I love this moment because I know what a big deal it is to cross that bridge.  I’ve crossed it a few times, but I usually let someone else lead the way.  That is, I was not often the one to say it first.  I bring this up because this article from The Huffington Post discusses several aspects of love – the fact that it reduces our stress levels, the way it causes us to act toward potential romantic rivals, and the economic pros and cons we weigh out when deciding whether or not to tell another person that we love them.  But the thing that struck me most about it was the finding that men are most likely to say “I love you” first.

This caught my attention because I have a theory about it.  My theory is that in most relationships (not all, mind you, but most) the woman actually wants to say “I love you” first.  She feels it earlier and wants to express it, but resists for fear of her statement not being reciprocated.  Much like most women wait for their boyfriends to propose marriage, we also wait for the man to take the lead in other relationship milestones.

I have no idea why this is.  In point of fact, I’m just theorizing here, so I could be completely wrong, but let’s pretend I’m right.  Why women aren’t more assertive in our expressions of affection?  Why do we wait for the man to say it first?  Is it because we want to make sure that the man has had time for his romantic feelings to fully develop?  Or is it because we fear that we will jump the gun wanting something to be love sooner than we know whether or not it really is?  And if we know it’s love, why aren’t we strong enough to risk our pride and say it?

Love is a tricky business.  Especially in the beginning of a relationship we constantly teeter between exposing and protecting ourselves.  It’s a highly personal decision to tell someone you love them.  We each must choose what’s right for us.  But I wonder about the calculus that factors into that decision.

Late last week I e-mailed one of our regular babysitters (Nanny had plans) to ask if she could babysit Sunday evening while GAP and I went out for our anniversary to our favorite Irish pub for some fish and chips and a set or two of live music.  No problem, she said.  Then on Sunday evening, about 30 minutes prior to her scheduled arrival time I surprised GAP with the news that we were going out and to get dressed.  Six thirty came and went.  I called the sitter and left a voice mail.  I texted from GAP’s phone (people often forget I can’t text…).  And then, an hour later I sent an e-mail saying I assumed she wasn’t coming and could she please touch base and let me know what happened.

On Monday I posted a little recap of our anniversary on our private family blog, and mentioned the failed pub outing in passing.  One of our best friends read my post and inquired if the babysitter in question was (we’ll call her) Amy, because Amy had failed to show up for them earlier in the weekend.  Our no-show was indeed Amy.

We have left many messages for Amy asking her to confirm that she’s okay.  I called the emergency contact numbers I had to check on her, only to find disconnected numbers and outdated voice mail boxes.  I called the university where she’s enrolled and talked to the Dean of Students, whose emergency contacts were no more fruitful than my own.  Another friend of ours checked the Highway Patrol logs to confirm that her name wasn’t listed in any accidents.  It wasn’t.  Then yesterday morning she failed to show up for a fourth friend of mine for a date that had been set a couple of weeks prior.

The long and short of it is this: we’re worried.  She has been watching IEP on an as-needed basis for two years.  She babysits for my good friend at least weekly.  She has never been more than five minutes late.  She has never failed to respond to calls or e-mails.  This is highly out of character for her.  And yet, I’m not sure how far to take my concern.  If she were our regular nanny, or a close friend, or a relative I’d have called the police days ago.  But she isn’t.  So at what point does my well-intentioned concern cross the line into intrusive meddling?

I want to do the right thing.  But I’m not sure what the right thing is at this point.

As it turns out, our health is the product of a much greater combination of factors than merely what we eat and how often we exercise.

While trolling The Huffington Post yesterday I came across this article about how the Mediterranean diet isn’t just about food.  As a longtime disciple of fish, vegetables, and olive oil I was intrigued.   After World War II a group of researchers began the Seven Countries Study, which evaluated the health of more than 12,000 participants.  According to the article’s author, Georgianna Donadio, the study accurately identified that “certain Mediterranean lifestyles and dietary patterns were connected with good health.”  But the study failed to look beyond the food-based components of the Mediterranean Diet and further evaluate the lifestyle as a whole.

“…the Mediterranean Diet is not just about what people eat. It is about the values, habits, relationships, quality of how food is grown and the quantity of how food consumed by these particular groups — not just how or what they eat. … The whole health of an individual is about the physical, emotional, nutritional, environmental and even spiritual components that create our overall state of health. Our dietary choices and habits can be seen as a metaphor of what the overall or whole picture of that individual’s health is expressing. We eat how we think, feel, work and behave, all of which are influenced by our environment, values, age, financial and education levels and even by our gender.”

This explanation got me to thinking about a passage I read nearly a year ago in Malcolm Gladwell’s Outliers.  Gladwell begins the book with a description of an Italian immigrant community in Pennsylvania in the mid-1900s.  The first generation immigrants in the late 19th century kept many of the old country’s culinary ways, but as their roots grew deeper in America they adopted many of their new home’s tastes.  A young physician was alerted to the strikingly low incidence of heart disease and other comorbid conditions and began to study the community.  What this physician found was a dietary and exercise culture like that of any other Pennsylvania community, as was their genetic makeup.  A thorough analysis of the community pointed to the town itself as the source of such good health.  Gladwell points out that it was the transplant of the paesani culture of Southern Italy – the intergenerational families, the civic organizations, the unifying effects of the church, and the neighborly culture – that insulated these people from the pressures (and ailments) of modern life.

These kinds of studies fascinate me.  It seems we are always looking for the short answer or the quick fix.  How easy it would be if the silver bullet to good health were contained in some tiny pill.  How easy it would be (relative to the truth, that is) just to adhere to a regimented diet and exercise plan.  But in today’s world, you know what is hard?  Participating in a community.  (And I’m not talking about Facebook or the blogosphere here!)  It’s hard to reach out to people all the time.  It’s hard to let other people reach out to you.  It’s hard to carve out time and effort for your friends, neighbors, and relatives.

We constantly bemoan the busyness of our lives.  As a working mother this genuinely resonates with me.  But studies and anecdotes like these always grab my attention.  There are incredible health benefits to friendship and community.  We may think that we are just fine going it alone – or even going it only with our immediate family.  But we are likely wrong.

I’ve yet to read a study indicating that strong friendships and strong communities are overrated and not worth the work.  If I ever do, I’ll be sure to let you know.  In the meantime, I think I have some reaching out to do.  Or at the very least, I should go eat lunch with my work friends.  I have to look out for my health, you know.

“Plastics?”

“No.”  He blew right past my joke.  “Robots.”  And then he went on to tell me how we are standing in the doorway of a whole new era of robotics.  I felt like I’d traveled back to the early eighties but still listened attentively while he told me of an article he read about recent advancements in robots.

Then, driving to work one morning last week I heard this piece on NPR about… robots.  As it turns out GAP was not so far off the mark after all.

Apparently there is, in fact, a new wave of robots being designed, built, and actually used in society.  Up to this point most robots (C-3PO notwithstanding) have been utilitarian in nature.  They performed repetitive physical functions like assembling car parts.  They lacked distinctly human characteristics and they presented no threat to our understanding of interpersonal relationships.

However, the nature of robots is changing.  Per NPR robotic babies are being used to comfort the elderly, and robotic nannies are helping look after children.  According to Sherry Turkle, author of Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other, the evolution of robots to fill human emotional needs is cause for concern.  Turkle was interviewed in the NPR piece and commented that the difference between new robots and old robots is that the new robots are, “proposing themselves to substitute for human beings in these more intimate roles.”

Turkle goes on within the interview to explain that the people she has interviewed have expressed interest in robot companions because of the disappointment they experience in other people.  She even told of one woman whose boyfriend was such a slouch that she envisioned replacing him with a robotic boyfriend.

Really?

Maybe I’m naïve.  Maybe it’s all written on the wall in front of me and I’m still not seeing it.  But I just don’t see this actually happening.  There may be a sad, lonely, person here or there who dreams of life with an inanimate companion, but I think that person is the exception.  The reason I believe this is that we know the difference.  (Did anyone else see Lars and the Real Girl?)  We know that programmed affection from a machine is not the same as real affection from a person.  No amount of technological sophistication can change that.

What interests me more, though, is a tangent to the robot premise.  I wonder about the increasingly robotic nature of our relationships with other people.  We keep up via Facebook and Twitter.  We hit Reply All on e-mail threads.  My MBA girlfriends and I try to connect for one breakfast or dinner per month, but even that has been hard now that most of us are mothers of very young families.  Apart from the three colleagues with whom I eat lunch most days, the sweeping majority of my interaction with my friends is electronic.

This is largely due to convenience, but there is also a safety net in mass electronic communication.  If I’m sitting in a one-on-one situation with you I have to be tuned into you.  I have to read you.  I have to respond to you.  That’s a lot of work, not to mention the fact that I could really screw it up.  Conversely, I have an audience of one.  If something I say doesn’t resonate with you, it might hit me hard.  But in the electronic realm we communicate with a panel of friends.  We only have to talk about ourselves.  Chances are good that someone among our online friends will see fit to endorse what we post.  And we only have to respond to people if we really want to.  Most of what we read goes untouched.  We could never get away with this kind of behavior in real life.

I don’t think we will ever rely on robots the way we rely on people.  It just won’t happen.  But I do worry that without practice our interpersonal skills might atrophy over time, and with that atrophy our in-person relationships will become unsatisfying.  The risk here is not that robots will replace people as companions.  The risk is that without practice our social skills become so scant that we might, even if only for a moment, want them to.  And that, to me, is scary enough.

A tweet from Gretchen Rubin turned me onto this Wall Street Journal article about how we divvy up all of the responsibilities within a marriage.  Author Katherine Rosman wisely observes that, “In a coupling of two busy people, it’s inevitable that a marital ledger develops, sometimes spoken, sometimes not.”  She notes that during a week in which she had to work especially long hours her husband put in a lot of time with their two young children and then ponders how much free time on the weekend that earns him.

GAP and I have similar arrangements.  We alternate who comes home by 6:00 to let the nanny off.  I volunteer at the children’s hospital on Sundays, and he plays league basketball on Tuesdays.  There is a give and take to these things.  But in order for there to be a give and take, there has to be some sort of score – some baseline of equality against which we measure.  The distinction here, and in Rosman’s description, is that we have to care more about what we owe than what we are owed.  If I care most about when GAP is in the hole, this scorekeeping devolves into the stereotype we all fear.  But if I worry only about my debts, and let GAP worry about his debts, then we stay balanced without things turning sour.

Rosman tells a story about a recent week when her husband and kids were plagued with the flu, when she did laundry for days on end to keep the germs at bay, when she was dealing with a looming deadline that overwhelmed her, and how her husband helped her through her meltdown to make the deadline.  The morning after the deadline she and her husband were both cranky and tired from having been up late.  It had snowed overnight and the car needed to be scraped.  And she explained:

He could have said — but never would — that I should scrape the car because he had helped me with my story the night before. He never would say that, because that isn’t why he had helped me.

In every marriage, there are things we do for the ledger. And then there are things we do for love.

And that’s what makes the difference.  For all our efforts to keep our marriages balanced, what really matters is that at the end of the day, when we really need each other, we help each other not for the IOU on the other end of the favor, but for love.

What if I were getting paid to be friends with you?

Would that change our friendship?  Would you still want to be friends with me?  Would you still believe that I wrote my posts without influence or bias?  Would you believe that I wrote because I wanted to share something with you and hear your thoughts?  Or does the whole operation become suspect because I might only be writing to you for the paycheck?

I’ve never thought about selling ad space on this site.  For starters, I don’t have the readership to make it worthwhile.  (I like to believe that what I lack in numbers we make up for in substance.)  But more than that, this site is all mine.  It is a reflection of me and an extension of me.  I am beholden to no one here, and that is a rare and precious thing.  Not something I would sacrifice easily.  Many (most?) bloggers start out this way, but reconsider that decision if and when their readership grows to levels that cause them to quantify their lost opportunity.

I got to thinking about all this yesterday afternoon as I read the NYT Sunday Magazine’s article on Heather Armstrong – mommy blogger and writer of Dooce.com.  The article traces her path from her roots as a blogging pioneer back in 2001 to her current status as one of the most successful personal bloggers on the Web.  That journey included the difficult decision to sell ad space on Dooce.

As is the case with many successful bloggers, Armstrong’s decision to air ads drew the ire of many readers.  As the NYT Magazine article points out:

“It is a question that hovers over all personal blogs — if they are based on trust, do you violate that trust by introducing commerce? Readers of personal blogs return again and again for the connection, the feeling they really know the writer — and ads can break the ‘we’re all friends here’ mood.”

The connection.  Like any lunch or coffee date, we come for the connection.  But what happens to that connection in the presence of corporate sponsorship?  Does it atrophy and die off?  As I look at that question I see a correlation, but not a causality.

The blogs I love the most are the ones where I’ve found a connection.  They are the blogs whose authors I can relate to, those whose thoughts provoke me, and whose stories touch me.  They are the blogs whose authors have taken the time to e-mail me outside of comments, or to respond to an e-mail I sent to them.  Simply put, I feel a connection when there actually is a connection.

Almost by definition, this happens only with smaller blogs.  When visitor counts start numbering into the millions (as is the case with Dooce), the blogger simply can’t actually connect with individual readers anymore.  No one has a million friends, and there is a reason for that: it’s impossible.

So about that connection.  I don’t think it dies off because of ads.  I think it dies off because of increased online traffic.  But frequently increased traffic and ad sales come onto the scene around the same time.  Much like anyone in the public eye, the more people who follow you (be it in People magazine or on your blog) the more protective you become of your existing relationships – and the fewer people you’re willing (or able) to connect with in a meaningful way.

I suppose that’s why, of all the blogs in my blogroll, only a couple are “big” blogs.  Like most of you, I’m here for the connection.  For the conversation.  In blogging, as in real life, I’m not friends with celebrities.  And I’m okay with that.  If this blog ever grows to the size that would cause me to consider, even for a moment, selling ad space (unlikely), I will do well to remember why I started this blog in the first place.  In the often-divergent world of quality and quantity I hope I’ll always be smart enough to choose the former.

Last night, while he did disagree with my perspective, his larger objection was with my approach.  He felt that I was parroting a refrain that has been exhausted in the national media, without taking the time to consider it critically or to look at the other side.  He was right.  His criticism stung then (it still does) but I have a greater appreciation for it this morning.

So I come to you today with half a post, but not half a point.  We should all exercise careful judgment when choosing the people whom we allow to assert their influence over our beliefs and actions.  But once we’ve made those choices we should hear what our counterparts have to say, even when we don’t like it.  My conversation last night was certainly one of those times.

My original post will be published at some point, once I’ve researched it further, based it in fact rather than anecdote, and broadened my perspective to represent other views.  In the meantime I am thankful that GAP (a bit like Mrs. Elliott) reminded me that I am capable of more.  It seems that these are lessons we must learn more than once in our lives.

GME was one of the most honest, curious, and lovely people I have ever known.  She is a testament to what this blog is about, and was a role model for me as I transitioned from a late-blooming adolescent into a grown woman.  And so it is that today I dedicate this post to her, and just a few of the reasons she will be so dearly missed.

She raised five kind and generous children, one of whom is my mother-in-law, who in turn raised six kind and generous children, one of whom is my beloved husband.

She had a passion for music and raised a family of carolers.  In keeping with their tradition that was founded back in the ’50s and ’60s her kids take their own children caroling to nursing homes (a massive group of nearly 30 now) every Christmas.

She was a reader.  Any time we visited her she asked GAP what he’d been reading (inevitably something political and challenging) and would ask to borrow it.  In turn, she would make margin notes in anything she read and would pass it along to GAP when she finished so they could discuss it.

She loved rain.  As a farmer’s wife she loved looking out the window to see darkening skies because it meant that her hardworking husband  could not go out into the fields and would instead be at home with her.

She was stubborn and humble.  In her later years as many of her grandchildren were getting married she was unable to walk down the aisle as part of the formal processional without the aid of a wheelchair or walker.  So she made sure that she was seated before the ceremony started so as not to draw attention to herself.

After September 11th she was curious about Islamic extremism and how it evolved.  Rather than plunge into day over day of cable news she ordered a copy of the Koran and read it to gain a better understanding of the religion itself and what might have prompted those men to do what they did.

She had eyes that sparkled with life.  No matter how many years her skin betrayed, her eyes were young until the very end.

And, all she wanted out of life was for the people she loved to be happy.  She hated all manner of sadness and was not one to indulge in it under nearly any circumstances.  And so it is that tomorrow’s service comes with strict instructions.  It is to be short.  It is not to be sad.  Men are not to wear suits.  We are all to wear bright colors.  And there is to be pizza afterwards.

GME was not perfect.  But she came awfully close.  Between life and death she chose the better option, but she will still be acutely missed for a long time.  I am thankful that I will live the rest of my life as a member of the family she raised.  Her life and beliefs will be imprinted on my own for the rest of my life, and I am better for it.

I was reminded of this last night.  We arrived at my in-laws’ house late in the evening.  After sleeping in the car IEP was eager to play for a bit prior to being put down.  Our bedtime routine includes a handful of books each night, followed by IEP curling up in GAP’s or my lap, rocking in the glider, and being sung to for a few minutes.  Last night my mother-in-law (E, for those who are frequent readers of comments here) was up to bat for bedtime duties.  As I listened on the monitor I heard her sing “Bless this House” to my baby.  It was the song that her family ended all of their caroling stops with so many years ago.  And it is the song that the entire family will sing together at her memorial service tomorrow.  It was late, she was singing quietly, and her typically strong voice cracked in a few places.  But I could hear GME coming through loud and clear.  And I was thankful, once again, for this woman whose life is now intertwined with mine forever.

Earlier this week an innocent stroll through the New York Times Sunday Magazine led me to this article on the correlation between headphones and hearing loss.  Apparently the number of teens with some hearing loss has climbed 33% since 1994.  Earbuds, which have become significantly more popular since the launch of the iPod nearly 10 years ago (has it really been that long?), are particularly bad offenders as they block out less background noise prompting users to listen at higher volumes.  It seems that the same man who gave us the chance to conduct our lives to the tunes of a personal soundtrack is also slowly whittling away at our eardrums.  Steve Jobs giveth, and Steve Jobs taketh away.

However, worthwhile a topic as hearing loss is, there was actually another side-effect of headphones that I found more intriguing, namely isolation.  In today’s world earbuds are ubiquitous.  We see them everywhere.  On the subway.  At the gym.  I even see them on people walking around my office during the day.  But what does this little accessory say to other people?  If you go about your life with earbuds forever in place, what is the net effect to our culture?  It prohibits a shared experience.  It mitigates conversation.  And it sends a big visual signal that you are off limits to those around you; that we are off limits to each other.

I have sat on both sides of this fence, and so I struggle to say what is right and what is wrong.  I have sat next to overly talkative people on planes and been grateful that my big headphones (my ears are too small for earbuds…) signaled to the intruder that I was not an appropriate recipient of their chatter.  I have also tried to approach someone at their desk in the office and been frustrated that I was forced to “interrupt” their personal concert to ask a work-related question.

As I think about it I believe there should be some social code surrounding headphone usage.  It’s taken us years to get there, but I think today most people understand the do’s and don’t’s of cell phone etiquette.  Not all people follow them, but we at least have a common understanding of what they are:  Don’t talk loudly in a public place.  Don’t constantly check your phone while someone is trying to have an in-person conversation with you.  If you have to take a call in the middle of a meal or a meeting, excuse yourself first. And so on.

The problem with establishing such a code for headphones is that their usage is, by definition, silent and unobtrusive.  But silent and unobtrusive carry burdens of their own.  We are social creatures.  We live in a society of shared experiences.  If we all self-select out of the collective, what does the collective become?

The NYT article suggests that in 2011 we all unplug from time to time; that we listen to music together.  If we did that a bit more frequently I suspect we might be exposed to something new that we like.  Or we might have an interesting conversation about it.  Walking through your day with a “don’t bother me” sign hanging from your ears might be appealing from time to time.  But if it becomes our default I think we all lose.

This man is usually all business, so it was refreshing to hear him speak so candidly about his personal life.  Since he was a bit older (40-ish) when he married, embedded into his story was the following synopsis of how his selection criteria in a potential wife changed as he aged:

When I was in my early twenties I thought, “She’s beautiful.  And I love her.”

When I was in my mid-twenties I thought, “She’s beautiful and she’s funny.  And I love her.”

When I was in my late twenties I thought, “She’s beautiful and she’s funny and she’s smart.  And I love her.”

When I was in my early thirties I thought, “She’s smart and she’s funny and she’s rather pretty.  And I love her.”

When I was in my mid-thirties I thought, “She’s smart and she’s got a solid career and she’s funny and she’s really somewhat attractive.  And I love her.”

When I was in my late thirties I thought, “She’s level headed and I enjoy her company and she’s not altogether bad looking.  And I love her.”

And when I hit 40 I thought, “This is really someone I can work with for a long time.”

I suppose if I were this man’s wife and I wanted to choose the most objectionable interpretation of his story I could be offended that he seems to be implying that it was only after he lowered his standards six or seven times that he found himself interested in marrying me.  But having heard his little litany firsthand I can vouch that this isn’t how he meant it at all.

Rather, what he meant to convey was how foolish we can be in our youth.  When we are 22 appearances are paramount.  But by the time we turn 30 we need more.  We need someone we can relate to, someone who can have a conversation, someone who is fun.  And as we age further we need more still.  We need compatibility.  Give and take.  Balance.  Trust.  Fulfillment.  And a thousand other things that mere beauty can’t deliver. 

If you think about it his standards actually increased over time.  Finding a beautiful man/woman?  Not so hard.  Finding a man/woman you want to build a life with?  A Herculean task.

What I find curious about this little phenomenon of evolving tastes is that it takes us so long to figure out what really matters.  Do 20-year-olds not care about a decent conversation?  Do they not care about a good laugh?  Do they not care about common interests and values?  Or is it that at such a young age the need for real compatibility seems so far off that in our youth we indulge ourselves in the qualities we know can’t matter as much when we start to look at “forever”?

I like to think that I had a better-than-average head on my shoulders back then.  In retrospect, I know I didn’t.  So I suppose the fact that I ended up with a handsome husband is either a function of dumb luck or hard work.  Actually, I think it’s a bit of both.