Weave
I haven't done this for a while, so it's probably time to see where it goes. I love telling stories. I'm well past the point where I want to sit on a porch, jibbering away about "In my day..." My dream job would be someone paying me to live in a library and spin yarns around unsuspecting youths.
This is the garbage-plate version of that menu. I'm going to see if I can merge these snippets into a cohesive twine that pulls in the direction of a possibly not terrible future. Here's the ingredients.
- Minor toe surgery
- A complaint my teachers had about me
- The beautiful future where smart assistants bring joy through spectacular incompetence
- Why I love jigsaw puzzles.
Every December we pull out a folding table and dump the contents of a 1000 piece puzzle on one end. There's the initial hunt for the edge pieces. Then the focus on anything particularly unique in color or shape. After those rites of passage the real puzzling work begins.
I'm a sucker for that part. There's a rhythm that suits my way of being. Look at the puzzle; look at the puzzle poster; back to the puzzle; note the shape; go to the box and sift focusing on shape, then colors, then detail. Place the piece. If it fits victory and repeat. If not reset and regroup. Repeat 700+ more times.
The part that I find the most fascinating is that the image doesn't change, but as each section fills in what you see shifts. Your understanding is evolved with each piece snapped in place. I love the feeling that emerging comprehension brings. The ability to focus in, find specific qualities; then drift outward and drink in the scene. It's incredibly soothing, and I love that it can be both a solo adventure and pathway for quiet bonding.
A few days ago we were trying to figure out what to watch as a family. I asked my daughter if she'd "...seen the movie Cold Storage?" My daughter said "What?" at the same time as my smart thermostat said "I didn't get that?"
I said "Cold Storage". My daughter said "No", and my smart thermostat said "Okay calling ...". There was a brief hesitation before chaos erupted. I could hear a phone ring coming from the thermostat; my family was laughing, deep belly laughs, and I was panicking; trying to figure out how to end the call before it went through.
Silly things like that are so valuable, nothing bad actually happened, but the delight my family took in my unreasonable panic was pure gold. The timely reminder that no matter how "smart" this future we're living in wants to be, it's also farcically inept. There's something unique about how comedies of errors can encapsulate our fears and frustrations letting us both laugh and face them at the same time.
I was a funny student. There are lots of stories of me creating unique challenges for teachers. A favorite of my mom's is that whenever I would get a book report or research paper back with corrections I would shove that paper in my backpack, and proceed to write something from scratch.
This was in the early days of word processors, I had access to WordStar on an Apple ][c. In theory I could just go in and make the suggested changes and turn in the paper for decent grade. I just wouldn't.
This wasn't viewed as precocious - I was missing the entire point of the corrections, I was supposed to be learning how to write correctly but I was wasting the teachers' time and reinforcing bad habits.
In retrospect I've come to understand that I really don't like editing, which if you've for some reason made it this far, you already know. But more than an aversion to editing, I find myself still stuck in this loop, where I see the same things, but differently. Especially in These Times - every tick of that second hand brings a new piece into view, the puzzle's still the same but, I see a new detail that I want to explore.
There are risks to this -ever forward- drive. I love skiing. I'm not particularly good, I stay mostly on the main runs, but when I can get into that flow and my skis cut into the snow as I turn back and forth, the feeling of strength and freedom is incredible.
Sometimes the details get you. A few years back I went up and I didn't take the time to trim my toe nails. Needless to say, I paid a price. The small cost of a slightly too long big-toe nail slowly expanded over the last few years.
At no point was it ever a major problem, but its effects were always lingering. And then suddenly it would hurt to walk. This had happened a few times since that winter. I could usually just patch things over with an intense trim, but this time I couldn't eke my way around my initial mistake.
Some novicane, 10 minutes of various cleanup, a very tight bandage and just as slow-suddenly as the bad, I can numbly feel the unraveling of easier times.
One of the hardest things, for me at least, is to know when to look broadly, and when to obsess the small. It's incredibly easy to get pulled along by the big visible compelling feels that flow from mastery. The excitement of newness. The joy of seeing something come together.
The level of upheaval across technology these days has decimated the standard ways in which many of us had come to derive those feelings of joy from our work. We're not finding the puzzle piece to place, not setting our edges in the hillside.
We still have all the risks of missing something small, but as teams shrink we'll even lose some of the ability to collectively belly-laugh at the inanity of it all.
This dual downward pressure on what was once a minefield of potential delight is a lot to take in. Yes there are glimmers of the past, when in some mid-day fugue you suddenly see a new way to Krazy Glue your army of agents into a more "efficient" squad of Thunder Cats, but it's just not the same.
I've mused on this before, finding consistent joy in technology is going to be hard. The answer I gravitate towards is people. Wherever I end up, whatever I do. I need people both in and out of the workplace to remind me that the puzzle isn't just that 1000 pieces on the table. It's the ever interweaving world of those that I meet. Its scope is massive, and impossibly small and I need everyone's help to see both.