Weird things are happening to me, what does it mean? - Page 7

flowperson · 01-26-2008, 02:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Snoopy

I have nightmares about drool.
s.

Silver drool cup time ? BTW, what is the meaning of the Brit term of derision, "Hard Cheese". I don't believe that it refers to the bad work habits of employees at cheese counters .

flow....

Bruno's logic · 01-26-2008, 04:25 PM

“By expressing fears and overcoming them, there is nothing but strength. / These are overcome fears...” -Quahom1

Fear…
Political and religious leaders use fear to manipulate the masses.
Fear is often times harder to overcome, than it is to impose.
Try not to worry so much, for worry is fears foundation.
Tear down the walls of fear that enclose your soul and rebuild your heart with love and compassion, forgiveness and understanding. This will set you free. This will open doors that are locked. This will release an imprisoned soul…
Fear is real and all of us must come face to face with it but if we realize that Fear is only an emotion, a feeling that people experience, we can beat it back to its source, overcome it and continue on.
~G. Bruno

path_of_one · 01-26-2008, 04:25 PM

To add to this never-ending disintegration of the original topic, I'll bring back the issue of fear that grey and Q were discussing. While I am inclined to agree that many 18-year-olds in the first world have not really contemplated their real fears yet, remember that with the highly variable lifestyles we all have, age is not really the factor that matters. It is more dependent on class and even gender.

From experience, and talking to various kids in high school, by 18 many of us had experienced:
The fear of being homeless.
The fear of parental or other family friend abuse.
The fear of one of us or a friend losing their life or ability to walk in a car accident.
The fear of our house burning down with us in it.
The fear of drowning.
For women, the fear of being raped or sexually assaulted (in the U.S. one out of every three women is sexually assaulted.)
The fear of failure (I mean this seriously- I knew kids with anorexia and drug problems that arose primarily because their parents harped so badly on them about any little imperfection in their performance.)
The fear of overwhelming depression (you'd be amazed at how many kids have suicidal thoughts and help each other climb out of that hole).
The fear of gangs and violent crime.
The fear of a war starting and the draft being instituted.
The fear of being pregnant at the wrong time (generally, despite birth control use).

It's sad, but it's true. And I didn't even grow up in the inner city, but went to a nice suburban high school. Maybe for those of y'all in your 50s, life was better when you were a kid? I don't know. But I can say definitively that life in high school about 12 years ago had more or less all the fear you get to experience in adult life, minus a few significant ones like fearing for your kids. But in terms of death and disease and all that-- I saw more deaths and accidents in high school and college than I have since. And sadly, many many kids experience relatively extreme poverty (with worries about bills and homelessness) before they are an adult. A lot of high school kids work to help pay their family's bills.

Perhaps saddest of all, is that most kids by the time they graduate have had a friend or acquaintence experience the what I consider the worst of the worst: abuse of some sort, mental illness, and violent crime. At the larger high schools, there seems to be at least one or two people from each class that commit suicide or are murdered. You'd be amazed at the overwhelming number of girls that have been raped by 18 (not to mention all those who have been simply taken advantage of by older men- sometimes teachers- that have been sexually assualted but not raped, etc.). This seems to result in a ton of depression and mental illness among young women, and frequently the only people they feel they can talk to are their friends. It's not like I've taken an extensive poll of young women in the US, but the statistics bear it out, and about half the young women I knew in high school had been raped or mentally coerced into having sex by the time they graduated.

I won't say all the things I witnessed or had happen to me, it's too personal to share on a forum. But suffice it to say that there is nothing since that has added to my fears. By the time I was 20, I had experienced or been a close observer of nearly every horrible thing I could imagine. I've spent the remaining decade or so overcoming them and dealing with it. And I was a good kid. Went to a good suburban high school, got straight As, went to college on a full scholarship. I wasn't reckless, didn't do drugs, and all my friends were honors students and mostly middle to upper middle class.

If most kids don't experience what my friends and I did, then I concede the point. But the statistics say otherwise... And remember that in the third world, kids often watch brothers and sisters die before they are even a teenager, and often are displaced due to war and other violent conflict. I'm amazed there is a functioning generation of adults in these places at all- testimony to what the human spirit can endure.

Muslimwoman · 01-26-2008, 08:04 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by flowperson

Silver drool cup time ? BTW, what is the meaning of the Brit term of derision, "Hard Cheese". I don't believe that it refers to the bad work habits of employees at cheese counters .

flow....

as salaam aleykum my friend

Hard cheese means tough luck - it sounds so silly when these things are pointed out to us

flowperson · 01-26-2008, 08:38 PM

Salaam MW...No I pretty much became acquainted with the term through Terry Thomas films. What a funny guy. How's things in your desert ?

flow....

Muslimwoman · 01-26-2008, 09:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by flowperson

Salaam MW...No I pretty much became acquainted with the term through Terry Thomas films. What a funny guy. How's things in your desert ?

flow....

Bleedin cold. How is Julius doing?

flowperson · 01-26-2008, 09:46 PM

Hi...Just in the mid fifties f. most days. Nice in the sun and cool in the shade.
The Green Queen of Mean is doing quite well my friend. I take her outside on my shoulder for an hour or so most days if it's not too cool.

Mishmish still in attack mode, or is she weaving in and out of your feet wherever you walk these days ?

salaam Flow....

Muslimwoman · 01-26-2008, 09:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by flowperson

Hi...Just in the mid fifties f. most days. Nice in the sun and cool in the shade.

Are you familiar with the British term BOG OFF?? Just asking

Quote:

Originally Posted by flowperson

The Green Queen of Mean is doing quite well my friend. I take her outside on my shoulder for an hour or so most days if it's not too cool.

Great stuff. Is she still doing her thing?

Quote:

Originally Posted by flowperson

Mishmish still in attack mode, or is she weaving in and out of your feet wherever you walk these days ?

I now fall over every 3 paces, he seems to have gotten over himself.

Have missed chatting to you, I feel like I have been away ages.

Oops sorry am seriously hijacking this thread.

Salaam

flowperson · 01-26-2008, 10:11 PM

Salaam MW...

Yeah I feel guilty about the hijacking bit also, especially after Path's most meaningful and true post. I have a 65 year perspective on the fear thingy. It's been getting worse by degree since WW II and especially so the past eight years or so if you hadn't noticed. It's almost as if the oldsters are obsessively fearful of the younger generations. Or maybe we brought too many Nazi scientists over to work here after the war. They did make great rockets !

She's right, it's getting worse, my kids keep me informed and they're well into their thirties. I have some ideas about why it is happening like this, but nobody seems to give a damn about it all. People just settle lawsuits and the lawyers get richer. Nobody cares about the causes, which still lie in the future IMHO. UGH !

Julius is still doing her thing and spending lots of time in her condo project. She's not doing as many naughty things these days, but she still is feather picking. Maybe that's her next improvement goal. I'm waiting to be surprised.

Nope, Bog Off is not among the colloquialisms that I am familiar with. Was it originated amongst peat cutters?

Sorry to misgenderize Mishmish. Be sure not to trounce upon the poor soul. Love is such a many splendored thingy.

peace my friend....flow....

Muslimwoman · 01-26-2008, 11:01 PM

Oh flow my friend, I fear the 'fear thing' has always been with us in every generation. Each generation watching the young running headlong into oblivion.

We all reach an age where we see the stupidity of youth but of course when we were young our elders 'didn't have a clue' and now we are seen as the clueless. Give it 15 years and they will be the clueless and we will rock in our chairs and say 'told you so' as our children voice for their fearsfor the young of today.

My Grandmother talked of her fears for my father, in his teddy boy years with razor blades sewn into his lapels. Where would he get a job, etc. It goes back centuries and beyond.

path_of_one · 01-26-2008, 11:13 PM

LOL- it's OK to highjack, flow. We did it above for a while about accents. It seems to be how this thread runs, since the original poster, Nevermore, has not returned to our conversation.

And fear has always been there, of course, but it seems like a few things are getting worse in the US. More and more I see the older adults (i.e., 30s-50s) taking advantage of teenagers sexually, many of it older male-younger female but a growing number of older female-younger male as well. There are also a lot of teenaged boys taking advantage of teenaged girls. I also see a lot of parents who don't seem to have a clue about what their kids are experiencing or going through, and sadly, sometimes seem to care more about the appearance of a happy family than really having one. I don't think it was the norm 40-50 years ago in the US to have kids betrayed so much by the time they graduated high school. Yes, perhaps they went off to war at 18 and found a lot of fear and death and violence there. But it is not the same thing as finding it among your own community where you are supposed to be protected and safe. Of course, the kids aren't innocent bystanders- they're bringing guns to school and getting into fights, many experimenting with drugs (an amazing number of honors students are into drugs big-time, and more often have the money to buy them), etc. But my point is that first, there is a societal reason for that. And second, that it affects even the kids who are trying to be good and responsible- no one really escapes it, because you're surrounded by it.

Muslimwoman · 01-26-2008, 11:32 PM

I understand what you ar saying but I just think it has always existed, just in different ways. What we see now as the evils of the world existed before, just in different ways. What would it have been like for a coloured child in the US 50 years ago? I feel sure their parents would be fearful. Wasn't there uproar when rock and roll came to disrupt the American dream?

I just wonder if each generation has the same level of fear, justover different issues?

greymare · 01-26-2008, 11:40 PM

yes, a chook is a chicken. why , what do you call it? I dont really have anger issues, ( she says as she thumps the table) honest.

greymare · 01-26-2008, 11:49 PM

sorry guys, posted late on previous (chicken ) subject. LOL. we hav e digressed (new big word for me). but that is ok. muslim woman, good to have you back, have missed you. hey there flow and love to miss(demeanour)JULIUS. yes, fear has always been there, some more so than others. My original comment was that I hoped that they hadnt felt real fear. pity alot do.

flowperson · 01-27-2008, 12:33 AM

Hi Ladies...Yes I agree that it has always been there, but IMHO it has also been more analog and random in the past. In these digital days it all seems more planned, programmed, addressable, and targetable for some overall purpose.

That's just the way that I see it all from my perspective. Like Path has said, it seems to especially target the best and brightest in a lot of ways as if something was trying to purposefully ruin the future for the human race.

flow....