Expressing opinions

I quite enjoyed a link that was suggested to an excellent blog called “World Scott” that I’ve been reading; and MJ has worked on her home page and added to her blog and that’s been inspiring too… Great, deep, thoughtful expressions of strongly held beliefs.

I’ve been nervous all along about my own commentary – wondering if I should simply stick to the everyday stuff that I just have fun with, and try to make ‘fun to read’ as well – but I am so interested personally in other people who express themselves boldly and unequivocally that I’m trying to talk myself into moving steadily in that direction myself; make myself more comfortable with actually expressing, not just holding strong opinions. (Not that I’m done with pumpkin pictures and turtles and other ‘observations,’ mind you. This blog has been a means of connecting with family and friends by at least half, and will continue to be.)

My father was a ‘bold opinion’ man, and I grew up – I’m embarrassed to admit – cringing at that! I would just know that the person he was about to pontificate to wasn’t going to agree with him, and I’d silently wish he’d just keep to some neutral subject. I guess I don’t like conflict… And I also grew up in a small church environment where every year there was a Congregational Meeting where everyone had strong opinions about the most ridiculous stuff – I’d be mortified and literally shrink down in my chair to think that someone – anyone! – could make so illogical or irrelevant or just-plain-silly a point, in public, as some of those people did. And having lived in a small town in Alaska for so many years, I was involved, reluctantly but necessarily, in school board and city council meetings that more often than not would result in some pair of combatants "stepping outside to settle this.” Now that’s mortifying!

My husband has strong opinions about practically everything and I disagree with the extreme-ness of them often, but equally often agree with the underlying principles, once I disassemble much of the radical rhetoric and often inflamatory 'bent.' Having been also married too long to a man who could only talk about the weather and sports, I am hopelessly attracted now to people with strong, viable, rational, compelling opinions on practically everything. Even when they make me feel uncomfortable and ‘inadequate.’

I long ago found that ‘liberal’ politics lends itself to quick, easily memorized ‘sound-bites’ that make a political discussion pithy and successful. It is hard to argue, in the short term, with the humanitarian, noble sounding rhetoric of the political left. It is so very simplistic. My opinions are based on more layers of reasoning – and are harder to make understood in the 30-second cocktail party sort of conversation. They are based on years of reading, observing, questioning, rationalizing, and ‘following the money’ sort of conclusions. I can’t make a point about them briefly at all. My liberal friends lose interest long before I can even come back to their original discussion! And now that 'right-wing' politics have gotten so far off from what I believe, I can no longer even label my views with a known identity.

But I’m going to keep trying, occasionally, and hope that those of you who are reading my blog for the pumpkin pictures will humor me and hang in there too – there will still be plenty of that sort of thing!