I'm kinda failing at finishing books lately, not sure why... possibly I'm sleeping instead.
I did finish a few though, so here goes...
"Thunderstruck" by Erik Larson chronicles both the period in G. Marconi's life when he single handedly pushed through the idea of using wireless transmissions to reach across the ocean and the detective story and chase of a murderer across the ocean waves as wireless transmissions effectively made the world a much smaller (and more transparent) place. It wasn't as good as his previous book about the devil and the white city (hmm, he has a penchant for murder and invention) but it was worth reading if only for the historical context regarding the hard parts of innovation (hint it has very little to do with the technology sometimes).
"A Madman Dreams of Turing Machines" by Janna Levin is a little bit of fiction about two of the giants of math from the 20th century. Kurt Godel and Alan Turing had very different views and contributed to the shape of our current understanding about math and thinking. In other books I've caught a glimpse of Alan (cryptonomicon for one) but in this one you get a pretty good sense of his perspective on the world. He was a major code breaker during world war 2. This book gives you a taste of his private life and his motivations and thoughts. Kurt gave us the notion that math could be incomplete (not solvable) which turned quite a bit of thinking on its head. Janna is a scientist and this book is her first novel. She's written other books though, so I'm off to find them (yes that means this was good).
"Autograph Man" by Zadie Smith was one that I picked up a while ago, she's pretty good and this was a solidly entertaining read about a boy who grows up obsessed with collecting autographs and ultimately tries to track down one of the people that is represented (questionably) as one of his prized possessions. A glimpse into English life and this particular subculture.
"The Zero" by Jess Walters is set on September 12th 2001 and is a tragicomic take (from the point of view of a cop who is slowly losing his eyesight and possibly his mind) on the social aspects of 9/11. In particular it deals with the blunting of emotions, the marketing of tragedy, and the inflated and misguided hunt for enemies within. A tight book.
Heavy Rotation?
Red Hot Chili Pepper's new 2 cd set is not "new" music in that it sounds just like the last RHCP album but if you like the sound, its more of the same.
"The Inside Man" soundtrack. Great indian/hip hop song and some really nice and moody arrangements by Spike Lee's longtime musical collaborator.
"Love" by the Beatles. A new remix by the Beatle survivors of some of their classics. Octopuses (pi?) garden is my favorite on this one...
Sean Lennon has a new album and I like it. The first track is my favorite thus far. He's got a bit of his dad in there somewhere and it is starting to come out.
Monday, December 25, 2006
Sunday, November 12, 2006
Books n stuff November 2006
Hmm, its been a while.
Lessee... books I've read (and actually remember) and other stuff of note mediawise.
The "Memory Keeper's Daughter" by Kim Edwards was a heavy read (not a big book but an emotional one about giving away a child during the 60's when kids with down's syndrome where thrown away like defective goods.)
"The Ghost Map" by Steven Johnson is a great detective-style historical story (true story) about the cholera epidemics that swept through london in the 16-1800s. In particular it focuses on the worst one and how the people who solved the problem used visualization to understand and later communicate the real source of the epidemic to a world that did not want to acknowledge that they were stuck in their own orthodoxy (they all thought up to this point that you got cholera either because you weren't of strong moral fiber or because you were living at a low altitude... animacules where not really widely understood yet). What is really scary is that today there are still cholera outbreaks in india and the developing world. Secret solution back then? Well lets just say that the brewery workers where paid in beer and didn't get sick. Read it.
"What is the what" a new book by David Eggers (of "Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" fame... if you didn't read that one read it). In "WITW" Dave does another kind of autobiography, this time for one of the lost boys of sudan. He and Valentino Achak Deng (one of the lost boys) carried on a multiyear conversation and then David wrote the book. Its called a novel but most of the stuff that happens actually happened to Deng or one of the other boys. Its a book worth reading. At times sad and funny, stark and oddly hopeful. It spans Valentino's early childhood in an idyllic dinka village and his long and grueling, unexpected, lucky, unlucky journey to America, and being tied up and robbed while minding his own business in his own apartment in Atlanta by not so friendly Americans. I'm not done with the book yet but I'm already enjoying the read.
David is also the creator of the best super hero supply company in brooklyn and a fine pirate supply shop in san franscisco and if you read a bunch you've also probably seen his McSweeney's Quarterly. He has also started up a creativity/writing program for kids aged 6-18 in New York (and now a few other cities) that is making me think that maybe I should try to get one started up in my town.
"Beasts of No Nation," by a 23 year old named Uzodinma Iweala who is a young american of african decent. Although he grew up in washington DC he captures the life of a child turned child soldier amazingly well. Its not explicitly set in the sudan or africa at all but reading both this book and "What is the What" together is probably about all I can read on this subject for a while. Its pretty good for a debut novel with a unique voice and a heartbreaking message. Maybe a bit overhyped.
"The Town that Forgot How to Breath" by Kenneth J. Harvey is a ghost story about electromagnetic disturbances, a sleepy newfoundland port town and the people who have lost their lives to the water. Its a fun little book to read around halloween.
"This I Believe" was produced back in the mid century by Edward R. Murrow and has been brought back by NPR with a companion book that is a must read. He started the project as a daily series of 5 minute radio segments by famous people about what they believed. Helen Keller, Eleanor Roosevelt, Robert Heinlein and hundreds of other participants took a brief moment out of their lives to talk, in a positive way, about what they believed. After listeners complained that they didn't hear from any regular joes the series expanded to include teachers, dockworkers, and other people from all walks of life. The series took off and became an international phenomenon. I think whats wonderful about this idea is that it was very simple and yet it revealed a great deal about the psyche of the time. Its interesting that the new book includes both 1950 and current essays and that it is very hard to tell the difference between the two. There is the same feeling of hopelessness about the current state of the world and the same sense of hope about what is good and right in the world. The website has all of the essays in a searchable database. Go. Now. Read one. Listen to NPR. Write one. They provide a nice respite from the day. I'd recommend one a day or at least one a week for the rest of our lives. It was originally started to become an antidote to the cycle of bad, horrible, unthinkable news that was then flooding the airwaves. its good that this antidote has been rediscovered.
A (rather long) clip from Edward R. Murrow's own essay/intro gives you a taste...
"We hardly need to be reminded that we are living in an age of confusion. A lot of us have traded in our beliefs for bitterness and cynicism, or a for a heavy package of despair, or even a quivering portion of hysteria. Opinions can be picked up cheap in the marketplace, while such commodities as courage and fortitude and faith are in alarmingly short supply. Around us all—now high like a distant thunderhead, now close upon us with the wet choking intimacy of a London fog—there is an enveloping cloud of fear....We don’t pretend to make this time a spiritual or psychological patent medicine chest where one can come and get a pill of wisdom to be swallowed like an aspirin, to banish the headaches of our time. This reporter’s beliefs are in a state of flux. It would be easier to enumerate the items I do not believe in, than the other way around. And yet, in talking to people, in listening to them, I have come to realize that I don’t have a monopoly on the world’s problems; others have their share, often far, far bigger than mine. This has helped me to see my own problems in truer perspective. And in learning how others have faced their problems, this has given me fresh ideas about how to tackle mine."
Heavy Rotation?
Idlewild by Outkast (from their new movie... which I haven't seen yet... uneven but worth listening to)
Til the Sun Turns Black Ray Lamontagne (kinda joe cocker meets jack johnson... really good, gotta go buy his older stuff)
Every Waking Moment... new Citizen Cope (maybe not quite as good as his first one but damn good)
Eraser by Thom Yorke (from Radiohead... basically sounds like radiohead)
Lemonade (nice G. Love mix with a bunch of songs with guest performers)
Game Theory by the Roots (Dave Chappelle's house band kills me)
Exit Music (covers of Radiohead songs by others... really good)
Just went and saw English Beat on Friday. Lets just say that if you need a little pick me up you should go read Edward R. Murrow's complete essay while listening to "mirror in the bathroom" and think about how lucky you are to be alive (well, that's what I'm gonna do).
Lessee... books I've read (and actually remember) and other stuff of note mediawise.
The "Memory Keeper's Daughter" by Kim Edwards was a heavy read (not a big book but an emotional one about giving away a child during the 60's when kids with down's syndrome where thrown away like defective goods.)
"The Ghost Map" by Steven Johnson is a great detective-style historical story (true story) about the cholera epidemics that swept through london in the 16-1800s. In particular it focuses on the worst one and how the people who solved the problem used visualization to understand and later communicate the real source of the epidemic to a world that did not want to acknowledge that they were stuck in their own orthodoxy (they all thought up to this point that you got cholera either because you weren't of strong moral fiber or because you were living at a low altitude... animacules where not really widely understood yet). What is really scary is that today there are still cholera outbreaks in india and the developing world. Secret solution back then? Well lets just say that the brewery workers where paid in beer and didn't get sick. Read it.
"What is the what" a new book by David Eggers (of "Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius" fame... if you didn't read that one read it). In "WITW" Dave does another kind of autobiography, this time for one of the lost boys of sudan. He and Valentino Achak Deng (one of the lost boys) carried on a multiyear conversation and then David wrote the book. Its called a novel but most of the stuff that happens actually happened to Deng or one of the other boys. Its a book worth reading. At times sad and funny, stark and oddly hopeful. It spans Valentino's early childhood in an idyllic dinka village and his long and grueling, unexpected, lucky, unlucky journey to America, and being tied up and robbed while minding his own business in his own apartment in Atlanta by not so friendly Americans. I'm not done with the book yet but I'm already enjoying the read.
David is also the creator of the best super hero supply company in brooklyn and a fine pirate supply shop in san franscisco and if you read a bunch you've also probably seen his McSweeney's Quarterly. He has also started up a creativity/writing program for kids aged 6-18 in New York (and now a few other cities) that is making me think that maybe I should try to get one started up in my town.
"Beasts of No Nation," by a 23 year old named Uzodinma Iweala who is a young american of african decent. Although he grew up in washington DC he captures the life of a child turned child soldier amazingly well. Its not explicitly set in the sudan or africa at all but reading both this book and "What is the What" together is probably about all I can read on this subject for a while. Its pretty good for a debut novel with a unique voice and a heartbreaking message. Maybe a bit overhyped.
"The Town that Forgot How to Breath" by Kenneth J. Harvey is a ghost story about electromagnetic disturbances, a sleepy newfoundland port town and the people who have lost their lives to the water. Its a fun little book to read around halloween.
"This I Believe" was produced back in the mid century by Edward R. Murrow and has been brought back by NPR with a companion book that is a must read. He started the project as a daily series of 5 minute radio segments by famous people about what they believed. Helen Keller, Eleanor Roosevelt, Robert Heinlein and hundreds of other participants took a brief moment out of their lives to talk, in a positive way, about what they believed. After listeners complained that they didn't hear from any regular joes the series expanded to include teachers, dockworkers, and other people from all walks of life. The series took off and became an international phenomenon. I think whats wonderful about this idea is that it was very simple and yet it revealed a great deal about the psyche of the time. Its interesting that the new book includes both 1950 and current essays and that it is very hard to tell the difference between the two. There is the same feeling of hopelessness about the current state of the world and the same sense of hope about what is good and right in the world. The website has all of the essays in a searchable database. Go. Now. Read one. Listen to NPR. Write one. They provide a nice respite from the day. I'd recommend one a day or at least one a week for the rest of our lives. It was originally started to become an antidote to the cycle of bad, horrible, unthinkable news that was then flooding the airwaves. its good that this antidote has been rediscovered.
A (rather long) clip from Edward R. Murrow's own essay/intro gives you a taste...
"We hardly need to be reminded that we are living in an age of confusion. A lot of us have traded in our beliefs for bitterness and cynicism, or a for a heavy package of despair, or even a quivering portion of hysteria. Opinions can be picked up cheap in the marketplace, while such commodities as courage and fortitude and faith are in alarmingly short supply. Around us all—now high like a distant thunderhead, now close upon us with the wet choking intimacy of a London fog—there is an enveloping cloud of fear....We don’t pretend to make this time a spiritual or psychological patent medicine chest where one can come and get a pill of wisdom to be swallowed like an aspirin, to banish the headaches of our time. This reporter’s beliefs are in a state of flux. It would be easier to enumerate the items I do not believe in, than the other way around. And yet, in talking to people, in listening to them, I have come to realize that I don’t have a monopoly on the world’s problems; others have their share, often far, far bigger than mine. This has helped me to see my own problems in truer perspective. And in learning how others have faced their problems, this has given me fresh ideas about how to tackle mine."
Heavy Rotation?
Idlewild by Outkast (from their new movie... which I haven't seen yet... uneven but worth listening to)
Til the Sun Turns Black Ray Lamontagne (kinda joe cocker meets jack johnson... really good, gotta go buy his older stuff)
Every Waking Moment... new Citizen Cope (maybe not quite as good as his first one but damn good)
Eraser by Thom Yorke (from Radiohead... basically sounds like radiohead)
Lemonade (nice G. Love mix with a bunch of songs with guest performers)
Game Theory by the Roots (Dave Chappelle's house band kills me)
Exit Music (covers of Radiohead songs by others... really good)
Just went and saw English Beat on Friday. Lets just say that if you need a little pick me up you should go read Edward R. Murrow's complete essay while listening to "mirror in the bathroom" and think about how lucky you are to be alive (well, that's what I'm gonna do).
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Road Trip 1: Be Prepared.
He was the whitest, purest, most naive, kindest hearted person I had ever met. We discovered friendship on a shared ride to Wisconsin thrown together by fate. He would later become a police officer driving a one horse-power, four legged coupe through the streets of chicagoland.
Tonight we would embark on our ultimate trip across the eastern United States in the first Beetle I ever owned (a 1971 two-toned beast that would soon leave us drifting into the mountains of Kentucky). We left at midnight (mistake number 1) bound for Atlanta with a full tank of gas, two weeks of freedom, matching "Mr. Bubble" t-shirts (mistake number 2), and of course the requisite new wave bleached, razor-slot-cut sided, spikey topped sting wannabe hairstyles (mistake number 3). We were college room mates who had spent the last year getting to know each other by driving (through snowstorms, tollbooths, heatwaves, and beer swilling toga cloaked fratboys to visit our girlfriends 3 hours away in madcity). I had devised a simple plan and Paul was all for it. A. Drive down to Atlanta and pick up my childhood chum; B. continue on to Hilton Head Island for a week of lazy sunburned days on the beaches; C. collect the run off girls (mistake number 4... ok, really more like hopeless fantasy number 1) that dripped from Paul's charisma; D. drive back to chicagoland and resume our meek and humble college lives.
Around 4 am (remember mistake number 1?), Paul at the wheel (this became a pattern), Indiana ablating the paint from our ride, "Tainte Love" spilling from our tape deck, things started to go slightly awry. For background it's useful to have memorized and have at your fingertips a copy of John Muir's classic "How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive" and in particular the section of the book that describes the large hole at the bottom of a beetle engine where a drain plug is supposed to reside in the hopes that oil will resist spilling out onto the highway, killing your engine, and slowing your southerly directionality. We didn't hear the engine die. Paul (budding detective) noted the glowing red light and rapidly descending speedometer though and we pulled off the road for a looksee. After retracing our journey (on foot, eyes scanning the road, crickets serenading us) in search of the mythic oil drain plug we decided to push the car to Atlanta (noting a glow on the horizon that looked promising). We were soon gliding downhill towards an oasis of gas and truckstop love. We found no drain plugs at the rest stop, no german engineered parts at all for that matter. They laughed at us when we asked (remember mistake number 2?) for help. However we would not be diverted so easily. Paul began to buy up bottles of 10w-40 while I slipped under the car to drop the entire oil pan. We fashioned gaskets using a swiss army knife and spare oil containers. We sandwiched the makeshift parts in place over the gaping oil plug hole with degenerate american nuts and bolts. We were soon pinging down the roadways in search of our american dream again, refilling the engine with gas and oil every hour on the hour as it dribbled across the border between north and south, laughing in the face of Mr Murphy and his law.
Paul was driving again when we entered Kentucky's mountain range and he noticed that we were slowing down even though we heard the engine winding up, even though we were in fourth gear, even though we had the gas pedal embedded in the floor even though Joe Strummer and his crew were calling us towards London. "Bonnieville 1 mile" is where the Volkswagen finally came to rest. Once again Mr. Muir's book is useful for reference, and in particular the section that illustrates the one large nut holding the wheel to the axle, the one large blurred, spinning when it clearly shouldn't have been spinning since we were sitting by the side of the road wondering why revving through the gears was doing nothing but spinning the, axle with that one large nut doing nothing useful. We would not Rube Goldberg our way out of this (years before macgyvering was all the rage Rube would guide our journeys). We had met our roadtrip match. Who designed this car? Who thought one screw should hold in the life blood, one nut should hold on the wheels, four bolts the entire engine? More importantly who would fix it in Bonnieville Kentucky, a town with no stop lights, slow moving gapers looking at mistakes number 2 & 3, a town with a single gas station with dirt floors and a shotgun leaning up against the door, strains of Deliverance lilting in the breeze, who?
Toad (or was it Newt?) of course but he'd have to tow it to his shop, he assured us he could fix it in a week for 200 bucks no ups and no extras, Newt (Toad?) would save us. As we rode in the back of his pickup truck to the next town down the greyhound line (Lizbethtown?) we were looking on the bright side, we'd never been on a bus ride of such epic proportion before, we'd never had to hail a bus who's driver didn't usually stop in that particular hamlet so may not even slow down for those two sorry oil stained Mr. Bubble apparitions, we'd never felt so out of place (well maybe the time that our accelerator cable broke and we slowly drifted to a stop in the heart of the Cabrini Green housing project, bullets zinging off the roof, cops laughing at us as they carted us away for our own protection). Our first real taste of southern hospitality came 4 hours later when the bus pulled into a local town and stopped so we could all buy dinner from the local po' folks (the actual unfortunate name of a chain of restaurants in the south).
Two weeks later, our skin glowing blindingly red from the sun and our minds still reeling from the effects (or lack thereof) of fantasy number 1, we tooled along the highways and byways of Kentucky in a metallic blue 240z saying our goodbyes to my atlanta friend, in debt to him for more than we could say. Newt handed us the keys milked us for the dough (now it was 250 bucks and he retarded the engine timing so that we'd spend the rest of the drive overheating and stalling) and we headed home.
Paul and I grew up together that summer, stumbled towards manhood, fumbled through relationships, opened our souls, tested most limits (the first and last time I ever almost threw up from too much beer, he in fact did throw up... after both too much beer and 10 white castle hamburgers... across my parent's bathroom).
I learned that he was a fat little crippled boy scout raised by the commander of police of a small suburb, suddenly rejuvinated, maraculously cured and suddenly growing into his looks, winning gymnastic competitions, just learning to live his own life (getting an earring in his family was cause for permanent expulsion from his parent's home for, apparently, ever). He found me to be, oddly enough, the bad influence, the dangerous friend, the city kid raised to know that we'd all be blown off the face of the earth by 22 (this was just a few years after Three Mile Island and the cold war was mutually assuring plenty of destruction), hoping to invent his way out of it.
I was going to be a scientist (mad of course) and he an airforce pilot.
Paul was driving later that summer when he talked me into taking a detour into my first art class in college. The wheels fell off my theoretical scientific future at that moment but all we thought at the time was that it would be a nice way to make some easy credits, the wind whistling past our faces as we began to slide uncontrollably out of man-childhood. That decision changed our direction and prepared us for life in startling new ways. In fact that one push, that single conversation, his singular idea to take a blow-off art class when neither of us was particularly interested in art (I had last engaged in drawing on an Atari 400 in high school, replacing pencil for pixels but ultimately assumed it was no way to make a living and wandered slowly away) set us on very different roads from that moment on.
A year later he was a bouncer at a punk bar (he fell in with our art teacher and her alternative crowd... did I mention that no woman could resist his baby face and boyscout glow?), we had both broke up with our girls and become engaged in new lives. Somehow we had also lost the map to our friendship.
The next (and last) time I saw him I would have a child, a career in something called design, and a soulmate. He would gallop off into the sunset, girls spilling from his fitted uniform, back on the straight and narrow, following in his father's tracks, fighting crime, his ride no longer in need of a book about misfit automotive engineering and the 101 uses for a pencap, super glue, chewing gum and toothpicks.
Tonight we would embark on our ultimate trip across the eastern United States in the first Beetle I ever owned (a 1971 two-toned beast that would soon leave us drifting into the mountains of Kentucky). We left at midnight (mistake number 1) bound for Atlanta with a full tank of gas, two weeks of freedom, matching "Mr. Bubble" t-shirts (mistake number 2), and of course the requisite new wave bleached, razor-slot-cut sided, spikey topped sting wannabe hairstyles (mistake number 3). We were college room mates who had spent the last year getting to know each other by driving (through snowstorms, tollbooths, heatwaves, and beer swilling toga cloaked fratboys to visit our girlfriends 3 hours away in madcity). I had devised a simple plan and Paul was all for it. A. Drive down to Atlanta and pick up my childhood chum; B. continue on to Hilton Head Island for a week of lazy sunburned days on the beaches; C. collect the run off girls (mistake number 4... ok, really more like hopeless fantasy number 1) that dripped from Paul's charisma; D. drive back to chicagoland and resume our meek and humble college lives.
Around 4 am (remember mistake number 1?), Paul at the wheel (this became a pattern), Indiana ablating the paint from our ride, "Tainte Love" spilling from our tape deck, things started to go slightly awry. For background it's useful to have memorized and have at your fingertips a copy of John Muir's classic "How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive" and in particular the section of the book that describes the large hole at the bottom of a beetle engine where a drain plug is supposed to reside in the hopes that oil will resist spilling out onto the highway, killing your engine, and slowing your southerly directionality. We didn't hear the engine die. Paul (budding detective) noted the glowing red light and rapidly descending speedometer though and we pulled off the road for a looksee. After retracing our journey (on foot, eyes scanning the road, crickets serenading us) in search of the mythic oil drain plug we decided to push the car to Atlanta (noting a glow on the horizon that looked promising). We were soon gliding downhill towards an oasis of gas and truckstop love. We found no drain plugs at the rest stop, no german engineered parts at all for that matter. They laughed at us when we asked (remember mistake number 2?) for help. However we would not be diverted so easily. Paul began to buy up bottles of 10w-40 while I slipped under the car to drop the entire oil pan. We fashioned gaskets using a swiss army knife and spare oil containers. We sandwiched the makeshift parts in place over the gaping oil plug hole with degenerate american nuts and bolts. We were soon pinging down the roadways in search of our american dream again, refilling the engine with gas and oil every hour on the hour as it dribbled across the border between north and south, laughing in the face of Mr Murphy and his law.
Paul was driving again when we entered Kentucky's mountain range and he noticed that we were slowing down even though we heard the engine winding up, even though we were in fourth gear, even though we had the gas pedal embedded in the floor even though Joe Strummer and his crew were calling us towards London. "Bonnieville 1 mile" is where the Volkswagen finally came to rest. Once again Mr. Muir's book is useful for reference, and in particular the section that illustrates the one large nut holding the wheel to the axle, the one large blurred, spinning when it clearly shouldn't have been spinning since we were sitting by the side of the road wondering why revving through the gears was doing nothing but spinning the, axle with that one large nut doing nothing useful. We would not Rube Goldberg our way out of this (years before macgyvering was all the rage Rube would guide our journeys). We had met our roadtrip match. Who designed this car? Who thought one screw should hold in the life blood, one nut should hold on the wheels, four bolts the entire engine? More importantly who would fix it in Bonnieville Kentucky, a town with no stop lights, slow moving gapers looking at mistakes number 2 & 3, a town with a single gas station with dirt floors and a shotgun leaning up against the door, strains of Deliverance lilting in the breeze, who?
Toad (or was it Newt?) of course but he'd have to tow it to his shop, he assured us he could fix it in a week for 200 bucks no ups and no extras, Newt (Toad?) would save us. As we rode in the back of his pickup truck to the next town down the greyhound line (Lizbethtown?) we were looking on the bright side, we'd never been on a bus ride of such epic proportion before, we'd never had to hail a bus who's driver didn't usually stop in that particular hamlet so may not even slow down for those two sorry oil stained Mr. Bubble apparitions, we'd never felt so out of place (well maybe the time that our accelerator cable broke and we slowly drifted to a stop in the heart of the Cabrini Green housing project, bullets zinging off the roof, cops laughing at us as they carted us away for our own protection). Our first real taste of southern hospitality came 4 hours later when the bus pulled into a local town and stopped so we could all buy dinner from the local po' folks (the actual unfortunate name of a chain of restaurants in the south).
Two weeks later, our skin glowing blindingly red from the sun and our minds still reeling from the effects (or lack thereof) of fantasy number 1, we tooled along the highways and byways of Kentucky in a metallic blue 240z saying our goodbyes to my atlanta friend, in debt to him for more than we could say. Newt handed us the keys milked us for the dough (now it was 250 bucks and he retarded the engine timing so that we'd spend the rest of the drive overheating and stalling) and we headed home.
Paul and I grew up together that summer, stumbled towards manhood, fumbled through relationships, opened our souls, tested most limits (the first and last time I ever almost threw up from too much beer, he in fact did throw up... after both too much beer and 10 white castle hamburgers... across my parent's bathroom).
I learned that he was a fat little crippled boy scout raised by the commander of police of a small suburb, suddenly rejuvinated, maraculously cured and suddenly growing into his looks, winning gymnastic competitions, just learning to live his own life (getting an earring in his family was cause for permanent expulsion from his parent's home for, apparently, ever). He found me to be, oddly enough, the bad influence, the dangerous friend, the city kid raised to know that we'd all be blown off the face of the earth by 22 (this was just a few years after Three Mile Island and the cold war was mutually assuring plenty of destruction), hoping to invent his way out of it.
I was going to be a scientist (mad of course) and he an airforce pilot.
Paul was driving later that summer when he talked me into taking a detour into my first art class in college. The wheels fell off my theoretical scientific future at that moment but all we thought at the time was that it would be a nice way to make some easy credits, the wind whistling past our faces as we began to slide uncontrollably out of man-childhood. That decision changed our direction and prepared us for life in startling new ways. In fact that one push, that single conversation, his singular idea to take a blow-off art class when neither of us was particularly interested in art (I had last engaged in drawing on an Atari 400 in high school, replacing pencil for pixels but ultimately assumed it was no way to make a living and wandered slowly away) set us on very different roads from that moment on.
A year later he was a bouncer at a punk bar (he fell in with our art teacher and her alternative crowd... did I mention that no woman could resist his baby face and boyscout glow?), we had both broke up with our girls and become engaged in new lives. Somehow we had also lost the map to our friendship.
The next (and last) time I saw him I would have a child, a career in something called design, and a soulmate. He would gallop off into the sunset, girls spilling from his fitted uniform, back on the straight and narrow, following in his father's tracks, fighting crime, his ride no longer in need of a book about misfit automotive engineering and the 101 uses for a pencap, super glue, chewing gum and toothpicks.
Sunday, May 21, 2006
books 'n' stuff for May 06
It's been a long dry spell for insanely great books and I figured I should at least catalog the blobs of paper I've slogged through in the last 2 or three months... read on if you can't stop reading books (the first thing you have to do is admit you have a problem).
First a bright spot. I reread Vernor Vinge's "A Deepness in the Sky." He is good. It's basically the story of a civilization that lives life briskly while the sun shines and then hides deep underground and hibernates when the sun suddenly turns off (every 200 years). Its also about 2 warring space civilizations that decide to visit this odd star and exploit the poor natives. The best part about the whole book (and it is a really good book) is Vinge's take on how to build a galaxy spanning civilization (hint governments would fail or become degenerate but he's got an alternative that just might work).
Vernor Vinge's new book, "Rainbow's End" held such promise. First if you've never read his books, read them all. Find his short stories, essays, anything he's written is worth reading. He hasn't had a book out in a while so I bought this one with glee (yes actual glee... though it was sugar free). I'm not saying its bad, in fact the first chapter is worth buying the book for, but it just left me wanting (if you're a newbie to really good futuretelling you'll probably love it).
Set in the near future, it extrapolates in some not so obvious (well obvious once he does it) ways the tech trends of today into a believable world (his "True Names" is a classic in this sense). An old timer gets gene therapy and enters a second childhood. All the books of the world are being fed into shredders (to better scan them and put them online for those poor children who don't understand paper), people routinely shadow others via augmented reality and most social networks detect outbreaks and cures far sooner than the slow and structured government organizations that used to protect us (of course the converse is true as well... the world is full of asymetric threats). Trouble ensues and the old timer gets involved, maybe the world almost ends or becomes sentient... I won't say.
I get the sense that the book might have gone an entirely different way or that it was laying the groundwork for a sequel that would knock our socks off (and given his track record I'll give him the benefit of the doubt).
"Fluke" by Christopher Moore is a little gem. Never heard of this guy before but he writes a good book. Nothing groundbreaking just a little story about the real reason whales sing. Mildly sci-fi (and he knows his marine biology).
Fluffy mindless sci-fi body shifting detective fun. Richard Morgan's "Altered Carbon" is a pretty gripping run through the classic "who-done-it" (which in this case is complicated by the fact that the victim seems to have committed suicide, isn't actually dead due to spinal backup archives and is a rich bastard who can't imagine why he'd kill himself and so ends up being the person that hired the detective in the first place). A bit brutal, but fun.
"Broken Angels" is a sequel of sorts to "Altered Carbon" though not on earth and with a far different tone. This time the main character (a detective in the first one but now a mercenary fighting an unwinnable war... remember I said people can have themselves backed up... so he gets to die alot and come back...) has been contracted to track down an alien artifact. Another fun read with little substance.
"Market Forces" is one more by Richard Morgan (ok I was on a run). This time it is the near future and pimping and racing cars ala fast and furious has emerged as the best way to get ahead in the corporate world. Deathcarmatch meets mergers and acquisitions meets global corporations that run wars for despots. I didn't really get into this one but if you like dystopia.... well... uh...
"Black Swan Green" by David Mitchell (he wrote "Cloud Atlas" which was kinda trippy but a bit overwrought) is the best book he's done so far. It feels autobiographical or at least very lovingly detailed (maybe it's just that I remember the era that he writes about well). Each chapter is another month in the life of a 13 year old english kid in the 1980's. A compelling portrait of a painful age (thatcher is PM and the falklands are under siege... which I can't recall being a big deal here but it was clearly a blow to the empire over there).
"The Pleasure of My Company" by Steve Martin (the comedian) is a little book in the mode of "the curious incident of the dog in the night time." A man who's mentally challenged (augsbergers? autism? low IQ? OCD? or maybe some combination... you can't tell until the story gets rolling) tells of his adventures trying to cross the street, meet girls, stay out of a murder investigation, join Mensa, and learn about life and love. A sweet and amusing set piece.
Oh yeah, I read one more by Salman Rushdie called "The Ground Beneath Her Feet." Not a little book, nor the kind that you just slip through in a moment. If you like to read though it's a fun ride. He's got a way with words and ideas and legends and musical lyrics and slightly alternate worlds and tragedy and love and the brutality of life. It's the story of a girl (kinda like Madonna) who meets a boy (who's sorta like a cross between John Lennon and Elvis), they fall in love and become mega super rock stars. Rushdie sets it in many locales as the pop stars explode upon the world but the main characters grow up in Bombay (later Mumbai) in the 50s and 60s and Bombay alone is quite a story all by itself (and feels like a character in its own right). There are murders, families explode, Carly Simon and Genevere Garfunkel sing about a bridge over some water and there is a touch of sci-fi/magical realism throughout his words.
First a bright spot. I reread Vernor Vinge's "A Deepness in the Sky." He is good. It's basically the story of a civilization that lives life briskly while the sun shines and then hides deep underground and hibernates when the sun suddenly turns off (every 200 years). Its also about 2 warring space civilizations that decide to visit this odd star and exploit the poor natives. The best part about the whole book (and it is a really good book) is Vinge's take on how to build a galaxy spanning civilization (hint governments would fail or become degenerate but he's got an alternative that just might work).
Vernor Vinge's new book, "Rainbow's End" held such promise. First if you've never read his books, read them all. Find his short stories, essays, anything he's written is worth reading. He hasn't had a book out in a while so I bought this one with glee (yes actual glee... though it was sugar free). I'm not saying its bad, in fact the first chapter is worth buying the book for, but it just left me wanting (if you're a newbie to really good futuretelling you'll probably love it).
Set in the near future, it extrapolates in some not so obvious (well obvious once he does it) ways the tech trends of today into a believable world (his "True Names" is a classic in this sense). An old timer gets gene therapy and enters a second childhood. All the books of the world are being fed into shredders (to better scan them and put them online for those poor children who don't understand paper), people routinely shadow others via augmented reality and most social networks detect outbreaks and cures far sooner than the slow and structured government organizations that used to protect us (of course the converse is true as well... the world is full of asymetric threats). Trouble ensues and the old timer gets involved, maybe the world almost ends or becomes sentient... I won't say.
I get the sense that the book might have gone an entirely different way or that it was laying the groundwork for a sequel that would knock our socks off (and given his track record I'll give him the benefit of the doubt).
"Fluke" by Christopher Moore is a little gem. Never heard of this guy before but he writes a good book. Nothing groundbreaking just a little story about the real reason whales sing. Mildly sci-fi (and he knows his marine biology).
Fluffy mindless sci-fi body shifting detective fun. Richard Morgan's "Altered Carbon" is a pretty gripping run through the classic "who-done-it" (which in this case is complicated by the fact that the victim seems to have committed suicide, isn't actually dead due to spinal backup archives and is a rich bastard who can't imagine why he'd kill himself and so ends up being the person that hired the detective in the first place). A bit brutal, but fun.
"Broken Angels" is a sequel of sorts to "Altered Carbon" though not on earth and with a far different tone. This time the main character (a detective in the first one but now a mercenary fighting an unwinnable war... remember I said people can have themselves backed up... so he gets to die alot and come back...) has been contracted to track down an alien artifact. Another fun read with little substance.
"Market Forces" is one more by Richard Morgan (ok I was on a run). This time it is the near future and pimping and racing cars ala fast and furious has emerged as the best way to get ahead in the corporate world. Deathcarmatch meets mergers and acquisitions meets global corporations that run wars for despots. I didn't really get into this one but if you like dystopia.... well... uh...
"Black Swan Green" by David Mitchell (he wrote "Cloud Atlas" which was kinda trippy but a bit overwrought) is the best book he's done so far. It feels autobiographical or at least very lovingly detailed (maybe it's just that I remember the era that he writes about well). Each chapter is another month in the life of a 13 year old english kid in the 1980's. A compelling portrait of a painful age (thatcher is PM and the falklands are under siege... which I can't recall being a big deal here but it was clearly a blow to the empire over there).
"The Pleasure of My Company" by Steve Martin (the comedian) is a little book in the mode of "the curious incident of the dog in the night time." A man who's mentally challenged (augsbergers? autism? low IQ? OCD? or maybe some combination... you can't tell until the story gets rolling) tells of his adventures trying to cross the street, meet girls, stay out of a murder investigation, join Mensa, and learn about life and love. A sweet and amusing set piece.
Oh yeah, I read one more by Salman Rushdie called "The Ground Beneath Her Feet." Not a little book, nor the kind that you just slip through in a moment. If you like to read though it's a fun ride. He's got a way with words and ideas and legends and musical lyrics and slightly alternate worlds and tragedy and love and the brutality of life. It's the story of a girl (kinda like Madonna) who meets a boy (who's sorta like a cross between John Lennon and Elvis), they fall in love and become mega super rock stars. Rushdie sets it in many locales as the pop stars explode upon the world but the main characters grow up in Bombay (later Mumbai) in the 50s and 60s and Bombay alone is quite a story all by itself (and feels like a character in its own right). There are murders, families explode, Carly Simon and Genevere Garfunkel sing about a bridge over some water and there is a touch of sci-fi/magical realism throughout his words.
Sunday, May 14, 2006
backstory part 5: Mom's day
I thought mother's day would be a nice time to take a breath and capture a little bit of the eulogy I gave at my mom's passing.
My father and brothers read from the bible.
The priest spoke of Jesus and his leadership by serving others. Simple things that echo through my mind at quiet moments. He noted that my mom had spent most of her life teaching an ecumenical worldview (I had to look that one up and it was a good word for the way she lived).
My sister and brothers did their part, suggesting bits of history and family lore, reminding me of moments in her life and then they wished me luck, too choked up to speak themselves, knowing that I was after all, the big mouth.
I compiled my list and entitled it: "The 10 secrets of being Mary"
I thought I'd make it just about up to the introduction and break down. I could feel my body rebelling against me, legs shaking, chest heaving for air as I walked to the front of the chapel. As I looked down on her casket, out on our family and friends (some I had not seen since childhood), up at the light streaming through the stained glass, over at her little brother. I knew I'd be fine. She deserved a good word in honor of her shining life and love.
I took a deep breath and told the world about growing up with Mary Margaret McManus as my mom.
The 10 secrets of being Mary
1 that light in her eyes.
She had a playful intelligence that couldn't be dimmed. She would laugh and smile and play word games and when we'd sit around the dinner table we'd always learn new words, my dad would write them down and puzzle over them (he acting the naive blue collar mechanic, she the patient teacher). She loved sharing her knowledge. Even when her body was more burden than fortress her mind was alight, her eyes would shine.
2 the scientific method (the family as experimental medium)
My mom was a scientist, a researcher and later a school teacher. We were her most ambitious experiment. We drank tang, mixed powdered milk, ate moon bars used by astronauts, invented meatzas. She was doing something right, each child grew to be bigger and more strapping than the last (oldest was 5'10", second was 5'11", third... well, fourth was 6'5" and fifth was 6'5" and some change). We were a red headed culture that grew far past our petri dish. We learned from her that science was power, that knowledge held the key, and that the world was open to us.
3 keys to the kingdom
It was a little thing, I didn't even remember it until my sister brought it up. My mom had the keys to everyone's house in the neighborhood and they hung on the wall in our kitchen. Even when the kid down the street that I was currently in a heated war with over some world shaking childhood slight, even when he would come to our door, locked out of his home, perfect moment for revenge... no words were said... I gave him the keys under the universal sign of neutrality and peace that was my mother's will. I learned that the community was just a bigger part of the family (I wish I could be just a bit more like my mom, I fear that I channel her mother more than her sometimes with a fiery glare and desire to spit steel bits of caustic humor when I should just chill... I'm working on it though).
4 mi casa es su casa or the six degrees of Mary McManus
We were wealthy beyond imagination because we had a place to call our own, a house, a home. She loved to meet new people, she invited them home and if they needed a place to stay for a night to lay there weary heads or a week or a year, they could stay. We didn't lock the doors until everyone was home and safe for the night. She opened her arms wide (and she had long arms, which you'd know if you ever cracked wise or punched your little brother in the back seat of the car when she was driving).
5 wealth without bounds
I thought the powdered milk was just a part of the experiment, the straining of clumps between our teeth a little game my mom would play on us to test our courage. I thought everyone walked the alleys to find furniture for the porch, parts for the cars. I just assumed we were rich without bounds. We had encyclopedias, books covered every open space on walls from floor to ceiling, we had tools and irons and garbage bags and things that could cut things and things that could put them back together in new and odd ways, and a basement full of wonders that brimmed with adventure (when it wasn't blazing from some mishap... firemen not far behind).
I think with the engine parts in the living room and the rocket powered skateboards and VWs with no bodies (or physical means of support for such things as steering wheels and seats) cruising the streets as we dreamed of sand dunes, we were actually more like the poor white trash black sheep of the neighborhood. We never knew it, we never doubted for a moment that this was what it was to be rich without bounds. (My dad approached me after my eulogy and said I had hit a bit close to home, shyly embarassed by my comments about our wealth or lack thereof, proud man, mechanic at heart. But he knew, as she did, that riches were measured in conversations, inventions and the playful interchange of the mind with friends and family. He just gave me a hug and whispered "just a bit close, mick.")
6 a glass of water and a little reverse psychology
When I was about four I threw a temper tantrum and would not, could not, stop. My mom grabbed a big glass of water and said "stop now or you will be very wet my friend," and I kicked and screamed and cried and she threw that water in my face and I stopped. She had a way of raising children that said everything was alright. You could do no wrong, but if you stepped over the line you would get wet. I laughed a bit when my son was three and a half years old and throwing a tantrum and without thinking I grabbed a giant glass of water and said "Stop now or you will be very wet my friend." I have now proven that it works in two successive experiments in which the subjects have never exhibited tantrums of that sort again. If you're tracking this of course it is all part of number 2, the scientific method.
7 fire and brimstone and indestructable women
Raising a child is pretty complicated stuff. My mom was raised by someone who really knew how to light up the fire and brimstone. My grandmother was a piece of work. I mean that in a wonderfully Irish way. She raised an amazing woman and all her children were wonders to behold from scientists to engineers to captains of industry. My grandmother set the tone and was the template for spit and vinegar, carried a pearl handled .22 and ran a business as a single mom in the male/mob dominated stockyards of chicago in the 30s. I said before I think I channel my grandmother more than my mom sometimes when dealing with my own child (minus the .22).
I often try to think of how my mom would deal with things. In the same situation that I might just rail at the moon with much gnashing of teeth, she would come up close and say "well friend, what are we going to do about this one," as if she were a co-conspirator. But she was an indestructible woman and I don't think she passed away at all as long as we channel her occasionally as our better nature.
8 unconditional love
I saw for forty seven odd years how my mom and dad lived together and there was never a question that they were in love, that we were loved. I never heard an argument, never stumbled upon a fight simmering below the surface. It was us against the world and the world wasn't such a bad place.
I remember saying to my mom at 18 that "I don't think I want to go to college, I'm going to Atlanta become a roadey for the Police, become a film maker for those newfangled things on that channel called Mtv that had just been born" and I remember sitting on the porch swing telling her this, knowing that in our family of course you went to college, got a Masters or PhD you must become a scientist and she said "ok, we'll be here, the house will be here. Good luck."
That was how she raised us, she gave us a little room to grow (and knew all about how to exercise catholic guilt). Sure enough 6 months later I was back, hungry for school, not quite ready to face the music of real life, ready to fail at anything in college rather than have to live the life I had just left in Georgia. Unconditional love was just a part of being Mary, she would always hold you, no matter what crazy scheme you got up to. A hug would pull you back.
9 the grand adventure and that light in her eyes
Everything was a grand adventure to my mom. When my new wife and my son and I were embarking on a trip to Arizona (from Chicago) and only made it to Springfield, Illinois before the oil rushed out of the engine in a glorious midnight burst of black smoke. I called my mom and dad and 12 hours later there was another car sitting in Springfield (they enlisted my brother and his wife to drive the spare car and of course never left home without a VW towbar kit in the trunk) and they would go see a movie and maybe catch a bite to eat, tow the VW back and we would continued on our way. No big deal. Just another weekend adventure.
About a year or two ago I had a chance to spend another adventure with her. We spent some time in a road trip across the country. We had to spring her from some evil doctors in a SWAT operation to save her from a slow decline towards death at the hands of a well meaning but decidedly barbaric hospital establishment on the shores of the atlantic sea. We carried her across the country. She couldn't walk or even sit up in the car, I had to carry her like a child from car to wheelchair to hotel bedroom and back. It was just another grand adventure that she cracked wise about and we had a wonderful time. I struggled with embarrassment and guilt and shame at not coming sooner, not doing more, not beating the doctors to within an inch of their lives for such a sham bit of witch doctoring and I finally got to show her that I was big enough to hold her up for once. That I wasn't at all embarrassed to carry her and make up for all the times that she had carried me.
10 shut up and hold tight (squeeze til they squeak)
Now I should just shut up and hold someone, because that was her most basic and profound answer. Just hold them as tight as you can, until they squeak. That's what she would do (did I mention that she was a big woman and had long, strong arms?)
I think she held the world, her family, her friends together in her arms more times than I could ever have imagined.
After the burial my mom's little brother (only child left now) came up to me and gave me a hug and thanked me for my words, for the small glimpse into what it was like to be raised by Mary. For sharing what he was too choked up to put into words.
I came back home adrift. Who would I impress now? What did it matter? I was loose in the world as if the last ropes that had moored me to the surface had been cut free. It would have been easy to just lose it at that point. To walk away from the buzzing noise of a long lifetime stretching out ahead of me with no anchor. I couldn't work up the energy to care about much of anything for months.
Of course if I told my mom about such small self-centered and pitiable thoughts she'd have just smiled and given me a hug. She'd say "well friend..."
My father and brothers read from the bible.
The priest spoke of Jesus and his leadership by serving others. Simple things that echo through my mind at quiet moments. He noted that my mom had spent most of her life teaching an ecumenical worldview (I had to look that one up and it was a good word for the way she lived).
My sister and brothers did their part, suggesting bits of history and family lore, reminding me of moments in her life and then they wished me luck, too choked up to speak themselves, knowing that I was after all, the big mouth.
I compiled my list and entitled it: "The 10 secrets of being Mary"
I thought I'd make it just about up to the introduction and break down. I could feel my body rebelling against me, legs shaking, chest heaving for air as I walked to the front of the chapel. As I looked down on her casket, out on our family and friends (some I had not seen since childhood), up at the light streaming through the stained glass, over at her little brother. I knew I'd be fine. She deserved a good word in honor of her shining life and love.
I took a deep breath and told the world about growing up with Mary Margaret McManus as my mom.
The 10 secrets of being Mary
1 that light in her eyes.
She had a playful intelligence that couldn't be dimmed. She would laugh and smile and play word games and when we'd sit around the dinner table we'd always learn new words, my dad would write them down and puzzle over them (he acting the naive blue collar mechanic, she the patient teacher). She loved sharing her knowledge. Even when her body was more burden than fortress her mind was alight, her eyes would shine.
2 the scientific method (the family as experimental medium)
My mom was a scientist, a researcher and later a school teacher. We were her most ambitious experiment. We drank tang, mixed powdered milk, ate moon bars used by astronauts, invented meatzas. She was doing something right, each child grew to be bigger and more strapping than the last (oldest was 5'10", second was 5'11", third... well, fourth was 6'5" and fifth was 6'5" and some change). We were a red headed culture that grew far past our petri dish. We learned from her that science was power, that knowledge held the key, and that the world was open to us.
3 keys to the kingdom
It was a little thing, I didn't even remember it until my sister brought it up. My mom had the keys to everyone's house in the neighborhood and they hung on the wall in our kitchen. Even when the kid down the street that I was currently in a heated war with over some world shaking childhood slight, even when he would come to our door, locked out of his home, perfect moment for revenge... no words were said... I gave him the keys under the universal sign of neutrality and peace that was my mother's will. I learned that the community was just a bigger part of the family (I wish I could be just a bit more like my mom, I fear that I channel her mother more than her sometimes with a fiery glare and desire to spit steel bits of caustic humor when I should just chill... I'm working on it though).
4 mi casa es su casa or the six degrees of Mary McManus
We were wealthy beyond imagination because we had a place to call our own, a house, a home. She loved to meet new people, she invited them home and if they needed a place to stay for a night to lay there weary heads or a week or a year, they could stay. We didn't lock the doors until everyone was home and safe for the night. She opened her arms wide (and she had long arms, which you'd know if you ever cracked wise or punched your little brother in the back seat of the car when she was driving).
5 wealth without bounds
I thought the powdered milk was just a part of the experiment, the straining of clumps between our teeth a little game my mom would play on us to test our courage. I thought everyone walked the alleys to find furniture for the porch, parts for the cars. I just assumed we were rich without bounds. We had encyclopedias, books covered every open space on walls from floor to ceiling, we had tools and irons and garbage bags and things that could cut things and things that could put them back together in new and odd ways, and a basement full of wonders that brimmed with adventure (when it wasn't blazing from some mishap... firemen not far behind).
I think with the engine parts in the living room and the rocket powered skateboards and VWs with no bodies (or physical means of support for such things as steering wheels and seats) cruising the streets as we dreamed of sand dunes, we were actually more like the poor white trash black sheep of the neighborhood. We never knew it, we never doubted for a moment that this was what it was to be rich without bounds. (My dad approached me after my eulogy and said I had hit a bit close to home, shyly embarassed by my comments about our wealth or lack thereof, proud man, mechanic at heart. But he knew, as she did, that riches were measured in conversations, inventions and the playful interchange of the mind with friends and family. He just gave me a hug and whispered "just a bit close, mick.")
6 a glass of water and a little reverse psychology
When I was about four I threw a temper tantrum and would not, could not, stop. My mom grabbed a big glass of water and said "stop now or you will be very wet my friend," and I kicked and screamed and cried and she threw that water in my face and I stopped. She had a way of raising children that said everything was alright. You could do no wrong, but if you stepped over the line you would get wet. I laughed a bit when my son was three and a half years old and throwing a tantrum and without thinking I grabbed a giant glass of water and said "Stop now or you will be very wet my friend." I have now proven that it works in two successive experiments in which the subjects have never exhibited tantrums of that sort again. If you're tracking this of course it is all part of number 2, the scientific method.
7 fire and brimstone and indestructable women
Raising a child is pretty complicated stuff. My mom was raised by someone who really knew how to light up the fire and brimstone. My grandmother was a piece of work. I mean that in a wonderfully Irish way. She raised an amazing woman and all her children were wonders to behold from scientists to engineers to captains of industry. My grandmother set the tone and was the template for spit and vinegar, carried a pearl handled .22 and ran a business as a single mom in the male/mob dominated stockyards of chicago in the 30s. I said before I think I channel my grandmother more than my mom sometimes when dealing with my own child (minus the .22).
I often try to think of how my mom would deal with things. In the same situation that I might just rail at the moon with much gnashing of teeth, she would come up close and say "well friend, what are we going to do about this one," as if she were a co-conspirator. But she was an indestructible woman and I don't think she passed away at all as long as we channel her occasionally as our better nature.
8 unconditional love
I saw for forty seven odd years how my mom and dad lived together and there was never a question that they were in love, that we were loved. I never heard an argument, never stumbled upon a fight simmering below the surface. It was us against the world and the world wasn't such a bad place.
I remember saying to my mom at 18 that "I don't think I want to go to college, I'm going to Atlanta become a roadey for the Police, become a film maker for those newfangled things on that channel called Mtv that had just been born" and I remember sitting on the porch swing telling her this, knowing that in our family of course you went to college, got a Masters or PhD you must become a scientist and she said "ok, we'll be here, the house will be here. Good luck."
That was how she raised us, she gave us a little room to grow (and knew all about how to exercise catholic guilt). Sure enough 6 months later I was back, hungry for school, not quite ready to face the music of real life, ready to fail at anything in college rather than have to live the life I had just left in Georgia. Unconditional love was just a part of being Mary, she would always hold you, no matter what crazy scheme you got up to. A hug would pull you back.
9 the grand adventure and that light in her eyes
Everything was a grand adventure to my mom. When my new wife and my son and I were embarking on a trip to Arizona (from Chicago) and only made it to Springfield, Illinois before the oil rushed out of the engine in a glorious midnight burst of black smoke. I called my mom and dad and 12 hours later there was another car sitting in Springfield (they enlisted my brother and his wife to drive the spare car and of course never left home without a VW towbar kit in the trunk) and they would go see a movie and maybe catch a bite to eat, tow the VW back and we would continued on our way. No big deal. Just another weekend adventure.
About a year or two ago I had a chance to spend another adventure with her. We spent some time in a road trip across the country. We had to spring her from some evil doctors in a SWAT operation to save her from a slow decline towards death at the hands of a well meaning but decidedly barbaric hospital establishment on the shores of the atlantic sea. We carried her across the country. She couldn't walk or even sit up in the car, I had to carry her like a child from car to wheelchair to hotel bedroom and back. It was just another grand adventure that she cracked wise about and we had a wonderful time. I struggled with embarrassment and guilt and shame at not coming sooner, not doing more, not beating the doctors to within an inch of their lives for such a sham bit of witch doctoring and I finally got to show her that I was big enough to hold her up for once. That I wasn't at all embarrassed to carry her and make up for all the times that she had carried me.
10 shut up and hold tight (squeeze til they squeak)
Now I should just shut up and hold someone, because that was her most basic and profound answer. Just hold them as tight as you can, until they squeak. That's what she would do (did I mention that she was a big woman and had long, strong arms?)
I think she held the world, her family, her friends together in her arms more times than I could ever have imagined.
After the burial my mom's little brother (only child left now) came up to me and gave me a hug and thanked me for my words, for the small glimpse into what it was like to be raised by Mary. For sharing what he was too choked up to put into words.
I came back home adrift. Who would I impress now? What did it matter? I was loose in the world as if the last ropes that had moored me to the surface had been cut free. It would have been easy to just lose it at that point. To walk away from the buzzing noise of a long lifetime stretching out ahead of me with no anchor. I couldn't work up the energy to care about much of anything for months.
Of course if I told my mom about such small self-centered and pitiable thoughts she'd have just smiled and given me a hug. She'd say "well friend..."
Saturday, March 18, 2006
Backstory part 4: child, hood.
During the holidays this year he asked me if my sister had told me anything.
"Anything about what?"
You see, he sometimes gets into trouble and doesn't like to tell us.
When he finally does spill the beans, the story is typical (boy goes off on adventure, boy pulls death defying stunt, boy lives to tell tale).
If you didn't know him, you'd just figure he had a vivid imagination (he does, but the stories are generally true, though they get better with each telling).
Turns out he had recently messed up his bike something awful while cruising on a daytrip with a gang of fellow players of hooky. He was going pretty fast (he likes speed) down a country road, hit a patch of gravel, aimed (somehow) towards the high grass and jumped off a moment before the bike flipped 4-5 times into an Iowan field. The bike was a total loss.
He made it home in one piece though (tame story by his standards). He jumped on the back of one of his friend's rides without any further incident (aside from a bruised tailbone, thumb, and ego).
Why couldn't he just play with his radio control model planes, take apart his toy cars, and battle orcs on his pc?
I worry, but his stories always end with a bright side.
Another boy, hood example to illustrate a typical day in this boy's life?
He recently told me about the time that a bomb didn't quite leave the B-29 bomber he was flying and how it spent its time poking, prodding, nudging the small of his back while he sat tangled in the parachute that had just misfired, shoehorned into the tailgunner's bubble and listening to the pilot describe a malfunction so serious that the crew was contemplating ditching the plane (which is a good time to have a parachute that's not covering the inside of your compartment).
They decided to land the plane instead of swimming in the sea of japan.
Sounds like a very immersive video game... god help us when he grows up...
It won't happen anytime soon certainly not now that he's single (my mom passed away a few years ago) and rolls with a motorcycle gang through the streets of the windy city. He's young at only a bit over 70 so there is still plenty of time to become an adult.
His most recent adventure with a bike turned out to have a bright side, the goldwing (his bike, which is about the size of a small car) was totaled and his insurance replaced it with an even more tricked out ride (now with 6 CD changer and antilock brakes).
"The old one always seemed kinda squirrely anyway."
When I was young there were far more kids in our family than adults and I fear that the ratio has slowly changed for the worse. I lose sight of childhood as I struggle to handle the stress of acting grown up. I lose the sensation that the whole world is our playground, that we are as rich as kings and as free as pirates on the high seas and that every day, every moment can reveal dazzling horizons if we'd only stop to breath.
I just spent the weekend with my dad and one evening listening to his old and even very recent adventures (see motobike death match above) reminds me that childhood is a state of mind that I could easily return to.
Dad reminds me how to breath.
My pop still lives most days in the playground, he's just a bit more achy and a bit more aware of the possibility of childhood's end. He has only recently been able to go out for recess a little more often now. A scraped knee and a bruised ego seems a small price to pay for the smiles he steals and the stories he weaves.
"Anything about what?"
You see, he sometimes gets into trouble and doesn't like to tell us.
When he finally does spill the beans, the story is typical (boy goes off on adventure, boy pulls death defying stunt, boy lives to tell tale).
If you didn't know him, you'd just figure he had a vivid imagination (he does, but the stories are generally true, though they get better with each telling).
Turns out he had recently messed up his bike something awful while cruising on a daytrip with a gang of fellow players of hooky. He was going pretty fast (he likes speed) down a country road, hit a patch of gravel, aimed (somehow) towards the high grass and jumped off a moment before the bike flipped 4-5 times into an Iowan field. The bike was a total loss.
He made it home in one piece though (tame story by his standards). He jumped on the back of one of his friend's rides without any further incident (aside from a bruised tailbone, thumb, and ego).
Why couldn't he just play with his radio control model planes, take apart his toy cars, and battle orcs on his pc?
I worry, but his stories always end with a bright side.
Another boy, hood example to illustrate a typical day in this boy's life?
He recently told me about the time that a bomb didn't quite leave the B-29 bomber he was flying and how it spent its time poking, prodding, nudging the small of his back while he sat tangled in the parachute that had just misfired, shoehorned into the tailgunner's bubble and listening to the pilot describe a malfunction so serious that the crew was contemplating ditching the plane (which is a good time to have a parachute that's not covering the inside of your compartment).
They decided to land the plane instead of swimming in the sea of japan.
Sounds like a very immersive video game... god help us when he grows up...
It won't happen anytime soon certainly not now that he's single (my mom passed away a few years ago) and rolls with a motorcycle gang through the streets of the windy city. He's young at only a bit over 70 so there is still plenty of time to become an adult.
His most recent adventure with a bike turned out to have a bright side, the goldwing (his bike, which is about the size of a small car) was totaled and his insurance replaced it with an even more tricked out ride (now with 6 CD changer and antilock brakes).
"The old one always seemed kinda squirrely anyway."
When I was young there were far more kids in our family than adults and I fear that the ratio has slowly changed for the worse. I lose sight of childhood as I struggle to handle the stress of acting grown up. I lose the sensation that the whole world is our playground, that we are as rich as kings and as free as pirates on the high seas and that every day, every moment can reveal dazzling horizons if we'd only stop to breath.
I just spent the weekend with my dad and one evening listening to his old and even very recent adventures (see motobike death match above) reminds me that childhood is a state of mind that I could easily return to.
Dad reminds me how to breath.
My pop still lives most days in the playground, he's just a bit more achy and a bit more aware of the possibility of childhood's end. He has only recently been able to go out for recess a little more often now. A scraped knee and a bruised ego seems a small price to pay for the smiles he steals and the stories he weaves.
Tuesday, February 21, 2006
before my eyes
I... uh.... mmmm....
huh.
Damn I can barely string sentences together this week (last week was worse when it came to continuously comprehensible streams of thought.)
My neck clicks now, my head is full of cotton candy and I've got a slight whistling sound coming out of my right lung (I won't even mention the high pitched keening sound coming from my knees and left wrist or the shaky legs as I walk up the stairs or the last week of either sleeping all the time or staring at the ceiling replaying last saturday night wondering why I couldn't just stay home, read an old book, watch the damn olympics its cold outside, baby its cold outside.
If only is hollow and stupid and doesn't quite work unless you really buy the whole multiple infinite worlds thing.
So quiet. So peaceful. So calm. Ben Harper and Jack Johnson floated in the background with their simple plan to change the world with their own two hands right about the time I lost my breath. Right about the time I realized that any sort of "control" that we have over our trajectory is no more than a coincidence, a bit of luck, an illusion, why can't I, what the hell, are my feet even touching the peddles, was that my head hitting the roof, is that tree in his own lane? By the time I figured out that nobody else drove on that little curving, hilly, forested, backroad, I was seeing stars, snowflakes, wisps of smoke and realizing that I had a thing that could help me contact my wife, if I could only figure out where it was, where I was, what I was (maybe if I put these legs out onto the road someone will run over them and realize they should stop, damn its cold).
She must have been close to hysteria when I finally made the connection, when I couldn't tell her where I was or rasp out much more than that I was really, deeply scared, cold, and confused, numb, when the ambulance driver finally talked to my son, when through some terrible bit of miscommunication theater they told him it was a fatal accident, when he called her to demand an explanation, to find damnit "my dad mom what the hell is going on where is he what did he do this time, he's alone out there somewhere, move", when the hospital couldn't tell her where the hospital was, when she was 5 blocks away and miles from home, when they took my cellphone away when she finally got it to ring, when she got within 30 feet of the twisted bit of metal and couldn't figure out what she was exactly looking at, when she played forward all the past memories of my silly mistakes, near misses and fumbling misteps with large fast moving vehicles over the past 20 odd years and god knows how many cars.
God knows.
He probably does know and she probably hasn't forgotten either, they keep a list of these things for me since my long term memory is not so long term, they tell me that I started with a 60's era bug for training, a vega stationwagon to teach my friends, a 65 bonneville convertible to take my girl to the prom, a 66 tempest which is not quite a goat, a 59 corvair conference room and a 60 dodge pioneer stationwagon rocketship, a 66 coronet, a 71 karmann convertible, a thing, a cadillac grandmamobile sedan deville... hmm they remind me that that was the last one that involved me and a totalled car... and my highschool sweetheart, the blues festival, a family of 16 in a car made for 4, a sunny day on lake shore drive, a crumble zone... well not in the 70's era cadillacs now that I think of it, a tow truck, and billy goats tavern until 11pm... yeah uh, back to the list... a rabbit, a honda civic, a saab, a bug, a bug, a chevy pickup, a subaru baja... a subaru baja so I could make it up my driveway and finally feel safe in these way too bumpy way too slick, way too vertical roads, a baja... isn't that some kinda new age brat?... yes it is, I am, we were, but now, yes god, yes lynn, I am, I am, I think, which is pretty great, alive yes, safe yes, warm yes, loved even when they want to kill me no?, but a bit worse for wear yes?.
I'm blessed (call it luck, karma, whatever makes you more comfortable in an overly politically correct world) with a few aches and pains, a little bit slower brain maybe for a while (I hope just for a while) and a whole bunch of new days ahead of me (which isn't such a bad deal when you weigh the options).
huh.
Damn I can barely string sentences together this week (last week was worse when it came to continuously comprehensible streams of thought.)
My neck clicks now, my head is full of cotton candy and I've got a slight whistling sound coming out of my right lung (I won't even mention the high pitched keening sound coming from my knees and left wrist or the shaky legs as I walk up the stairs or the last week of either sleeping all the time or staring at the ceiling replaying last saturday night wondering why I couldn't just stay home, read an old book, watch the damn olympics its cold outside, baby its cold outside.
If only is hollow and stupid and doesn't quite work unless you really buy the whole multiple infinite worlds thing.
So quiet. So peaceful. So calm. Ben Harper and Jack Johnson floated in the background with their simple plan to change the world with their own two hands right about the time I lost my breath. Right about the time I realized that any sort of "control" that we have over our trajectory is no more than a coincidence, a bit of luck, an illusion, why can't I, what the hell, are my feet even touching the peddles, was that my head hitting the roof, is that tree in his own lane? By the time I figured out that nobody else drove on that little curving, hilly, forested, backroad, I was seeing stars, snowflakes, wisps of smoke and realizing that I had a thing that could help me contact my wife, if I could only figure out where it was, where I was, what I was (maybe if I put these legs out onto the road someone will run over them and realize they should stop, damn its cold).
She must have been close to hysteria when I finally made the connection, when I couldn't tell her where I was or rasp out much more than that I was really, deeply scared, cold, and confused, numb, when the ambulance driver finally talked to my son, when through some terrible bit of miscommunication theater they told him it was a fatal accident, when he called her to demand an explanation, to find damnit "my dad mom what the hell is going on where is he what did he do this time, he's alone out there somewhere, move", when the hospital couldn't tell her where the hospital was, when she was 5 blocks away and miles from home, when they took my cellphone away when she finally got it to ring, when she got within 30 feet of the twisted bit of metal and couldn't figure out what she was exactly looking at, when she played forward all the past memories of my silly mistakes, near misses and fumbling misteps with large fast moving vehicles over the past 20 odd years and god knows how many cars.
God knows.
He probably does know and she probably hasn't forgotten either, they keep a list of these things for me since my long term memory is not so long term, they tell me that I started with a 60's era bug for training, a vega stationwagon to teach my friends, a 65 bonneville convertible to take my girl to the prom, a 66 tempest which is not quite a goat, a 59 corvair conference room and a 60 dodge pioneer stationwagon rocketship, a 66 coronet, a 71 karmann convertible, a thing, a cadillac grandmamobile sedan deville... hmm they remind me that that was the last one that involved me and a totalled car... and my highschool sweetheart, the blues festival, a family of 16 in a car made for 4, a sunny day on lake shore drive, a crumble zone... well not in the 70's era cadillacs now that I think of it, a tow truck, and billy goats tavern until 11pm... yeah uh, back to the list... a rabbit, a honda civic, a saab, a bug, a bug, a chevy pickup, a subaru baja... a subaru baja so I could make it up my driveway and finally feel safe in these way too bumpy way too slick, way too vertical roads, a baja... isn't that some kinda new age brat?... yes it is, I am, we were, but now, yes god, yes lynn, I am, I am, I think, which is pretty great, alive yes, safe yes, warm yes, loved even when they want to kill me no?, but a bit worse for wear yes?.
I'm blessed (call it luck, karma, whatever makes you more comfortable in an overly politically correct world) with a few aches and pains, a little bit slower brain maybe for a while (I hope just for a while) and a whole bunch of new days ahead of me (which isn't such a bad deal when you weigh the options).
Tuesday, January 17, 2006
Consumer Electronic Show 2006
CES was a pretty big let down this year, but for those of you who missed it... here I present my random list of things I saw at CES:
-These guys with that thing
-something stupid called Babble
-logitech's $99 webcam had the best free software (eyebrow/mouth/eye/head position tracking so you could paste parts on your face for your next webmeeting... or just be a different character)
-Finally a use for those segways... a mickshaw!
-Philips and Sony had e-ink based things (think super low battery life... because its like a sheet of plastic paper with lots of microscopic ping pong balls that are each painted white on one side and black on the other that can be flipped over with a little electrostatic charge...)
Philips had a lab demo of flexing display (refresh is 1 frame a second at best and sorta looks like a polaroid developing)
-Lego had a next-gen mindstorm (coming this fall I think), that was pretty impressive
For more commentary, see here (and thanks to jeremy for the pictures)
-These guys with that thing
-something stupid called Babble
-logitech's $99 webcam had the best free software (eyebrow/mouth/eye/head position tracking so you could paste parts on your face for your next webmeeting... or just be a different character)
-Finally a use for those segways... a mickshaw!
-Philips and Sony had e-ink based things (think super low battery life... because its like a sheet of plastic paper with lots of microscopic ping pong balls that are each painted white on one side and black on the other that can be flipped over with a little electrostatic charge...)
Philips had a lab demo of flexing display (refresh is 1 frame a second at best and sorta looks like a polaroid developing)
-Lego had a next-gen mindstorm (coming this fall I think), that was pretty impressive
For more commentary, see here (and thanks to jeremy for the pictures)
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