I am shocked.

Lugging my way from the gate to baggage claim tonight, I glanced up at TV screen showing CNN. I expected to see, well, crap.

I still remember the first time I sat down and turned on the news after four years of an MSM-less collegiate bubble. The stories, the petty political issues, were the same as they were when I was in high school. A feature on gays in the military? What, did they just pop in a video from 1999? Oy.

But back to my shock.

CNN was doing a piece on political attack ads. And not just a two-minute fluff piece-- they took a historical perspective, interviewing Dukakis about what he learned from the attack that tanked his campaign, they talked about the extreme things pamphleteers used to write in Jefferson's time, and they showed Lyndon Johnson's infamous "daisy ad". They talked to people who orchestrated attack ads for each party, talked about video editing techniques (use slow-mo and a black and white zoom in on someone's face to make them look sinister), talked about how the internet was changing the playing field (Republican spin expert laments "We used to have message control, total message control-- now it's the wild west") and showed examples of ads from the current campaigns.

I mean, it's still just covering tactics and strategies, not (heaven forbid) the merit of actual issues in the campaign, but mygod, it was like they'd had this crazy notion that journalism could involve intelligent, in-depth coverage of something that actually _informs the public_.

I hope they slip in more substance before the person responsible is tracked down and fired.

It's hard not to envy the street culture in Vietnam. They have everything that Suburban America has lost. People-- omfg-- actually interact with each other on a casual, regular basis. There's no See Something Say Something fear propaganda. People mostly trust each other, and are willing to talk to each other. People don't safety-proof their children from having a childhood. Hawkers are brisk, and traffic is overgrown, but overall there's not a great sense of time pressure.

Or at least it's so in Hanoi (Saigon's a bit dodgier & more consumer-istically depressing).

Let me explain. I say street culture because everything happens on the street. Or near it-- I'll start with the shops. Many of the small open-front shops that line the streets are owned by families who live in an apartment directly above it. So it's common for family members to switch off shifts, or keep each other company, or meet up in the shop at mealtime. Sometimes families gather on the street to play board games or chat while the children run around. During soccer season, shops with a television will spontaneously attract large crowds in the evenings.

Then there's the informal commerce on the street itself. There are street food vendors; who drag out pots and pans and very short (kindergarten-sized) plastic blue stools, old women who sit on doorsteps with boxes of fruit, and people who roam the streets selling tourist trinkets or shrink-wrapped packets of bras and underwear or more fruit.

And actually, technically I was just talking about the sidewalk. Whatever. Sidewalk culture doesn't have the same ring.

But the street matters too, I think. The primary mode of transportation is motorbike. I think it matters that when you look out at the traffic, you can see actual human beings; not just hunks of metal you want to curse at. And you can take motorbikes like taxis-- on almost every corner you will find men (always men) you can flag down for a ride. These people are not professionally licensed or with a company, and I have no idea how many do other things when they're not waiting on street corners.

Together it's a recipe for lots of informal contact and opportunities to meet new people every day. It promotes trust and reduces crime (when all of society hangs out on the street, it's not a place that troubled young males can seize to take out their aggression). It's just a really comfortable way of co-existing.

...

It's odd to think there can be so much freedom in a place where there are still such limits on political freedom. It may be that part of the reason people get along so well here is that they don't have political allegiances dividing them-- because they can't. In the past six months, Vietnam has imprisoned several peaceful pro-Democracy activists, including two from the US. Maybe I should go back and personalize: it's odd that I can feel so free in a place where I could easily be jailed and become an enemy of the government for expressing my inner thoughts out loud.

I have a friend who said he avoids buying products from communist countries and dictatorships, because he doesn't want to support those forms of government. Maybe at one time-- ie high school, when I had little exposure to the world-- I might have sympathized. But it would feel artificial now to take a stance like that from pure ideology, without acknowledging the impact on the people under those governments who are just trying to get along-- and address human rights problems in other ways than calling for democratic revolution. There are few governments that are pure evil, and Vietnam's is not one of them.

Ah, suffering. Getting involved with anything in the world means being implicated in pain in some way. At least my work in Vietnam brings that connection to conscious thought, in a way that a thousand other interactions in my daily life could and maybe should, but don't.

Via the Happiness Project:

"To get a person’s real opinion, ask what she thinks everyone else believes…If people truly hold a particular belief, they are more likely to think that others agree or have had similar experiences. For instance, if a man has had more than thirty sexual partners, he will more likely think that such behavior is common. After all, his life is one ‘data point,’ and that data point presumably weighs heavily in his mind…Furthermore the man with more than thirty partners probably knows a higher percentage of other people with thirty partners or more. This will further encourage him to make a high estimate of how many partners other people have had… [People] tend to assume that other people have had life histories at least somewhat similar to their own. When we talk about other people, we are often talking about ourselves, whether we know it ourselves."

Interesting perspective.  Maybe I'll try it sometime...

So with the caveat that I think there's some goshwow fun to Google Earth and its hackeries, I'm feeling kind of over maps. I mean geographic maps that measure distance through literal, objective distance.

When you think about it, physical distance really isn't that helpful in planning excursions. It's travel time that matters. I remember reading about some tribes in the Amazon that measure distance in terms of how long it takes to walk somewhere-- and now that some anthropologists have given them a lift, they think of New York as much closer than say, the next country over. And they're right. We're silly.

So this is what I want: a reorganization of the world map according to how long it takes to get somewhere. For me, a flight to New York is closer than a drive to the northern edge of this state-- so why do I bother looking at maps that make New York seem so far away? I'd like to have a better idea of what places are actually "close" to me-- from wherever I am on the globe-- so I can plan and scheme accordingly.


Googling around, I found one rudimentary example: http://www.number27.org/work/maps/traveltime/index.html
It only covers a handful of cities around the world, but it does get points for including "optional horseback ride across frozen tundra" as a method of transportation.

Anyway, temporal distance only takes up one dimension on a map. So I'm thinking my other dimension would be climate. It wasn't until I got to hang out in Anchorage for a day on a layover that I realized, oh wait, duh, ocean effect-- it's warmer than MPLS. Geographic maps totally suck at giving me a consistently reliable sense of what places are pleasant to visit. I want a map that puts the pleasant and convenient places right on the equator.

And of course, there are other factors that could be dimensions too. Cost of trip, degree of English speaking, respect for or harassment of women, likelihood of avoiding obnoxious western tourists, etc etc.

*~*~*

This train of thought was partly sparked by an article about this guy, Will Self, who recently took on a "psychogeography" project to walk from London to Manhattan. The choice of locations was kind of a lame gimmick, since he just took a plane from the UK to the US and slept to "erase the flight form memory." But at least he was committed to the going-on-foot thing while on the ground-- walking out of the airport by service road, and walking on his author tours. And he claims "it really works": "If you walk from your home to the airport and you fly somewhere else and you walk to your destination, your body's memory is more vivid than your mind's. The plane flight is nothing; the walk is everything. [At the end], when I walked into my hotel in Manhattan, it really felt as if the Long Island Sound had been rammed into the Thames Estuary. It was the most bizarre sensation."

And he does have a point about the artificiality of modern travel: "I've been traveling around the States on author tours for 15 tours now. A lot of these North American cities I've been in and out of numerous times, but I never knew where I was. That's an abuse of me and an abuse of the city, to reduce it to an assemblage of cab rides, bookstores, encounters with journalists, barrooms, and then back to the airport. These walks allowed me to reclaim these cities."

*~*~*

The article also reminded me of the first Geoff Nicholson book I read, Bleeding London. One of the characters, a tour guide, becomes obsessed with walking down every single street in London. (To the point that his wife thinks he's sneaking out for an affair, as I remember). The other characters also have obsessions (sex, revenge, etc.) that involve mapping/exhaustively searching the city.

And ha! I just checked his author site. Turns out his next book is a non-fiction work called "The Lost Art of Walking."

{But I don't want to give the wrong impression about Nicholson: his obsession isn't mapping or walking; his obsession is obsessions. The more eccentric, the better. And even if the overall structure of his books is sometimes flawed-- sometimes he bites off more, conceptually, than he can chew-- they're usually worth it just for his explorations of this theme.}

From a Seth Godin post:

When I was in college, a local human rights group posted up signs around campus one Monday. They read:

On Wednesday
Wear Blue Jeans
If You Are Gay

On Wednesday morning, you needed to have a discussion with yourself. "Should I wear jeans?... if I'm in the closet... or if I'm supportive of the quest for rights... or if I don't want to stand out... what will it mean if I don't wear jeans? Or if I wear jeans and didn't know about the sign..."

This, of course, was precisely the point. It started internal debate which led, all day, to spoken discussion. Which raised the issue.

I like this idea. A lot. Definitely a strategy to be kept in mind...

Six months or so ago, I came across a profile on Stumbleupon of this middle-aged guy with an "about me" section that was dark and suicidal. It said something to the effect of, my life has been ruined, taking care of my 88 year-old mother, when her life ends my life will too.

aka pretty much the most blatant anonymous cry for help ever, so what could I do: ignore it? As sappy and ineffectual as it is, I'm still the girl who sometimes takes pity on worms stuck on the sidewalk after a rainstorm, even in the middle of a run. I believe connections matter, or at least I willfully hope so. I wrote him back; don't remember what I said or have that message anymore.

I do have his reply:

Thank you for your note. It wasn't trite at all. When you are alone and feel isolated you really just want the pain to go away. I think the loneliness is the worst. I lost my wife (the girl in my dreams), my business, and had to leave the place I loved. Three strikes your out. Yes suicide has crossed my mind more than I care to admit. The only reason I haven't is because my mom needs me (major surgery for cancer) and I can't abandon her. I'm hoping that the thoughts of suicide will someday be gone before I am consumed by them. I haven't learned yet how to move on because I lost so much. My mind keeps turning back to remember what I had and doesn't want to focus on looking forward. I wish I weren't still deeply in love with her. She has moved on and is now intimate with someone else. That is really hard because you remember how it was with her and you feel your memories have been violated. I didn't mean for this too be a tome, I did want to thank you for taking the time to care.

Dale

Don't remember what I wrote back. I thought of him again this Thanksgiving, and sent a message to check up. He just replied the other day:

Hi,
Sorry I took so long to reply. My free time has become so limited. I've been working 7 days a week for months and maybe that helps keep me from focusing on the wrong things. My mom passed away after a fall and so my focus now is to save up some cash and decide if I should move back to Oregon or not. I probably will move for all the wrong reasons. I still long for my ex and probably have this false hope that if we can talk maybe there is something to salvage. Love can be such an albatross.

I hope things are going well for you and that everyones Spirit of Christmas hasn't worn you down. Here's to you having a great holiday, and thanks for caring.

Your friend,
Dale


It's almost too much to say anything about really, getting these huge random snapshots into a stranger's life. Does it mean anything to be a voice in the dark, really? Is it just ego to even try? I've already learned multiple times over you can't save another person, especially not from themselves, no matter how hard you want to. They have to find their own spark to save themselves. At that point, maybe, I can be a scaffold, an enabler. Oh but this gets too wordy. Too fluffy.

We just do the best we can, while taking care of ourselves, and we never really know.

[Post in Progress, to be added to...]

Some small things I would like to financially support once I have a regular income:

* public radio
* In These Times Magazine
* The Nation


Other magazines I'd like to subscribe to (again)

* The Economist
* SEED Magazine
* New Scientist

As I walked past my car this morning (on my way to public transport to another campus), I looked at the fine layer of dusty muck on all the windows, and sighed.  Next time I left the apartment I'd have to remember to bring down some paper towels and take care of it.

I grabbed a chunk of ice-bottomed snow from beneath the windshield wipers, turned it over in my gloved hand, and idly swiped at a corner of the windshield.  And what do you know, it cleaned off pretty well!  The ice made a great 'handle' and the snow wasn't too crumbly.  Sweet! In a few minutes I cleaned off the rest of the windows in the same manner.
I felt ever so eco-virtuous for a moment. :)

...

{A good start to the day, but I regret to report that the tree I saved by not wasting paper towels was sacrificed later this afternoon when I printed out some articles to read on my plane trip to Mexico... I hope its brief stay of execution gave it time to achieve arboreal nirvana}

A friend called me the other day to tell me about a piece of art hanging in the lobby of her Big Scary New York Law Firm that she thought I would appreciate.

The work, she told me, is divided into two side-by-side sections.

On the left side is a picture of the foot pedals of a piano.

On the right side is a picture of a pair of ballet flats.

Below both pictures is the caption:
"What should fit here is an oblique story about absence, but I can't remember the short version."

 

...

And I had to agree, it was just the right embodiment.

Well.

It looks like my friend Edwin did not win his election.  I'm sad for him.

On the bright side, the corrupt incumbent also lost.  So that is a promising thing, as was the replacement of many other corrupt pols high up.  As you may have read, it looks like the President fraudulently engineered his own re-election, which led to some riots.  That's troubling, as is the US's quick affirmation of the result (Kibaki's call for the public to accept the results so the nation can move on to a "time for healing and reconciliation" eerily echoes Bush's words after his own stolen election). But still, the many changeovers seem promising for the long-term. 

Edwin seems to be taking it well-- the brief note he sent out while the numbers were being finalized reads: <i>Bummed I did not come out on top but 2nd or 3rd ranking for a first time run in a really rural location [where mass media doesn't penetrate much and everything depends on in person meetings] is something to be proud of.</i>

He did a lot of good during the campaign (literally building bridges, bringing medical care to remote areas, providing seed funds and guidance to small businesses, etc) and knowing Edwin, he will bounce back quickly and throw himself into supporting the good guys who made it in this election and tackling new projects.  I admire him for taking this risk and for being able to take the long term, growth-oriented view about this loss. 

And on a personal level, I'm glad that next time he runs for something, I should be in a much better position to drop everything to go help out in person (plus I'll have an actual income to contribute then, rather than having to bleed out $50s from my grad school loans).
Edwin's boss at the Clinton Foundation, who initially hired him with the idea that he’d be "a research assistant doing fairly junior work", now makes blatant comparisons between Edwin and the former Pres. in terms of ability to convene people and make change happen.  Though in my perfect world, Edwin would have the highest positions in the world right this minute, I'm excited about being to help my friend in the long-term, in whatever form his future projects will take.