Oh boy, I have learned a lot throughout this. From simply life tips to random facts, I have learned so so much. The person that I interviewed showed so much wisdom and taught me many different valuable life lesson within the short periods of time that we talked. lets start of with what Ben Sullivan taught me;

The very first thing, and personally the most valuable to me, is to always live a modest life, and eventually you will be rewarded for your efforts. I don’t know if it is just be but when I finish a hard job or achieve a goal that I have been working on for a while, I want to boast and share to people that I did it, but what I learned throughout this experience and through what Ben said, it is always better to keep your victories to yourself. Life is much better and more simple when you live modestly, instead of gloating and bragging about what you have. Ben taught me that life isn’t about achievements, but instead about living. no one likes a self centered person.

The next thing that I learned is that you don’t always need a ton of people around you to make you happy. Family is always going to be your best friend and your number one supporters. When Ben explained to me his view on friendship and trust, it occurred to me that I focus too much on pleasing other people and trying to gain friends, rather than spending time with the people that matter the most to me. I have always known that family is the most important thing to me, but after listening to Ben talk about his family and how much he adores them, it really opened my eyes that I am lucky to still have my whole family around because some people don’t have that. I also have to come to the realization that my parents aren’t going to be around forever, so I need to cherish the time I have with them while I can.

I learned through writing this blog that I really enjoy writing about other people lives. I enjoy getting to tell peoples stories and understand why they are who they are. Personally, this has been a very fun assignment for me to do, because it gave me the excuse to go out and talk to someone who I probably wouldn’t have if it wasn’t for this assignment. After writing this blog it makes me want to learn other peoples stories and help them share their person thoughts and world views.

Empathy walls are a strange thing to me. I have never really been an empathetic person, because I know that everyone goes through hardship, and everyone goes through pain. I think that my personal empathy walls have changed and grown because I have learned to listen more and understand where someone is coming from. I have learned that when I truly put myself in that persons situation it makes me more empathetic for them.

Throughout this blog I have come to question myself a little bit but more importantly is made me realize that everyone is different. Everyone has their own story, and before judging anyone, you need to learn their background and why they think that way. It sounds cheesy, but never judge a book by its cover.

During this interview I wanted to make everything as laid back as possible. I didn’t want Ben to think I was interrogating him, but rather talking as a friend. We sat on his couch and watched the Mariners play the Twins in a long and drawn out baseball game. We talked and laughed for a bit before I decided it was the right time to start asking about what shaped him into who he is today.

The very first thing I asked about was his work environment. He explained how working at the same place for 30 years can be extremely repetitive, but also quite rewarding. As I learned from the last interview, he is a pretty introverted person, and really only talks to other people or his coworkers when they talk to him. He laughed and joked about how he is the oldest one there and how all the young coworkers who he doesn’t talk to find him very intimidating. “Honestly, I am a nice guy, but I don’t talk unless someone starts a conversation with me, so I guess that makes me scary. I have had some of my buddies there tell me the others are scared to come near me.” he explained when I asked what his relationship was like with his coworkers. Being a large man, approximately 6’2′, and built of solid muscle with a “resting bitch face” (as he described it) can definitely lead to people staying away from him. He doesn’t mind though. “I enjoy working alone, and the only time I ask for someone to work with me is when I need them cause it is a two person job.” Ben explained how he has the most knowledge there, so he gets frequent calls when he is at home about how to do something correctly, which annoys him because “my weekends are my weekends, I don’t like to be bothered.”

He explains how on Mondays (he has Sundays and Mondays off from work) he spends all day with his granddaughter, who is only 5 years old. He explains how getting to spend time with her and seeing how her mind works to solve problems is the best part of his week. “I like to observe. When we are playing outside I like to sit back and watch her run around and play. It is crazy to see how her mind works and how much it has grown.” Throughout the conversation I could tell that he enjoyed talking about his granddaughter. He was proud of her, and explained how she is one of the smartest kids he has ever known, “however I could just be biased, but I strongly believe she is a kid genius.” While talking to Ben about work and his granddaughter I came to the conclusion of a few different things. The first thing being is that he is proud that he is a role model to so many people, such as his coworkers, kids, and grand kids. When I asked him about it he acted very modest about it, he explained how he had worked the longest so of course he was going to know more, instead of taking pride and boasting about how he worked very hard to get to where he is now. Just by talking about these two things I learned that he is a very quite and modest man, but takes a lot of pride in his family.

The next thing I wanted to ask him about was his friendships. To this he responded, “I have no friends.” At first I felt sorry for bringing this topic up, but after talking for a bit of time I started to understand and grow fond of what he was talking about. He explained to me his concept of friendship. “See you have friends, acquaintances, and strangers. Friends are people you trust completely and have never done anything to harm your trust, acquaintances are people you know and talk to and maybe you were friends with at a certain point but they lost your trust, and strangers are people you don’t know.” He described how he had a lot of friends in high school and when he lived in Oregon, but since he moved up here, he lost a lot of those people. “I have my family, and that is all I need. Sure my wife and I don’t always get along, but I know I can trust her and she has always been there for me, so I know she is truly my life long best friend.” My heart absolutely melted with happiness when he said this. He explained how he didn’t need any “friends” he only needed his family and that was all. He was a simple man.

When I asked him if there was any certain point in his life that impacted the way that he saw life he responded and said that when his father died it changed his whole thinking on life. He explained how after the passing he became very aggressive and mean towards everyone. He turned to more drugs and alcohol instead of getting help. “That was the lowest point of my life. I don’t remember much of it but I am glad, because I don’t like thinking about it.” I told him that we didn’t have to talk about anything that he didn’t want to, and he just responded with “okay” and continued to talk about his father. He explained how he was hard working, and very modest. Ben said that he always wanted to be like him, which explains his modesty when talking about everything else. He said he also learned all of his political views from his dad, such as his pro-gun rights view point.

I decided to start to wrap up the interview at this point and asked him how he perceived the world and what he thought about what direction our world was going in. To this question he didn’t have much to say. He explained how he thought a lot of the generations were too self centered and focused on themselves to see what was going wrong with the planet. He expressed his feelings about global warming and how nobody was doing anything to stop it. “As long as my kids make a positive impact on others and don’t do anything stupid, I will be alright. I just want to know I raised them right and taught them how to treat others correctly.” I asked him what he was most proud of in his kids and he explained dhow they were hardworking and genuinely cared about others. He explained how all three of his kids were very smart, and made him proud every single day. He explained how it was humbling knowing that he knew he did good enough to raise his kids, and he was also proud of himself for getting through his hardships and working through everything by himself. When I tried to turn the topic back on global warming he laughed and said, “What does it matter to me? I’ll be dead before anything happens anyways.

Throughout the past two interviews I have learned this; Ben Sullivan is an amazing human being and I am so lucky to have the honor of knowing and sharing his story. Growing up around 4 sisters and a very rough mom, then losing his father, he went through a lot of hardship, but definitely came out on top. He taught me many things during these two interviews and that is to always be modest and humble about your achievements, because nobody likes someone that brags about everything, I learned that family is always going to be your closest friends, you don’t always need other people around you to be happy and you definitely don’t need a large friend group to be excepted, and the last thing I learned is hard work pays off. Everything that you work towards will eventually pay off. I am so grateful for this experience and being able to talk with Mr. Sullivan, and even if I never got to talk to him again, I am grateful for the things that he has taught me.

As the baseball came to a close, I thanked him for sharing his story and talking to me for so long. He thanked me for listening and explained how it felt good sharing his stories and experiences with someone. as I went to walk out of the house I turned around to say one last goodbye and Ben gave me a big bear hug and I learned one more thing before leaving. Just because someone looks big and scary, doesn’t mean they are, it just means that they have a story. As I walked out the door, the last thing he said to me was, “I really enjoyed our time talking Taylor, and I hope that you can learn from my mistakes and take something from my jumbling rambling about my life.” All I could say is that I learned more in the two hours that we talked, than in the past five years of my life.

This chapter in part 3 was pretty interesting to read about. It focuses on Jackie Tabor, her husband Heath, and their two kids. Hochschild follows Jackie around and listens to her stories about her past and current life. The chapter starts out with the whole family and Hochschild sitting down for lunch and talking about the family’s love for the outdoors and anything to do with fishing and hunting. They briefly brought up the effect of oil on the fish that Heath was catching, but Heath and Jackie both agreed that the effects was very minuscule, if anything at all, and decided that it wouldn’t hurt them to eat it. After lunch Jackie and Hochschild sat in the living room and discussed Jackies childhood. She explained how she came from nothing. Her mother was a single mom of five kids and worked three different jobs, until she finally remarried, but that married didn’t go well either. At the age on 19 Jackie walked out of her house and never went back after her stepfather told her if she left she wasn’t aloud to come back. Jackie described how she was lost, and lived with her older sister for a little bit of time, but still felt emotionless and lost.

Jackie explains how one day she looked up at the sky and ask God for help , and after that day, everything changed. She once read a bible verse that explained how you could never wish to much Avon something, or else you wont ever get it. After explaining this part of her life story Jackie took Hochschild to see three different houses. The first one was the first house Heath and Jackie lived in together, the second one was a slightly larger house they lived in after, and the third house was a house that they never actually lived in, but Jackie wished so badly to live in. Jackie never told Heath about wanting to live there, but wished every time she saw the house that she would one day live there. That never happened. This was the example that Jackie used to prove her bible verse was true. She explained how she wanted and wished too much for that house, so she never got it.

The three things that were the most interesting to me in this chapter was how strong Jackie’s religious beliefs were, considering everything she had been through. From personal experience I know that a lot of people that go through trauma or a bad childhood no longer believe in God because “why would he put people through that”. The second thing that I found interesting was how strongly she lived by one bible verse. Jackie based her life off of the Bible verse she read that day in her sisters home, and ever since then she lived by it, and even proved it with the house that she never lived in. The last thing that I found interesting and a bit irritating is the fact that Jackie and her husband both do not believe that global warming is a thing. With all the study’s and things that prove it is true, I find it frustrating that they don’t think it will affect them at any point in their lives.

I personally dont see myself connecting this chapter to my interviewee. The only reason I think this is because I know that my person is not religious, as he has clarified multiple times during our interviews, and because I know my interviewee believes that nothing will ever happen unless you work towards it. He doesn’t ever “wish” for anything, he works towards it. The only thing I could possibly use from this chapter for my interview are questions such as, “is there any certain quote you live by?” or “What is one thing you have always wanted but never received?”.

Since one of the biggest things in anthropology is protected the interviewees indentitiy, the name I will be using is Ben Sullivan.

While conducting this interview I have come to the conclusion of a lot of things, the main thing being that although Ben has gone through a lot in the past 50 years, he has worked very hard to be where he is now. Ben grew up in Roseburg Oregon, where he lived with his mom and four older sisters. He switched between his dads house and his moms, up until the age of 14 when he lived full time with his mom. He explained how his father was a very hard worker, and although he struggled with alcoholism, he was the hardest working men he knew. He said that everything he believes in know, was because of his dad, and that he wouldn’t be the same man if it wasn’t for him. Ben described what it was like to grow up in a house full of girls, and as he explained, it wasn’t always a fun time. They lived on a farm with plenty of land, and although he got in a lot of trouble as a kid, he worked very hard in the fields doing hay and any other work that needed to be done on their farm and any neighbors.

Ben struggled with anger issues all his life, but that never stopped him from dominating on the football field, basketball court, wrestling mat, soccer field, and about any other sport you can thing of. He was a very talented athlete, and at the end of his high school career he got multiple college offers for football scholarships. He even got some offers by scouts that promised him a spot in the NFL draft after college. Although it seemed like he had everything figured out with his football career, it all changed when he decided to turn to drugs and alcohol. Ben explained how he started smoking cigarettes at a very young age, and was drinking by the time he hit high school. Ben didn’t go into much detail, but explained how he decided he wanted to leave Orgeon, so at the age of 19, He left everything, including the college scholarships, and moved to Olympia Washington for a brand new start.

While in Washington he lived with a friend for a few years until he met a girl that he would later call his wife. Ben explained how even though he struggled with alcoholism and drugs, he still worked everyday as a mechanic and when he was making enough money, he bought a house for him and his girlfriend to live in together. After 3 years they got married, and after another 3 years they were expecting their first child, a little baby boy. At this moment was the time that he decided that the drugs needed to stop. So from that point forward, he has been clean. He explained how the pregnancy changed his life, and without his wife and kids, he wouldn’t be the same man he is now. In this time his role model, and over all mentor all his life passed away. His father passed away from a heart attack when he was 37. After that happened, it was a pretty rough time for him. All of his life he looked up to his father, and when he passed he promised him that he would live his life for him. After two kids, and 30 years of working as a mechanic, he is now living happily with his wife of 23 years, his 19 year old son, and 17 year old daughter. Even after all these years, he said that he still thinks of his father every day, and there isn’t a waking moment that he isn’t on his mind.

Now on to the political stance. I didn’t get too deep into this part of the interview because I wanted to focus on his life and where he grew up, so I would be able to focus of why he would believe what he does better. I did ask about the most popular political debates right now, such as gun rights, abortion, and overall thoughts on Donald Trump. For all of these answers he was pretty straightforward on what he believes. For gun laws, he very strongly believes that we have the right to bare arms. He explains how the second amendment states that since we have the right to bare arms, that shoulnd’t he taken away from the citizens. Abortion was a different story. Ben explained how he doesn’t have any religious beliefs, so he is personally pro-choice, although he believes that late term abortions should be illegal, other than for medical reasons. As for thoughts on Donald Trump, he was pretty vague. Ben feels that although Trump is controversial and has done some harm, over all he thinks that he has done some good things for our country, but also believes that after this term, he needs to leave office.

After this interview these are a few more questions I was to ask; How do you believe your childhood affects your political views? Is there any point in time that changed your moral thinking? Who has been your favorite president and why? What do you like about their presidency?

In this post I will be first explaining the field ethics that anthropologist go through when interviewing a person, and I am also going to be exhaling and summarizing chapter two in Arlie Russel Hochschild book Strangers in Their Own Land. Some of the main points in the ethics code are;

1. Do Not Harm: I will be following this rule by not showing any of the person I am interviewing personal information. For example, I might say what they do for their career, but won’t say exactly where they work
2. Be open and honest about your work: This one is pretty self explanatory, I will be upfront and honest about why I am interviewing them.
3. Get consent and permission: For this I will be asking and making sure they are okay with me telling their story, including information, or anything I write about.
4. Make sure your work is accessible: I will be doing this by sharing the link of my work with the person I am interviewing.
5. Maintain respectful and ethical relationships: I will be nice and respectful with the person I am interviewing and will listen to what they have to say without putting in my opinion.

Throughout chapter two Hochschild is interviewing Lee Sherman on his life, work life, and political views. Sherman was Democratic, but when we moved down south he turned more towards the Republican side. As a child Lee was always a daredevil. He was just one of seven children (which were all boys). When he grew up he got a job at Pittsburgh Plate Glass company, where he was called a mechanical genius. This plant was one of the highest ranked company’s for the most toxic chemical emissions. Sherman was an extremely hard and good worker, and always got his work done, even if he wasn’t wearing the correct safety equipment. One day on the job one of Sherman’s coworkers dropped chemicals on him and it completely burned off his clothes and hurt him pretty badly. At a certain time it got to the point where he could not bend his legs to get up or down and his feet felt like clubs. Due to this he needed medical leave and couldn’t work. Also while working for this job his boss asked him to illegally dump waste into a water system, costing thousands of people their jobs because it turned the water toxic and made the fish and sea creatures unedible. After all of this happened, Lee was fired from his job because of “absenteeism”. Lee was very upset by this considering he still worked very hard every day and was only on medical leave because of the work conditions. After getting fired, Lee Sherman now opposes a big government and supports anybody the supports the enviorment.

After reading this chapter it made me think of three questions to ask the person I’m going to interview;

1. How would you react or feel if you got fired for being hurt on the job?
2. Do you think your political stand point or view can affect your career or where you work?
3. Would you ever stay at a job with terrible work conditions if you were very good at the job?

Hello! I am Taylor Pease and in this blog I am going to be finding someone who thinks politically or ideologically differently than I do. After I find this person I am going to dive into their world and hopefully learn a lot of new things about how they think, and why they behave the way they do. I am going to be describing their life in as much detail as I can without giving out their actual identity. I am very excited to learn about someone else’s life and learn about how others think and what they believe.

I am doing something very similar to what Arlie Russel did. Arlie explains her research in her book Strangers In their Own Land and in this book she describes the steps she went through and her apprauch to learning more about the people of Louisiana. One of the first things Russel explains is the Empathy Wall. This meaning she wanted to break through the wall that is caused by empathy and learn and understand about things from the other peoples point of view. She wanted to talk, listen, and learn about their lives and their beliefs. The next thing she describes is is what she calls The Great Paradox. She explains how she wants to learn everything about their surroundings and the state they live in. Russel wanted to know everything about where they lived and what they grew up around. Another thing the she describes is how she did visits and follow around with the members of the society around the people. Not only did she want to know about one specific person, but also all the people around them and how they might influence their life. One of the last things Arlie Russel explains in the first chapter of her book was the Keyhole Issue. The Keyhole Issue is basically wanting to get a close look at their lives. She wants to know details about how they think and what they believe.

Further describing the things talked about in the book I wanted to give examples of each one so they are easier to understand. The Empathy Wall is one of the biggest part about learning about someone. Arlie does this by asking Mike Schaff to show him where he grew up and asked I’m about his family, to which he explained how he was half Canjun and half German. The Great Paradox is things like learning about the states life expectancy, school enrollment, educational degree attainment, and median personal earnings, or even reading different articles about politics in that area (of course that is if you are studying someone’s political beliefs like Arlie is). During her visits and follow around Arlie Russel followed a campaign trails of a republican candidate and his rival. By following this campaign it lead Arlie to many different places and started up a lot of conversations which other people, farthing her knowledge about the people around in the society. Over the five years of her doing follow around and visits, she accumulates 4,690 pages of transcripts from interviews. As for the Keyhole Issue, Arlie just wanted to know answers to questions such as how Mile Schaff could be so bright and warmhearted but wanted to set fire to the government, or how in a state where they are most vulnerable to volatile weather they could have such high climate denial. After being so curious about all of these questions, Arlie Russel set out to begin her journey.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton