Of Rocky Roads and Electric Sheep

Over Labor Day weekend awhile back Cait and I hiked up to Blue Lake. It felt great—even though the 6-mile round trip had me hobbling and begging for a hot tub the next day. The rocky, steep terrain reminded me of a novel I finished recently by one of the finest science fiction writers of all time, Philip K. Dick, called “Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep?"

It is the basis for the movie “Bladerunner,” but is quite different from the movie. In a world that has barely survived a multi-world war, most of Earth’s population has been bribed into migrating to other planets to survive. Only a few humans remain on Earth including the main character, a bounty hunter named Rick Deckard who tracks down and “kills” renegade androids. The androids are manufactured so skillfully that it is quite difficult to tell them from humans. The bounty hunter administers empathy tests to force androids to reveal themselves, since technology has not advanced to the point where they can be taught the most human of traits, empathy.

Meanwhile, there are so few animals left on earth that they are greatly prized as pets, and the less fortunate must settle for android animals. Our hero has a sheep and keeps it a secret from his neighbors that the sheep is not real, but an android. Throughout the novel we’re kept guessing about who and what is an android, and who is “real”—we even begin to suspect Deckard at times. Earth is bleak, polluted and radioactive, so humans derive some comfort from a device in every home that, when grasped by its handles, plunges them into a shared dream in which a man named Wilbur Mercer trudges endlessly up a rocky trail. (You were wondering how this would end up relating to a rocky trail, weren’t you?). In this way all share in Mercer’s feelings and travail as he endlessly climbs up the trail in his attempts to escape the “tomb world,” fending off the occasional rock thrown at him from above. Mercer is also said to have been able to heal animals at one time, a sacred ability given the high value placed on the few animals still remaining on Earth. As a result there is a religion of sorts called Mercerism. Eventually the androids discover and reveal a terrible truth about the genuineness of Mercerism, and those who believe are put to the test. But perhaps faith and empathy are stronger than we thought?

Walking up a rocky mountain trail not unlike the one I imagined Mercer to have climbed in the novel, I pondered all of this and tried to explain it to a perplexed Cait between short breaths as we climbed higher and higher. Is empathy a true test of what it means to be human, and if someone doesn’t feel empathy does that mean they are less human?

Check out the book if you haven’t read it—it’s fascinating. PKD wrote it in 1968 and it is amazing how relevant it still is today.

Golden Aspens on the Colorado Trail

Mark and I traveled 285 up to Kenosha Pass to hike the Colorado Trail last Saturday with the aspens at their peak. The trail gave us glorious vistas over a high mountain plain with patches of golden aspens, distant peaks, and storm clouds rolling over all so that the light on the plain was dappled dark and light.

The intermittent sunlight made the gold-green aspens glow in an almost otherworldly way—the groves looked magical with the trail winding through them almost as though we were on some kind quest to Middle Earth to visit the Elves in Valinor. As usual my camera didn’t really capture the true splendor of it all, but I try.

News Flash: I’m a woman who doesn’t wear lipstick – and I vote

I am utterly amazed at some women who were for Hillary who are now saying that with McCain’s nomination of Sarah Palin they will vote for that ticket. Palin’s positions on almost every issue you can name are diametrically opposed to Hillary Clinton’s positions. Sarah’s womanhood, in and of itself, does not sway me in the least. And I am very weary indeed of all the references to lipstick as some red badge of courage for womanhood. Lipstick is a choice for women like any other choice (and God knows we need our choices), but as a symbol it stinks. Please, please – can we get back to important issues like what the hell we are going to do about the economy and the war and health care? Just say no to lipstick politics.

It's All Right

After a weeklong business trip with the usual sense of isolation combined with strange moments of connectedness with airport strangers that business travel usually brings me, I woke up intensely grateful to be back in Boulder. This morning I listened to a Paul Simon song that’s been running through my head all week, the music based on a Bach chorale and the words so very relevant for the current time and for my return home from traveling: “American Tune.”

Many’s the time I’ve been mistaken
And many times confused
Yes, and often felt forsaken
And certainly misused
But I’m all right, I’m all right,
I’m just weary to my bones
Still, you don’t expect to be
Bright and von vivant
So far away from home, so far away from home

This country continues the long struggle of picking up the pieces from the latest hurricane in Galveston and environs. I see pictures of the places we visited in March on the west coast of the island, now totally destroyed. Meanwhile Wall Street has had its own hurricane and the U.S. government, counter to the current administration’s usual philosophy of letting the free markets resolve these messes, is stepping in to bolster the “giants who cannot be allowed to fail” before they topple and destroy our economy. But it’s only money, right?

Do listen to "American Tune." Simon sang it for the Democratic Convention in 1980. He sang it again on the first Saturday Night Live after 9/11. Simon has said in interviews that he wrote it in 1973 after Nixon won reelection.

And I don’t know a soul who’s not been battered
I don’t have a friend who feels at ease
I don’t know a dream that’s not been shattered
Or driven to its knees
But it’s all right, it’s all right
We’ve lived so well so long
Still, when I think of the road we’re traveling on
I wonder what went wrong
I can’t help it, I wonder what went wrong

In these times it’s important to remember how lucky we still are and how much we have to be grateful for as we seek the change we need in November. You can imagine Paul Simon waking up on a November morning to another four years of Nixon and writing this:

We come on the ship they call the Mayflower
We come on the ship that sailed the moon
We come in the age's most uncertain hour
And sing an American tune
But it’s all right, it’s all right
You can’t be forever blessed
Still, tomorrow’s going to be another working day
And I’m trying to get some rest
That’s all I’m trying to get some rest.

The song could leave you with a bleak feeling but I choose to take it as a hopeful call to find our way and make it all right before it is too late, to find our way again on this “long strange trip.” It’s time for a different approach. McCain represents safety and assurance to some, but there is no security because we are blazing a new trail on many fronts: financial, international and ecological. These lives we are all living—what radical changes may really be required to continue to live in this world and ensure that all the other inhabitants may also live? I believe Obama recognizes what we all must realize--much must change and greed must fall.

I intend to continue to recognize the abundance I have in the simple joy of living. To draw my happiness from the moment, not from all the “stuff” and money and accumulations. A key question: am I being generous enough to my fellow human beings? Am I practicing enough acts of random kindness? Eckhart Tolle says:

Many poets and sages throughout the ages have observed that true happiness is found in simple, seemingly unremarkable things...Why is it the "least thing" that makes up the best happiness?...The form of little things leaves room for inner space, and it is from inner space, the unconditioned consciousness itself, that true happiness, the joy of Being, emanates. To be aware of little, quiet things, however, you need to be quiet inside. A high degree of alertness is required. Be still. Look. Listen. Be present.

And…if you are having a cynical moment (or two or three) as you read this, please ask yourself how you like living with this cynicism every day and what you or anyone else is getting out of it. As John Lennon sang: "You may say I'm a dreamer...but I'm not the only one. I hope some day you'll join us, and the world will be as one."

2008 DNC in Denver – Pre-Convention Impressions

We drive into the Mile High City to see what we can see on Saturday before the Democratic National Convention. At 9:30 am in Lodo, Denver’s streets are pretty empty as they usually are on a Saturday morning—mainly tired people who’ve worked all night waiting for the bus to go home. As we walk among the tall buildings more people gradually emerge, some with convention passes already dangling from their necks and taking pictures. People stand on each street corner collecting money for the homeless.

Security on the 16th Street Mall is on high alert; quintets of cops biking the full length of the street, others on foot in cumbersome riot gear randomly searching inside flower pots and underneath tree grates. Cardboard boxes lined with trash bags have replaced the usual trashcans perhaps because they are much more easily checked and searched; the cops peer into them as they walk by. In front of the Paramount Theater at least 20 officers exit a bus and stand waiting for something. This is more cops than I have seen at one time since January 1973 in Washington, DC at the Nixon inaugural parade when Mark and I illegally marched too near the festivities and suddenly found ourselves fleeing a line of gendarmes waving billy clubs. The guys today seem a lot calmer, at least so far.

We stroll over to the Pepsi Center, now surrounded by rusty metal grid fence segments. At a security check that looks like a press entry point we see the white CNN logo on many dark blue t-shirts. A brick wall has huge stenciled lettering: CNN = POLITICS. A cop and K-9 unit wait to one side of this entryway eying all of those who wait in line to enter and a man takes his time searching a row of bags, backpacks and camera equipment one by one on the sidelines. Men with dark blue vests that say POLICE on the back and SECRET SERVICE on the front vet each person in line. (By the way, what is secret about people who wears clothing labeled “secret service?”)

Three serious people speak French as they stand to one side with bags and camera equipment labeled “French International Television.” Various security personnel inside the iron grid patrol the perimeter as the red, white and blue star decorations on outer walls of the Pepsi Center rise up behind them.

By 10:50 am we hear our first helicopter go over, and after lunch the crowds have increased significantly and all manner of street vendors are out selling food and convention paraphernalia. We buy two patriotic hats and three Obama buttons across the street from Larimer Square where every state flag in the union has been strung in colorful banners over the street. It is time to head home to Boulder.

As we reach the car we pass a woman unloading a stack of “Hillary” signs and I tell her I want a picture for “old time’s sake.” She says she is part of the Texas delegation, from Austin. I tell her to have a great convention and she wishes me the same, not knowing that the closest I will get is television each night next week. Yes, I was for Hillary – but now it is Barack Obama’s time with his newly chosen VP Joe Biden by his side, and we are all ready for a change in this country. Let’s do this.

Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

I’ve just finished rereading “Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance: An Inquiry into Values” by Robert Pirsig circa 1974. I think I first read this book about 30 years ago, and I certainly understood it and got more out of it this time around. If you get it yourself, be sure to get the Perennial Classics Edition with extra insights and a new introduction by the author.

Three threads intertwine in the book: the story of a man and his son trying to connect with each other as they travel cross-country on a motorcycle, an examination of the indefinable concept of quality and the balance necessary between intuition and technology, and a man’s inner struggle to retain his sanity as he reconciles two essential parts of his being into one, for his son’s sake.

The narrator talks about a friend traveling with him who has no interest or patience for learning how to maintain the motorcycle he rides - foresaking technology to focus only art and intuition – and how this is a mistake. To have Quality (Oneness) in one’s life both art and knowledge are needed. He makes the point that this is true for any work or activity and uses motorcycle maintenance as the analogy. Although Quality cannot be defined, you know it when you see it. Quality in an activity is recognizable by the peace of mind a person feels during the activity. Without peace of mind there is no Quality.

These ideas seem very relevant in this election year. From p. 270:

To put it in more concrete terms: If you want to build a factory, or fix a motorcycle, or set a nation right without getting stuck, then classical, structured, dualistic subject-object knowledge, although necessary, isn’t enough. You have to have some feeling for the quality of the work. You have to have a sense of what’s good. That is what carries you forward. This sense isn’t just something you are born with, although you are born with it. It’s also something you can develop. It’s not just “intuition,” not just unexplainable “skill” or “talent.” It’s the direct result of contact with basic reality, Quality, which dualistic reason has in the past tended to conceal.

It all sounds so far out and esoteric when it’s put like that. It comes as a shock to discover that it is one of the most homespun, down-to-earth views of reality you can have. Harry Truman, of all people, comes to mind, when he said concerning his administration’s programs, “We’ll just try them…and if they don’t work…why then we’ll just try something else.” That may not be an exact quote, but that’s close…The reality of the American government isn’t static, he said, it’s dynamic. If we don’t like it we’ll get something better.

(Yes. In January, we will get something better. Don’t forget to vote in November.)

I recognize in these ideas the reason why I am unhappy at work when there is too much focus on numbers, metrics and people as interchangeable “components” and not enough focus on the essence of good work and good results which is represented by Quality.

Meanwhile, I think of my brother, who also read this book thirty years ago and related especially strongly to it. Paul was a mechanical genius – he could fix almost anything. He just knew how machines worked. He was highly interested in Philosophy and could hold his own in philosophical exchanges with my husband, which is no small feat. And Paul struggled to reconcile dueling parts of his personality at war with each other in a way that only a person who is bipolar can really understand.

Pirsig talks about the issue of “stuckness” – how seemingly insurmountable roadblocks and problems are actually opportunities to step back and open mindedly re-examine the facts and their relative importance. This also reminds me of my brother as well as myself and our experiences in the high tech world. P. 292:

Stuckness shouldn’t be avoided. It’s the psychic predecessor to all real understanding. An egoless acceptance of stuckness is a key to an understanding of all Quality, in mechanical work as in other endeavors. It’s the understanding of Quality as revealed by stuckness which so often makes self-taught mechanics so superior to institute-trained men, who have learned how to handle everything except a new situation.

In other words, you must set aside ego enough to admit you’re stuck (even if you’re supposed to be a pro) before you can start down the path toward a solution. At the time he wrote this book Pirsig, onetime professor of Rhetoric and Philosophy, was writing technical documentation for IBM computers. So, high tech folk, the question of Quality as peace of mind comes into play. P. 301:

Peace of mind isn’t at all superficial to technical work. It’s the whole thing. That which produces it is good work and that which destroys it is bad work. The specs, the measuring instruments, the quality control, the final check-out, these are all means toward the end of satisfying the peace of mind of those responsible for the work. What really counts in the end is their peace of mind, nothing else…The way to see what looks good and understand the reasons it looks good, and to be one with this goodness as the work proceeds, is to cultivate an inner quietness, a peace of mind so that goodness can shine through.

He says that this inner peace of mind, “involves unselfconciousness, which produces a complete identification with one’s circumstances…levels and levels of quietness quite as profound and difficult of attainment as the more familiar levels of activity.”

In other words - the profound quietness that can be found in the Now. I want to believe that somewhere, somehow, Paul has also finally found this peace of mind.

The year was 1965 and I was twelve years old. I wanted to learn to play the guitar, so my parents got me a golden-bodied acoustic and signed me up for lessons at Tom Pickett’s Guitar Gallery on East Kirkwood Avenue.

In the Hoosier town of Bloomington it was not a happening scene yet in 1965. A leather vest here, some long-haired guys there, but not so much love and peace and psychedelia. But Kirkwood was right down the street from the Indiana University campus and in the next few years as I was folksinging more and more, barefooted beings called hippies began to frequent the avenue in fringe, brightly colored clothes, and beaded headbands, smelling of incense and patchouli oil. Many of them also had guitars, slung over their backs like apparel.

My long-haired (and very exotic, I thought) teacher started me out with D and A7, and at first I had to work hard just to simply strum and smoothly change back and forth between these two chords. I was heartened to learn that a person could play hundreds of songs just with two chords. The first song I learned was “Good News”:

Good news, chariot’s a’comin’
Good news, chariot’s a’comin’
Good news, chariot’s a’comin’
And I don't want it to leave a me behind.

I picked up other songs along the same lines like “Hush Little Baby.” Soon I had graduated to 3(!) chords, adding G. I learned how to read tablature, and then I learned the magic of minor chords with Dm and Am. With just these chords and another progression: G-Em-C-D, thousands of songs could be played. Eventually I learned bar chords, and then almost anything (theoretically) was possible.

I began to play and sing everywhere I got the chance – for my friends and family, in Dunn Meadow next to IU, in talent shows, even once on a local TV station at a very early hour one morning. My father loved to harmonize on some songs like “Tell Me Why” and “Kumbuya.” By then I had learned a lot of anti-war songs as the draft and the raging Vietnam War started to take more of my friends. “Strangest Dream” was one of these:

Last night I had the strangest dream
I'd ever dreamed before.
I dreamed that all the world had agreed
To put an end to war.

I also sang “Simple Song of Freedom.”

Come and sing a simple song of freedom.
Sing it like it’s never been sung before.
Let it fill the air, tell people everywhere
We the people here don’t want a war.

And of course, “We Shall Overcome.” Not to mention Dylan’s “The Times They Are a’ Changin.’” The guitar teacher mischievously taught me that one at a very young age, perhaps hoping to introduce a mild insurrection in my distinctly unrebellious young life – but my parents never seemed to object, perhaps because I was an incredibly well-behaved little thing until I diverged from their plan in my twenties and started living with Mark (shacking up, as my Dad called it). They were worried about our level of commitment to each other. Thirty-five years later Mark and I are still together, so there you have it.

I learned lots of folk songs, playing and singing for hours a day sitting on the edge of the bed in my room, probably driving my entire family crazy. Folk songs were a great form of expression for me and are to this day. I loved the lyrics and had a knack for memorizing them – learning whole sets of songs made famous by Joan Baez, Judy Collins, Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan. It was one of the most exciting and inspiring periods of learning and growth in my life and I’ll never forget it.