Searching for my civic life

Happy New Year, everyone! Maybe I'm lazy, but I seldom think about what I want to do, or maybe more precisely, how I want to live in the new year before it arrives. I have come up with no resolutions or list of things to do. No goals, and underdeveloped expectations. As the year turned over, I did acknowledge that I have an itch, however, to get more involved in civic life. In general, I invest my time in work, family, friends, and managing my household of 1 (plus 2 cats). These are all important, yet I face a fear that I will eventually have no voice in the world if I don't start paying attention to what's external to "mine" and participating in community life.

I live in New York City, on the Upper West Side. I like this neighborhood for many of the obvious reasons -- great restaurants, shopping, architecture, access to parks, access to transportation. I like New York because it's an international city -- a place where each and every person is free to be whoever they are without being an outcast. The anonymity of the big city is comforting. I may run for the bus, arms flailing like a fool, and no one will notice or laugh at me for it. I sit on the subway and notice the people across from me, as they notice me. We stare and contemplate each other as the train rumbles on. Sometimes we judge as we look through each other; other times we cast empathy with our gazes. We keep quiet, and ultimately, we let each other pass without requiring anything of one another. To me, this social spaciousness is peaceful. I also like being here because it's familiar. My grandparents have friends who live nearby, so when I came into the city as a kid growing up in New Jersey, this is one of the areas I'd see. I feel like I'm living in one of my childhood storybooks. How romantic.

So here I am -- a single, professional New Yorker with a good job, a nice apartment (but no mortgage), and no dependents. Aside from whatever books and computer equipment I purchase, and whatever I give to charities, I have no tax deductions. And as April 15 approaches, I will, no doubt, feel the blood letting. The tax code, of all things, makes me feel disconnected from our society – a signifier of my role in the machine: money comes in, money goes out. There is so little that I do in my life that is recognized as a need or a contribution. I know I'm fortunate, but I also ask -- am I an island? am I frictionless?

I refuse to accept that notion. The first thing I did to investigate a more explicit connection to my community is look up the community board web site for the Upper West Side (http://www.cb7.org/). I spent about an hour reading through the site. Maybe I can get involved with this? One look at the meeting agendas and I thought -- maybe not, or maybe not yet. Most of what I saw was about reviewing applications for building permits and the like -- something I know little about. For now it's enough to understand that this organization is there and generally how it works.

With the U.S. presidential primary season roaring, I looked next to find a group of supporters for my favorite candidate. I found them on Meetup.com, and I attended a meeting. I didn't immediately connect with the tone and style of the group, but tried to keep my eyes wide as I experienced, for the first time, what it's like to come together with strangers around an objective. It was interesting to encounter this heterogeneous group of people. I could credit Meetup with bringing us together, but I suspect that the Community Board also sees people of all shapes and sizes pass through. It made me ask myself, though, if this was what I was looking for when I set out to get more involved with the community. I couldn't help but predict that when the primaries are over -- or perhaps even after Super Tuesday, that this group would disband. A collection of people with a common objective does not, in and of itself, a community make. Yet the fact that we all are also dedicated supporters of a person, who happens to be running for president, because of the values and ideals he embodies gave me a sense that if I needed this group outside the cause of the election that I could turn to them. From the political will of our candidate, a community has emerged.

So what else makes for a community? Having worked at IBM, I know that members of a community do not always have to live in the same geographic region. Other dimensions can connect us. I looked to my social graphs on Facebook and Linked In. Sure, I know all these people -- some better than others -- but most of them don't know each other. Perhaps a community can emerge by virtue of knowing someone, but I’m not a superstar with that sort of gravity, so my social graph, regardless of size, is not a community.

I thought about my building. There are about 35 apartments on 7 floors. Are we a community? Right now, probably not. At least, we don't behave as one. We don't know each other by name or ask favors of each other, although we do all know the super. I would recognize a few faces if I passed them on the street, but as with the subway, we seem to -- not avoid each other, per se -- but to give each other space.

Next up – my company, Avenue A | Razorfish. In some ways we behave as a community, but in many ways, these behaviors and relationships are compartmentalized. I wanted to write: "...perhaps less and less as our professional and civic lives intertwine," but I don't believe this is true. In my observation, professional and social lives intertwine, but our civic lives almost seem taboo in context of the workplace. I wonder -- what are we protecting, and from whom? I fear we have our priorities reversed. This feeling is part of the itch.

Now I consider the Greater IBM Community. What is community-like about it? How can participating in it enrich my civic life and yours? We don't work together anymore, so perhaps it's safer to talk about situations in our world that may want for some of our consideration and civic-minded sweat. In her recent post entitled "A New Year: 20,000 Moments a DAY", Debbe Kennedy challenged us to think about what we could accomplish together in the business and social networking world in 2008. For me, these two facets of life are still part of what is "mine" -- my social network and my business network rather than our network. If we think of this network as a commons and don’t worry too much about the equity each of us has in it, individually, then what sorts of activities would we do? How would we behave?

Yours truly,
Ruth Kaufman
IBMer 2003-2007, ibm.com

Comments

[ethnmcrt]

Wow. Ruth, Debbe, both of you have asked really profound, even existential questions here. It's sometimes hard to gauge where our private personalities and public personae end and begin. It's pretty much universally accepted that everyone is actually multiple people -- your work self, family self, friend self, creative self, disciplined self etc. And our individual understanding of those personae is very hard to grasp without leaning on the reflection of a community. Sure, you could write in a journal or paint canvases in a secluded woodshed and have a completely private expression of self...but ultimately it is in the reflection of others that we gain a sense of self-understanding. How do others perceive us? How are we seen? So that's a rather long way of describing one thing that a community gives us -- a sense of self...an idea of who we are by showing who we're with.

[Debbe Kennedy, Global Dialogue Center (former IBMer)]

Dear Ruth and Ethan,

You have me thinking. Ruth, interesting life you have! Like Ruth, I've spent most of my life working hard and have my sort of private world. However, working in the virtual world over the last ten years has changed my whole view of what it means to share in a community. I've made the most meaningful relationships and collaborated with the best of people to do amazing things without ever seeing them and sometimes hearing them.

What kinds of events? Personally, I tend to hear Einstein whispering to us: "Create VAULE" and more and more people will find us, both inside and outside of IBM. I think what we need to keep reaching to take the next level of innovation in creating events/activities, both virtual and physical that "create value" for the Great IBMers attending. I imagine VALUE might be defined very different for each of us.

Personally, I think we need to experiment. Event could take many forms --- 1)Developing a dynamic, diverse BLOGGING TEAM so this blog is a reflection of our Greater IBM Connection community with all its diversity (contributing authors of all kinds WELCOME!)---then we could write a book :-) 2)Meaningful events for personal growth or current events or other interesting topics --- whether you're at IBM, in another career after IBM or retired, thinking, questioning and growing is what keeps us alive. 4)For some just "networking" is important --- I know I might be on the weird side, but I like networking with a purpose, like learning, dialogue, exploration, thought-leader gatherings, and for some partying. Short of this I think events end up like "high-school reunions" fun for the moment, but rarely enduring.

How would we behave? Hmmmmm! My vision is that we would all develop a sincere interest and curiosity about discovering who we all are ... we would always be welcome come as we are ... and enjoy it when we find common ground. At best, we'd step back to see Greater IBM as an opportunity of a lifetime that we have to forge a new path that we can look back on and know we made a difference. What excites me most is pioneering a the uncharted path that stands in front of us.

OKAY, my dear friends, your turn. What events? How would we behave?

Best...
Debbe

[Ruth Kaufman]

Debbe, I like your idea of approaching the notion of networking as fertile ground for events. Myriad little events (interactions) among individual people or broader events that impact and call upon many people simultaneously.

Ethan, I wonder if we could do a jam session with this community -- to help us articulate our purpose(s), in addition to "being here" (not that being here isn't meaningful in itself). What do you think?

[ethnmcrt]

I wonder if we could somehow use our wiki to do it? The wiki has been pretty much unused since it started...

[vasundhar]

Wonderful posts and Comments!

Ethan,Debbe,Ruth (a-z)
I Could not resist reading your posts and comments again and again.

While Ruth presented the essence of life in his apparently funfilled post, Debbe and Ethan you brought the dialogue to life with your Qualitative comments.

I Enjoyed reading them, and Now, May be its time for me to search for "The Life " as an experiment.