My Role in Life

Being from a middle class modern day gesellschaft community living in the foothills of the Cascades I rarely, until now, have thought about how I became the way I am. I have held many statuses in my life including: fisherman, photographer, student, mountain climber, son, friend,boyfriend, laborer. Statuses come and go but the two achieved statuses that will hopefully stick with me for life are photographer and climber. As a climber the role I am expected to take is one of safety and competence. People expect me to know how to use the gear and get them home safe. To keep the status of a climber I have to train rigorously. With that comes some role conflict. My girlfriend is not a climber and expects me to be home on my days off. Climbing is big part of my life and I have to try and balance the two but sometimes climbing wins. That creates a big conflict between the boyfriend me and the climbing me. Being part of the climbing community gives me the sense that it is a in-group for me. The use of the internet has allowed me to be part of the social network of climbers to spread word of new places to climb and meeting new groups to go climb with. Sometimes we have multiple groups meet up where half of the people do not know each other. This can cause some potential role strains because you are expected to go from a new acquaintance to a trustworthy be-layer . My master status use to be that of a photographer, but since getting sick with lyme disease four years ago I have become the guy with lyme disease. Chronically ill people are never looked at the same again. Take Michael “Magic” Johnson the basketball player. His master status used to be pro basketball player. Now people just see him as the guy who use to have HIV.

As a p...

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...norm that I have broken is shoplifting. I was around eleven years old and me and a friend got caught stealing baseball cards. Having my mother come to pick me up was embarrassing enough. Thought the store owner was nice enough not to call the police I was not allowed in the store anymore and I got grounded for a long time. Though this is not considered a huge infraction according to our societies laws, it scared me enough never to shoplift again. Had I not been caught, it could have become a habit into adulthood, and I could have achieved the status of: thief. Adults are a bit harder to set straight then kids.

We all have roles to play and act out. For some the highest achieved status may be that of a janitor, and for others maybe an Academy Award winner. Some roles are big and some are small, but all are equally important for a healthy society to function.