Brainwork

My ability to survive and thrive in my day-to-day life depends on two brains. One is the approximately three pounds of lumpy grey and white matter between my ears. The other, about 2.5 pounds heavier and also grey and white, is my laptop. They aren’t a truly redundant system — I haven’t yet figured out how to sync them, and let’s not even get into the mutual failover issue. But I’m equally dependent on each, for different reasons, and I fiddle with either one only with great caution.

Technically, it’s easier to muck around with the computer. If I don’t like the results, I delete the file or application and try again. If I mess up, I restore from my latest backup. If I really mess up, I always have the option of wiping the hard drive and reinstalling everything from scratch, or if necessary trotting the whole shebang over to the Genius Bar at the Apple store. And if all else fails, I can move the contents onto a new machine.

With the so-called wetware, it’s not quite so simple. I can upgrade some of the software, so to speak, but there’s no such thing as migrating to a new cerebral cortex, so it’s taken me a while to get everything running smoothly. If you’ll pardon the nerdy analogy, I’m still resolving various conflicts and incompatibilities — but by and large, things are finally operating as they should, and given how much time and effort (not to mention cash) I’ve expended to get there, I’m reluctant to experiment.

I rely so much on my two brains that tinkering with either one of them makes me anxious. This week I’ve been tweaking both at once, which I consider brave and/or foolhardy, even though I pretty much know what I’m doing.

This afternoon, I’m wrapping up the complex and somewhat nervewracking ritual of setting up a new laptop. Each stage has its own attendant anxieties, from transferring data from the old laptop to the new one (What if I lose something important, like the article I’m writing that’s due next week, and can’t get it back?) to doing a total erase and system reinstall so the old laptop is ready for its new owner (What if I accidentally pass along the Quicken file with almost 20 years of my financial records?).

I’ve done this plenty of times; I know what I’m doing, and besides, the Migration Assistant in OSX makes it damn near idiotproof. And yet I still cringed last night when I put the system disks in the old laptop and told it to restore itself to factory-fresh settings, and again when I set up a seven-pass erase on the old external drive. Even with two other copies of my data, one on the new laptop and one on its new backup drive, I still had to push past that last tiny bit of oh no, what if I make a mistake that can’t be undone?

Meanwhile, I’m also testing a couple of medications meant to reset my circadian clock when it’s been badly thrown off. Two or three times a year, I get turned upside down chronologically somehow, and I want a way to get myself back on local time in a day or two rather than struggling to function for a week as I inch my wake/sleep patterns forward or backwards by an hour or two every night. This is definitely not something I’ll be trying on a regular basis, mind you, but knowing it’s possible is a comfort.

I’m trying both medications now, when my clock is properly set, because I want to be sure they don’t make me twitch, puke, lose touch with reality, or sprout an extra limb, so that if and when I need them, I at least know they won’t make matters worse. I’m doing this with a doctor’s approval, but even so, when I swallowed half a white tablet this morning, I felt a rush of deja vu from last night. That niggling apprehension, that last tiny bit of oh no, what if I make a mistake that can’t be undone?

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The challenge of forgiveness

Let me set up a hypothetical situation for you.

Someone does something really crappy to you. It doesn’t involve torture, bloodshed, or imminent danger to life or limb — but it’s not a minor annoyance, either. Think cheating, stealing, lying to or about you, that kind of thing. To make matters worse, it’s done by someone you thought you had every reason to trust. And when you say, “Hey, what the hell,” this person you trusted plays the “you made me do it” card.

What do you do? Unless you’re a saint, you get mad, and you probably stay that way for a good long while. But then what?

To some extent, this is a universal experience. It’s probably not hypothetical to you. It’s not hypothetical to me.

To add insult to injury, someone who took advantage of my trust has noticed that I made the best of the betrayal, and now points to that as proof that it wasn’t actually that bad and, in fact, might even be considered as having done me a favor.

What do I do? I’m not a saint. I got mad. I’ve stayed that way for a good long while. But now what?

Because the thing is, I’m starting to realize that my anger is no longer serving me. Oh, it did at first. It gave me the strength to stand up for myself, to put an end to the bad behavior, and to say, “Do not do that again, or else.” But now my anger is becoming counterproductive.

It doesn’t make me feel better. It doesn’t undo the past. It doesn’t even elicit an apology; if anything, the other person has used it as an excuse to justify a lack of regret. Worse yet, rage keeps me perpetually frozen in the painful and infuriating moment that I discovered someone I trusted was entirely untrustworthy. As long as I continue feeling it, I continue defining myself as a victim — and more than that, I continue berating myself for not having known, somehow, that I needed to protect myself. That’s corrosive, even more damaging to me in the long run than the original betrayal.

And so I find myself wrestling with the terrifying concept of forgiveness. Yes, terrifying. I know continuing to be good and mad (understandable though it might be) is, as the saying goes, “drinking poison and expecting the other person to die.” But my fear is that without it, I have no way to protect myself against a repeat performance.

That’s why I wish I could erase the phrase “forgive and forget” from the language. I think it does us all a huge disservice; it implies that forgiveness equals defenselessness. Forgiving bad behavior — or to phrase it in a way I’m more comfortable with, letting go of anger about it — doesn’t mean accepting it. As a wise friend recently said to me, “You can forgive a scared dog for biting you, but that doesn’t mean you have to let it bite you again.”

If I let go of my anger, am I excusing being treated poorly, or worse yet, agreeing that it was appropriate? Does forgiveness mean I have to pretend it never happened? Does it obligate me to give the other person the chance to hurt me again in exactly the same way?

No. No. And no.

Once you move an untrustworthy person to the periphery of your life, where he can’t do you any further damage, you no longer need the weapon of anger to protect you. Letting go of it is about switching perspective from “things to run away from” to “things to run toward.”

I don’t know precisely how to do that. But I know it’s necessary. And I know it’s possible.

What are your thoughts on forgiveness?

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Travel Tuesdays: the big expenses

Last week I thought I had found an acceptably affordable one-way ticket to London, but this week, when I went to book it, it was gone. After two hours of concerted searching on Booking Buddy, I turned up an acceptable alternative for just $34 more than the first. Having learned my lesson about not letting these things get away, I jumped on it. I was exceedingly pleased with myself as I claimed my free one-way ticket for the flight home using frequent flyer miles — then somewhat less pleased to discover that “free” does not include $118 in taxes and fees.

Whoops!

Mind you, I’m not complaining. I’m still saving about $250 over any round-trip ticket I’ve seen for the dates I need to travel. Nonetheless, the moral is that it’s best to estimate high when you’re deciding how much you can spend, then look for bargains so you come in under budget.

Airfare will always be one of your top two expenses. Lodging is the other. Don’t stint on cleanliness or safety, of course, but be willing to be adventurous to cut costs here — do you really need to drop $200 or more a night on someplace where you’ll mostly be unconscious and thus unable to enjoy it? Probably not.

While I’m in York, I’ll be staying in a largish house on the University of York campus with several other volunteers. We’ll share a kitchen and bathrooms, but we’ll each have a private bedroom. When I leave there, though, I’m heading to London for three days, and I don’t yet know where I’ll lay my head. Time for more research!

In the past, I’ve stayed in a small hotel near Victoria Station, an historic (built 1851) house which offers a special rate on single rooms tucked up under the eaves. These rooms are tiny, with slanted ceilings, dormer windows, twin beds, and shared bathrooms; they’re also a little shabby and can only be reached by climbing four flights of stairs. They were probably the servants’ quarters when the building was a private home. I find them charming — not least because they’re also ridiculously cheap: if you book online, you get an Internet-only special of about $65 a night at current exchange rates, and paying in full in advance knocks off an additional 10%, bringing the per-night cost down to $58.50. In a city as expensive as London, that’s a bargain indeed.

However, I’ll be at the tail end of my trip, and if past experience is any predictor, I’ll be starting to worry about money, so I want to bring my costs down still further. That’s why I’m planning to book a bed in a hostel. I haven’t shared a bedroom since college, but I’ve found a couple of hostels with small dorms and no reputation for party atmosphere, and I plan to invest in good eyeshades and earplugs. This will let me whittle the cost of my lodging for three nights in London down to $30/night — thus almost balancing out the aforementioned taxes and fees from my “free” ticket. As a bonus, the places I’m considering are near both King’s Cross Station, where my train from York arrives, and a tube station on the Piccadilly line, which will take me directly to Heathrow airport when it’s time for me to leave. Location, location, location.

At this point I refer you to this excellent, detailed post by Audi of Fashion for Nerds about saving money on flights and beds. In future posts, I’ll share some further thoughts on the topic, as well as advice on the smaller expenses, like food, entry fees for attractions, and getting around once you’ve reached your destination.

Questions? Experiences? Thoughts?

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Travel Tuesdays: one-way frequent flyer tickets

American, Delta, and United now let frequent flyers book one-way tickets for half the number of miles necessary to book a round trip ticket. But be careful! If you book a one-way award, you’re not getting 50% off a round trip ticket. You’re getting a free trip in one direction. Going the other way is on your dime, and if you’re not careful, that one-way trip may end up costing you as much as a round-trip ticket would have. Do a little shopping before you book both legs on the same airline. It might be cheaper — a lot cheaper — to fly the paid half of your journey on another carrier.

Case in point: I have 30,000 miles on American, enough to cover a one-way trip between the continental US and Europe, which I plan to use for my trip to England later this year. I can’t use the miles on the outbound leg of my trip — there’s no available awards seating for a solid week on either side of the date I need to arrive. By default, therefore, I’m going to be cashing in my miles for my return trip (which is fine; I have a lot more flexibility on dates coming home). But how am I going to get to England in the first place?

I know I can fly into either London Heathrow (LHR) or Manchester (MAN). Both are about two hours from York by train, and if I take a redeye over Saturday night and arrive early Sunday morning, that makes it more than feasible to show up at my lodgings in York in time for my afternoon check-in and orientation. (Alternatively, I could fly in on Saturday, but that would involve the expense and hassle of finding a room for Saturday and then moving lodgings the next day.)

I first checked American’s own fares. A one-way ticket to either LHR or MAN would cost me almost $1000, thus wiping out everything I saved by redeeming miles. Looks like I’ll be taking another airline home.

Expedia, Travelocity, Orbitz, and Kayak.com all told me I couldn’t get there from here for less than $1000 — but thanks to Airfare Watchdog, I know I can do better. Time to start digging. I went to Booking Buddy, which searches multiple sites at once and lets you compare the results, apples to apples. Here’s the applesauce that emerged, listed by cost:

A site called Cheap Fare Guru said it could get me to LHR on United or Continental for $871.

CheapAir.com: $859 to LHR on United

Webjet: $787 to MAN on bmi

Priceline: $786 to MAN

CheapoAir: $757 to LHR on “major airline” or $803 to MAN on bmi

TripAdvisor: $747 to LHR on United

And then a site I’d never heard of before, OneTravel, popped up with a quote of $633 to MAN on bmi, taxes and fees included. Now we’re talking!

I’m going to do another search later this week to see if I can whittle it down further, but I think I may have found a winner. Stay tuned.

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Still not perfect.

The perfect is the enemy of the good. – Voltaire

~~~

Well, hello there. I haven’t made a blog post in far too long, and I have no excuse.

Actually, that’s not true. I do have an excuse. I was procrastinating. And for the strangest of reasons: I was putting off writing a blog post because I really, really wanted to do it.

I’ve spent some time trying to figure out what that’s about — and to my surprise, it turns out to be connected with, yes, fear. I wasn’t too darn busy to get to it. I wasn’t enjoying the pleasure of delayed but inevitable gratification, the way I think happily in the morning about the delicious meal I plan to make that night. I wasn’t using making a blog post as a reward for completing a less enjoyable task. I wasn’t even grasping for ideas; I have half a dozen ideas stacked up and circling like airplanes over O’Hare in bad weather! I was just worried that I’d sit down and write something heartfelt, put it online, and realize nobody was interested.

In other words, I had an attack of perfectionism.

I think a little bit of perfectionism lurks in the heart of all of us. After all, who doesn’t want — even a tiny bit — to be instantly and effortlessly good at everything, and to universal acclaim? But sometimes that desire goes malignant and grows wild. When that happens, it can turn into the compulsive striving and monomaniacal focus of the stereotypical control freak. But it can also do just the opposite and flip into a vicious cycle of “why try?”

Here’s how it works:

I worry about being judged and found inadequate.
so
I think the only alternative to being inadequate is being perfect.
but
I know I can’t be perfect, even at the things I’m very good at indeed.
because
No one is perfect. Even Nobel laureates, Olympic medalists, and great diplomats have failures.
yet
I don’t find that comforting
because
I feel Nobel laureates et al have earned the right to flop sometimes, but I haven’t.
so
I procrastinate, because doing nothing seems safer than exposing myself to criticism for doing something imperfect.

Avoiding doing things because I can’t do them flawlessly is like a baby thinking, “If I can’t skip the awkward toddling bit and go straight to a graceful run, why should I bother trying to stand up at all?”

There’s only one medicine for the “why try?” disease: deliberately choosing to do something in a half-assed way, or at least what I think is half-assed, and see what happens. To my surprise, what I think is “nowhere near good enough” looks just fine to other people. The draft I pounded out in an hour rather than revising every sentence three times? It didn’t come back for revisions. The photos I shot on the fly, snapping five times as many as I ordinarily would have? I nailed a handful of shots I probably would have missed otherwise. The awkward conversation I didn’t allow myself to rehearse in my head for three days straight? I didn’t have to be as eloquent as I thought I did.

And that’s why I’m going to post this right now and not allow myself to go back and tweak it later.

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