1. Comparison of number of times spent in medical appointments of various kinds in the past month.
2. Comparison of number of prescriptions medicines each of us takes on a routine basis.
3. How much time otherwise is spent daily on health maintenance (including such things as my twice daily 45 minute e-stimulator session, and weekly portioning out of medicines and inventory management of medicines and supplements.)
4. Total disposal income spend on health maintenance on a routine basis every month.
You see, in this world, you're lazy until proven otherwise, and it's the ill person's responsibility to prove themselves ill to the rest of the world. That means the ill person better be equipped with some pretty good proving skills or s/he is going to have to put up with some prejudice.
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Sometimes when I read mom's journals it starts me thinking in different directions. Talking to family members (via phone - none of them are nearby) can do that too. I keep trying to figure things out about this family. Unfortunately I was a child when some of the things probably started and even when I was a teenager I was off in my world and oblivious to things about dad's work and even about mom and dad.I mentioned to someone not long ago about mom's giving me money when I lived in Chicago to get my hair cut and it made me mad because I was hungry and all she cared about was my hair looking nice. I think she wanted me to get an Mrs. degree, which we used to joke about some girls going to Bible school just to get married. But I wasn't one of them. That is, I wasn't opposed to it, but I was really focused on the mission field and it was going to have to be someone else who was also focused on the same thing and we were going the same direction if I was going to get married, because I was serious about what I was preparing for (which, if you can imagine, made it all the more devastating what happened in Vienna).
The thing is though, that since mom's death I've thought even more about mom and trying to understand her. I couldn't have changed what I did, but I wanted to understand her more. I think there were several signs that she was grasping at keeping me closer to her. When I was in college, as an undergraguate, I went to school there in my hometown and I could live with my parents to save money which, since the school was a private school and since we were middle class but not really well off, was a way to save money, was okay with me. But the thing was that mom kept coming down stairs (my bedroom was alone in the basement) to talk with me, making it hard to study. I kept trying to tell her I was trying to study, but when my Grandmother was in Florida 6 months of the year I took the opportunity to stay in her house so I could study better. When I talked with mom about that later she said I should have told her, but I did and she wouldn't stop, and I don't think she could have. I think she was just needy that way. However, I don't think it was too hard on her having me gone when I left Seattle.
So I got my European Studies degree and then I moved to the midwest to attend Bible school, and mom sends money to get my hair cut, presumably to make me a better catch to get married.
And then when she visits me in Vienna she wants to help and I am able to arrange for her to teach health (she was a nurse) at a new English speaking Christian school there (that some of the Vienna missionaries are key in helping start). My mom was, in fact treated more respectfully than I ever was by the Vienna mission. And in Russia all we do by way of ministry is sing "How Great Thou Art" in English", but the thing is that I never was invited to have any public ministry like that at the church that I was a member of there. That was a Russian Pentecostal church (that didn't have any obvious sign gifts).
So my mom pushed my to marry a good chunk of my life and then given a chance outshined me at work. She couldn't outshine me at teaching English as a Second Language, interestingly enough, however, because I doubt that there would have been opportunity for that in Russia.
Remember that dad had said he would help with my student loan if I went into missions, so he was reasonably supportive of me in that. But mom evidently wasn't quit so supportive or at least wanted me to be married in any event. I never got any indication that this was an issue with dad.
Anyway, my mind just goes off in these various directions until it hits a snag or something in real life interrupts my train of thought. And then the fact that something happened is quite a different thing than attributing this or that potential meaning to it.
But to our new text...
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This text is on a somewhat different subject.Graham, Jill W. (1991) An essay on organizational citizenship behavior. Employee Responsibilities and Rights Journal, 4(4), 249-270.
I'll summarize the introduction to say that the author attempts in this article to present a paradigm of employee citizenship behavior that builds on what had preceded it and appeared to be lacking and draws on the political model of citizenship.
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"Part I: The Nature of Political Citizenship"
"In ordinary usage, citizenship describes the status of belonging somewhere, and it implies both rights and responsibilities. These three concepts are closely connected." (p. 251)
I won't comment on this yet... it's just by way of introduction.
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"Relational Ties"
"An interdisciplinary review offers organizational scholars numerous typologies for the purpose of characterizing the relational ties between individual members and their collectivities. For example, in her classic study of commitment and community, Kantner (1972, p. 148) discusses 'two strains in social life':
...Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft. Gemeinscheft relations include nonrational, affective, emotional, traditional, and expressive components of social action, as in a family; Gesellschaft relations comprise the rational, contractual, instrumental, and task-oriented actions, as in a business corporation....While coercive relationships exemplify a diminished form of Gesellschaft relations, covenantal relationships are an enhanced form of Gemeinshaft relations. Shared moral commitments strengthen the ties that bind people together. Kelman's distinction between identification and internalizationas bases for psychological attachment captures the differences between normal and covenantal Gemeinschaft relations.
...Covenantal relationships tolerate risk and forgive errors...
While the parties to a covenantal relationship can forgive one another should disappointing performance occasionally occur, a contractual relationship (Gesellschaft) is either terminated or penalties are assessed on the erring performer... As noted by Daniel Elazar (1980, p. 10) 'The partners [in a covenantal relationship] do not automatically live happily ever after, but they are bound by covenant toward such an end.'
The emphasis on struggle is important. Covenantal relationships are not conflict-free... Instead, the mutual trust typical of covenant ties allows members sufficient confidence in their status as permanent partners to release the energy needed for experimentation and progress during difficult times, with space for disagreement, mistakes, forgiveness, and mutual learning." (p.251-253)
This is a lot, but I didn't want to break it up. At first glance, the Vienna mission seems to have elements of both Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft: It had a family type atmosphere but it was also a workplace. I've also discusses elsewhere in this blog internalization and identification of mission norms and values, and how the mission expected its members to internalize them. So in that respect, the mission would have been more like covenantal Gemeinschaft relations.
The mission did not tolerate risk and may only have forgiven the occassional error, especially inconsequential onces or ones committed while learning something new. These are because of the security issue and potential for damage to its ministry and harm to to those it worked with, both the students and other missions.
I think the rest of the discussion about forgiveness and struggle is importent and interesting. I'm not aware of anyone, other than new recruits perhaps as they learn the ropes, making mistakes. So I am not aware of how mistakes would actually have been handled. This in itself might be telling, I supposed. Did mistakes just not exist? Were they hidden from view so no one knew about them except those closest to the source?
In any case, I have a hard time envision the likes of "conflict" "disagreement" forgiveness" "mutual learning" etc. occurring in any real way (i.e., not stilted). If there was going to be any learning it was going to be on the part of the erring one, and it was not going to be particularly mutual. Conflict would not end happily, unless departure of the errant one be considered happy. In other words, the mission held the upper hand and so the relationship was very lopsided.
It's ironic that I, as I have said here numerous times, reciprocal trust was very important in the mission, but that trust was not for the purpose of experiementation and it was not the kind of trust that made one feel comfortable to experiment necessarily. Within strict bounds there was some professional leeway, but they were pretty strict bounds. For example, if you were going to be teaching on an upcoming ministry trip you had some latitude, within the syllabus, as to some of the content you used or teaching methods.
But really, compared to other professional jobs I've had ( ESL instructor, librarian) there was little creative latitude at the Vienna mission. And when I compare it to the level of trust expected between members at the mission and at other places I've worked it's completely opposite. So the other places I've worked didn't require anything like that kind of trust, but allowed a lot more professional leeway than the Vienna mission, which is opposite of what the text seems to be saying.
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I'm going to end here because it's late. I wanted to get farther, but we'll pick up here next time.
