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About Me
- Susan Harwood
- It's one of those odd things . . . I live in my little house by the sea and listen to the radio and reckon I know best about more-or-less everything . . . as I keep telling the news-casters, the policiticians and all the experts interviewed there. I shout quite loud - but I'm beginning to suspect they can't hear! Sometimes, I write to my MP . . . but there's always more to say. So, here it is!
BOOK ON A BLOG
THE BRICKS IN THE CAVE - A full length children's adventure story by Susan Harwood - click on the book to read it.
ANOTHER BOOK ON A BLOG
TIMES RHYMES - For people who want to learn 'Times Tables' the easy way!
7 comments:
Are you thinking of anything or anyone specific here?
I could write an essay on this one but in a nutshell . . . I suppose it is just 'easy'. Blame diverts!
Diverts responsibility.
Diverts action.
Diverts attention.
Diverts constructive thought.
Blame is pointless unless it leads to change and improvement.
Rosy
ps going up to Scotland my daughter took the children for a picnic on St Andrews beach ~ I thought of you when she told me!
I'm not thinking of a particular instance, Rosy, but it keeps happening - over and over again there's the idea that, if someone can be found upon whom 'blame' can be laid, the problem (any problem!) is solved.
But it isn't.
That fits in with your 'divert' analysis.
It is often cruel too. Someone makes a mistake. Their sorrow / guilt / distress is made worse by the 'blame' which is piled on them when probably what they need is support.
Putting blame on other people eases our own guilt.
Then, when the 'guilty' person is found - that seems to be the end of it. That person is got rid of and - hey, presto, 'problem solved'!
But how can people learn from their mistakes if the people who make them are made to leave their jobs? How can an organisation improve if the only 'brooms' there are the new ones?
You ask if I'm thinking of anything or anyone specific and, although I'm not, I also know it is something which has come up in the news during the last few days which got me cross enough about it to put it here as a 'shout'. If / when I remember what it was, I'll come back and leave a note.
St Andrews - the very long sands there are wonderful, especially in winter when you can walk along them almost alone. One day, maybe I'll be able to take my own family there to see them (and to picnic!). It's funny how major parts of our lives happen before we formed our current families so they don't share those experiences. I find it odd to think my husband and children haven't always been there - that there was a time when I did things without them. It's almost as if I expect them to share my memory; even to go back in time and to live it with me.
Do you feel like that?
The trouble with 'new brooms' is that they so often sweep EVERYTHING up - or under the carpet! I think sometimes change is made for the sake of change and no improvement is made at all ~ just a new set of problems.
I'm not sure about memory sharing. My girls have always loved stories of when their father and I were young so I suppose I am always aware of the fact that the tales I tell did happen long before they were born.
My husband died when our eldest grandchild was only 6 months old ~ and there have been another four babies since then!! I was always determined that they should feel as if they knew all about him ~ so I often tell them just little details to make him 'come alive'.
What I do find strange is the fact that my 'youth' was all so long ago! Even the elder daughter is now 29!!
I'm not sure that I have properly answered your question but I have to say I can't imagine what life was like before ~ when I didn't have to worry about them!
Is this a private conversation or can anyone join in?
I like Rosy; she came to visit me once and I've visited her several times; she seems to have gone off me.
But I came to you through her and I've just seen your entry ' Blame'. I think 'blaming ' anyone for anything is often wrong. This blasted blame culture is the cause for nobody ever taking responsibility for themselves and sorting out the mess of their own making.
This is something that can make me shout, not only at the radio.
Cheers, glad I got that off my chest.
Rosy - I think what you are saying about you finding it difficult to realise your youth was so long ago coincides with my puzzlement that my family doesn't share all my memories. It's to do with the conflation of time. My family (my husband and the children bit of it) are so much part of my life I can't imagine life without them. Because I can't imagine life without them, I can't throw myself properly back into a time when they weren't here. It is as if they always have been.
My 'youth' seems like last week.
If my youth was last week and my family have always been here - then we must have lived my youth together.
(!)
A logic of emotion if not of reality!
Susan
Hello Friko. I'm glad you left a comment about 'Blame'.
That's an interesting point. If blame is concentrated in one person, the wider group may be less inclined to take up its own responsibility.
I often feel sorry for the one chosen to 'take the blame'. If something very terrible went wrong and I knew I'd played a major role in it going wrong - I think I would need a lot of support in making changes and in sorting out the mess. Criticism would probably make things work. I can criticise myself quite efficiently without everyone else joining in!
This comes especially to mind when something goes wrong in the child protection parts of the social services. Generally, it seems problems arise when there aren't enough people, or they don't have enough experience, or they do have the wrong kind of training. Rarely does it turn out that the social workers involved have been lazy or malicious. (At least, that's how it appears to me when I listen to the radio!)
. . . and sometimes it's the structures . . . but there again, no-one will have set them up that way with the intention of making things go wrong.
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