For most of my life my primary concern has been myself. Sure I would care about other people, as much as my programming would allow. In the end though my universe was centered around me. That may sound selfish, but if I'm not around then everything else for me doesn't really matter. It may not have been the best way to run a ship, still it was my way and it was working for me. Mostly. There have been times where I'm watching a show or movie and I see people behaving how I wish I could be. It's an idealized version of friendship. Almost as though a Norman Rockwell painting has come to life. I know this and I still sometimes want it for myself and the people I call friends. That's not to say what I have is bad in any way. It's just more real. People can be thoughtless. I can be thoughtless. More often than not the thing I meant to say comes out as something else and people look at me like I'm trying to swallow a whole octopus. Even with all these blunders, I still knew what to expect.
Watching a lot of movies and television I felt like I had seen the story where a character is going to have a baby plenty of times. Sometimes they're sad, a lot of times they are happy, but almost always they are freaked the hell out. Just when you think you've got the game figured out, a new player comes onto the board. These characters would run around doing all sorts of wacky things or go through montages where they buy baby books, find a good doctor after sifting through all the crazy ones, and then going to various appointments. All this normally happens in the span of like twenty minutes because in the end the movie is still about the characters and not the tiny alien that's gestating inside one of them. The movie comes to an end with the birth of said alien and if you're lucky they may show a little bit of how wonderful it all is. Aw that's nice. I feel like I'm prepared.
We've been having babies since before we could call ourselves human. While I'm not sure I'd say we are exactly experts at the whole thing. I do feel like we've learned enough to be dangerous, but not quite deadly. Honestly it's a miracle that we're alive. Think about all the things that had to happen for you to be here right now? If the exact scenario of your conception didn't happen it's likely you wouldn't be around to read this. Millions of things have to go right for each person to be born. Change the timing and a boy may be a girl. Change the environment and maybe the whole thing falls apart halfway through. Our bodies are these complex mechanisms that we really have very little control over. Sure we can shovel fuel in the form of our favorite flavors into it in order to keep things running, but we can't exactly tell our kidneys to step up their game. Most of the time I can't get my stomach on board with the same food I've eaten a hundred times before Sometimes I wish there was some kind of external monitoring system that told me what the hell was going on inside of me. I suppose it wouldn't matter because without control that information is useless. I could tell you my heart rate right now, but that doesn't really give me the whole picture of all the other things connected to that piece of information. Now think about how inside someone they're building a completely new person from scratch. Sure I helped in my small way, but it was really a fire and forget. Somehow it's putting together its own brain. If it's doing that then it means we did that ourselves at some point. We really created ourselves.
Knowing this it kind of makes me sad to think how easily we forget about the miracle that is our own lives. Sure reality means there's more to it than simply marveling at how amazing our bodies are. As adults we're kind of over the whole magic of life and the world around us. Now go watch a little kid in the same environment and notice how ensorcelled they are by the smallest things. I can't quite remember when the world stopped being so overwhelmingly magical to me. I think with the internet and the world being full of people who are genuinely trying to hold onto or at least recapture that sense of wonder, it's not a lost cause. Children are the constant reminder that the world can be a wondrous place. While they're running around being amazed at everything in the world, the adults are running right behind them being terrified of that same world consuming the tiny versions of ourselves. This means my primary concern is no longer myself. Instead it's going to be this external portion of myself that is scampering off to go eat dirt and actively put itself into dangerous situations because it has no idea that a mountain lion wielding a chainsaw isn't something you run towards.
Wednesday, July 29, 2015
Thursday, July 2, 2015
On The End of the Preamble
With so many things in our lives there is a build up. The weeks leading up to Christmas. Months planning a wedding. Getting ready for a trip across the world. We prepare ourselves and look forward to these moments as they approach. Then they happen and life continues. I remember as a kid loving the Christmas season. Watching as everyone got more and more excited by putting up lights and decorations. The number of presents under the tree subtly getting bigger as we got closer to that big day. By Christmas morning excitement was at its highest and that's when the bass drops, usually leading to wrapping paper everywhere. The rest of the day you kind of bask in the afterglow of that level of joy. The next day you wake up and it's behind you. Hopefully it hasn't been disappointing, but not matter what experience you have, the moments we look forward to the most will eventually be in the past and on their way to being memories. A part of me wonders if that's why the idea of heaven is so appealing to people. It's a place where you get to be with all your loved ones and live your best moments for ever. I think most people would classify that as wonderful, even if they don't believe such a thing makes any kind of logical sense. I suppose the natural inclination is to start looking forward to something else, which in itself isn't a bad thing. It's good to have upcoming things in your life that you are excited to become reality. Maybe that's what life really is about. Moving onto the next thing while enjoy what came before.
The world is a strange place when you return to it. At least that's how it can feel if you've been away for any longer than normal amount of time. I look around at the things that are familiar and yet somehow foreign. It's been said that you can't go home again because it's not the place that has changed, but rather you that is different now. When some people leave the familiar all they can see are the differences in what they see now compared to what they've always seen before. This isn't exactly a bad thing, but focusing on that can make it harder to appreciate something new. I'm not saying one should just accept something because it's different. It's like learning a language though, where you will have an easier time if you stop translating and just start accepting the new word for the old object.
Still it's not until you've been away from something that you really see it for what it is or maybe what it once was. I remember coming home from college my first year and seeing the house I grew up in. It was the same place it was six months ago when I had left it, but I felt like I had seen and done so much in that small amount of time that it felt smaller on a fundamental level. It was still very comfortable. In the years since then I've returned home several times and each time that house is something different to me. It still has all the old memories. The context for me being there changes though, which in turns means I see the entire place differently each time. It's hard to imagine that one day the home I grew up in won't be available anymore and I'll never be able to return to it.
We often don't realize when something is coming to close. Sure we can see the last day of school coming or know when it's time to say goodbye to our visiting family members. There are times when we know we won't see someone again or won't do something again, but more often than not the last of something sails by us without much notice until later, when we realize that we'll never get another chance at it. People often say live life like each day was your last. It's when we know that there will never be more that we embrace how special something is, even if it's normally not special at all. It's next to impossible to lead a normal life living that way. That kind of sentiment is usually saved for characters in movies and those unfortunate enough to know that their days are limited so it's best to actually live like there aren't a lot of tomorrows, because there might not be. Most of us though will get up tomorrow and probably not think about how yesterday was the last time that ever was going to happen. Sometimes that's a good thing though. That could mean yesterday was the end of what came before and while it's sad that you won't get to go back and experience it again, tomorrow is the beginning of something new. Maybe it's the first day rather than the last one.
The world is a strange place when you return to it. At least that's how it can feel if you've been away for any longer than normal amount of time. I look around at the things that are familiar and yet somehow foreign. It's been said that you can't go home again because it's not the place that has changed, but rather you that is different now. When some people leave the familiar all they can see are the differences in what they see now compared to what they've always seen before. This isn't exactly a bad thing, but focusing on that can make it harder to appreciate something new. I'm not saying one should just accept something because it's different. It's like learning a language though, where you will have an easier time if you stop translating and just start accepting the new word for the old object.
Still it's not until you've been away from something that you really see it for what it is or maybe what it once was. I remember coming home from college my first year and seeing the house I grew up in. It was the same place it was six months ago when I had left it, but I felt like I had seen and done so much in that small amount of time that it felt smaller on a fundamental level. It was still very comfortable. In the years since then I've returned home several times and each time that house is something different to me. It still has all the old memories. The context for me being there changes though, which in turns means I see the entire place differently each time. It's hard to imagine that one day the home I grew up in won't be available anymore and I'll never be able to return to it.
We often don't realize when something is coming to close. Sure we can see the last day of school coming or know when it's time to say goodbye to our visiting family members. There are times when we know we won't see someone again or won't do something again, but more often than not the last of something sails by us without much notice until later, when we realize that we'll never get another chance at it. People often say live life like each day was your last. It's when we know that there will never be more that we embrace how special something is, even if it's normally not special at all. It's next to impossible to lead a normal life living that way. That kind of sentiment is usually saved for characters in movies and those unfortunate enough to know that their days are limited so it's best to actually live like there aren't a lot of tomorrows, because there might not be. Most of us though will get up tomorrow and probably not think about how yesterday was the last time that ever was going to happen. Sometimes that's a good thing though. That could mean yesterday was the end of what came before and while it's sad that you won't get to go back and experience it again, tomorrow is the beginning of something new. Maybe it's the first day rather than the last one.
Saturday, June 27, 2015
Travel Log: The Last Frontier
We are the stories we tell. The past is just this long narrative that's been shaped by our own feelings. History becomes how we remember it, even if it didn't quite happen that way. Everyone has a story and everyone is a story to someone else. Sometimes I wonder what life would be like if we could experience even a part of someone else's story from their perspective. We may not always be the hero of the tale, but we tend to try and justify why we do something. If we're human then there are plenty of times when we look back and realize just how far off we've gotten. Even the public story we share with others is either a highlight reel or tweaked for mass consumption. I'm not saying it's bad, but it's easy to forget there is more than what's on the surface.
I never thought that I would bring someone to see my childhood home. I had reached a point where it seemed like any person in my life who hadn't been there once already would be too far removed to make the trek up to see it. It's not like you meet people as an adult and then ask them to travel a thousand miles to see where you came from. Instead it just becomes part of the story we tell other people when we meet. Sure there are pictures and that sort of thing but an image of a thing doesn't compare to the feeling of standing in a place. To understand the placement of things and how they fit together. Now when you tell a story about that time in the backyard they can see it more clearly. The story is a bit more complete.
Alaska has always been a been a bit of a pause for me. I know you can't go home again, but this place was always where I came to try and reset back to zero. I'm generally a nostalgic person already because I like my past, even though it's not all rainbows and triumphant musical cues. It's still where I came from and it made me who I am today. So when I come back to this place a part of me is remembering what once was and what it has become since I left. It's strange to think about, but I've lived in other places longer than I ever lived here. I have a new home, but even that home was chosen because of its similarities to my original home. I live where I live now because it's a place that has all the best parts of where I came from and a lot fewer of the negatives. Still we're at the end of this long trip and as per usual the end brings about a bit of an existential crisis. I start to ponder what it all means and if I want to return to reality. Reality where I have my friends around me. Where you go to work on a regular basis and generally behave like a responsible adult doing adult things like paying bills, building things not out of Legos, and telling yourself that you shouldn't get quite so excited about a movie coming out where the main character has the ability to shrink down to the size of an ant in order to fight industrial corruption and the weaponization of science. Reality also means that time is moving again. It always has been, even while sitting in my childhood home, but when I go back that means I'm going to keep getting older and we'll be further and further away from what was. Then again it means we're getting closer and closer to what will be.
This last part of the trip though has a reunion of the past. Facebook is one giant spoiler alert when it comes to our lives today. Thankfully though it means that rather than waiting twenty years to see how someone is doing, I can check their wall and see how their kids are doing or how that barbecue went on Saturday. On the other side there are people I haven't physically been in the same room with since high school who have seen the inside of my house and watched the work we've been doing for the past couple of years. It's a bit comforting to know that my friends and the people from my past are still there in some ways. Still it will be nice to see a bit of the stories of others as not told through funny links and carefully chosen totally candid pictures of life. I know that reunions today aren't anything like they have in movies. It will likely just be a bunch of people with a shared past getting dinner and drinking beer together. I am excited to see who shows up because even with Facebook, there are plenty of people who have lived their lives without it, meaning a person like me, who loves technology, has very little idea what's been happening for them. It's funny how twenty years is a long time and yet the world has felt relatively the same. If I could go back and tell my high school me that the world would be an amazing place, but not for the reason you'd think (sorry the flying cars thing is still not happening), I think my younger self would feel a little let down by the prospect of life being just life. The older me thinks about how reassuring it would be to know that despite all the mistakes and lunacy that things will work out. Sometimes it's going to feel like a giant vat of chaos has been spilled at our feet. In the end though I prefer this life to whatever silly dreams my former self had thought up. Except the one where I learned how to fly. That one is still the best and I'll keep hoping that somehow I remember the trick to flight. Until then we'll have to see what comes next...
I never thought that I would bring someone to see my childhood home. I had reached a point where it seemed like any person in my life who hadn't been there once already would be too far removed to make the trek up to see it. It's not like you meet people as an adult and then ask them to travel a thousand miles to see where you came from. Instead it just becomes part of the story we tell other people when we meet. Sure there are pictures and that sort of thing but an image of a thing doesn't compare to the feeling of standing in a place. To understand the placement of things and how they fit together. Now when you tell a story about that time in the backyard they can see it more clearly. The story is a bit more complete.
Alaska has always been a been a bit of a pause for me. I know you can't go home again, but this place was always where I came to try and reset back to zero. I'm generally a nostalgic person already because I like my past, even though it's not all rainbows and triumphant musical cues. It's still where I came from and it made me who I am today. So when I come back to this place a part of me is remembering what once was and what it has become since I left. It's strange to think about, but I've lived in other places longer than I ever lived here. I have a new home, but even that home was chosen because of its similarities to my original home. I live where I live now because it's a place that has all the best parts of where I came from and a lot fewer of the negatives. Still we're at the end of this long trip and as per usual the end brings about a bit of an existential crisis. I start to ponder what it all means and if I want to return to reality. Reality where I have my friends around me. Where you go to work on a regular basis and generally behave like a responsible adult doing adult things like paying bills, building things not out of Legos, and telling yourself that you shouldn't get quite so excited about a movie coming out where the main character has the ability to shrink down to the size of an ant in order to fight industrial corruption and the weaponization of science. Reality also means that time is moving again. It always has been, even while sitting in my childhood home, but when I go back that means I'm going to keep getting older and we'll be further and further away from what was. Then again it means we're getting closer and closer to what will be.
This last part of the trip though has a reunion of the past. Facebook is one giant spoiler alert when it comes to our lives today. Thankfully though it means that rather than waiting twenty years to see how someone is doing, I can check their wall and see how their kids are doing or how that barbecue went on Saturday. On the other side there are people I haven't physically been in the same room with since high school who have seen the inside of my house and watched the work we've been doing for the past couple of years. It's a bit comforting to know that my friends and the people from my past are still there in some ways. Still it will be nice to see a bit of the stories of others as not told through funny links and carefully chosen totally candid pictures of life. I know that reunions today aren't anything like they have in movies. It will likely just be a bunch of people with a shared past getting dinner and drinking beer together. I am excited to see who shows up because even with Facebook, there are plenty of people who have lived their lives without it, meaning a person like me, who loves technology, has very little idea what's been happening for them. It's funny how twenty years is a long time and yet the world has felt relatively the same. If I could go back and tell my high school me that the world would be an amazing place, but not for the reason you'd think (sorry the flying cars thing is still not happening), I think my younger self would feel a little let down by the prospect of life being just life. The older me thinks about how reassuring it would be to know that despite all the mistakes and lunacy that things will work out. Sometimes it's going to feel like a giant vat of chaos has been spilled at our feet. In the end though I prefer this life to whatever silly dreams my former self had thought up. Except the one where I learned how to fly. That one is still the best and I'll keep hoping that somehow I remember the trick to flight. Until then we'll have to see what comes next...
Friday, June 12, 2015
Travel Log: Intermission
We are back home for about a week before we head off to the last frontier. It's very surreal being home. It's good to be home, but very strange how quickly you fall back into old routines. It doesn't feel like two months have passed and yet everything around us shows that the world kept on without us, which we knew it would. While traveling the real world became this abstract thing that you're aware continues to exist. It's hard to divide your mind into two places at once though. It reminded me of when I left home for college. For a long time I kept thinking about things in terms of how they would have been if I were back home. Summer was supposed to be like this and I would normally be doing that. Eventually though you let go of where you were and accept where you are. Now we're back and this massive trip is behind us without any real fanfare. That's how it goes though. These large moments in our lives quickly go from something you're experiencing to a thing you did before you can really grasp the concept that it's become the past.
Strangely enough being home and knowing next week we're going to be off again makes this feel a bit like a really long layover in our own town. We've unpacked and started doing every day things like stressing out about the house or what type of sandwich to make that compliments the beer we bought. The jet lag is still playing tricks on us though even though we managed to go to bed at what would be considered a normal time locally. Our first day back we were up at 4AM because even though we had been going for 30 hours without sleep, our bodies were like 'three hours of sleep is plenty, time to get moving'. We found out that the grocery store is very nice at 6:02 AM on a Wednesday to do grocery shopping. We also found out that you can't buy beer before 7AM. It's something I never really thought about, but now that I know it makes total sense. You have to stop enabling people at some point. Still it's not our fault that our brains and bellies were operating 17 hours in the future.
While we're home we hope to see who we can before we scamper off again. We really need to get better at being able to answer the question of 'what was your favorite?' It's hard to answer because of how long the trip was. It's a perfectly fair question though because when someone goes on vacation you ask them what they liked about it. For us though we essentially lived in South East Asia so it's a bit like asking someone what was their favorite moment from a two month period. Thankfully in addition to this travel log I've decided to log all the highlights from each area. It's interesting how quickly things you do start to fade. Hopefully with a memory appendix I'll be able to map my way back to the various points in the trip and come up with a more meaningful answer to the question.
Up next: The Midnight Sun!
Strangely enough being home and knowing next week we're going to be off again makes this feel a bit like a really long layover in our own town. We've unpacked and started doing every day things like stressing out about the house or what type of sandwich to make that compliments the beer we bought. The jet lag is still playing tricks on us though even though we managed to go to bed at what would be considered a normal time locally. Our first day back we were up at 4AM because even though we had been going for 30 hours without sleep, our bodies were like 'three hours of sleep is plenty, time to get moving'. We found out that the grocery store is very nice at 6:02 AM on a Wednesday to do grocery shopping. We also found out that you can't buy beer before 7AM. It's something I never really thought about, but now that I know it makes total sense. You have to stop enabling people at some point. Still it's not our fault that our brains and bellies were operating 17 hours in the future.
While we're home we hope to see who we can before we scamper off again. We really need to get better at being able to answer the question of 'what was your favorite?' It's hard to answer because of how long the trip was. It's a perfectly fair question though because when someone goes on vacation you ask them what they liked about it. For us though we essentially lived in South East Asia so it's a bit like asking someone what was their favorite moment from a two month period. Thankfully in addition to this travel log I've decided to log all the highlights from each area. It's interesting how quickly things you do start to fade. Hopefully with a memory appendix I'll be able to map my way back to the various points in the trip and come up with a more meaningful answer to the question.
Up next: The Midnight Sun!
Sunday, June 7, 2015
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