Neal Stephenson, one of my favorite writers, has a presentation on a great online TV station called Fora.tv (after finishing his presentation I started downloading quite a bit from there). He discusses "SF" (Science Fiction) as a genre and makes a lot of interesting points, one of which had me laughing because a Hallmark film on television I happened to be exposed to was predictably NOT SF.

As Mike Ladd once pointed out, people like Mozart and Shakespeare were "writing pop sh_¹" which was why he didn't feel slighted by a lack of recognition from today's literati.  Not only is it true but if one holds something I recently read as literature in comparison with Cryptonomicon, the points Stephenson makes are as sweet as refined sugar.

I agree with a lot of his points although I thought he failed to make a distinction between "space opera" and true SF.  A piece he had in the NY Times concerning recent Star Wars films illustrates the distinction I thought would have fit in his discussion.

Final note: his discomfort and lack of polish in public speaking was heartening for me as the mark of a man who writes more than he markets.

¹I am self censoring because people used to complain to me in my previous blogging life and those of you who don't mind can handle an underscore more than those who can't stand the epithet.

I hadn’t gotten beaten by my mom that day, and we hadn’t had any significant arguments over anything. I thought that if I died, I wanted to die without being mad at my mom. So I thought, I might as well take the opportunity to do so before I got back to the house—at which point who knows whether there would be another fight or a beating.

I put a bullet in the chamber and raised the rifle up. The closer it got to my head, the faster my heart beat. I was taught that whoever committed suicide would go to hell. But I was so miserable in the Amish culture that I believed God would understand that my motives were good.

In the end, I didn’t have the guts to point the barrel straight at my head. Okay, I thought, I’ll just put the gun next to my cheek to see what it feels like.

The instant I felt that cold hard steel, I suddenly realized that I wanted to live.

I had never had that thought before in my life. I had always thought I wanted to die. I don’t know where the idea came from that I wanted to live, but it completely changed my outlook on life.

Here is the whole thing.

A few months ago I was at our local equivalent of Jiffy Lube getting an oil change. The guy working on my car not only had rehearsed and delivered their customer service script impeccably, as he worked on cars he'd yell out all the "check point" items that he'd finished. It went something like:

Brake fluid. CHECK!
Wiper fluid. CHECK!
Tire pressure. CHECK!

You get the picture.  The zeal with which he shouted his checklist was commendable - I'd wager a drill sergeant in a bootcamp somewhere either smiling, because of all the effort, or frowning, because effort like that seems out context when it's a matter of the wiper fluid or windshield wipers on a car - by extension a mockery of that much ceremonial bombast as applied to anything.

Before I could think to snicker I realized I actually liked it. If this kid took the trouble to shout and scream over an oil change, he'd take it seriously enough not to make a mess - the silly kinds of messes that I've paid for in the past - a broken wire that opens the car's hood, or a tire that's been ignored an nearly flat as I left.

These days I'm liking the people who take themselves seriously even if it seems like pomp or pretension.  Risking ridicule in the hopes of achieving something - that's something I can admire and even aspire to...

I've been thinking about my friends from high school - an effect of Facebook I suppose. It's interesting how we became archetypes that we wouldn't have anticipated. In part we knew what we wanted to be but the reality of it now has the kind of clarity that we would never have been able to conceive at that time.

The moulds that we fit: the financier, the educator, the academic, and the craftsman. 

My friend B was always cheerful in nature, easy to talk to and a quick study.  He studied at prestigious schools and now spends his days on markets, buying, selling, and maneuvering his way to sums of money that I'm sure would leave me speechless. I remember running into him in New York many years ago and he described being given a "small fund" in his early days, something that couldn't be "messed up" - the amount in said fund? A modest $1,000,000.

My friend J was, ironically since he became an educator, not so interested in school. He liked girls, sports, and driving around in a small yellow sports car - owned by his father but operated with his juvenile sensibility.  Despite his lack of zeal for book learning he always knew he'd teach history. He was the first among us to get his advanced degree and now teaches history and coaches.  J, the guy I remember yelling at his mother: "I'm 18! I know what's best for me!"

A was a quiet type - weird is what we thought but with the kind of wisdom I've acquired with age I realize he may have had a lot to say but not in the context of the type of nonsense we would banter about in high school. We all knew he was off-the-charts intelligent but perhaps it was the silence and awkwardness that kept him accessible.  He married an anthropologist and lived tribal style for the last decade while working as a linguist and Bible translator.  He has his faith sorted out - I wonder if that's another secret that would have been revealed had we asked him in between our sophomoric jokes and relentless teasing. A few weeks ago I got an email from him - mass email - that he had finished his PhD via a university in the Netherlands. 

Finally I count myself the craftsman.  In between the listlessness, the obsession with basketball (which I now see as an obsession with practice), and varying passion for what I learned (in which I now see an interest in connecting small pieces into something larger), inside there was the sensibility of a person who makes things.  I'm not sure where it came from but I don't imagine myself useful for much these days outside the realm of writing software. 

There are more archetypes but I like to think of the four of us since we were relatively close and yet our paths ended us all over both geographically (London, Portland, Sioux Falls, Holland) and as the people we were destined to become.

Today I had this thought: only you can make yourself happy. I wonder if it's my age but I hang around sites like The Happiness Project gleaning tidbits, finding little infusions of wisdom that make me retrench and work for it.

I read fantasy books. You know: swords, magic, etc... I should say I used to - of late they don't work for me quite like they used to.  But a recent quick read is reminding me of all the myths I used to envelope myself with in those books: duty, honor, true love, and, of course, a quest. Maybe it's reading about all those quests that gave me wanderlust in the first place, and that's not such a bad thing, is it?

The "serious" book I am enjoying at the moment is The Craftsman, I'll do my best to muster a review when I finish.

I listen to the Merriam Webster "Word of the Day" podcast in batches. I wrote a program to download 2 months worth and then work through them when mowing or commuting. Anyway, the word of the day on April 7 was luftmensch, a particular favorite of mine. Not to be all "meta" about it but I actually just like Yiddish words in general.  

Friday was the anniversary of "D-day" - it's hard not to know that on that day Americans stormed the beaches of Normandy in what was to be an Allied push towards Berlin.

Despite the patriotism and memories of "the war" most people here would be hard pressed to remember having (if ever they did) to learn of the Battle of Stalingrad.  I'm not going to argue about the importance of various World War II battles having already done so* with "Brat Paul" - my Korean Russian friend from college. I'd like simply to point out that war, death, and the memories of it are universal.

So why is it that different countries celebrate their own Memorial Day and make it on different dates?  I wish it were not so - I wish there could be a global day of memory for people who die in war. It should not be restricted to those in combat; there should be remembrance of the people who die for being in the way, at the wrong time in the wrong place.

I've been wanting to write short fiction about Ugandans involved in the Iraq war.  Perhaps the story would be based on my cousin who is not from a "poor" family, but neither is he rich.  He goes to Iraq to "fight for freedom" with the hopes of making some money and has a relationship with someone very American - how about a girl from South Dakota who enlisted after graduating from high school?  Their turbulent relationship ends when she comes back but she thinks about him every Sunday that the church asks those who "fought for their country" to stand up.  About a decade later he finds her "mommy blog" and writes to ask for help immigrating to the United States.  He comes on a tourist visa but it expires and somehow he is deported. 

Just some complicated thoughts from the memory of war around here.

*Conversation as follows:
Paul: Russia was win!
Me: What... ?
Paul: World War II, Russia was win!
Me: O.K.

In school you feel the same.  Even when people are divided into tribes of geek, chic, and boring, there's a common bond you have: you're all there, you have to "get to class" or "take a quiz."  A lot of people I knew in college were financially constrained too: we'd go to Taco Bell where you could order 3 tacos for just over a dollar or, if you wanted something to sit in your gut and rot for a few days, you'd go to Burger King and get a couple of Whoppers for $2.12.

As time passes we all go our separate ways.  Some people have a lot of children.  Some none.  Careers start to show - some of do well and some strive or flounder.  Pretty soon you may be either the friend who visits an old schoolmate and leaves with thoughts of "how bourgeoisie" or you're the friend who wonders when reality is going to hit that old friend who may have just one obligation too many.

You move. They move.  You talk on the phone sometimes. Frequently at first but you get busy.  It's every so often and you greet them with expressions that take you back to the day. You use an instant messenger for short bursts of conversation. Link sharing.

But slowly you drift until you start to wonder how you thought you were the same.  You're not.  Was it always this way, masked with the commotion of schoolwork and youth, or did you change? Did they change?

The friends never replace themselves.  You get older, you work, you become either more bohemian or more attached to institution. You make new acquaintances but it's not the same. It's a sad thing. It's a lonely thing. There you sit, thinking about it.  Here I sit, brooding.

Paul Graham wrote about cities this week. It was probably coincidence but I was one of the first to see and respond to it.  It's quite difficult to read things like that from the vantage point of Sioux Falls because it takes no stretch of the imagination to figure out what Paul might say about this place.  I think I'm like Paul in some ways, so I'm sure I have a good idea.

But there are a lot of people who choose to live in small places, off the beaten path and they find a way to thrive off of it.  I'm going to have to write to John Udell or Marian Bantjes not to seek a person to validate my existence here, but to see how there can be a path for people like me who don't live in a metropolis.

Here's some big news: the company I work for is not continuing existence and my fellow coworkers and I will become employees of Daktronics. 

This is exactly the kind of prattle I'd start writing and delete but I'm trying to get this blog going again.