Philosophie du Jour (Part un of a series)

I used to work at the Tilden Little Farm (my boss balked at the phrase "petting zoo"). We had cows (milking shorthorns), sheep (black Welsh mountain), goats (alpine and nubian), pigs, ducks, geese, and chickens. Of our flock of 15 sheep, we had two rams, each confined to his own pen adjoined to the main pasture.

One morning, a coworker and I were opening up the farm. I was pretty new, so she was teaching me the rhythms and routines of getting the farm ready for the public. We brought our wheelbarrow over to the ram pens, and we tossed a compressed mat of alfalfa (a "flake") into each of the pens.

"And now for the most important part," she said, and stuck an arm through the horizontal wood slats of the fence. She put her outstretched hand on the kinky black wool of the feeding ram's head. "You gotta show these guys some love," she said, giving him a pat.

Take the time to show you care.

The Giving Tree

Now that I think about it, the first love story that I ever really appreciated was probably The Giving Tree by Shel Silverstein. And I don't think I really realized that The Giving Tree was a love story until recently, and a pretty tragic one at that.

Well, if you've read the story, then you know that [WARNING: SPOILER ALERT] the tree keeps giving to this one little boy until there's nothing left but stump. And the boy never does a single thing in return. In fact by the end, the boy (now grown into an old man) still finds a way to exploit the tree: he sits down on the stump.

That last part always infuriated me. I was infuriated mainly at the ungrateful boy, but a little bit of my anger found itself directed at the foolish tree as well.

Well, I'm older now. I think I've come to the point where I can appreciate the Giving Trees and forgive the Little Boys in my life.

Summer Reading

Read (or at least start):

• Fresh Air Fiend by Paul Theroux
• Ulysses by James Joyce (22 CDs of audiobook, aborted)
• Lolita by Vladimir Nabokov (in progress)
• The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat by Oliver Sachs
• The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon
• The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
• In Patagonia by Bruce Chatwin
• Living Poor: A Peace Corps Chronicle by Moritz Thomsen

Online book club, anyone?

Point Reyes National Seashore

I spent the last three days out in Point Reyes with my co-worker Hazel. She'd never been backpacking before, and I was glad to introduce her to my favorite pasttime. She's a bit older than me, and enlightened me a good deal on things like work, writing, good books, and the foster care system. Otherwise, we spent a lot of time in our own mental spaces.

I guess when you only go backpacking with one other person, the experience is much more personal than communal. I feel like we're trained to fear silence in a conversation, that it's the end of the world when we run out of sensible things say. But in some settings, living to that standard only distracts from fully absorbing the surrounding beauty. Sometimes, the sensory, rather than the social experience is more important. It's nice to have someone there to share that with, but ultimately, the thoughts we have in reaction to that beauty are a deeply personal experience.

So here are some images of things that left me in rapture, the experience of which I can't ever fully share.


Morning dew.


Succulents.


Sea cliffs.

Drafts

• Date: 6/3/10
  Title: Going Solo
  Premise: Reflect on the experience of leading a volunteer group. Draw parallels to working for the Park Service, except now you're a leader instead of a follower. Explain the exhilarating pride of moving up the ladder.
  Quote: "I stood in front of the semi-circle of high school kids."
• Date: 4/19/10
  Title: Day 109
  Premise: Describe the sex noises coming from upstairs. Compare it to a leaky roof, but for sounds instead of water. Use humor and a third-person narrative to reassure yourself that you're not a whiner. But really, you hate (and possibly envy) these fucking people.
  Quote: "His apartment had a leaky ceiling. Every now and again, drama seeped through the floorboards from above."
• Date: 3/15/10
  Title: Day 74
  Premise: Use first person. Reflect upon the recent experience of rejection. Use writing as a way of catching your breath.
  Quote: "I'm not going to publish this post. This isn't that kind of a blog."
• Date: 12/7/09
  Title: Billie
  Premise: Recount the conversation you had with the schizophrenic performance artist who hangs around campus.
  Quote: "deserted marines in 1967"
• Date: 11/6/09
  Title: Brothers
  Premise: Reflect on how you wished for brothers as a child. Compare that with your current living situation: two other dudes in a one-bedroom apartment.
  Quote: "He expected it to be something like summer camp, except every day."
• Date: 10/27/09
  Title: The Joy of Economics
  Premise: Explain your former philosophical/moral code that was based upon Economics. Critique its internal logic and self-justification.
  Quote: "The truth is that there is a lot of suffering in the world. The joy of economics comes from the reassurance that it's okay that I did nothing."
• Date: 10/21/09
  Title: Games
  Premise: Explain your general lack of competitive spirit, with specific regards to board games. Perhaps explore the dark, perverted nature of your love/hate for competition.
  Quote: "He liked to win."
• Date: 9/26/09
  Title: Current Pretensions
  Premise: Explain how you're a pretentious sonofabitch.
  Quote: "Igor Stravinsky and correspondence chess."
• Date: 9/21/09
  Title: (Untitled)
  Premise: Describe the guy you saw earlier today.
  Quote: "He walked down the street, false confidence in his stride. He held a bundle of flowers in front of him, gripped in his right hand like he was ready for battle."

Co-operative Living

Whenever I try to explain to an outsider what it's like to live in my co-op, I say this: "Imagine the dorms, but after the revolution." Imagine the ranks of Berkeley students, but purged of all the business majors and 99% of the Asians. Rather than the tripartite tenets of "liberté, égalité, fraternité," the neo-Communards live by but one word: Frivolité.

Some clips and soundbites:

I sat at the dining room table (and makeshift dance platform), eating a big bowl of broccoli for breakfast. Directly in front of me, the thick, brass stripper pole extended from bolts in the table to the skylight above.

They sat in the computer room, researching the LD50 for caffeine.
"Yup, she has enough," he said. "Several times over, actually. That was a pretty big baggie."

Dinner was ten minutes late and I still had about fifty falafels to go. I scooped the chickpea paste from the industrial-sized serving pan and furiously packed it into my cupped hands, making fat little pucks. I was sweating bullets and Daft Punk was playing over the speakers.

He retched a little bit as he emptied the kitchen compost into the big green dumpster at the loading dock. The fruit flies evacuated in a swarm. He vowed to send out an e-mail to discourage people from putting ranch dressing in the kitchen compost.

Live the Dream

The Common Buckeye

Tommy and I have a motto, and it's "Live the Dream." I think that just about sums up how things are going for me right now.

I have something of a Little Prince complex; I have an insatiable urge to find a corner of the earth and become its guardian. If you're unfamiliar with the story, it's about a little blond boy in a green jumpsuit who's the custodian of an asteroid and the single rose that grows on it.

Well, it so happens that I've become the manager of a native plant nursery on campus, with the main objective of propagating plants for use in restoring the native ecology of Strawberry Creek. It's a job that makes me aware of the ecological degradation in my immediate environment, and at the same time empowers me to reverse the damage. That's a great feeling.

We are humans, and we live in a world of our own creation. Through carelessness, greed, or ignorance, we can very easily turn our earth into a dirty, uninhabitable place. However, with engagement, charity, and education, we can make our surroundings beautiful.

In a sense, these are also the two faces of the student co-op where I currently live. It is a place where someone will bake a mixing bowl-full of chocolate chip cookies to share with everyone else. It is also a place where people throw glass bottles off the roof, if only for the joy of hearing glass break.

Why do I celebrate chocolate chip cookies and detest broken glass? I guess it goes back to my desire for order. Perhaps a good example is a wooden sailing ship. This is an example that a Philosophy major-turned-EMT-turned-carpenter once posed to me.

"Consider a wooden sailing ship," he said. "The universe wants nothing more than to see a wooden sailing go to pieces. Without maintenance, the boards will rot, the sails will tear, and the anchor will rust. In essence, a sailing ship is a symbol of man's battle against entropy, that tendency for all systems to head towards chaos. But instead of chaos, we have order, which requires a constant struggle to maintain."

I don't doubt the fact that the earth is a messy system. But that doesn't deter me from striving to create a planet that is more beautiful and livable than the one we have right now.

Update: I was brushing my teeth when I realized that the Netherlands is my dream country. Almost the entire country is below sea level, which is quite inconvenient for a country that borders the ocean. And so originate the dikes and windmill-powered pumps for which Holland is famous. There's a saying that goes, "God made the earth, but the Dutch made the Netherlands."

Excuse me, but did you lose something?

I apologize for butting in, but you seem distressed, like you've lost something. If you've lost your way, I'm not sure if I'm certain of the way out. You can follow me, but I'm not making any promises. If you've lost your dignity, I'll try to prop you back on your feet for a bit, but I think it's reasonable to expect that I won't stay there forever. If you've lost your dreams, I am so very sorry to hear that. Not least of all because there's absolutely nothing I can do to bring them back. Well, maybe you didn't need those dreams and it was time you had some new ones anyway. If you've lost your patience, then take a breath; you'll probably feel better afterwards. No, you haven't lost any of those things? Well lucky you.

Losing something doesn't hurt. It's wishing that you still had it.

The View from Twenty

Here are some pearls of wisdom, handed down by the wise sage of the East (Bay). It is a known fact that wisdom in pearl form is more easily digestible, and more readily forgotten. So, now for some "wise beyond his years" advice from a grown man of one score years:

• Make decisions. Take responsibility for them. Bad ones count too.
• Not all people are alike. You are probably just as much an abhorrent freak of nature to them as they are to you. Take this in stride.
• Bad things will happen to you. Friends are the people who let you complain in front of them.
• Generosity is one of the surest ways to feel wealthy.
• Loneliness is a form of self pity. Never forget that there are people who care about you.
• Self-destructive people can't help it. If they had a choice (or at least an easy one), they wouldn't be.
• Some people need mind-altering substances to glimpse beauty in the world. Don't feel sorry (or left out or superior) because you don't.
• Fortune cookies can give surprisingly good advice.

That's enough for now. I hope that's not a promise for more to come in the future.

Hi, How Are You?

Hi, how are you? I hope that you are well. It pleases me to see you in good health and spirits. What's troubling you right now? That's too bad. I wish that it didn't have to be that way. What are you looking forward to? Really? The excitement in your face is contagious; I can't help but feel some of that too. We should make some plans. Perhaps someday we will see each other. Yes! Yes! And we will have something to do. Just think of all the fun that's to be had in the future, isn't it wonderful? Yes, our plans sure were fun to think of, just now, weren't they?

Oh, how am I? Well, I thought you'd never ask! (Though this whole time I've been wishing that you'd ask). Well, you know me. I've got nothing to complain about. It goes as it always has and always will. People come and go. Books come and go. Bad habits come and go. Hobbies come and go. I'm fine, really. Nothing here to complain about. It sure is nice that we took the time to talk on this rooftop, phone, or computer.

But really, how are you?

It is the distant future in the year 2010...

Me: Look at us!
Anna: What?
Me: I mean, we're talking, face-to-face.
Anna: I guess we are.
Me: Isn't that so analog? Like, there's no electronic interface separating us. We're not holding banana-shaped pieces of plastic to our heads, or pushing buttons. No, we're looking at each other in the face with our eyes and then we're speaking to each other using our vocal chords. How crazy is that?
Anna: Quite remarkable.

Just the other day, Anna and I were contemplating what it means to socialize. I suppose that neither of us has the firmest grasp on the subject, and we spent some time comparing notes on when we considered it appropriate to use a text message. But what freaked us out the most was the sheer size and power of online social networks. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say that we were left in awe or had our minds boggled. For me, the image that immediately comes to mind when I think of web 2.0 and social networking is that of a glob of grey matter, a mosh pit of neurons, firing off impulses in a storm of activity.

Anyway, Anna recounted how Tumblr, through a string of posts and re-posts of some content that she had made, ended up linking her to an acquaintance who she had not contacted for the better part of a decade. Bizzare. Welcome to the future of human interaction, I guess.

Postscript: Sorry Anna, but I know that that's not how you talk. Well, that's not really how I talk either.

Drawing is Hard

Started with this:


Created this:


Total elapsed time: 30 minutes.


Damn, drawing is hard. I was talking (internet chatting) with Kimmie last night about the difficulty of reproducing an image of something by hand. I think that the conclusion we came to was that drawing depends more heavily on the ability to observe, rather than the ability to touch pencil to paper. It's easy to think of drawing as this active process full of movement as your pencil glides across the paper. But I think I've realized how much of an internal activity it is; I spend the bulk of my time staring when I draw.

Thinking back, I realize now how much drawing aided me in learning to identify plants. I had this internship with the National Park Service a couple summers ago, and my boss gave me a handy dandy little Write in the Rain field notebook. Even if I made just a quick sketch, the process of drawing still challenged me to make a careful observation and pick out the identifying features characteristic to a particular plant.

I remember this one sketch of a naked lady that I was especially proud of. I spent probably a good half hour on it, but found the result rather pleasing. I wish I had my old field notebook with me right now. I should go out and buy a new one.

Day One

(Interior, afternoon, a windowless high school classroom)
Me: What day is today?
Mister Shimmon: Today's the first day of the rest of your life!

So yesterday I turned twenty. Not quite a monumental occasion in our culture, but it's still a nice, round number. Aesthetics aside, I spent the day quietly, picnicking with the family (my parents, my sisters, and their longterm boyfriends) out at the Berkeley Marina. These are my sisters:

From doctorpon

Hats! Yes, hats are all the rage! If my sisters look a little bit dour, it's because one of them is eating a chocolate (or a chocolate-covered coconut macadamia nut) and the other has something in her teeth. So they tell me. Can you correctly identify which sister belongs to which excuse? For the sake of anonymity, let's refer to them as Sister 2 and Sister 1, going from left to right.

Anyway, it's been some time since I've had "family time," and I'd forgotten how many worlds apart it is from all other social interaction I've gotten used to. I can't believe that that's the social universe I used to live in; it definitely reminds me of all the reasons why I was no good at navigating that social landscape, which as I recall, quite strikingly resembled the surface of Mars.

Sister 2: Happy birthday David!
Longterm boyfriend 2: Happy birthday!
(I extend my hand towards LTBF 2, Sister 2 accepts it, shaking my hand)
LTBF 2: I think that one was for me.
Sister 2: Oh.
(Sister 2 and I quickly hug)

...later...

Mom: I brought bottles of San Francisco tap water for everyone! Here Sister 1, you can use this one. (Mom indicates a Nalgene bottle with a Hello Kitty! sticker on it)
Sister 1: Oh, I brought my own bottle of water. (Sister 1 indicates her aluminum Sigg water bottle)
Mom: Well then LTBF 1 can have this bottle then.
Sister 1: We can share my bottle of water.
Mom: No, no, he can have his own bottle of water, you don't have to share.
Sister 1: No, we can just share.
Mom: Are you sure?
Sister 1: Yes.
Me: I think she's trying to say that she would prefer that they share her bottle of water.
Mom: Okay then.

...later still...

Sister 2: So did I tell you that LTBF 2 and I almost died during our vacation in Oahu?
Mom: Oh my God... (look of unmitigated horror)
Sister 2: We were using the Inside Guide to Oahu and it had this hike "for locals only."
Me: (snicker)
Sister 2: Anyway, for the first part, we basically had to hack through the jungle
Mom: oh my God...
LTBF 2: A machete would have been useful.
Mom: oh my God...
Sister 2: There was 2,500 feet of climb in the first two miles
Me: (snicker)
Mom: oh my God...
Sister 2: Anyway, we get to this jackknife ridge, since the guidebook says to follow the ridge...
Mom: oh my God...
Sister 2: And there's this drop-off on either side of probably a thousand feet
Mom: Oh my God!
Me: Sweet.
Sister 2: You probably would have enjoyed it though, we were right in the clouds. I guess that guidebook had a disclaimer for a reason.

Every family looks bizarre from the outside. They all operate on their own internal logic. Too bad I still have absolutely no clue what the hell is going on.

Post-script: By popular demand, here is a digitally-enhanced photograph of beets. If you haven't had the pleasure of eating beets, they make everything turn red. Everything.

From doctorpon