Month: July 2018 | the Wakefield Doctrine

TToT -the Wakefield Doctrine-

July 28, 2018 By clarkscottroger

Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

‘the nail in the coffin being carried by millennials: a modern ‘wallet’
yeah, right that’s a hundred dollar bill (well, three-quarters of one)…
“cash? what is this ‘cash’ you speak of? are you hiding food in the woods?“

This is our…. hey, it’s the last Saturday in July (aka… time to step up on the slingshot-to-October) lets not shave, wear socks or bother with capital letters. (there are those who say that my people, clarks, don’t have a wild side. ha!)

this is the Ten Things of Thankful. created once upon by Lizzi (of the House of Lewis) as her own clark-like bootstraps (through which she succeeded in changing her frame-of-reference). hosted by Kristi, it is a place to register your gratitude. writing style and format are… shall we agree on ‘tolerantly casual’? Ten is the number cited in the title, but, of course, there is a certain Book of Secret Rules (aka Secret Book of Rules) that allows for all sorts of tomfoolery*, provided it is of good intent.

1) Una

“Sheep’s in the meadow and the…”

2) Phyllis

3) the Writers Club Now this is a recent development. A club. People who enjoy writing. (Only requirement for membership: the willingness to answer the following question: Do you think there’d be a difference between being a member of a group or… belonging to a really cool club? (lol… no, I’m serious. And it’s an essay question. Compare and contrast. You remember!) Warning! The ‘clubhouse’ is a blog (at the link) when you get there you’ll see one Post. It is (as I refer to it in the most recent entry) the refrigerator wall for the club. at the moment. leave a comment, a question whatever. (The answer to the un-asked question: At this point some hardy souls, adventurous denizens of the world virtual. Val and Mimi, Denise and Kerry and Pat Brockett at present.)

4) hey Zoe! you owe me an answer to the qualifying question (for a trial membership in the Writers Club) and DSM-5 citation…. tell Joules to let the bears down from the tree and send a photo

5) new correspondent** Lorraine. She stopped in last weekend with a fun TToT post.

6) Pat for her joining in on a Six-duet over at the Six Sentence Story

7) Driveway Corn

(There’s a bright, golden haze on the ~~meadow~~ driveway
The corn is as high as a ~~elephant’s eye~~ rearview mirror
And it looks like it’s climbing clear up to the sky)

8) THIS SPACE AVAILABLE (this is for any Readers, fans, followers, blog wanderers and tourists, if you feel like you’d like to participate but are hesitant… (“I’m sure all those people are published and professional writers, surely I’ll look silly. except for that Doctrine guy, what’s the deal with him? Don’t he realize that people might not get the ‘humor’?”) send in your ‘One Thing of Thankful’ and we’ll put here at Number 8. Serially!

9) Sunday Supplement Phyllis and Una go for a non-9-mph-passenger-seat-with-the-window-a-safe-one-third-up-around-the-abandoned-golf-course-where-the-scents-and-smells-are-like-driving-through-the-Mall-of-America-at 33-mph-in-a-convertible-with-the-top-down ….walk.

“come on! lets go! first the car and then outside in the woods!”

10) Secret Rule 1.3 (go ahead, ask! the BoSR/SBoR is there to be used by men and women who toil over a smouldering*** keyboard.)

music vid?

* lets see you come up with a emoji for that

** that should be ‘participants’… but clearly I’m all caught up in the winds of time reaching gale force and can’t help myself.

*** for our Founderess, for all of being the our cultural taproot and home to the Bard, they still can’t lose the extra ‘U’s

Filed Under: Featured, Psychology, the Wakefield Doctrine Tagged With: personality types, predicting human behavior, relationships, the Wakefield Doctrine

Six Sentence Story -the Wakefield Doctrine-

July 26, 2018 By clarkscottroger

Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

It’s Wednesday evening.

The sky is dark and the wind is warm, the air feels like a bathroom when, having turned on the shower, you return after a quick check of your email turns into twenty minutes online. In no way is it a bad thing.

Each week, on Wednesday evening, Denise opens the door of the Six Sentence Story bloghop. We have all had the week to consider the current prompt word and completed (or nearly completed) a story that contains six sentences and some relationship to said prompt word.

We have a treat this week. A multi-POV Six. (I sometimes liken these multi-POV to a musical duet…with improvisation.)

Valerie Newman has been a partner in a couple of Sixes based in the story world of ‘The Case of the Missing Starr’, my ‘pulp detective’ story WIP. It’s a street light world of hard liquor, fast women and unfiltered cigarettes. Val definitely has an ear for this kind of story. Val’s ‘About Page’ clearly has not told us everything. (lol)

This week’s multi-POV Six has, as backdrop, a world of a different WIP, ‘Home and Heart’ (A Sister Margaret Ryan Story). While still a mystery/suspense tale, it examines life questions such as ‘what is family’ and ‘can we ever, really, change’.

My ‘duet partner’ is Pat Brockett.

The prompt word this week is:

Resort

Stalking the Greyhound bus was a mountain, floating behind the thinning forest that raced past the widows; looking exactly as she knew a mountain should, Mt Shasta was tall, conical and covered with very white snow; other than the ocean, it was the biggest thing Sister Catherine had ever seen.

With a sigh, the double doors retracted, as the bus came to a stop next to a single story building proclaiming itself: ‘Nan’s Lunch, Sundries and Rx’; guarding the exit of the dirt and gravel parking lot, a sign: ‘Welcome to Dunsmuir’ (and underneath), ‘Home of the best water on Earth‘; the two-lane road continued down into the forested valley and honor guards of plywood and house paint desperately offered information about resorts and campgrounds, mountain climbing and canoe trips.

“Who’d you say you was looking for,” after a road-tired minute, Catherine realized her designer clothes and diamond-encrusted wrist watch were reason for the sullenness of the waitress’ scrutiny; St. Dominique’s sixth grade teacher felt a new appreciation for the power of symbols and uniforms, certain that, had she been dressed in the plain-cloth habit of her Order, the woman would be smiling and impossible to shut up.

“Aren’t you a little off the beaten track, ma’am?” a heavy-set man to her right, turned slowly on his stool, the better to display the gold badge and holstered gun; despite the white donut dust on his salt and pepper mustache, he radiated a polite hostility common among law enforcement in rural communities; “I certainly hope so,” Sister Catherine’s reply a failed attempt to avert a staring contest, however fortune smiled in the form of younger, almost friendly voice.

“Miz Duquette? Hell, ever body knows Miz Duquette, shes nothin but the best healer-woman south of Crate Lake,” a young man, his hand on the half-open door to the parking lot turned with a smile that was shared by no one.

“And your interest in Miz Duquette is…” the Sheriff, clearly annoyed at the interruption, stood from his seat, his stare rekindling the tension, even as Sister Catherine confronted the fact she’d not given any thought to what she would do when she met her birth mother; instead she smiled her best, ‘Your-son-works-very-hard, but-not-all-of-us-can-get-straight-A’s-smile’ and said, “She was my mother and I’ve come to talk to her.”

Filed Under: Featured, Psychology, the Wakefield Doctrine Tagged With: Six Sentence Story, the Wakefield Doctrine

Monday -the Wakefield Doctrine- “… of development, writers clubs and understanding the world around us.”

July 23, 2018 By clarkscottroger

Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

Do we outgrow the past or do we simply forget? Do the improvements, growth and developments we achieve (through effort, ambition and circumstance) become like, well, the way it is.

We admit to a fondness for the occasional peculiar word or phrases that, although uncommon in everyday conversation, are fun. Today (in light of the opening sentences) the fun word/phrase/expression is raison d‘être. (which our friends at wikipedia define as “…a French expression commonly used in English, meaning “reason for being” or “reason to be”.”)

The Wakefield Doctrine is the reason for the existence of this blog. All, and only, because it hit me one night that it would be good to ‘formalize’ my personal system for explaining the world and the people in it.

The Wakefield Doctrine holds that we are, all of us, born with the potential to experience the world as one of three characteristic realities. At an early age we ‘pick’ one of these three ‘worldviews’ and we are on our way to becoming clarks, scotts or rogers. The Wakefield Doctrine, as a personality ‘theory’, is not concerned with how you would describe yourself, the results of questionnaires created to identify traits and interests or even what you think that girl is doing sitting out there in the middle of the field looking back towards the house filled with people she may or may not be related to (well, sometimes we enjoy the traditional approaches; I mean, damn! give yourself away in one description much, clark? lol). Unlike other tools developed by psychology, sociology and phrenology, tools easily transposed to popular media such as ‘the Face Book’ where they lie, attractively packaged, club-shaped mirrors waiting for someone to notice, “Oh, honey! Come here! I found this personality test in my magazine and it so has you down to a T! Lets take it together. You first.”

Central to the hypothesis of the Wakefield Doctrine is the notion that we all live in a reality that is, to a certain degree, personal. Nothing weird, mystical or magical. Simply that if you and I are standing in front of the entrance to, say, a very popular restaurant, our experience of that moment will not be identical. The Doctrine takes this and jumps up above the individual and says, ‘Suppose the world was one in which individuals are separated from each other in a way not easily discernible or, better still, imagine that the life we wake up into after each sleep is that of the Predator, simple and direct, eat or be eaten; or suppose everything in the world is knowable and, to a degree established in a way that allows for complete agreement among like-minded people, that the universe is, in fact, definable and quantifiable.’

This is key to understanding the Doctrine. Children (you, me and the girl behind the counter asking if that’ll be Regular or Premium) all grow and develop (their) personalities in order to successfully interact with the environment that surrounds them. Social, physical, the whole thing. And this is done in the context of the nature and character of the world, as they experience it. These strategies evolve and develop into the style we refer to as our ‘personality type’.

I grew up in the world of the Outsider (clark). I developed a way of relating to the people and the world around me that permits me to stay out of the limelight (can’t have people pointing at me and telling everyone that we don’t belong) while at the same time giving me the tools and the drive to search for whatever it was that I didn’t learn when I was too young to realize it i.e. how to be a real person.

A friend of mine grew up in the reality of the Predator (scott). She’s a lot of fun to be around, gets more done in a morning than most people do in a week. She is always on alert, never is not paying attention to whats going on around her and everyone likes her…except for the ones who are terrified of her. Temperament is often un-fairly pronounced with the accent entirely on the first syllable… we prefer the word: mercurial. You want something done right away, you ask her and step out-of-the-way.

If you want that thing done right… you find my friend who grew up in the life of the Herd Member (roger). He will know how to do it so that the joints line up, the glue doesn’t stick out at the ends and it stays the way it’s supposed to be… forever. He knows the simple fact of the life that there’s a Right Way. No, nothing as an alternative, no second-runner-up. One way. Fortunately, my friend has so many other people around him that grew up knowing that they all belong. Sure there’s minor disagreements over decor, but it’s all one big hap…. Herd. The world is good. Just have to understand.

OK enough for a Monday morning.

Gotta go work on the Writers Club. Stuff to do…

Filed Under: Featured, Psychology, the Wakefield Doctrine Tagged With: personality types, relationships, the Wakefield Doctrine, three personality types

TToT -the Wakefield Doctrine- “… of weeds and flowers, technology and dreams.”

July 21, 2018 By clarkscottroger

Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

Three clarks.

This is the virtual place that Lizzi created. Having created it, (and nurturing it into a bloghop for all sorts of people of good intent), she passed the reins, (or tiara (or scepter)) to Josie.

Kristi now maintains the home fires. Each week she prepares the place for those who would contribute their experiences with the world that has engendered a feeling of gratitude. And, since we’ve been with the TToT from the beginning time, the Wakefield Doctrine gets to participate too! )

These are the things I am grateful for this week.

1) Una

A dog guarding the spiral corn.

2) Phyllis

Phyllis, work, treehouse. The essentials.

3) weeds

Thistle just before flowering. Still dangerous.

Green stuff and weeds, flourishing.

4) flowers

Rose supplanted by a dog.

5) oh, man! no way I’ll succeed in relating the feeling I had this morning when a favorite science fiction book stepped (almost) into reality. I was on google street view… wait, the book first. That way, if you want to have the same experience I did, you can read the book first and duplicate the steps that lead to my own… (cool word…come on, clark! find a cool word)…. frisson. (Sure, I’ll go with that.) …moment of frisson.
Where was I? The book! Roadmarks by Roger Zelazny (1979).
Spoiler Alert! (in case you want to attempt the aforementioned ‘replicate clark’s moment of frisson’.) The ‘hook’ in the story echoed for me today in a way that was… well, here I am writing a TToT Item of Gratitude because of it. Very cool. (yeah, no way that made any sense. but rather than waste time and electrons, if you’re still curious, ask me in a comment to explain what the hell Item 5 was supposed to mean. Ed.)

6) Speaking of Writing and such, ‘the Writers Club‘ is..coming along fine, thank you for asking. Actually it is. I’m grateful for the responses of the people I’ve been talking to about it.
Speaking of pirates, has anyone posed the ‘qualifying membership question’ to zoe yet? What?! OK, I got this. Zoe: In the world of people, associates, rogers and clarks, there are Groups and there are clubs. Is there a difference? (A simple yes or no will suffice. DSM-5 citations optional but will count towards score. You may pick up your No. 2 pencils and begin….now.)

7) Friend of the Doctrine Cynthia as she follows the most remarkable of paths. In part remarkable because of her dedication and determination and plain, old hard work in discerning where the path might be found. As students of the Doctrine will attest to, the most difficult part of self-improving oneself is not in ‘the effort to do what is necessary’. Rather, the difficulty is in allowing oneself to see what really needs to be changed. And, then the path appears. If you’re looking for it. Cynthia is way good at that shit.

8) THIS SPACE AVAILABLE. (Presented as a public service). This space on the Doctrine’s List is reserved and available to any Reader who might be toying with the notion of participating in what clearly is a muy coolito bloghop. However, speaking for my people, sometimes we know something might be fun but the risk of doing things wrong (and thereby inviting excessive scrutiny) totally outweighs the benefit …so we sit it out. Here is the place you can try it out. Send in your Grat Item as a comment and I’ll place it right here. With full attribution as you would have it. Come on! You know you want to.

9)Sunday Supplement

Talk about your ‘set up’ photos! Here’s a photo from a ride to the pet store today.

Una is my co-pilot.
Yeah, I know! I’ve got about six semi-amusing captions for this here photo here.

10) Secret Rule 1.3 (from the Book of Secret Rules, aka the Secret Book of Rules) which states, in part: “[t]he act and fact of completing a list (of Ten Things) comprises, constitutes, manifests and, ‘my-god-I-did-it’ for inclusion as an Item on (said) List. Convention holds that it (the Item alluding to the completion, et. al.) is placed in the last position. Unless, there are more and then (that) realization may create an infinitely recurring loop of gratitude. Watch it.”)

Music video this week: good song, decent singing, incredible guitar playing.

Filed Under: Featured, Psychology, the Wakefield Doctrine Tagged With: predicting human behavior, psychology of personality, relationships, the Wakefield Doctrine

Finish the Sentence Friday -the Wakefield Doctrine- “…and don’t leave your reality strewn with your books, toys and fears”

July 19, 2018 By clarkscottroger

Welcome to the Wakefield Doctrine (the theory of clarks, scotts and rogers)

Friday is the day that Kristi and Kenya invite all to make a partial sentence whole again. More than that, they have set up a rotation series of what, effectively are three definitions of ‘sentence’! Lets let them do the honors:

Hi all! This week’s an easy one: Write a 5-minute stream-of-consciousness post about “my bed.” See? EASY! Who doesn’t love her (or his) bed and have five minutes to write about it? The linkup will go live Thursday night (July 19) at 10pm eastern and will stay open through late Sunday evening. Hope to see you there!
Link up with Kenya G. Johnson here:
https://www.kenyagjohnson.com/

or with me here:
https://findingninee.com/

Trapped by a pronoun! Argh! Well hailing from Y Chromia as I do, (anyone see Rich Rumple around? Now thats the guy you want streaming his consciousness; funny and he writes good.

In the meantime… I will set my timer Hold on…. its here somewhere (hey, its within the rules to, like, write the prompt in, before typing and such, right?)

Timer 5:00 go

“…my bed

…is like that cafe in Casablanca, the back of the room where Miss Bonnie (Romper Room) couldn’t see us and an acne-glowing, black-lit, Emporium India incense-fogged dorm room… with albums covers in view, cause I’ve spent a genuine lifetime listening to the music I grew up enjoying and can ‘name that tune’ pretty much on one note.

Seriously, the bed is my border town between real life and dreams. Now that I read that, I think, ‘Well, duh, thats what it is for everyone!’ But since I spend time there either reading myself to sleep (what is the magic of aging that takes a process and reverses it while speeding it up?!! As a very young child, my mother might read me a story to get to sleep but, it like took forever and sometimes I’d remain awake. Nowadays I’m lucky if I get five thumb taps on my kindle ….”

(Post 5 minute SOC (well, still SOC, but out of time)… jeez! am I like the slowest typer in the world or what?

Seein how short the wordage is, heres a bit of music from the day: