Daniel Greene

Category: Lifestyle

My views on politics, religion, health, intimacy, and more

  • Struggling to manage my use of the Internet

    I have struggled to manage my time on the Internet ever since I first got online in 1995. I hesitate to say that I have an Internet addiction, because I don’t like all the baggage that comes with the term “addiction,” but I will say that there are times I spend too many hours on Web sites. And maybe I do have an Internet addiction.

    Lately, I notice — especially with Facebook — that I get pain in my elbow and wrist from so much mouse clicking to follow everyone’s posts. I read all my Friends’ postings, regardless of how well I know them, and I just keep reading and commenting and reading and refreshing pages. There are people in my Friends list that I’ve spent more time with on Facebook than in real life. But no matter what our relationship in real life, I find myself reading everything they post. It begins to seem as though my “best friends” are the ones who interact with me the most on Facebook. Yet that’s insidious, because it doesn’t mean they’re closer to me; it just means they’re on Facebook a lot and they like to interact with people on it. It’s seductive to sit there clicking, clicking, clicking on everyone’s content, yet I have to do something about my overuse strain. I am, after all, a sign language interpreter, and I have to save my hands and arms for work.

    And speaking of seductive, it is so tempting to add all the people Facebook suggests to me as Friends– well, all the people I know, anyway. I never went and added all my friends Friends or anything crazy like that, but I did add almost all the classmates, coworkers, and friends I recognized. It got to the point where I had 378 Friends! As I started following more closely, I realized that I hadn’t even remembered some of my classmates correctly. In one case, I thought I was following a guy who was one class ahead of me until I realized that I was following his brother who was two classes behind me. He seems like a great guy, but the last straw was when he made that “tell me something you remember about me” prompt in his status message, and I realized, well, I didn’t remember anything.

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  • The unacknowledged life is still worth living

    What if I die and no one remembers me? Does it make my life any less valid? I’ve been asking myself these questions lately as I find myself feeling compelled to share my life online.

    When I got a Flickr account in 2006, I felt compelled to publish every good photo I took. In turn, I felt compelled to document my life in photos so I could share those photos — my life — on Flickr. Then I got a Facebook and Twitter account, and I began to feel compelled to share my life there, too. I enjoyed the response, and that drove me to share more. There’s nothing wrong with the impulse to share experiences, but I have to believe that my life is worth living regardless of whether I’m acknowledged for it.

    Maybe I’m having a midlife moment. I’m 42 years old. It’s unclear whether I’ve made a mark on the world. And it’s time to decide whether or not I care. I don’t have kids, my parents are getting older, and I don’t have a lot of siblings or cousins. Who is going to remember me? And does it even matter.

    On the one hand, I am coming to terms with my nature. I need to communicate with others, to create my own expression and share it with the world. Looking at people’s enthusiastic self-expression in social media outlets, I can see that I am not alone.

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  • Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

    Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies
    Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

    I’m making three dozen of these tonight with this recipe:

    Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Cookies

    • Servings: 3 dozen
    • Difficulty: moderate
    • Print

    Ingredients
    • 1 cup butter, softened
    • 1 cup firmly packed brown sugar
    • ½ cup granulated sugar
    • 2 large eggs
    • 2 tsp vanilla extract
    • 1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour
    • 1 tsp baking soda
    • ½ tsp salt
    • 2 cups uncooked regular oats (I used cracked, toasted Coach’s Oats)
    • 1 12-oz package Nestle’s Toll House semisweet chocolate morsels
    • 1 cup pecan pieces
    Directions
    1. Preheat oven to 350º
    2. In a large bowl, beat butter and sugars with an electric mixer at medium speed until creamy. Add eggs and vanilla, beating well.
    3. In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, and salt in a bowl, stirring well. Add oats; stir well.
    4. Add dry mixture to butter mixture and stir until well blended. Gently stir in chocolate morsels and pecan pieces.
    5. Drop by rounded tablespoons 2″ apart onto baking sheets lined with parchment paper (I used wax paper on two of the baking sheets and nothing on a non-stick baking sheet, and it worked fine.)
    6. Bake for 15 minutes or until peaks of golden brown appear on top.
    7. Cool on pan 5 minutes or until firm
    8. Cool further to desired temperature on wire racks.

    (I took this photo in April, but I’m making more of them tonight!)

  • Gift from Andy on our Fifth Anniversary

    Andy got me these new shelves as a “wood” present for our fifth wedding anniversary (the gift of the fifth wedding anniversary is wood). We put them up last night even though our anniversary’s not until Saturday. I really like the way they look with the photos on them!

  • Flying the Rainbow Flag with Pride

    Flying the Rainbow Flag with Pride

    I’ve always been just a little bit of an activist. I wrote research papers in high school about the Nazi extermination of gays and about the Stonewall riots when I was only 16 and 17. I really wanted to learn and teach my history.

    In 1983, when I was 15, I was in my final sex education class (all about sexually transmitted diseases), and they didn’t teach HIV prevention at all. They said they hadn’t received any training about it and they didn’t have a curriculum. They let me stand up in front of the class and teach my peers everything I knew about the disease and how to avoid contracting it / spreading it. Looking back even now, what I said was correct. Less than five years later, the school district not only had a curriculum to teach HIV prevention; they changed the name of sophomore Sex Ed to something like AIDS and Other Sexually Transmitted Diseases.

    I never make a secret of the fact that I love men and chose to spend the rest of my life with one. My husband and I hold hands wherever we go. We enjoy it, and it’s the least we can do to keep pushing the envelope in all sectors of society. We’re here, we’re queer, enjoy it! 🙂