What we've all been waiting for...

A poem I came across the other day:

The Quality of Love


In the throws of the affair
I was surprised to learn
I could love two women
With intensity
At the same time
One with whom I’d spent many years
And one recently met

Now
The quality of these loves
Is best described by the difference
In my bathroom behavior—toilet procedure
At home
Though the room was occupied
(my wife in the tub)
when ya gotta go
Ya gotta go—and I always went
But in an apartment near chicago
I would carefully close the door
Run the water
And turn the fan on

During this time
If a doctor had informed me
I had but six months to live
Looking back
I think
I would have chosen
The apartment
For the first three months
But I know now
I would have wished to go home
To die
With someone who knows just
How full of crap
I really am

And an excerpt from the book, Still Life With Woodpecker, by Tom Robbins:

"Albert Camus wrote that the only serious question is whether to kill yourself or not.
Tom Robbins wrote that the only serious questions is whether time has a beginning and an end.
Camus clearly got up on the wrong side of the bed, and Robbins must have forgotten to set the alarm.
There is only one serious question. And that is: Who knows how to make love stay?
Answer me that and I will tell you whether or not to kill yourself."

Who am I? Let me tell you...

In my first ever visit to the social networking site "myspace.com," I learned some interesting things:

• Tash is a 35-year-old single woman. Her faith in God is only paralleled by her love of the Denver Broncos. At this very moment (as I can tell from her recent last login), she is feeling thankful (probably because the Broncos haven't lost yet this week).
  
• "Mizz Tina Marie" is just divorced, even though she's only 21. She lives in Connecticut and is interested in using myspace to find a potential date. She does warn, however, that "I'm flattered that my page is so entertaining, that you come by everyday to see it, and you aren't even on my friends list, can you say STALKER!!!"
• Finally, there's Elvis, 21 and from Bridgeport. One click on his page and Vodka bottles start falling from the top of the page. One of his buddies said that, in a conclusion I have yet to understand, all of the alcohol on his site makes Elvis' profile "gay." Maybe such a comment fazed the young man and pushed him to the bottle. Right now, he's listed as "drunk."

Tash, Miz Tina Maria, and Elvis' profile in no way standout; the three do not provide more information than other people (in fact, they were the first three profiles that I looked at before I got bored). In what the Economist calls a "dictator's dream," people are putting more and more information about themselves on the Internet for all to see. Relationship status, sexual preference, likes, dislikes, groups of friends, telephone numbers, location, status -- listing personal information online is not the exception but the rule. Never before, the Economist continues, has so much personal information been in one place. And people are doing this voluntarily.
Social networking sites like facebook are not the only venues in which information we provide personal information. Each search we enter into Google is saved, possibly forever, so that the company can, at best, market to us better and at worst, sell information to curious governments spying on its own people. (In China, Google has been accused of "collaborating" with the government over search results.)
Each purchase we make with a credit card is stored on company servers. Not only do we allow these people to know what we're buying (which for some is scary enough), but also where we frequent.
Some of these conveniences make our lives better. We just need to make sure that we know precisely the consequences of using these services.

Facebook Fiasco

Well, I've always been wary of facebook, but now I'm wary of our whole generation. So much has changed in the way we communicate with each other, and based on responses I got to an email the other day, I'm convinced that we aren't quite aware of what exactly these changes mean.

The original email is the one pasted below. I sent it to Facebook, and I blind carbon copied many of my closest friends. Instead of outrage, the common response was, "who cares?" Over the next few weeks (not tonight, I'm going to bed), we'll explore first why the changing ways we communicate are so important and second why I'm now shifting from online back to the hand written letter.


To Whom It May Concern,

Facebook disabled my account last night because I would not submit additional personal information about myself, namely, my birthday. I write today so that the operators of Facebook might reconsider both its recent actions and also the overall direction of the site.

Here's the story: for months, Facebook has sought my birthday for “security reasons.” The site placed a yellow box at the top of the "newsfeed." Such a request was fine: I simply ignored it. Last night, however, Facebook's approach became more intrusive: a popup box appeared on each page I clicked. Incredibly obnoxious, I grumblingly submitted to Facebook’s incessant requests by setting my birthday as “January 1, 1910,” making me a young and healthy 97 and eagerly awaiting my 98th birthday. For whatever reason, the site rejected my submission. I then tried a date a little bit closer to my real birthday (how much closer I still will not say) -- “January 1, 1976” -- but Facebook still somehow knew that this was not quite right. I tried again, and again, until I could try no more; Facebook disabled my account. Whether this action will be temporary or in perpetuity, I now inquire.

To what ends Facebook wanted personal information about me, I do not know. Maybe the site will claim that it simply wanted to confirm that I was over 13, the minimum age which Facebook allows membership. But maybe – and much more plausibly – Facebook sought my birthday because such information is useful for, at best, making money and, at worse, because it understands that users’ favorite books, movies, and education, which profiles people look at, their sexual preference, and their religion is information valuable in its own right. What a far cry from the original aim of Facebook, and how very, very scary.

In writing this letter, my goal was to ask for my account to me reactivated. But I am now more seriously considering, especially as new networking sites are born, whether I want to be part of the Facebook community even if reinstated (I think that I do). Kicking me off sets a bad precedent, and worse, makes me -- and I'm sure when others hear about this and other similar actions (and they are already hearing) -- concerned that Facebook is no longer an online social networking community but instead a marketing, money-making, information-collecting machine. We will see whether, if it ever reaches that point, Facebook will even be trusted with a valid email address.

Thank you for your time, and I look forward to hearing from you soon.

Best,



Eli Berman
eli.berman@yahoo.com

Let's Go O's

I'd just like to start this second blog with a little quip I've heard a few times: great men realize when there is a need; true leaders recognize that need and fill it. The phone calls, the emails, and the posts have started rolling in; I'll let you, my closest followers, decide if I'm just a great man or a true leader. And one more thing. You're welcome, all of you, my loyal supporters. Really. You're all welcome, and I'll continue to do my best to serve you (as long as you keep on mailing me those checks).

A few years ago, on the website sta.cathedral.org/~eberman, a young man who called himself "Thunder Thighs" left some disturbing messages on the "town hall" section of the page. Those comments closely mirror the comments (or should we say graffiti?) left on this blog a few days ago. Let's take a look at those un-American, I-don't-support-the-troops words and see if they have any credibility.

From 1918-2003, Boston Red Sox fans claimed that their team was "cursed." I neither have the time nor the desire to rewrite the history of that sorry franchise, but I will mention one thing. Red Sox fans traced that curse back to the sale of Babe Ruth, that famous slugger, to the New York Yankees. The ghosts of baseball, Babe Ruth, or whoever, Red Sox supporters cried, cursed the Red Sox for doing something so very stupid.

But even a quick look at baseball history, any knowledge at all of Red Sox history, completely rejects such a simple interpretation of the past. Anyone who knows anything about baseball knows that the Red Sox were in danger of folding. The money the Yankees gave to the Red Sox for Babe Ruth kept that franchise afloat. There was no curse, ever, there was just a terribly managed franchise. So in four years they've won two championships. Impressive. In 85 years they've won that same amount. Not so impressive. In fact terrible. But not as terrible as the Chicago Cubs.

The Cubs have not won a championship since 1908. Almost 100 years. They have a nice stadium, they had Harry Caray, and they...well I guess that's about it. So in 2007 they had a better record than the Orioles. 1908 says it all.

Thanks for checking in, Dsyntax. I hope all is well with you in Cali. I also hope I've clarified some things for you.

A Falling Tree

Matt Drudge offers links to breaking news; Arriana Huffington offers her opinion on pressing political matters of the moment; others are a lot smarter, funnier, and better writers than I (you don't have to believe it, but I have to say it). I don't know if anything I have to say is enough to generate a blog. So, if you're unsure about whether or not his posting has any value to you, if you're moving your cursor to that red "x" at the top of the page, itching to check out who won the Redskins; game (they probably lost) or Chad's latest profile change (oh my god! he's now "it's complicated") I'm fine with that. If a tree falls in the woods, and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound? Who knows? (And really, who cares?) But you will certainly take comfort--or change that, maybe I will--in the fact that, if I write a blog and you don't read it, it will still be here.

So what can you expect from "Eli in Fairfield?", the new and exciting blog from Eli Berman? Well, I wouldn't expect too much. But if you'd like to stay in the loop about current issues in education, politics, sports, and (of course, last but not least) love, this blog just can't be missed. So tune in, log on, or do whatever young people are saying these days and check out this site. Oh, I almost a forgot. A message to Drudge and Huffington: Watch out. Berman's coming.