Lists about what we love about Hayward, California

1) All the people of Hayward- Together we make this city great.

2) Library – The Hayward Public Library is somewhere where every one can go regardless of age, reading ability or physical ability. You don’t need money to go there or to borrow materials. It has lots of materials to lend and loads of free programs to attend.

3) The Farmer’s Market, gives us access to wonderful fresh low cost produce to keep us all healthy and happy.

4) The schools, community college, university and others places of learning in Hayward give us opportunity for learning and learning and education are always good.

5) The parks where we can have a bit of nature without leaving our neighborhoods.

6) City Hall is new and beautiful, it gives you civil pride.

7) Downtown Hayward. It has loads of restaurants, movie theatre and shops. Right now when some of the shops are not rented ,there is beautiful art in the windows.

8 ) Hayward Arts Council. It produces great art that is often shown for free in Hayward.

9) Sun Gallery, shows Hayward residents all different kinds of art.

10) Japanese Garden, this offers calm, beauty that reflects centuries of traditions

11) Senior centers, they offer so many chances at friendship, companionship and fun learning.

12) Churches and Houses of Worship and spitiruality give us some peace in this chaotic world.

13) Shopping at the various shops and malls around town, gives us shopping therapy.

14) Restaurants that reflect the cultural and ethnic diversity of this city.

15) All the festivals thrown all over Hayward during any given year or season.

16) All the volunteer efforts that fuel great non-profits. This is a win-win situation, it helps the non- profit and it gives to the volunteer as well. Contact Volunteer Hayward or the Library to learn more about volunteering.

17) The Historic houses in Hayward that can help show us our history and other people’s history.

18) The weather that is so good for growing things, letting people walk and enjoy the outdoors and that keeps us content.

19) All the trees and flowers that grow in people’s gardens, wild spaces and all the kinds of in between places but that we get to see and enjoy.

20) The businesses that contribute to the city by supporting the children, the non-profits and the people.

I’ve been learning a lot recently. It’s funny. As an adult, you learn so differently than you did as a child. It’s easier in some ways and it is so much harder in others.

I find that because it is conscious, it is easier. I know what I am learning and I know why I am learning it. If it is for work, it is clearly defined and usually time specific. I need to learn this software program in order to do X by the fifteen of next month. It is a task. it is usually quite contained. I have something I need to do and the software is the way to do it and I need to learn the software in order to get this task done.

When it is for personal use, it is often less defined, less time specific and less clear what, if  anything, is going to be accomplished - but it is still conscious.

I am the one making the decision. People forget that they always have a choice about learning. No one is going to make you learn something. It just usually is that people do not want to live with the consequences of not learning whatever it is that they “need” to learn( at work or in a new relationship).

We rarely chart our process as we learn something new. We just see it in terms of whether we can do what we need to do. Can I send an email with a photograph enbedded in it? (or whatever job we set ourselves to learn). We might learn things that we can’t use today or tomorrow but might need in the future.  It is often an uncomfortable time when we are so acutely aware of what we do not know. It’s something that happens in school so much that we are constantly told what we do not know but in adult life, we can often avoid focusing on what we do not know and stay with what we do know. I am sure we all know people who at a dinner or other social setting just talk about what they know even if no one else shares that knowledge or enjoyment of that topic.

” Let me tell you about the aging process of the Blue Lascar Butterfly of the Burmese Highlands.” This might be right after someone mentioned a new movie called ” The Blood Pool of Knightsend”.

It’s sometimes makes me feel sad when I witness this because the person feels so out of place, they can’t even stay quiet and wait until the conversation comes back to something they do know about and can share in the conversation about.

I am reading a book about adults learning a new language as adults( Dreaming in Hindi by Katherine Russell Rich). The author says how hard it is and then offers studies that back her up on many fronts. Language is one set of skills but anything we learn as adults has a progression.

We talk about the learning curve but when you are actually in a learning situation, it is tough to see that it will all become more clear and that before too long we will be more knowledgeable than we were before.

I say, keep learning, it keeps the brain well oiled. We don’t all need to learn a new language or musical instrument but keep learning. Deal with feeling uncomfortable for the time in between when we do not know anything and when we start to know a little. Rejoice. You are uncomfortable but you are doing a great thing. Keep learning, encourage others to learn as well. It will help us all if we all keep learning.

One of the trials of my moving to California from Massachusetts that I didn’t envision and that no one warned me about was the loss of humor for a while. If you move to a place where you know no one, then you cannot joke. It is as simple and ugly as that.

If I were to attend a comedy club in Iceland where all the comics were Icelandic, I would undoubtedly miss all the really good jokes(This is even if the comics were speaking English which is the only language I understand- and why would a rocking club in Reykjavik have English speaking comics when the audience would be speaking Icelandic?). I don’t know any Icelandic history ( think all the George Washington, Abe Lincoln, George Bush jokes you’ve heard), I’m not proud of this. I know nothing about Icelandic eating habits, (think all the American fusion diet jokes, the as American as Apple Pie jokes). I know no Icelandic authors (even though I hear that they have some good mystery authors( Arnaldur Indriðason -Reykjavik Murder Mysteries 1. Jar City (2004) aka Tainted Blood 2. Silence of the Grave (2005) 3. Voices (2006) 4. The Draining Lake (2007) 5. Arctic Chill (2008) 6. Hypothermia (2009) and Yrsa Sigurðardóttir Last Rituals ( 2005) and My Soul to Take: A Novel of Iceland(2007)).

Think of some stupid joke; a duck walks into a bar. The bartender hands him a drink ( the newest Pomegranate margarita or mojito) and says; “That’s $25.97. How do you want to pay for that? The duck says; “same as always put it on my bill.”

Ok to understand that award winning joke, you have to know some cultural context. You need to know what a duck is, why it is unusual for a duck to walk into a bar, what a bar is, who the bartender is ( and all the bartender jokes) and then you have to understand why the punch line has a double meaning.

Ok, back to me coming to California. All the attempts at humor were in English. But I didn’t know any Californian geography( or distances between towns or cities), history, notables(Herb Caen, the twins), reputations(Why would anyone voluntarily go to Fresno?), institutions( Thrifty Jr., Albertsons, Wells Fargo, Bank of America, Candlestick, the maze, Telegraph, the Haight, Stern Grove, The Greek Theatre.

One kind of humor is repetitive. If I say something like Excusssse Meee (think Steve Martin in the 80s), if I say it repeatedly, in every conversation, eventually it might become funny. It might not, it might become tedious boring and really annoying. If I tell a weird story where something doesn’t make sense but the rest of the story is absolutely normal, that might be funny ( Think Monty Python re dead Parrot or the Council of the Funny Walk). If I tell a story and something truly unexpected happens that might be funny. There are lots of different kinds of humor but a lot of it depends of some shared assumptions. If you are new to a place, a culture, a group of people, you have to be careful of your assumptions and many times you should not assume that others share them.

In the early days here in California, I was struck again and again by saying things I thought were perfectly normal and having people stare at me and say after a polite pause, “What?” Clearly what I had said to them had not been understood as I meant it, let alone as a humorous remark. I would then retreat and answer politely, and go another day without exchanging any humor with anyone. It was fascinating to watch when I would risk another humorous try. I always considered it a mark of true friendship when I knew someone well enough not to have to think before joking. I also found there were definitely times when I would be taken aback when someone would actually joke with me out of the blue. Be it at the grocery store, or in line at the bank (when one still stood in line at the bank).

I have lived in other parts of the world where language divided me from people and the ability to joke, but this move was the first time I was aware of being denied humor simply because I did not know people well enough to joke with them.

It was also a lesson for me in that I do not want to live long without some humorous interaction. I might have to but I always prefer a little humor…

Recently I had a computer set-back. If you work with computers, and I think the majority of people do these days, you will have some sort of accident, mishap, disaster, meltdown, glitch or simply a little oops moment. Mine was that I had over 1500 photos entered into my IPHOTO on my  home computer. They were in various folders all within that same software program IPHOTO. Some were scanned from old photos. Some were silly snapshots I had taken with my digital camera but liked well enough to save. Some of them documented events, like my cousin’s 90^th birthday party. Some of them were simply shots of images I liked. They comprised over 6 years of photographs. In some cases the original photos date from the 1800s (these were the ones that I had scanned in).

A month ago they all vanished without a clue in a single moment. What happened no one knows. I have had a technician look for them but he could find no clue. After that single moment, one has to move on.

Step One. Accept what has happened. My photos are gone.

Step Two. See if someone can help recover what was lost. I thought of a computer technician I know and engaged him to investigate.

Step Three. Accept it if they say the item is gone, that it is in fact gone. He looked and said he could find no trace of my photos.

Step Four. Move on. So not let this loss stop your enjoyment of photography, of working with computers, of life.

I am in step four. I am moving on. I do not yet know if there are copies of some of those photos elsewhere. I will figure that out when I start rescanning photos. I will miss some of the photos which are not going to be rescanned. I will miss some of the images that can not be recovered. It does me no good to mope or to try and figure out some new technician to ask- I have asked the question and gotten it answered by a good, capable technician who looked for the photos. I think that these situations are good mini practices for the big losses in life.

I am sad, don’t get me wrong. I can’t be too sad though. Part of it is my own fault. Did I back up each photo by saving it somewhere else as well as in IPHOTO? No. That is the end of the story. If I had stored each and every image in IPHOTO and also on a cd-rom,  I would have only lost what was stored on the computer, I would be able to reload the photos and go on with nothing more than a few minutes spent importing the photos.

Granted we can not guard against all of life’s tragedies  but with computers we can safeguard our files by saving them in more than one location. Put your files on a cd-rom, or in another application.  I can put my photos in both IPHOTO and simply elsewhere in a separate folder (that is not connected to IPHOTO).

I also want to stress, this loss like the bigger more important losses that are bound to happen to us, is not something to stop us, not meant to end our enjoyment of life, it is simply a way to remind me in this case to be more vigilant in saving my images and to appreciate them while I have them. Of course in life as in photography, the real lesson is to enjoy your life as you are living it, not rely on some printed form of it to substitute for the real thing.

As you go forth, safeguard your work, savor it while you create it, and then if something happens, you will have had the enjoyment of the moment when you created it as well as the memory of your work. Let my story remind you to safe your work before something happens.

One of the things that many of us need help with these days is how to handle the complex situations in life that involve many agencies. For example, if we have an aging parent and are concerned about their future- we have legal questions, we have medical questions, we have questions about their psychological welfare, we have questions about how to rearrange their house if they are staying there, or where to move them to if they can’t stay in their house. The Hayward Public library is here to help you. We are having a program called CARING FOR OUR AGING PARENTS-Locally on Saturday October 10 from 1:00pm-3:00. Various social service agencies are coming to answer your questions. We are going to try to provide most of the  answers you will need. Come and join us, as always, it is free. If you live in Alameda County you can call 211 for any social service question.

Once again, we are trying to provide you with the information you need, when you need it and in the form that suits you.

When I hear people talk about public libraries, many people think of old fashioned public libraries. We at Hayward have really changed into one of the new wave of public libraries. We do many things that help people when and where they need that help. We are always interested in hearing from people who have suggestions of how we can use our tools to reach more people. Do any of you have any suggestions? Would people like tweets from the library? If you answer yes, what kind of information would you want to receive? Someone suggested that appropriate tweets would be only when our plans changed; such as if the scheduled “Lawyer in the Library” program was cancelled for one day but was rescheduled for another. Are there other suggestions?

I forgot to mention the other day one other trick I use to remember what is said to me; I write it down. When I listen to a program on tv that interests me, or if I go to hear someone speak, I take notes.

The actual physical act of writing down what is being said while I am hearing it sends an additional message to my brain that this is something I want to remember. It is yet another way to remember it as well, since now I have both heard it and seen it (as I am writing).

Just one more little trick. I would still love to hear from you about the tricks or methods you employ to help you maximize your gifts and minimize your skill deficits.

I’m back. Thanks for all your great comments. I have to say that I thought SARK’s workshop was great. It is always amazing to see charisma, feel it, witness people feeling so positive towards a speaker. I saw it with Jan Wahl and now again with more interaction with SARK.

I heard about a Myers Brigg type system for people and their preferred form of exercise. It was called the 8 Colors of Fitness by Suzanne Brue.

Ok, what I thought was interesting about this, and how it ties in with SARK, is that we all have ways of being in the world. We all have gifts and deficits. Some of us are great spellers and some of us can’t spell worth a dime. I think it’s not whether you can spell or not, but rather, if you can’t spell, whether or not you have found a way around this skill you are missing. I think it is great to learn how to utilize our gifts and minimize our deficits.

SARK talked about micromovements. She said she had been a procrastinator. She said she has found a system that minimizes that deficit for her so that she can be as productive as she wants to be. She calls it micro movements.

I thought this was great. The Eight colors of Fitness is just a system that might help put you with like-wired people so you stand the best chance at staying with your desired fitness goals.

It doesn’t matter what skill or deficit of a skill we are discussing, I am convinced there is a coping mechanism. If you are not a good speller, there are now spell checks and mobile dictionaries that one can take with you everywhere.

If you are always late, you can set your pda to give you reminders, or an alarm to stay on track.

There is now  an awareness that most of us are not perfect in every regard and that it is unrealistic to think that we are. And, and this is very important, that just because we have some skills and not others, that if we want to, we can compensate for those skills that we do not now possess.

I think this is so much healthier than it was just a few years ago. Now there is an acceptance that we do not all learn in exactly the same manner. There is less shame about being dyslexic, or maybe dyscalculic. People have started to recognize that people are differently gifted.

What I find fascinating and exciting is the coping mechanisms that we discover for ourselves to cope with our deficits.

Sark mentioned this micromovement strategy worked very well for her. She starts a to do list where nothing on the list can take more than five minutes.

To Do :

1.) Go to the closet

2.) Open the closet door

3.) Pick three hangers

4.) Examine the clothing on hanger 1

5.) Make the decision whether to donate it  to Good will, sell it at the consignment store, or keep it.

6.) Rehang it in the closet, put it in a bag labelled consignment store, or Goodwill.

7.) Examine the clothing on hanger 2

8.) Make the decision whether to donate it  to Good will, sell it at the consignment store, or keep it.

9.) Rehang it in the closet, put it in a bag labelled consignment store, or Goodwill.

10.) Examine the clothing on Hanger 3

11.) Make the decision whether to donate it  to Goodwill, sell it at the consignment store, or keep it.

12.) Rehang it in the closet, put it in a bag labelled consignment store, or Goodwill.

13.) Close the closet door and walk away smiling.

That’s a more approachable list than

CLEAN OUT CLOSET!

I would be interested in each of your tricks, let’s share what works with us for getting things done, coping with skill levels and see if we can all win.

I hope you all continue to concentrate on your various creative projects. I’ll be back in a week and we’ll continue on together. Dream. Focus.  Create. Concentrate. Enjoy.Walk. Repeat from the beginning; focus, concentrate, enjoy,create,  walk, repeat…

When I say the library is an oasis, think in the big sense not in the quiet sense. In these days when money is in short supply for everyone, it is a good time to reflect on the wealth of fun and adventure available for free at the Hayward Public Library.

Have you ever heard of Library browsing? This is a great cheap sport. There are no referees, no uniforms and only a few errors that could get you thrown out of the game.

Step 1. You go to your local library, in our case the Hayward Public Library.

Step 2.You pick an area to explore. Let’s say fiction. That’s always fun.

Step 3. You start at a random letter and you look at the shelves. This means you aren’t looking for a particular book. You’re not checking to see if War and Peace by Leo Tolstoy is in. You are simply browsing through the Ms to see if anything appeals.

Now since we have little space and many books, all the titles are showing only their spines. That makes it hard to see enough to judge a book by its cover. This is where the fun comes in.

Step 4. pull out a book, examine it, read the back cover or the inside cover blurbs. Open to a random page and read a paragraph or start at the beginning and read the first page. Does it capture you? Are you interested? Have you ever thought about this as a book to read? The great thing about the library is that you can take it out and try it. If you don’t like it, simply return it the next day and start again.

I can’t tell you how many great authors I have found this way. At a book store, sometimes there is a table of fiction all lying face up and you can browse by covers. This is called marketing and we only have the room to do that with the newest books. In Hayward, we have these set aside in a bookcase near the front door so you can see them as you walk in. new books are fabulous but I would say, do not forget the books that are a little older. They can represent hours of fun without having to wait in line.

We have some other aids to help you in your browsing, we have little stickers on some of the novels. There is one which identifies that the author is African-American, one that identifies the author as Asian and one that identifies the author as Latino/a. These are simply to help you before you pull the book off the shelf to examine it.

We have a separate Mystery section, ditto Science Fiction and Western. We don’t have a separate romance section since isn’t romance a part of almost all of our lives?

If you discover an author who has written a series, we (Librarians) can help you find the other books in the series and how to identify which books come in which sequence.

This same sport can be played in any of the sections of the library including the non-fiction, the audio books, the music CDs, the movies(either video or DVD) and even the EBOOKS.

If you don’t know about the EBOOKs; let me explain them a bit. They are a resource that you sign up for inside the library. Then at home if you have a computer that has internet access, you can access a book that will display on your computer. At home, you read the entire book on your computer screen. These are often used when the entire book doesn’t need to be read but simply a portion has to be referred to for research or other specific non-fiction research. You might have heard of the Amazon.com KINDLE. That device is for EBOOKS. It is a stand alone product. We use your computer so there is no expense  incurred by you using our EBOOKS, as there is with the KINDLE and the books downloaded onto it.

We also have downloadable Audio books that you can access through your computer at home if you have signed up inside the library. These you would listen to at home through your computer and it’s internet link or you can transfer them to an MP3 device.

 Enjoy the Oasis, it is an island of amazing in this land of gloom and doom. Enjoy the American Free Public Library. I know I do.