Today’s post comes from living and loving expert and relationships thought leader B. Marty Barry.
Dear Readers,
I want to assure you that although I’ve never met you, I deeply care about each and every one of you very, very much! This simple act of caring is so powerful and life-changing, I’ve always been surprised it doesn’t get more attention at the highest levels of society – particularly among our governmental leadership.
But now I’m encouraged to see this changing with the latest news out of Washington that some national agencies are collecting data from our phone calls, Facebook posts and Google searches. I see it as a welcome sign that government has finally realized there is something crucial missing from so many lives – an expression of interest!
So many of us simply want to be acknowledged.
Oh, some presidents have said “I feel your pain”. Well, at least one said it. Critics poo-poo that kind of sentiment, trying to minimize the significance as a cheap gesture by saying it’s “just words”. But words are powerful! And it matters when we know someone is paying attention to us! Every day I see heartbroken, invisible people who want their voices to be heard, their posts to be read and their slideshows viewed! They’re desperate for someone to care.
In the coming days, as details continue to leak out about what was information was collected and by whom, I hope we discover that it went beyond the simple stockpiling of metadata and that someone, anyone, in the Intelligence Community or the Justice Department or the White House had the courage to simply reach out and “friend” someone. Or anyone. Or everyone!
In fact, with unemployment still so high, why don’t the NSA and the FBI hire young people to “friend” ordinary overlooked Americans, suspicious gun lovers, rowdy foreign nationals and even suspected terrorists? It needn’t be dangerous, since no one has to ever be in the same room together anymore.
And a simple “Whassup?” can uncover worlds of information.
You can spy on people and learn a few things, but I’ve discovered they will tell you absolutely everything you want to know (and then some) if you simply put an arm around their shoulder and ask!
Your for-always friend,
B. Marty Barry
Would you make a good spy?
Trail Baboon 
Exactly what i needed to read this beautiful (Sunshine? Is that you?) day/morning!
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a bike ride without a wind chill factor is very unusual here in mn 2013. enjoy
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Rise and Eavesdrop Baboons!
B. Marty, I thought you were a guy! I thought you looked like Stuart Smalley, and now, I suspect you have outed yourself in the picture above. You are a female therapist like me! And I had always suspected the “B” in B. Marty represented Bertrand. Now I think you are a Brenda. You look quite lovely with the earphones and tape deck. The little antennae on the earphones give you a buglike, yet ET kind of look.
And, of course you are so correct about the needs of people to be heard. It never occurred to me, though, that people have a NEED for spying! I will try this in my practice. I have had to pound on the wall to tell my business neighbor to pipe down. After this inspiring column, I will mike his office secretly and just listen. I might even amplify his mediation sessions, which at times become loud, into my waiting room instead of playing harp music on an iPod.
And yes, I am an excellent spy. Career change? FBI? CIA? I am off to a new career.
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Brenda Martina Barry?
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Interesting. I thought I once saw a picture of B. Marty and he was a he. He looked like he could have been a relative of Jim Ed Poole. But maybe I’m thinking of somebody else.
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I still visualize or auitoryilize bill martys voice every time I read one of his blog entries.
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The B. is for Billy. At least that’s my recollection from way, way back.
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Yep, Billy Marty Barry.
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Maybe Brenda is his sister.
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the act of collecting data seems so obvious that it hardly qualifies as spying. everyone knows that there is a record of phone calls form cells and landlines and to have the fact that someone is looking at them be spy news is pretty funny to me. if anyone cares about my conversations and who I am talking to when I guess I have always assumed the jig would be up if researched. the truth is I have a pretty boring life. if I were doing things I was hiding form I would be doing it differently. cash purchases of prepaid phone programs and alter egos on my bogus facebook accounts to a computer that could never be linked to me would be my m. o. my code name is jaguar and I will be hidden amongst the telephone records of the masses teasing the undercovers with the wisp of an identity that changes phone numbers facebook accounts and identies at a momnets whimsy. the notion that tracking is the way to go assumes the dolt you are tracking is unaware and unthinking. let me order up parts for things I am trying to keep secret on my visa card and call my buddies to arrange a meeting on our local hang out is pretty low tech surveillance. anyone who object to that should be burning their trash instead of putting it out for the trash man. my phone records and the story of my life are out on the curb every week along with the electronic records of my interactions of the type that will get me into trouble any time anyone wants to look into it. my only hope of survival is to appear less interesting than the next guy. so far so good.
would I be a good spy. no I would be bored to death. looking up data and following trails that lead you from point a to point b. unless you give me james bonds job with an ally like q to furnish me with trick cars and cool gizmos to do my double ought work. I think spys today will have drones and computer virus’ to do their dirty work. the bottom line on this spy business is if you want to get the bad guys. I would be willing to get the bad guys. the truly bad bad guys who are slimeballing their way through life plotting and manipulating to make their life go the way theyd like it to at the expense of anyone and everyone else. I can figure out ways to undermine and help to put an end to those type of things but sifting through phone records is not my cup of tea. leave that to the geeks in the computer lab.
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Good morning. I live in a small town where some people seem to know more than they should about other people’s business. Apparently there is a good supply of people here who like to spying on each other. I’m not one of those that spends my time spying on my neighbors, although I don’t mind doing a little gossiping.
Probably I don’t have the right mind set to be a good spy. I think those people who think the government is going too far in it’s efforts to collect our private information are right. I don’t think I would like to be involved in spying on everyone’s private communications. Our government seems to want to be like the small town people who think it is okay to get involved in other people’s private business.
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If spies aren’t supposed to look like spies, than maybe I would be a good one. A pie-making, gardening, Luthan handbell ringer is a great cover, plus, like Jacque, I have a knack of getting people to tell me things they would never tell anyone else. We are getting more rain here, by the way.
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That’s Lutheran.
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Buckets of rain is a Lutheran thing? Seems sort of Old Testament to me.
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You need to read more carefully, Linda. She’s Lutheran when she rings handbells.
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Do you suppose that means she’s Unitarian or Congregationalist when she’s gardening?…
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A pagan Earth Mother, I think.
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It does get sort of Old Testament out here at times. I like the Pagan Earth Mother moniker.
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I should add Crystalbay to the list of we who can get people to tell us things (and even charge them for it)!
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I’d be a lousy spy. I was born feeling guilty, so when I have any kind of contact with officials of the state (like a highway cop) I quake and my voice warbles and I look like the guiltiest person on the planet. I’d never hold up under interrogation.
My Montana rancher friend Larry is just the opposite. His towering contempt for government empowers him to lie to authority with ease. Larry was on an elk hunting trip in which one of his buddies shot an illegal elk (too young and small). They field dressed the little elk anyway and put it in the horse trailer they were towing to get the legal elk and all their gear home. It is a big deal to have an illegal elk. A game warden could have confiscated the guns of the whole crew and slapped them in jail. Larry’s name would have been in all the Montana newspapers. Out on the highway heading home, they got pulled over by a game warden. But before he could open the trailer to examine the elk they’d shot, Larry began to sass the warden. After a few minutes of talk, it came out that the warden had shot an antelope that fall on land Larry owned . . . only the warden hadn’t asked permission to hunt there. Larry really roasted him. The warden felt so sheepish about what he’d done that he never even opened up the horse trailer. Larry could be a great spy.
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anybody could be a spy if they were spying on a guy who poached game on their property. my dad took a buyer to north Dakota hunting once and because the out of state license was too expensive and chances of getting caught were so small they told the guy ok you are john billington in the fargo phone book we have a jim billingsford his address is 123 main street. remember that in case we get stopped and they bought a local license. the game warden stopped them and they all joked and cajoled their way through the stop and when it came time jim billingsford remembered 123 main street and the warden went to the next guy. when the warden left this guy collapsed and said his heart was thumping so hard he thought he was going to pass out. they told him he did good and that he may want to keep that job as a buyer at gambles. he’d never amount to much more. spying was not in his blood. they all laughed at his mr peepers outlook and the razzing didn’t quit until the hunt was over.
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It seems to me that if you have nothing shady to “hide”, there’s no good reason to get lathered up about knowing that the government has the capacity to track cell phone numbers or email names. They do not have the power to actually listen to or read any communications without credible suspicion or evidence of wrongdoing and special permission. Not liking this reality on “principle” is prevalent, but it’s been going on since J Edgar Hoover or before. It’s nothing new or particularly sinister at all, but given the relentless efforts on the right to manufacture scandals, it’s just piling on.
This has me thinking about how I’ve been complicit in my own public disclosures, though. People looking for a new therapist just google my name and, much to my consternation, they open up my Dancing Grandma web site or some editorial I’ve written lambasting the right wing. My Caring Bridge site is another example of my personal life being on display. Just last week, I discovered that I could remove “visitors” from accessing it and did so with two particular “friends” who routinely have kept track of my health issues vicariously rather than ever making direct contact with me.
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I am not a good liar, at least not for long, so I would have a hard time covering up my actions from friends and loved ones. If, however, I was able to selectively truth-tell, well, that’s another story. Especially if I were the sort of spy that tim could not be – one who sat and sifted data all day. I may be doing that now and no one would be the wiser. it’s really a cover that I am a mild-mannered corporate drone telling folks that I am improving the world one search term at a time – I could tell you what I really do from my cubicle, but then I might have to re-locate you using one of our special programs…
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I’ll bet you are a great liar, Anna, because it is my guess that you lie only on extremely rare occasions. That’s the key to fooling people. Especially if you have told truths that people assume were difficult for you to share, it is easy to lie just as long as you choose your occasions carefully. My erstwife was a literal, truth-telling person 99.9% of the time. Because it seemed that she never misled people, she could sell outrageous lies on the few occasions that appealed to her.
I can remember only one example. Kathe was telling a friend of mine about a bear that became unpopular by swamming from island to island up near the Canadian border, ransacking cabins. The bear made a big mistake when it destroyed a propane refrigerator, for those are rare. If you live on a little wilderness island a propane refrigerator is a treasure because you can’t plug in an electric fridge but you can carry tanks of propane to the island. Then Kathe told my friend that the bear goofed when it destroyed a propane microwave oven, for those are extremely rare. Island cabin owners organized and shot the bear. About a half hour later, Gary was still working on that story. “A propane microwave? How does THAT work?”
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Outright lies I have a hard time with – I might be able to speak them believably, but as the saying goes, “the truth will out.” Selective truth telling is a finely honed talent that I have developed over time – it allows my sense of ethics to stay intact at the same time that I am, for all intents and purposes, lying. Story telling and embellishing – well, that’s another matter. I would be right there with erst-wife telling tales about a bear and a propane microwave. Better story telling involves creative use of the truth (which may or may not be lying).
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ChKPEKMw74
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OT: the new format. I really like the way you can click on the day’s image and both the intro and the discussion come up. I like the way previous days’ discussions are so easily available. I don’t like that stupid little box that tells me where text will be inserted; the box itself blocks my text when I’m editing. On the whole, I like the new format!
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And I greatly appreciate the large for-aging eyes font!
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Upper right corner of the computer screen is a thing that will ask you what zoom level you’d like 100 for normal 50 or 75 if you want to see the whole page at once of 150% for a close up. If print is too big if too small it can be tweaked to where you like it
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When I was a kid, I fancied myself a good spy. Not only was “Harriet the Spy” one of my favorite books, but I thought I was good at sneaking up on people. That misconception was blown at a neighborhood gathering when a friend and I were sneaking up on a group of people and his oldest sister said loudly, “Okay, Mark and Edith, we see you, so don’t think you’re that sneaky.” Ever since then, my desire to be a spy has been tempered by the reality that I wouldn’t be very good at it.
However, on second thought, maybe I just needed to practice more. Maybe I have what it takes…I’ll ask my sister who works for the FBI if I would make a good spy, see what she says. 🙂
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So many of us loved Harriet the Spy. But she had a rather rare talent. Difficult for the average person to duplicate.
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Harriet rocks. Loved that book.
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I realize that this is yesterday’s topic, but I’ve been away and I can’t let anything about Harriet the Spy go by. I did a lot of Kid Lit during my college time and I especially remember the heated discussion that we got into about “Harriet”. Most of the adults just could not let go of the fact that Harriet didn’t really learn her lesson — they thought the adults should have watched her more closely or channeled her. There were just a few of us in the class who tried to hang onto the fact that this book was written for KIDS. Who all love it the way it is. Not everything has to be a big lesson learned!
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In fifth grade, Margie W. and I would play Russian-American spies, in and around the snowbanks created by the snowplows. That was no doubt the height of my spy career… I am good at keeping secrets if I know they’re supposed to be secret; and I could probably lie if I have to, not sure how successfully. But at this point I can’t run very fast, so I may have to withdraw my application.
Where DID you find that photo, Dale??
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I am sure that in these times it is no surprise that the government is secretly looking at our private communication records. Of course, this is not proper and shouldn’t be something that they are allowed to do. This should be stopped and if it is done this evidence should not be allowed in court. There are too many ways that private information that has been obtained, by what should be illegal means, can be used to discredit people and also put them in jail. You may think that this is not a problem because only people who have done something wrong will have their private information used against them. However, if we think about it I’m sure we all know that there are plenty of people that are capable of misusing private information that they shouldn’t have, including people working for the FBI and the CIA as well as various other people in law enforcement.
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I’m wrestling with this one a little. I agree my first reaction was “the government, etc. should not be doing this. Then I think about why they say they’re doing it.
There should not be terrorists in our country, and there should not be nutcases who kill their family and school children and people watching a marathon. But these things now exist, and I’m willing to give up a little privacy in the hope that some of them can be stopped before they do something.
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It is the President that is asking us to believe that we should give up some of the legal protection that we have from over reach by the government. We have gone through many years when Presidents have lead us into wars that have gone badly and that shouldn’t have been fought. I think we should not be too quick to agree that it is okay, in the name of protecting us from terrorists, to give away a protection from improper government behavior.
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Especially since the power we give to a current administration will be claimed by subsequent administrations, with differing agendas.
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The TV spy shows I remember from the 60’s were Man from U.N.C.L.E. and Girl from U.N.C.L.E. I thought it was kinda cool that they had a girl spy. She had the rather fanciful name of April Dancer.
I don’t think I would be a good spy – I am woefully unobservant.
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The girl from uncle had Noel Harrison Rex’s kid named for Noel coward if I remember correctly
Illia kuriakan was my favorite tv name. I alway loved topper Leo g Carroll as the uncle chief
But the best part of the man from uncle was that it inspired get smart
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Illya Kuryakin is a fine TV name. And it was unusual in those days to have a Russian character who was a good guy.
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We have a very tall lilac hedge that shields our back yard and everyone elses yard from most of the adjoining neighbors. After a really bad ice storm a few years ago that broke lots of branches, we had the hedge cut down to about 2 feet tall to start over straight. I felt so exposed with that hedge gone for the couple of years it took it to grow back. Did people spy more? I don’t know, but everybody really likes our hedge and remark that they really hope we never consider tearing it out.
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One of the best things about lilacs is their ability to regenerate from almost nothing. They are among the most resilient of plants.
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Hi everybody. I haven’t had time to check in lately. I can’t promise I’ll be here regularly anymore. I miss it a lot but I’ve had to make some drastic priority changes. I’ll have to try to read back. I think I stopped reading in early May. Have I missed anything?
I’m not sure I like the new format yet. I wasn’t sure I was in the right place when I opened the page… I couldn’t find the story at first.
I don’t think I’d make a good spy. I’m certain it wouldn’t be a good career choice if it meant that I’d have thrilling adventures and have to use all kinds of 007 gizmos and respond instantly in perilous situations. I do think, however, that I would make a good detective or investigator. I enjoy examining the details of an event, especially if the story is an interesting one. It might just be the introvert in me, but I enjoy putting the pieces of a puzzle together to solve a mystery.
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I was wondering about you the other day, and I am glad you checked in!
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welcome back krista. I see you around on fba nd know you are alive and well. pr at least alive. is the new job ok, moving out of the old house? did the caddy coworkers back off and become less in your face. will we see you at rock bend assuming I can find my way there.
stick your head back in , stay as long as you can and leave when you must.
you will be a baboon til you die
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Glad you checked in, Krista – just drop by when you can find the time. There was a G.O.A.T. update on May 25…
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Good to have you back, however briefly!
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