The Inconsiderate and the Uninteresting

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A show I watch asked the question has America become more inconsiderate? They immediately moved this discussion of societal etiquette to the use of cell phones. Does someone answer a cell phone in the middle of your meal? Do they answer that call without asking to be excused? I don’t know if my lack of interest on this particular discussion is based on the fact that it’s become cliche to complain about cell phone usage, if I still feel like something of an outsider looking in on the whole cell phone world, or if most of the people in my inner circle are not obsessed with cellphones. Whatever the case is, I have fewer problems in the cell phone discussion than most. My concerns are less micro.

Cell PhonesLarry David has an observation he calls being car conscious. Are you car conscious when you cross the street? How quickly do you walk when you cross? Are you ambivalent to the amount of time you have to cross the street, when you have the right of way, and do you walk at your own pace regardless of the amount of time you have to cross, or do you always walk expediently?

The primary influence of my life, my dad, was considerate. Some of the times he was too considerate in my opinion, but the exaggeration shaped me. I have my moments, just like everyone else has moments, but there are some people, and we all know them, that you can just tell are born inconsiderate.  It’s a way of life for these people, as opposed to a momentary slip.

Gene Simmons once said: “Most people are not very interesting.” What Gene probably meant to say, I believe, is that most people are not very attractive. Interesting is, of course, relative. What is interesting subject matter to one person can be dreadfully boring to another and vice-versa. Reading through some of Gene’s books, and listening to a number of his interviews, I’m willing to put money on the fact that Gene finds attractive women interesting, regardless their subject matter… Especially those attractive women that find the subject of Gene Simmons interesting.

On Alec Baldwin’s radio show, NBC News host Brian Williams said that he believes his political opinions have been cleansed from his reporting.  Brian Williams has been known to deliver such lines, in the guest appearances he’s made on 30 Rock and on the Late Show with David Letterman, with such an excellent dead pan that it’s impossible to know when he’s kidding.  For further clarification, some of us wish we were back in the 70’s when laugh tracks were the norm.  We find the fine line between comedy and tragedy too confusing at times.

In a line from Simon Vozick-Levinson’s Rolling Stone review of Thom Yorke’s Atoms for Peace, Levinson writes:

“Thom Yorke hates being predictable more than anything except maybe climate change.”

YorkeIf the rhythm of this line sounds familiar, it may have something to do with the author of the quote co-opting from those old Superman lines used to promote the corporate sponsorship of that show:

“If there’s one thing Superman hates more than crime it’s tooth decay, and to fight tooth decay Superman uses Crest.”

The only difference is that the author was presumably serious.

Answering questions directly can be a problem at times:

“Does (something) stress you out?”  This is a question that we humans seem to enjoy asking of one another, regardless of the topic.

“Yes, it does,” I answered.  The answer that I provided was so direct, and clipped, that the two of us stared at each other in silence for a second.

“How does it stress you out?”

I then describe for them how this stressful situation affects me.  I am very matter-of-fact in my description, for I know that I’m walking into their net when I do so.

“Well, that’s what happens,” is the smug answer.  “If you didn’t expect that, you shouldn’t have gone down that road.”  They then laugh smugly at my naivete with that response.

“Wait a second,” I say, “You asked me two direct questions that I answered directly.  I knew the answer to the question, but how do you get to be the smug one?  Do I have to qualify every answer I give, or can some of it be assumed?”

Inconsiderate in the Checkout Aisle

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Are you inconsiderate? How inconsiderate are you? Are you one that is momentarily inconsiderate, or do you have bad habits? When you’re at a grocery store, and you need a moment to discuss the needs of your household with your significant other, do the two of you wallow in the middle of aisle during this discussion, or do you create a pathway for any possible oncoming shoppers? How considerate are you? Are you one that waits until the need for a pathway arises, or do you prepare for this eventuality beforehand? How many people have to say, ‘excuse me’ to get by you? Are there moments where this has happened, or is it an event that occurs whenever you’re at a grocery store?

Whenever a discussion of ethics arises on TV, or in literature, the audience is usually subjected to larger questions. How concerned are Americans with the world at large, are Euros so self-righteous that they think they’re better than most other countrymen, and what of the societal ethics regarding cell phones? Are Americans becoming more inconsiderate on the street, in their cars, or in their everyday life? These discussions are all very macro, and as such less interesting to me. I think we can get a better gauge of humanity, and their ethics, in the seemingly inconsequential manner in which we conduct ourselves in a grocery store.

When we’re at work, or church, we’re usually on our best behavior with the fear that the boss might see us at our worst. When we’re in bars, or sporting events, our behavior is usually altered to some degree, but when we’re at a grocery store, we are who we are, and the interactions we have with strangers define us.

The grocery store can be a breeding ground for selfishness and self-involvement, in that the only reason we go there is to satisfy our personal needs. It does require some effort, therefore, to avoid focusing too much on ourselves, and to remain considerate of those around us.

We’re all going to have moments in supermarkets, just like in life, where we slip up and become inconsiderate. When you’re discussing the benefits of beef broth and mushroom soup to your next meal, you and your significant other can get so caught up in that discussion that you momentarily lose track of the world around you. Some of the times, the two of you have to be shaken out of that world by a fellow consumer trying to get by, and if this happens to the considerate they are embarrassed by the momentary slip up, and they quickly move to rectify it with apologies.

There are others, and we all know them, that seem to be born inconsiderate. It’s a way of life for these people, as opposed to a momentary slip up. They’re the ones that walk gingerly through cross walks, ignore a person that’s speaking, and place their cart in the middle of an aisle while reaching for the peas. These people can be immersed in the broth/soup conversation, be jerked out of the conversation by a passerby, and continue that conversation while apathetically moving their cart aside ever so s-l-o-w-l-y.

Even these annoyingly ambivalent and methodical shoppers can be redeemed, however, if they know the regimented process involved in the checkout aisle. We also understand that some discussion is necessary when two people are making choices for a household, but that doesn’t mean that we are any less frustrated with you. It can all be forgiven, however, when you have made all of your selections, and your focus is acute in the checkout.

Anyone that has achieved the age of—to be generous—thirty, knows that there is an order to the manner in which a customer moves through the checkout aisle. Some of us have watched our elders and learned of the considerate order, that allows the consumer to make his stay in the checkout aisle a smooth, orderly, and quick transaction. This order is very regimented, to the progressions you physically make through the aisle, and onto the manner in which you prepare to pay. Those of us that have paid attention to our elders, and all the precedents we have witnessed with other customers, know this order. We may not expect every customer to follow this order down to the regimented progressions through the aisle, but when we see an example of the opposite, we grow impatient and frustrated with their inability to follow the codes and standards of our society.

To paraphrase Ice Cube’s line in Boyz in the Hood: “Either they don’t know, don’t show, or don’t care about the standards of the grocery store checkout aisle.”

How prepared are you for the total, when that cashier calls it out? If you’re writing a check, how much of it is written out before the total is given to you? Do you have your billfold in hand, if you’re paying cash, or are you one that waits until the total is called out? If you’re one of the latter, what did you think was going to happen? Did you not consider the fact that you would have to eventually pay, or were you simply not thinking?

I find cash to be the most considerate method of payment available to those waiting behind you, and I usually have a hand in the billfold ready for the total to be called out. I’m also, usually, within one to two dollars of the total. About the only inconvenience experienced by those behind me is the change thing. If I have an opportunity to get rid of some change, I will always do so. Some of the times, I will count my change beforehand, to know how much I have versus how much I may need, but most of the times, I am (unfortunately) totally caught off guard by the fact that I can dispense with some change in this transaction, and I will fish around in my pocket for any change that I have. It’s a minimal inconsideration, but I still have to put a checkmark by this if I’m going to be honest and objective on my consideration list.

I have little to no problem with you debit card people, as long as you know the process well enough to know which buttons you will be required to punch through without too much pausing, or too much instruction from the cashier. Most debit card people are caught off guard by the “change” question at the end of the debit card machine’s algorithm, and I’ve thought more than once that we might all be better off if this question were placed at the beginning of the algorithm, so that people are more practiced in that part of the process.

Other than my personal problems, involving dispensing with change, my progressions through the checkout aisle are honed and polished. My conveyor belt progressions are impeccable. For, not only do I push the items as far forward on the conveyor belt as possible, but once the checker has reached the halfway point in my number of items, I am halfway through the aisle. This halfway point places me in a perfect position to reach any items that the cashier might not be able to reach, and it makes me available for questions that she may have. At the point when she only has a few items left, I am at the little check writing outcropping, with cash in hand. This allows the person behind me to move forward so that they can push their items as far forward as possible, and prepare for their checkout.

Those of us that have studied the protocol, and understand it well, want no praise for our actions. We do not do it for the glory. We understand that as others drift through life, on the lookout only for the inconsiderate, they will accidentally ignore those of us that follow the procedure. If those same people watched us, and learned from us, and copied our procedures, we would consider it the greatest of all compliments, and we believe that it could leave a trail of ease for the rest of humanity that move through the checkout aisle.

We’re all going to experience some problems in the checkout aisle. Some of the times, we’re going to have to have a price check, and some of the times the verdict on those price checks are not going to go our way, and we will have to put some items back, and some of the times we’re going to have coupons that slow the proceedings, and some of the times the unexpected will arise that causes a severe delay in the lives of those behind us. Some of the times, all we need to do is apologize, and all will be forgiven. It may not mean much to those of us that have already reached a pique of frustration with humanity, as it usually does nothing than add an exclamation mark to the swear words we have in our head for them. We will accept their apology, however, and move on, knowing that that person has done their best to be considerate, and they have thus eased the suffering that I think they should be experiencing for their malfeasance.

Linda Ronstadt rejects the need for more fame: The Hall of Fame

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It’s not anything I’ve ever given a second thought to,” Linda Ronstadt says of being elected to Rock and Roll’s Hall of Fame,  “I never thought of myself as a rock ‘n’ roll singer.  I’ve thought of myself as a singer who sang rock ‘n’ roll, who sang this, who sang that.

“I remember one of the guys at my record company asked me once if I would induct somebody into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, and I said ‘I really don’t like going to things like that.’  And he said, ‘Linda, you have to do it if you ever want to get inducted yourself!’

“I said, ‘I don’t care if I ever get inducted,’” she said. “That was a long time ago—in the ‘80s, and that was the last I ever thought of it.”

Ronstadt‘Heretic!’ the rock and roll intelligentsia is probably screaming.  ‘She’s lying!  She’s a witch!!  Get her!!!’  Some, more reasonable Americans, are probably thinking that her ambivalence toward induction has something to do with the fact that she can’t sing anymore due to her Parkinson’s disease diagnosis.  Others might think that Ronstadt fears that she won’t match up to other inductees, under this most, scrutinizing spotlight, but most are thinking that it’s just not rational that a living, breathing human being would leave any amount of fame on the doorstop before entirely fading away into obscurity.

How could you not be intoxicated by the fame a Hall of Fame induction might bring you?  Isn’t it every person’s dream to be enshrined in such a manner.  Isn’t that why you did what you did.  Doesn’t it put a punctuation mark on your career?  Are you lying when you say that you don’t spend every moment of your existence remembering your glory years?  Don’t you want to have your legacy properly placed alongside your peers?

It’s not enough, for some, to simply have their songs still played on radio, it’s not enough for them to know that they have had some form of artistic impact on millions of lives.  They want more.  What is more?  What you got?

Even though the brunt of their careers are now thirty years past, most artists still want more.  They still have agents, and public relations guys, and they are immersed in this competitive desire to have more fame, more money, more recognition, or more of ‘what you got’ than their generation’s peers. We’re so accustomed to every artist clinging to their moment in the spotlight that when one artist steps forward and basically says, “Enough.  I’m ready to move on in life,” we consider them to be either dishonest, or driven by an unseen agenda that we have to unearth to reveal them as the freaks they have to be.

I think it hurt Linda that she didn’t write (her own songs),” said one longtime Hall of Fame voter who asked not to be identified.  “Unlike (others), (Ronstadt) was viewed as a popularizer of songs, which isn’t as valued in the rock tradition as the pop tradition.  She also was more pop in some ways than country or rock or soul, even though she incorporated touches of all that in her music.”

It could have a lot to do with that, say those of us that aren’t attempting to evaluate Ronstadt’s position with an agenda.  It could have something to do with the fact that Ronstadt can’t sing anymore, and all these retrospectives and celebrations bring her feelings of pain and sorrow.  Or, it could have something to do with the fact that (hold onto your bootstraps) she no longer has a desire for unnaturally prolonged fame.

She boils her career down to ‘I sang this, I sang that.’  She said that she didn’t want to be considered the Queen of Rock, when she was declared so in the 70’s, and that she has either lost, or given away, all of the awards she has received in her life.  She then furthered her heresy, by condemning the Rolling Stone (the magazine’s) effect on music when she said: “There was a puritanical attitude about music that reeked out of Rolling Stone: The attitude that only a certain kind of music is hip, that you have to be funky.  Where does that leave Jimmy Webb or Paul Simon or Kate & Anna McGarrigle or so many other great writers whose songs have nothing to do with whether they are hip or trendy or what they’re supposed to be doing this week? People write music from the most personal point of view, and that process endlessly renews itself.”

Music, she says, “Should be about processing your feelings and helping you get through life.”{1}

Taken at face value, most music is simplistically pure, she seems to be saying, but those outside the art form (Rolling Stone critics and writers) bring so many personal agendas, and personal interpretations, and attempts at self-aggrandizement, that what is actually simple becomes complicated with all of these establishment attachments added to it.

Would the Sex Pistols have achieved any fame at all, if Rolling Stone magazine had never existed?  Anyone that was so subjected to the Rolling Stone definition of cool that they actually bought a Sex Pistols album, knows that they were actually pretty terrible, but they achieved worldwide fame on the basis of attitude, and that attitude fit perfectly with the Rolling Stone ethos.  Anyone that bought a Ramones album, based on the never-ending plaudits that every Rolling Stone writer attached to them, to gain their bona fides as a rock critic, knows how limited the range of the Ramones catalogue was.  Ask any Rolling Stone writer about Tom Petty, and they’ll say he was great.  Ask these same people about a similar artist, from a similar era (say Billy Joel) and they’ll point their thumbs down with a raspberry to follow.  Petty was traditional, and Joel was more oriented towards pop music, which Rolling Stone generally rejects as bad.  Michael Jackson, bad, Prince good; traditional rock good, arena rock bad; and punk rock good, heavy metal bad.  It’s the Rolling Stone ethos.

Taste in music is relative, of course, and I’m sure that there are some that actually preferred Jim Morrison’s voice to Freddie Mercury’s, but how much of that preference was personally decided, and how much of it was spawned by the Rolling Stone’s declarations of good and bad?  How many of us dismissed Bohemian Rhapsody as unserious bubble gum pop, that therefore shouldn’t be held in the same category as the more important song The End by The Doors.  You can like Bohemian Rhapsody, in other words, but if you put it on the same level with The End, you’re unserious, and you should be dismissed as such.

The effect this magazine, and American Idol, have had on music is unquestioned, and this is what Ronstadt rejects: “This sort of competition has nothing to do with art.  It’s so counterproductive to put everybody in some kind of category.  That’s got nothing to do with anything.  I just don’t like it. I think competition is really good for horse races.”  She was speaking of the American Idol effect with this specific quote, but the feet of Rolling Stone’s writers can be held to some of the same fires.

In our teens, many of us were confused, on a daily basis, on what we could like and what we couldn’t.  Was it okay to like Michael Jackson back then?  That depends on the mood of the cool kid of the day.  Was it okay to like Kiss?  It usually wasn’t, but there were days when you could catch the right cool kid, on the right day, and find out it was.  Was it okay to like Cindy Lauper and Phil Collins?  That all depended on the motif you were trying to create.  Did  you want to be a kitschy, retro, nerd, or were you seeking good music?  If you truly wanted to be in the know, it was probably safer to put the Lauper CD back and pick up a Patty Smith, or Aretha Franklin CD.

The cool kids that I hung around—those that refused to join the Echo and the Bunnyman, Elvis Costello, and R.E.M, inner circle of Rolling Stone magazine cool kids—faced a quandary with Ozzy Osbourne.  Was he cool, or was he a kitschy cool, cartoon character on par with Kiss?  Most of the high school students I hung out with knew nothing of Black Sabbath, or anything that preceded the bat-biting heavy metal dude.  Once we found out the man had history, transcendental history, it was cool to love Ozzy again.  I was so confused.

I don’t know if the cool kid status, is as confusing today as it was back then, but I do know that for most adulthood allows those insecurities to slip away, like a snake shedding its skin.  I do know that most people start to like the music they like, because they like the music, and they eschew all of the personal, and establishment attachments that are placed on it.  I do know that most adults are confident enough that they don’t need the constant reinforcement that it appears most aging rock stars do when they have their Rolling Stone, classic rock bona fides redefined by the Hall, and they get to feel like cool kids again, until they are so overwhelmed that they are move to tears by it.  Very few of them appear to be so confident, or comfortable, that they are able to opt out of all this foolishness and say, “Okay, that’s enough, let’s all move on.  I’m in my sixties now, and I’m simply tired of reliving all those events that occurred thirty years ago.”  Linda Ronstadt appears to be the exception to the rule, and her public proclamation appears to have reflected so poorly on the others that they need some sort of explanation for this most personal affront.

[Editorial update] Linda Ronstadt was inducted into the Hall of Fame in April 2014.  In the dignified manner Ms. Ronstadt has conducted herself throughout her career, she said:  “I don’t want to seem ungracious, but I’ve refused all comment about this.”

{1} http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/music/posts/la-et-ms-linda-ronstadt-book-parkinsons-rock-hall-fame-simple-dreams-20130927,0,5027737.story