, I’ve advised partners to wait until the internet relationship luster wanes on their unfaithful partner’s tryst and then address the issues that may have led up to the search for intimacy online.
Social network communities that share common interests may develop more care and concern for their members, but again, I would argue the connections will only be limited to the medium for which the relationship developed in. I’ll be interested in hearing whether my suspicion is correct or whether friendships in real space and time are normative having developed from what I perceive as a 2-D medium.
But in 3-D space and time, Americans are much more isolated. Many sociologists are chronicling the demise of public life to the private (Bellah, 1985) as well as a lessening of civic associations (Putnam, 1995). Most recently, this tendency towards individualism has permeated the bedroom in Paul Amato’s research on marriage titled “Alone Together” (Amato, 2007). I attribute these changes to our culture of consumerism that requires more and more money to acquire the supposed necessities of life. The Weberian notion of the Protestant Work Ethic has been replaced with an uber work ethic. This is like a work ethic on steroids. As a result the work/community/family balance is compromised with the reality of work and the social network at work superceding any and all other connections. Until this trend is brought back into balance if there ever were any, community and family relationships will continue to suffer.
I’m experiencing my first blogger fatigue!! I may add more, but I think this addresses some of your questions.
April 8, 2008 at 10:45 am
You distinguish correctly the different levels of intimacy in a relationship. It is granted that the current technology does not allow us to re-create the non-verbal perception, and the myriad of other sensorial information that is accompanied by a face-to-face encounter, but at a greater level, the whole humanity has for the first time being connected in this vast web. Such event has not ever been experienced. Previously the classic in-group bias was extremely concentrated and experienced through nationalism or regionalism, but no longer we can claim thet true geographic boundaries can divide us. To that extent I believe that there is a backlash towards integration. As Michio Kaku mentioned in a recent speech in the Smithsonian, that isolationism is reflected in drastic and extreme expressions such as terrorism. However, these minor expressions just try to stop the inevitable: a total human interconnection.
April 8, 2008 at 10:58 pm
In many ways, I think the internet is overhyped, like much technology. Much of what is posted online is opinion, business, and hype. As far as relationships go, I do think that real relationships can happen, but online relationships can be, for the reasons you guys posted, impoverished. I think the same principles and moral laws that guide and direct real life relationships must still apply online.
I remember a couple of professors I had at California State University, Fullerton, that taught about their Native American religion, spoke about the Native American’s relationship with the Earth, calling the earth Mother, and the sky Father, and the moon Grandmother, and the Sun Grandfather (I hope I got this right). I think technology disconnects us from our relationship with the world. I have an idea for a science fiction story where the astronaut must travel to a distant galaxy and only has a family created by technology. I am thinking how sad and lonely that would be. There is no way to circumvent what seems to be a very vital need human beings have for real connection.
April 9, 2008 at 12:58 am
By the way Tom, you are the man! I have a story to tell. My brother Tom and I (his younger brother Dan), used to work with my Dad. My Dad was a very hard worker. Each job my Dad had, I think to him, was easier and gave him more freedom to make as much money as he was willing to work for. His previous postions included working in the blast furnaces of the Edgar Thompson Works steel mill in Braddock, PA. Prior to the steel mill he worked with his brother digging, literally, mountains of dirt out of the coal mines. So my father’s notion of a work day was distorted beyond any sort of rationale or understanding of what one human being could do in a day.
By the time I came of age Tom or Buzzy, as we in the family called him, had already been working with my Father for a few summers installing fences. My Dad and his brother John, started a family fence business sometime in the early 60’s. Well this business took off and my Dad would use my brother and I for cheap labor. Both my brother and I would dread each day of work and dread what that day would bring. I remember people seeing me and my brother working with my Dad, and look at my
Dad in that seemingly, knowing, conspiratorial, way to my father, and say something like ‘ a hard days work never killed anyone’. I knew that they knew absolutely nothing what it meant to work a day with my Dad. My Dad brought little to no money for lunch and their was little at our house to pack a lunch with and our days could start early in the morning and last well into the early twilight. Our days started with loading up the truck with the material we needed to build the fence: sand, gravel, and cement, fence material, and the tools we needed to dig the holes…usually consisting of a post hole digger, digging bar, & 100lb jack hammer. As the spring & summer wore on, the days would become blisteringly hot and the humidity would go above the ninties. We would become tan and muscular from digging, holes, and mixing cement. Most of the jobs my Dad would get would require us to knock down a small forest of weeds and trees, or become mountain goats to traverse the terrain to excavate the fence post holes and then mix and carry the concrete to said holes, and then eventually carry the 300lb rolls of chain link wire over hill and dale, constantly stopping to detangle the wire from every possible root, vine, or hidden obstacle that seemed to reach out and snag the fence roll.
Well, one very hot, and humid day, my brother and I were working in a back yard in Squirrel Hill, a wealthy enclave familiar to most Pittsburghers. The customers back yard looked like some patch of the Amazon forest and Tom (Buzzy) was lost, hidden from sight by the gigantic foilage. He was inside of this jungle trying to dig a hole. Unfortunately, but quite regularly for this area and this line of work, their was an equally mammoth sized rock blocking his progress. Of course, on this day, we did not bring the jack hammer. What we had was a 25lb digging bar. We had become experts at wielding the digging bar. Buzzy started to work on this rock and started hammering at it with the pointy end of the bar. His work on this rock was impressive. I kept waiting for him to give up, and come out of the leafy greeness gasping for air, and motioning for me to take over. On this day, my brothers profound confidence and optimism and dogged determination towards this rock was especially compelling and created a curiosity in me about what exactly he was trying to do in there. Finally, the digging bars dull thud against the rock changed ever so slighly, signaling, to the trained ear that my brother had indeed cracked this rock and started to pry it out. Both surprised and envious, I asked him, quizitively, how did you do it? He stepped out of the greenery, soaked in sweat, and with a big grin on his face said, ‘I prayed about it and it broke’. I thought about his for a bit, and finally I said earnestly, hey could you pray for some ice tea and sandwiches?!!! And do it quick! I am not sure if this prayer was answered, but I think we helped the prayer along by just knocking on the door and asking the customer for some refreshments.
April 10, 2008 at 12:20 am
Reading my brother’s story about my Grandpap reminds me of the rich narrative, I use the term narrative (narrative makes it sound purposeful, it wasn’t), because I can’t think of a better word that describes the rich stories that make up the meaning of mine and my families life. It would seem that human beings exist within this rich tapestry of meaning that makes up a persons life. I don’t think that we do this consciously, unless you are a budding social scientist. However, I remember my Grandfather and my Dad finding common ground around sports and travel. There were also a lot of stories about my Grandfathers legendary ability to eat and drink, but those stories I will leave for a later date. I am not sure how my Grandfather came about his knowledge and appreciation for sports, and particularly the game of football, but he always spoke with an air of expertise and special powers of observation and knowledge. You would have thought that he was a scout or a sports columnist in a previous life, but he was the trainer for our high school football team and the janiter too. However, the manner in which he spoke, you would have thought that he was Knute Rockne. When my Grandfather spoke we kids listened, especially we boys. These stories shaped my idea of what it meant to be a man. We would sit on his porch and my Grandfather and my Father would drink and talk about sports. My Grandfather would usually have the baseball game on, in the background, in the summer and football in the fall. I remember my Grandfather and Father talk about great athletes, particularly the ones that came out of Scott High, the local high school. My Grandfather had been a trainer at Scott High, for what seemed to me, to be a millenium. He knew the players intimately, taping them up before game time, getting to know them through out the year, and sizing up their character and ability compared to all of the athletes that had come before. He also had a very close relationship with the coach(s) and the way my Grandfather would tell the story, the coach would often confide in him and take his advice when things were looking bleak. I remember my Father talking about the great fighters of his time. He would talk about Joe Louis and the fight with Max Schmeling, and Rocky Marciano, Edzard Charles, and other great fighters of the 40’s & 50’s. I remember one special athlete by the name of Franny Rogel. Even before I knew who Franny Rogel was,(he would be the football coach at Scott High and leave the year before I would have played for him), I idolized him. He had played for the Pittsburgh, Steelers. A home town boy. He had also been a star at Penn State. Listening to these stories would send me off into a revelry of my own glory. I would imagine myself achieving the same status and earning the admiration of all, but espescially my Father and Grandfather.
The other topic of conversation was travel, not travel to other countries or even vacations, but the roads, routes, byways, avenues, streets, and any other paved and unpaved places that cars and trucks would go. My Father was a truck driver, for a time. Not some little truck but a semi, a tractor trailer. The stories that he told about driving were stuff of legend. The time he drove his truck off a cliff, the time he had to burn his way through an ice storm, another time that he had to back his way up 10 story building with only rail road ties separating him from careening over the edge and certain death. My Grandfather on the other hand could not compete with these stories and never tried, but he could compete with knowing every fricking route their was both east and west in Pennsylvania and all parts both north and south. Both my Dad and my Grandpap would start to feel the effect of the beer and my Grandfather would get to explaining to my Father some particular road or route. He would say, “Jesus Christ, Tom, you know where the hell I’m talking about. Thats route 163, right where 163 and Route 89 crosses.” This would go on for 20 minutes. To make it especially tricky, my Grandpap would link the location with a year, way before my Dad was born. For instance,”Hell Tom, that was a two lane highway, back in 1923.” Some of my fondest memories were the times when I would get done with football practice that we had behind Benjamin Fairless elementary school in Braddock. I would be exhausted, covered in soot, and walk up Jones Avenue and into first ward, where I knew my family was waiting to celebrate my birthday. I would still be in my football uniform and I would walk up the steps to my Granpaps door and feel so proud to be a part of what my Grandpap and Father believed was so important.
April 14, 2008 at 12:50 pm
Some of the lessons I have learned from school and being a therapist-
1. Go where the horse pulls you.
2. You cannot, not communicate.
3. Families repeat themselves from one generation to the next in different forms (Monica McGoldrick, et al).
4. When all else fails, listen to what your client is telling you.
5. If client’s are not willing to take what you are offering, you have probably not spent enough time joining.
6. You will get nowhere telling a mother she is a bad mother.
7. 50 minutes is long enough, longer sessions do not necessarly make a better session.
8. People do not usually change by someone telling them they need to change.
9. If you feel as though you cannot stay awake another second longer, when you are with your client, you are probably not doing therapy.
10. All behavior is purposeful.
11. Most human beings are oppositional.
12. The antidote for defensiveness is validation.
That is enough for now.