Few things make a post, I suppose.

[silveradept]

• I'm starting to edge toward my seasonal...maybe not depression, but I'm definitely feeling more down than usual, and I think it has to do with the clustering of the harvest holidays at the end of the year. The sorts of holidays where you go feast with friends and family and celebrate making it through again.
  
  Something is twisted around in my psyche such that it assumes, essentially, that everyone already has plans, has their guest lists set, and they haven't invited me because I'm not really a person they know well or not a good enough friend to invite to the table. (And furthermore, it only counts if the invite comes without prompting or suggestion, because then they feel guilted or obligated.) That was likely a bad conclusion drawn while I was with someone else, because that other person was probably the reason for the lack of invitation. But I think I start feeling it a bit more around these times, because it's one more way for me to try and convince myself that I'm A Failure at adulthood.
  
  Reality checks appreciated.


• A person came to the library today and wanted to know if they could register to vote here. My state does online registration and in-person, so it seemed like it would be an easy situation. Except that they had just moved, and the cut-off date for online registration was a few days ago. They could still go to the county seat and register in person for a few more weeks, but this person didn't seem inclined to do so.
  
  "I just moved here," they said, "so I don't know anything about what's going on, so I don't need to vote this time around, right?"
  
  I reminded them that there were federal offices up this election, so if they wanted to do stuff about Congress, they'd need to register.
  
  Through this entire encounter, they'd assumed reluctant to do anything particularly onerous, and were ready with stories of things like where they were from, they could register at a college, and that because they just moved here, they didn't really need to do anything for this cycle.
  
  They left, likely not going to register, and I find myself torn between two things that I'm mad at. One, the likely lesser, was that this person didn't seem to want to expend any real effort to get registered and vote, and that annoyed my civic sensibilities (and the part of me that needs people to vote on the library levy) that someone preferred not voting because they would be slightly inconvenienced by registration.
  
  The greater one is "why isn't it easy, or even automatic, to get registered? Someone got their license updated and/or renewed, or their vehicle tabs paid, or otherwise interacted with the government and confirmed the necessary data? Good, now their voter registration automatically updates. Just moved? You're registered as soon as you provide the information needed for your identification card. (And there needs to be ways for the undocumented to be able to participate in the process as well.)
  
  Why do we deny inmates voting rights? Why aren't they automatically restored at the end of their sentences? Why not be able to register on the same day and cast a ballot?
  
  I know partisan reasons why certain political actors want more or less registered voters, but they shouldn't be allowed to mess with the system, and the sensible default should be that unless someone had a really good reason why they can't, they should be eligible and registered as painlessly and automatically as possible.


• Every public library worker you know has long since learned what the past tense of "shit" is, because they have discovered or had sometime mention to them that someone using their bathroom has done such a thing outside the boundaries of the receptacle designed to dispose of such things. Today was my turn to use the word "shat" in my official request to have someone else's shit get cleaned up off the walls. This is not the first time. It will not be the last. And we definitely don't pay the custodians enough for this.

Comments

[redsixwing]

Something is twisted around in my psyche such that it assumes, essentially, that everyone already has plans, has their guest lists set, and they haven't invited me because I'm not really a person they know well or not a good enough friend to invite to the table.

Ouch. That sucks. :(

That really does sound like a bad conclusion, and with the guilt-or-obligation rider, it seems like it's preventing you from asking for what you want, too. Double ouch!

Can you pry on that part at all? If you can get the desire to be with your friends out there, there's much better chances of someone helping you out.

But I think I start feeling it a bit more around these times, because it's one more way for me to try and convince myself that I'm A Failure at adulthood.

Hey, Silver? You're one of the people I read for level-headed and intelligent analysis. You're a librarian, which makes you a quiet superhero already. You /rock./

Sucks that the person didn't want to take the effort to register. You did everything you could, and it sounds like they really wanted to rationalize their way into not voting this time.

Horse, water, etc.

the sensible default should be that unless someone had a really good reason why they can't, they should be eligible and registered as painlessly and automatically as possible.

I agree. The current method of handling this is bupkis, and it harms people, and harms the legitimacy of the system itself.

What we can /do/ about it, aside from electing people who have an interest in more people voting, I'm less sure.

[silveradept]

Yeah, there's also something that rebels quietly in me about talking about holidays out of order, even those realistically, that's the way things get done, so I might have to change the way I think about them so that they don't trip the part that says "November holidays are forbidden to discuss until November 1."

And some part of it is that it's usually the people d me that have already made plans by the time I start thinking about them, and so I'm used to being pulled along to whatever they had already put together.

As for more people voting, well, those candidates are probably going to be minorities that want more people who have had obstacles placed in their way, historically, to be able to vote. So White people would have to vote for minorities, and the historical precedent on that isn't all that great.

[azurelunatic]

I can agree with the idea that preparations for a future holiday should not take over until it's that holiday's turn, but I think it's within the bounds of kaibu to quietly start projects which have a long lead time while the dominant season is still of another holiday.

Also, there are things which span seasons. I'm preserving some cherries in sugared alcohols, and the proper season to start that is the season when the cherries are most plentiful. The fact that they might be given as Yuletide gifts is not necessarily informing the start date. (And the season of Yuletide nominations has a long lead time.)

Thoughts

[ysabetwordsmith]

>> But I think I start feeling it a bit more around these times, because it's one more way for me to try and convince myself that I'm A Failure at adulthood.

Reality checks appreciated. <<

There are two basic approaches, Ask and Guess. Ask culture assumes that it's okay and expected to ask things, and okay to say no. Guess culture expects people to observe and extrapolate things, because asking is exhausting and saying no is embarrassing. It sounds like you feel more Guess culture, in which case, you need to observe closely to make accurate guesses about people, and hint obliquely that you'd enjoy having someone to spend the holiday with. This is challenging if one has brain weasels.

However! This is exactly the kind of problem that cognitive-behavioral therapy excels at fixing. You can do a lot of it on your own just with worksheets, or you can find a therapist. CBT lends itself really well to short-term treatment, often 2-3 months. Doing it while your problem is "on" is much more feasible than try to fix it while it's "off" at some other time.

Here's an example workbook:
http://www.hpft.nhs.uk/media/1184/cbt-workshop-booklet_web.pdf

From my perspective, I'm Ask. I prefer to talk about holiday plans well in advance. Do you have plans yet? I don't have plans yet and I'm checking with various friends and family to see whose might overlap this year. You know I can cook. Who's available? Where / when do we want to hook up? That sort of thing.

The key is, the sooner you ask about holiday plans, the more likely someone will have open space available. If you're flexible, you can usually get together some time in the vicinity of the holiday. And in today's age, very many people are lonely, who might appreciate someone else opening that topic so they don't have to.

I also like to be specific about what I want and don't want from holidays. Just being around people doesn't do it for me, and I hate being about people who are fighting. I want at least civil discourse, I love cooking and eating together. I'm into decorating cookies, rooms, gifts, and other things. I like shopping if it's not too crowded. When I'm clear about this, it improves my chances of getting at least some of what I want. So think about what you want and ways you could pursue it that wouldn't be too uncomfortable.

>> The greater one is "why isn't it easy, or even automatic, to get registered? <<

Because the people in power don't want citizens to vote, especially citizens who won't vote for them, exactly like the person you spoke to. Barriers lower participation.

Think about it: a person who just moved is TIRED and BUSY. They don't want to make an important decision (e.g. voting) without knowing what they're doing. They don't have TIME to learn all that stuff in a few weeks. When the system itself tells them they're not welcome, they believe it. Most people have had the experience of putting in a lot of effort only to be shut out at the last minute. Where's the polling place? Will it take 10 minutes to vote, or 8 hours? You don't know that until you've done it. So without support, eligible people don't vote.

Me, I know the lever's not connected to meaningful political change. I'll vote as long as it's not too much trouble, but I won't waste energy on something with "statistically insignificant" effect on political activity.

>> Why do we deny inmates voting rights? Why aren't they automatically restored at the end of their sentences?<<

Because they're Black or Hispanic.

>> Why not be able to register on the same day and cast a ballot? <<

Because then more people would vote, and those would be people inclined to vote out the current oligarchs.

[anais_pf]

For what it's worth, I am someone who hosts a reasonable number of dinner parties and other parties (like once a month, though not all the holidays) and there are plenty of people I would love to have at my house who I don't invite because it seems obvious they have other friends and family and there would be no point in inviting them. Sometimes I *do* invite some of those people and they almost always say no, they have other plans. I think I invited 50 people to my NYE party one year, and only the same 10 people who always come, came. If someone I liked asked me what I was doing for NYE I would totally invite them to my annual party. If someone I like asked me what I was doing for Thanksgiving, well, I'm either going to my family's or to my SO's family's, so I can't invite anyone here. But when I used to host Thanksgiving dinner every other year, I might have invited someone who seemed not to have plans already.

TLDR It's not you!

[silveradept]

Oh, that makes sense. Which might make it a question of "I need to think about this earlier if I want to get on people's calendars." It still might be "we've already got plans," but then you know.