ideas

ideas, other, stories

Tomorrow I’ll grab my stuff and jump onto a little airplane for an hour flight through some very pretty mountains to my new home, Nondalton. The four days that follow will be no less then sheer madness, and on the fifth day will be the wildest, funnest, and craziest thing we teachers go through: the first day of school!

I’m pretty sure the whole ‘unpacking & settling in’ thing is going to have to wait for labor day.

So far I have been amazed by how wonderful this district is. These folks know how it’s done and I’m honored (and..frankly..moderately trepidated!) to be a part of their team. I am left awe-struck time after time at the deeply rooted care and devotion exhibited by all staff I encounter–teachers, admins, ed. support, business–and championed by the superintendent. It’s incredible. This is a good, good place to be.

———-

Now, on flying! I just finished an absolutely excellent book about flying, “The Thinking Pilot’s Flight Manual.” I highly recommend it–it’s the best stuff I have read thus far in my (short) aviation career. Here are a few notes from the lighthearted-but-poignant last section, a compilation of truths and opinions all come by the hard way:

The weather is not going to get better in the next 5 miles. 

One close encounter with a tower or a set of power lines appearing out of the haze or fog when scud-running, or going below minimums on an instrument approach, will give you years of the most hideously vivid nightmares  you can imagine. 

Tornadoes really are caused by mobile homes. In hot, muggy weather, be cautious of airports near mobile home parks.

When making a decision regarding weather, an effective tool is to ask oneself if this might lead to looking stupid in the NTSB report.

Departing with one component of a redundant system out of service will make the other one fail in flight.

Everyone looks silly wearing a headset.

Males over age thirty look ridiculous dressed in military flight suits when near a civilian airplane. The effect is amplified if the pilot in question has a pot belly. If he has any patches or wings on the jumpsuit, he is an embarrassment to the airplane, and there is a good chance it is secretly laughing at him.

A pilot with any poetry in his or her soul knows that it is always appropriate to quietly thank the airplane for a flight after putting it away. In fact, some assert that those who do not do so may have no soul, and should not be allowed in the sky.

The cliche is depressingly true: the chances of making a superb landing are inversely proportional to the number of people watching.

The rainbow around your airplane’s shadow on a cloud is called a glory. The first time you see one, the name will make eminent sense.

There is nothing more beautiful than this world when viewed from aloft.

ideas, other, stories

I spend some time here & there thinking about why I fly. The trivial answer is: because I like to! Of course this begs the not trivial question: why do I like to fly?

Try this: look away and close your eyes for about 30 seconds, and before you open them take three deep & slow breaths. Exactly when you open your eyes, not a moment later, observe the object that happens to be centered in your gaze. What color is it, how is its texture? Is it old or new? Good. Now think about how you saw that object when you opened your eyes. Hopefully there was a fleeting moment, a peculiar moment, in which you saw things differently. Like a quickly fading dream or deja vu, the moment you think about it, it is gone. Dust blown into the wind.

Now. Imagine: when you closed your eyes, suddenly you popped into an other world. This is a magical world–it looks a lot like the one we live in, but also somehow looks different. There are different rules, all sorts of terrifying things that can kill you very very quickly, and  best of all, a new type of freedom you’ve never felt before. You have been well trained for the dangers and rules, and you can handle them without too much worry or panic. You can spare some time and energy to soak up the beauty and freedom of this mystic world. And when you open your eyes you are back in this world–you don’t see just one thing newly, you see it all. The whole world. The problems, the pain, the beauty, the suffering and the laughter, you see anew. You stop and smell a flower.

Just like when you closed your eyes a minute ago, this moment fades too. A bit slower, albeit. Soon, maybe ten minutes or maybe a few hours, you have re-calibrated and you function in this world just as you did before you closed your eyes. Well, almost. There is a residual after effect…you are a little bit calmer and a little bit happier. And you remember the other world. And you will be back.

That other world is the sky, and that is why I like to fly.

ideas

Asked about writing stories:

You always have this image, of the perfect thing, which you can never achieve, but which you never stop trying to achieve. But I think, that at the core of it, there’s this image that you have, this interior image of something that is absolutely perfect, and that’s–that’s your signpost, your guide. You’ll never get there, but without it you’ll never get anywhere.

ideas

Is it any wonder that the human condition can be summed up so short and clear by saying we all just badly need a hug sometimes. ?

ideas, other

Half a million dollars and four to five years of both full time apprenticeship AND weekend coursework. A lot of time and money. That’s the name of the game for an electricity or gas (power generation/distribution) company to take a worker from entry-level apprentice to proficient wireman. And except for the time consumed by weekend coursework, the power company eats that. All of it. After the fact, it is another five years for the company to break even on their investment. Ten years after a worker enters an apprenticeship program, it is finally worth it. It’s the same story for many other trades.

For government recognition of proficiency in education, you’re looking at two to three years of part time coursework and six months to a year of on-the-job training.

I’m an American and I’ll have my electricity reliable, please. Thanks.

 

ideas

Have enough time in the morning to enjoy a second cup of coffee after breakfast.

ideas

Angry men shouldn’t be pastors

ideas, other

So I watched this movie yesterday, and for the first third I’m like “hmm..if this guy is the hero for his ‘determinism’ and they don’t handle with his denseness and worthlessness I’m gonna be disappointed.

So then in the second third and I’m like OK, this is looking like they’re gonna handle stuff, this could turn out a great movie.

I’m thinking here that this movie could turn out to be a beautiful re-tone and refinement and media-shifted version of Shop Class as Soulcraft. I’m thinking that maybe, because these are some good actors and maybe the writer’s awesome, it could be not just a “rich suit guy finds meaning in using his hands” gig, but a hard hitting commentary on the meaning of human life.

So then the third third rolls around and I’m like yes, yes I think they may pin this. Maybe it won’t be as great as I want it to be, but we’re goin’ the right way here.

Then the scene on the docks, “these men knew their worth,” and I was like yes. Could’ve been better, I wouldn’t say it’s worth pinning Crawford’s book on, but hey it’s good, not going to whine.

And then a minute later the last scene happened and I found myself sitting in the couch half dazed, with just enough sense to be grumbling some unkind things directed at the directors and writers and producers and actors. Aw c’mon guys.

ideas, other, photography

If you’re trying to be cool you’ve already missed the boat; the fire inside to have courage is the thing itself.

So is that if and only if or exclusive or?

What other picture could go here but Teddy and Muir

Serious studs

 

 

ideas

It’s hard to do official-ish things in Guatemala. I hazard the guess (literally) that lots of developing countries are that way. There are mountains of paperwork and steps and it’s actually really hard to find any information about anything unless you know somebody. The paperwork is tough: it needs to be done in ink with signatures of you, a notary, and your great great step-mother’s uncle, while the steps usually consume one or more whole days–in the capitol city, which takes a day or two to get to from anywhere else in the country. And deadlines. The world ends if you don’t meet a deadline (they’re usually not met).

Why? I think it’s like a Volcano ice cream bowl from Coldstone: Oreos mashed in with strawberries and chocolate syrup and bananas in vanilla ice cream: there’s a lot goin’ on that makes it what it is.

I’m sure that a significant ingredient is technology, namely how it’s kinda here but not really. There’s online banking but when you make any transaction more significant than a withdraw or deposit, it is first and foremost written and signed in pen in a Book of Acts. Also, there’s an enormous amount of corruption all around. I’ve talked with a lot of Guatemalans about this stuff, they agree and quite benevolently explain that that’s simply how things are here. It’s just hard to do stuff here.

How does a country become this or change away from this? Were the Mayans like this? Where the Spanish Catholics or Evangelical missionaries like this? My word, were WE once like this (possibly not, but I don’t know)? And the North America indigenous?

Gear change: a girl in the sponsorship program is graduating from high school this year and has the desire to keep studying, the aptitude to swing in the big leagues and the heart to actually do good things there. That’s a rare combo. She has a heart that’s not been muted and dumbed and a mind that’s survived a normally crippling secondary “education.” An absolutely necessary condition for this country to climb out of the mud will be for the few-and-far-between individuals like her  to reach for the stars.

But you know what? That won’t happen. If she does manage to keep studying, it’ll be Saturday classes at one of a few local university micro-branches that remarkably effectively board up the mind wherever the secondary education failed to do so. There are only a few good quality learning universities here and only rich people enroll. All the mountainous paperwork and myriad steps aren’t so bad when you can hire three or four lawyers to make sure things work out.

This girl, Ana, won’t ever know what it’s like to reach for the stars, to follow her heart and creativity and imagination, to have the world tell her “go for it and see what happens.” She’ll end up graduating from high school in October and going straight to work in the education system, with absolutely inadequate training to address the problems and struggles the students face, teaching the same poor curriculum that she herself only barely escaped.

Because that’s the way things are here, and it makes my blood boil.

ideas

If Google shows a music group Wikipedia page before the official page, is that a good thing or a bad thing?

ideas

Ok, I’ve been doing a lot of thinking in the past few months, and lots of accelerated thinking in the past few days. Here’s the mind dump.

You can’t erradicate slavery in the world until people aren’t hungry. If a country is hungry there are going to be slaves.

You can’t get rid of hunger until women are actually worth something in rural villages, until a baby girl is worth just as much as a baby boy.

You can’t realize a world where women are worth what men are worth until you fix the old and deeply etched culture of each rural village that lives in every old man and old woman, every local healer and little child. Yes, cultures need to be corrected–but not that alone, they need to correct themselves. The fire has to come from within.

You can’t fix hunger by sending food, not even by planefuls and boatfuls. That makes it worse. After a bad week have four beers and a whisky, feel horrible and sad and so have another drink. You’ll just have a worse hangover the next day because of the extra drink. Well, ok, that analogy doesn’t make a ton of sense. But really the future cannot look like countries sending food to other countries, and every step that way is a step away from what the future can look like.

And like Norman Borlaug would say, you can’t build a peaceful world on empty stomachs.

(from a month or two ago, I got lazy and didn’t final-draft-edit it)

ideas, photography

A digital SLR like this: indexed ISO adjustment wheel for the right thumb, shutter speed dial, manual/aperture-priority modes and only-auto white balance, two-position light-meter switch: matrix and weighted spot. Push-button 12 second timer, manual mirror-up mode. No external display, only an in-viewfinder needle light meter and small lcd counter on top for pictures-remaining. Super long battery life and well padded circuit boards, gasketed metal body.

Pretty please!

Oh yeah, and if it could look like a Nikon F3 or a Leica III series, without looking like it’s trying to look like a Nikon F3 or Leica III series, that would be a great plus.

Edit:
And if light meter needle could have little tick marks +/- EV in thirds, up to one EV, that would be some seriously wonderful frosting on the cake.

funny, ideas

M, this is for you.

A few days ago I realized April Fool’s day is coming up soon, and I have been thinking a lot about it. Lots of things have come into my mind and heart when I realized that April Fool’s day is something deeper, a clear window into human condition. I only realized this when the concept of birthday and the concept of April Fool’s day came together in my mind, which happened thanks to my dear friend from school and my old Troop leader from Boy Scouts,  who were both born on April 1st.

Wait, April Fool’s day? There are a lot of Holidays that are great for getting all windy about–Commercialized Christmas, unThankful Thanksgiving, Egg-riddled Easter, Baffling Boxing-Day, et cetera–but really Dave, April Fool’s day? Yes, April Fool’s day. And a birthday. Humor is one of things we still really have no clue about, and birth is the beginning of life.

Is this whole post just a hackneyed cliche? Ends and means, friend, ends and means.

In the past six months, my mind has been really occupied by this thing, human essence, human condition, or whatever you might want to call it. Living in Guatemala has been a wild experience so far–not at all what I expected, but more learning than I can shake a stick at it. Two things have been separately wandering around my mind–the celebration and remembrance of birthdays, which many don’t do here (the lower two thirds of the population, the poor, usually don’t know their date of birth), and why we find humor in the unknown and unexpected (like April Fool’s jokes).

Two days ago, in a twinkle of a moment these two things dovetailed and immediately made all the sense in the world and opened up this window, this lens that helped me understand this idea of humor and the celebration of birthdays.

It’s long, so click to read more–

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