From "How to Be Idle: A Loafer's Manifesto." I mentioned this book the other day and even gave a part of that quote, but now I've gone and bought it and have access to the entire quote, so I wanted to share that. I'm also reading the whole thing, in my idle moments.
The author, Tom Hodgkinson, has written a number of books, and they all seem thematically related. The busiest one is "Business for Bohemians: Live Well, Make Money." Then there's "The Freedom Manifesto: How to Free Yourself from Anxiety, Fear, Mortgages, Money, Guilt, Debt, Government, Boredom, Supermarkets, Bills, Melancholy, Pain, Depression, Work, and Waste" and "How to Be Free." A couple great parenting titles, "The Idle Parent: Why Laid-Back Parents Raise Happier and Healthier Kids" and "Why Ignoring Your Children Will Make Everyone Happier: Or, What to Neglect When You're Neglecting." That subtitle — "What to Neglect When You're Neglecting" — is a riff on the famous old pregnancy classic, "What to Expect When You're Expecting."
I'm avoiding the headlines today.... maintaining the dream-flow.
Anyway, I just bought "Why Ignoring Your Children Will Make Everyone Happier: Or, What to Neglect When You're Neglecting." I feel like my parents had the idea for that book. I read the first 2 pages and see that it takes this D.H. Lawrence quote seriously:
"How to begin to educate a child. First rule: leave him alone. Second rule: leave him alone. Third rule: leave him alone. That is the whole beginning."ADDED: The quote at the top of this post makes me wonder whatever happened to Erik Hagerman, "The Man Who Knew Too Little"? Blogged here in March 2018.
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When I listen to classical music on the radio, for example when driving, there is nothing worse than having my reverie and dream-flow interrupted by the tedious reality of news headlines.
Or when you’re at home eating peanut butter and they run a ridiculous contest like who shot Alexander Hamilton.
It's a long way from WQXR the radio station of the New York Times. The main classical station. The news was given by a serious man at a volume that would shake the house, if you'd set it for listening to the music.
"I used to have three theories on raising children. Now I have three children and no theories."
Dated quip.
You don't have to be lazy or bohemian to avoid news headlines. I like to think of myself as a philosopher, and avoiding news has greatly contributed both to my happiness and my ability to focus on more important things.
I find the main problem with watching news is it gives you a tremendous number of things to worry about with absolutely no ability to do anything about it. I find out little Timmy feeling well in Ohio, what the hell am I supposed to do about that? Drive to Ohio with a piece of rope?
Tom Hodgkinson
I used to go to his bookstore, The Idler, in Notting Hill when I lived there. Oh, it is everything you dreamed it would be! It had interesting books, and places to loaf around, and a little outdoor space. And classes (the bookstore and some of the classes are online!) on grammar or calligraphy or almost anything.
The book group read books about Idling. There were talks at night where you could go listen to authors or poets or photographers. People who wrote about Led Zeppelin or the Spanish Civil War, actors about their roles.
The other people were so fun to talk to, too! I know once my husband and I went and chatted with a fellow American. He was one of the Cowboy Junkies and was visiting his father in law, who brought him in for one of the talks.
It felt like you'd been dropped into the Notting Hill movie.
Thanks for the heads up on this author. All these books sound right up my alley.
In this annus horribilis I’m consuming perhaps one-twentieth of the news I consumed a year ago. I presume someone will alert me if things get really grim, and even then Hillary Clinton will still not be president.
@MayBee Cool!
Google Home blasted us with the urgent headline that Covid cases continued to spike in the US and Trump is simultaneously trying to force school children into an unsafe and unhealthful environment by demanding schools reopen fully. This was from Reuters and was read by a woman with a high-pitched voice. I imagine this latter bit was intended to convey the seriousness and urgency of the situation and my emotions. Mission accomplished, though my resulting emotions were probably not what they were going for.
Ordinarily I skip the news in the morning. I'll usually read (blogs and overnight emails) or listen to music on Spotify. Much better ways to start my day.
“Give me a child until he is 7 and I will show you the man.”
― Aristotle, The Philosophy of Aristotle
For a loafer he seems to be awfully busy writing books.
May I recommend 'The Classical Station' WCPE?
Music all day long, no news. Stream at: http://audio-mp3.ibiblio.org:8000/wcpe.mp3
WUSF is nice too, for jazz in the night, but I have to pause it every hour to skip over the NPR newsbreak which I can no longer stomach.
"Your chaos will do nothing but profit your oppressor." Engaging writer. Thanks for the heads-up.
That’s a great rule if your kid is DH Lawrence.
Since parenting itself has very little effect on how children turn out (e.g.) (completely contrary to Aristotle's baseless slogan), I've often wondered if the the desire to "mold" children is just a holdover from the days of yore when most children died before they reached adulthood, and therefore needed to be protected.
MayBe
Cowboy Junkies were/are Canadian I believe. Great band. Thorazine rock
News is brain poison. To raise self-sufficient, happy, strong, healthy kids, you need to be simultaneously unpredictable and dependable, fair and unjust, strict and easy going, discouraging and heartening, controlling and liberating. Answer questions with questions, forced marches, fishing trips, monkey bars, swings, slides, baseball, swimming, woodworking, home appliance repair, small arms target shooting, yadda yadda yadda.
Free range and helicoptering are absurd endpoints. It's not one or the other, it's both in deterministic chaos
When I listen to classical music on the radio, for example when driving, there is nothing worse than having my reverie and dream-flow interrupted by the tedious reality of news headlines."
You can tell this book is from 2007, since I don't think most, if any, NPR stations play much classical music anymore.
I have five children. The advice I give to young couples is "Have more children and pay less attention to them. They are great to have when they are older." We didn't start that way. We were in fact quite opposite, putting all our focus on raising the first two. When asked if they were in school or home-schooled, we say "both." Then we adopted the last three, and while they needed intense emotional support over the first year, we had learned by then that children do pretty well on their own, just putting some pretty severe boundaries for them at the outside edges.
Let me add that this is because we have learned that it's mostly genetic plus random factors over which parents have little control. Aristotle was flat wrong on that, and we've got an impressive body of evidence over the last twenty years as evidence.
“Give me a child until he is 7 and I will show you the man.”
― Aristotle, The Philosophy of Aristotle"
"Much may be made of a Scotchman, if he be caught young." Johnson.
British bookstores are the best. The people who work there *know* books the way a London cabbie knows all its streets.
I gave up on TV news yearrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrs ago.
I always, always listen to the radio in the morning. Usually NPR. But sometimes, the powerful clear channel WJR 760 AM. The latter is more or less devoutly pro-Trump and is an outlet for the Rush Limbaugh Show.
I never ever watch morning television unless by chance or accident.
Is this an all-broadcasting issue? Radio and tv? Or just tv?
The blurb says that in the freedom manifesto, he recommends a scythe. Lessons from RH.
Or it may have bee in a review. In any case, scything.
Howard said...
News is brain poison. To raise self-sufficient, happy, strong, healthy kids, you need to ...
Have a brain tumor, apparently. I suppose you get them in Basic? Pardon others not following your fine example.
Michael said...
MayBe
Cowboy Junkies were/are Canadian I believe. Great band. Thorazine rock
Thanks Michael! I just assumed. Poor Canadians overseas. Everyone thinks they're Americans.
People mostly watch the "news" to feel superior to other people. If the "news" can make you feel superior to Donald Trump, the most powerful person in the world, that feels REALLY good.
People may tell themselves (and others) they watch the news out of a sense of duty, so they can feel even more superior.
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