Did we awake from the stupor that can consume our lives — lost amidst bits & bytes, screens & feeds — and find ourselves, as G.K. Chesterton once wrote, “in a street full of splendid strangers?”
The idea is not that we will win in our own lifetimes and that’s the measure of us, but that we will die trying.”
Barbara Ehrenreich
Stopping puts some space in your long haul. Rest is a way of being. Pacing is recalibrated care. ~Pato Hebert
Cells in embryos make their way across a steep “developmental landscape” to their eventual fate.
Embryonic cells continuously monitor their changing surroundings and make small corrective adjustments, optimizing as development proceeds, locking in on their planned identity relatively late.
Processing positional information makes genes variously switch on and off throughout the embryo, giving cells distinct identities based on their location. (Some cells unfortunately take the wrong paths and are unable to get back on track.)
All the information is there in the landscape and processing that information effectively may be the phenomenon that makes a bunch of loosely stuck-together atoms behave like the thing we call life.
Had I been like a man living in a wood from which he knows there is no exit, I could have lived; but I was like one lost in a wood who, horrified at having lost his way, rushes about wishing to find the road.”
-Leo Tolstoy
High above the flying scud and dark-rolling clouds, there floated a little isle of sunlight, from which beamed forth an angel’s face; and this bright face shed a distinct spot of radiance upon the ship’s tossed deck.
“Ah, noble ship,” the angel seemed to say, “beat on, beat on, thou noble ship, and bear a hardy helm; for lo! the sun is breaking through; the clouds are rolling off – serenest azure is at hand.”
Moby Dick by Herman Melville
Mark Singer: Is there anything you’ve been able to draw upon, David? Is there comfort in the past?
David Milch : I feel the past falling away and the attachments of regret for what wasn’t done or was done badly or was done without sufficient sympathy, and it was for that reason that our granddaughter’s visit was such a redemptive and compelling occurrence. Everything is an adventure for her and a delight and a surprise, an opening up, and that’s a big gratification.
Mark Singer: I’ve never thought of you as a sentimental person, but maybe I misread that. How would you characterize yourself?
David Milch: As an unsentimental person.
Third Act by Mark Singer (New Yorker May 20, 2019)
Had a great test ride today. Harley-Davidson LiveWire has a very strong, broad powerband and handles quite well as a quiet (and sweet smelling) street bike.
Expected sunny weather but instead got drenched by a cloudburst when approaching the foothills around the valley, so I stuck with the streets around town and put off riding the winding back roads. Still, lots of fun.
Interested in the drive to electrify California? With focus on electric motorcycles? LiveWire is #1 in the lineup of futuristic transportation vehicles.
Just think of the many issues needing resolution before the year 2034, including fortifying the energy grid and making electric recharging more convenient.
It’s an exciting challenge.
Human thought is still best described by metaphor, poetry, & other literary devices to express what we do not fully understand. Experience is a matter of sensibility & intuition, of seeing & hearing the significant things, of paying attention at the right moments.
Garry Kasparov
Woke up, fell out of bed, dragged a comb across my head. Found my way downstairs and drank a cup and looking up I noticed I was late. Found my coat and grabbed my hat, made the bus in seconds flat. Found my way upstairs and had a smoke, and somebody spoke and I went into a dream.
A Day in the Life by The Beatles
Success is measured by the opposition you encounter, and the courage with which you maintain the struggle against overwhelming odds.
–Marden
Eschew sidewalks and low hanging tree branches; walk in the middle of the street, and listen for the notes of traffic.