Where the Bananas Are

My latest addiction is Stumbleupon.com.  I can spend an hour easily jumping from one item to the next, constantly looking for items of interest.  When I signed up for an account, I was asked to list my interests, and one of those interests was quotations.  I love a well-constructed phrase that provides insight into the working of the human psyche or human society.

Of course, many quotations are meant to be inspirational.  I was perusing a website the other day that was filled with inspirational quotes when it occurred to me what I was doing, and why.

First it has to be understood that I am an unapologetic believer in evolution as a concept to describe how human society has been shaped. The development of the human language was a key factor in the success of humans as a species (7 billion strong and growing).

Before our current success, we had to survive.  Communication was key in our survival.  Of course, that isn't limited to just the human species.  It is key to many species, and the impetus for communication within a species deals with two main topics:  where food may be found and warnings of danger.

These concepts are only important to species who live communally.  We qualify for that.  Solitary animals usually only have two types of communications:  this is mine (stay away) and it's time to reproduce.  I guess we have those as well, but that type of communication is generally self-evident, I think, and doesn't lend itself to my current topic.

What does lend itself to my current topic is dancing bees.  Bees are a communal animal, and they have a means of letting other bees know where to get the pollen.  Upon returning to the hive, bees who have found a good source of pollen will do what is known as either "the waggle dance" or "the round dance."  The waggle dance tells the other bees the pollen is some distance away, the round dance is a shortened version of the waggle dance that tells the other bees that the pollen is closer.  If the pollen is really good, the bees dance harder.

Another animal behavior that lends itself to my topic is meerkat barking.  They live communally, too, and when they are out foraging, one meerkat will stand guard.  If the sentry spots something hinky, he barks, and everybody takes cover.  Then, once everyone is safe in the hole, the sentry will go out, barking constantly as he checks everything out.  When everything seems to be in order, he stops barking, and everybody comes back out.

Bees dancing to share food sources and meerkats barking to warn of danger.  I think the human language began with our primitive ancestors trying to convey similar concepts to one another.  We just got real good at it.  We developed a language capable of expressing both concepts in many ways, shapes and forms.  And as simple as these concepts seem, I want to take them down a step further.  I want to completely simplify the underlying idea.

There is food here:  At the most basic, this idea can be simplified to I can lead you to sustenance.

Danger approaches:  The root idea behind this is I see something you don't which will cause you harm.

In the first idea, sustenance can go beyond physical sustenance.  We, as humans, have progressed beyond just struggling day to day to find nourishment for our bodies.  We have reached a point in our development in which spiritual, emotional, and existential nourishment is much more difficult to come by than a bunch of bananas.

We have also moved past warning each other about approaching creatures which may be trying to eat us.  Our warnings usually have more to do with self-destructive behaviors, or warnings against misconceptions on where sustenance as understood in the first idea may be found.

Now think of every inspirational quote you have seen today, either on Facebook or wherever you get your inspirational quotes.  Does it offer sustenance or a warning?

I love quotes.  I love the simple expression of complex ideas inherent in the best quotes.  But I think the complexities of this world go far beyond what a simple quote can tell us.  We need to read, we need to try to  understand more than these simple quotes that we see all day can express.  We have moved beyond the simple bee dance and the meerkat bark.

We can't just throw quotes back and forth and hope to convey to one another the broad range of sustenance available and dangers present in today's society.  We have to read, we have to talk to one another, we have to truly communicate in order to really understand each other.  There is sustenance everywhere, and we can tell one another how to find it.  There is danger every where, and we can keep one another from falling prey to it.  But first we have to understand one another, and that has to come from a deeper level of communication than can be expressed in an internet meme posted on Facebook or Stumbleupon.  We have to remember that the inspirational quote can only tell us where the bananas are.  It is up to us to go get them.

Elegy for Robin Melton

This weekend, the world lost one of the truly great people I have known.

Robin Melton grew up in Billings, Missouri just like me.  She was in my brother's class, a year older than me.  She lived about a block from me.  She had a great yard for whiffle ball, and I remember playing there.  I remember her mother had one of those purple martin houses, and there was a particular bird living there which Robin pointed out.  She said he was very rare in this part of Missouri.  He looked to me like any other bird, but she knew he was special.

I wonder if Robin knew how special she was?  I think she did.  But she never held that over anyone.  She was intelligent, athletic, and beautiful.  Many people are at least one of those things.  She had the good fortune to possess all those attributes, and one more.  She was kind.

I was the kid brother tagging along when I went to her house.  Robin was impressive then, even before we all went through adolescence and realized the incredible beauty she possessed.  She played baseball on the boys' baseball team, and excelled at it. As a kid brother, I was used to being rejected by my brother's older cooler friends, but Robin welcomed me as an equal.

Growing up in a small town, there are rarely any of the cliques you will find in larger schools, but common interests do have a tendency to produce groups which spend more time together.  Robin was an athlete and a cheerleader.  She ran with a popular crowd, and she was usually at the center of that crowd.  She still made time for everyone that wanted to talk to her.

Years later, after I had gone through various life-shaping events, I ran into Robin.  She and my wife served on the board for the local Habitat for Humanity together.  My wife was as impressed by her as I have been for most of my  life.  We would see Robin at various events, or even just out shopping, and she always made time to say hello.

I even had the opportunity to interview for a job with Robin once.  I was between jobs at the time.  She knew I had a degree in English.  In the interview, she told me she had some wonderful scientists working for her, but they just couldn't write.  She tried to justify the additional expense of a writing consultant by exploring other areas where I might be able to pitch in.  Unfortunately, I had no back-hoe experience to go with my English degree, so the position didn't materialize.

She did ask me one question in the interview, though, that I have carried with me.  When I told her that I just hadn't found a job that I felt would make me happy and challenge me, she asked me why not.  She appeared to be honestly confused by the concept.

I think she spent her whole life challenging herself and succeeding, always moving forward.  Living any other way was not even a consideration.

In this part of Missouri, in any part of the world, Robin was one of the rare ones.  I have known a few people who have accomplished great things.  But I have never known anyone who did so with such grace, with such kindness, with such beauty.

What I've Been Reading (and feeling guilty about)

I've been reading THE CLASSICS, or at least trying to read the classics.  There are many books which I feel I should have read that I haven't yet.  I'm trying to make up for that.

Most of these books are available free on my Kindle.  Moby Dick and The Brothers Karamazov are two examples.  I'm trying to read both.

But I have to admit, I've bogged down in Moby, and I fear the same may happen in The Brothers.  My life is lived in short bursts of activity.  Not often do I have the time to just sit and read and concentrate and spend a good amount of time thinking about what I have read.

All these wonderful time saving devices in my house, and I have less time than ever.  Or so I tell myself.  Even when I may have the opportunity, I feel guilty for indulging myself.  I always feel like there is something else I should be doing.

I should repaint the trim in my house.

There is a lot that could be done in the yard.

There are all kinds of projects I could be doing at the farm.

I need to go visit family more.

I should be spending more time with my kids.

I need to be working on my novel.

I should be doing more to find a job and help support my family.

Please don't think these reasons are in order of importance.  They just occur to me in random order, so I wrote them that way.

One day last week, I didn't feel well.  It started as a minor stomach thing, but was exacerbated by the fact that I didn't have any coffee in the house.  If I don't get my dose of caffeine in the morning, bad things happen.  That day, I somehow lost the drive to do anything else except read.  I read all of The Moon and Sixpence by Somerset Maugham.  If you haven't read him, you should.  Particularly The Razor's Edge.

I thoroughly enjoyed myself.  Between bouts of napping my way through a migraine and reading, the entire day got away from me.  Of course, guilt set in later, but I did enjoy myself.  I just needed the excuse of not feeling well to avoid the guilt long enough to read.

I need to read more.  Before life became so complicated, I read so much.  When I was a teenager, when I was in the Army, when I was in college, I read so much.  For anyone who thinks all their time is being absorbed by high school or college or the military, you have no idea.  Have a family.  Have a home.  Even without a job, I have no time.  I always stay busy.  There is something about the age I am, and my circumstances, that makes me feel guilty when I do things by myself which I enjoy.

My Lack of Gratitude for Where I Am Now

Sadly enough, the first thing that hits me when I wake up each morning is the fact that I don't have a teaching job.  I wake up, and there is that moment.  And then the moment of disgust with myself for my own self-pity. I then get up, get my children around to go to their summer day camp, pack their lunches, get myself ready for my day, and take them there.  Or sometimes my wife takes them.

I really don't think self-pity in my situation is appropriate.  What I should feel is gratitude.  I have a job.  In many ways, it's a good job.  I go in at a time that is convenient for me.  I work on days that are convenient for me.  I am making a monetary contribution to my household, albeit not a very large one.

On days when I don't go to that job, I go help a friend remodel his house.  I get to spend the day with people I like, and I get to learn new skills.  While this endeavor doesn't make a monetary contribution to the household, it has allowed me to replace the carpet in my house (badly needed) in exchange for my labor.  Very nice carpet, too.

And I have the opportunity to do what I have always said I wanted to do.  The flexibility of my schedule allows me to write.  I am not emotionally or creatively drained by either job.  In fact, they seem to be inspiring me on some levels.  I'm writing a novel, and it is going well.  I like it.

My future is uncertain, and I don't like that.  But everyone's future is uncertain.  The uncertainty in mine is just a little more apparent.

Will I get my novel published?  I don't know.  Will I ever be allowed the opportunity to teach again?   I don't know.

I need to concentrate on what I do know, not on what I don't.  I know my wife loves me and supports me.  I know I have more time for my kids now.  I know that writing makes me happy.  I know that there are people in my life who believe in me and value me.

I read today about some of the tenets of Eastern religion and philosophy.  We should not concentrate on the product of our efforts, but on our efforts themselves.  Success and failure are in many ways not in our control, and are actually only a matter of perception.  The only thing we can control is what we do and how well we do it, and we should approach what we do with a certain level of dispassion in order to ensure the quality of our work.  This goes against much of what we learn in the west.  We are told to do things passionately.  There are drawbacks to this.  One of those is our reaction to failure.

I'm afraid that failure is inevitable.  I will fail.  But failure is not the end.  Failure is an opportunity to learn.  Too much emotional investment will result in not gaining all lessons to be learned from that failure, or lessons learned too late.

Maybe this novel will never see the light of day.

A certain quote makes more sense to me now.  I am not trying to be published.  What I am doing is writing.  Publication is not the goal.  Writing well is the goal.  The quote I refer to is, "Do or do not.  There is no try."

I will continue to apply for teaching jobs.  This is something I can do.  I can't control the outcome, but I can continue to do this.

I will continue to write.  And I will submit my writing for publication.  This, too, is something I can do.

And I thank everyone who helped create this opportunity for me, no matter the role, up to and including my own.

Head Lice and Other Tragedies

To what extent is it healthy to be able to let go of things beyond individual control?

I always try to think about this sort of thing in two ways.  First, I consider it from a secular point of view.  I would think that most psychologists and psychoanalysts would consider it perfectly healthy to be able to just dismiss the circumstances and move on.  Then I consider it from a more religious stance, and I remember the line from the AA meetings:  Let go, let God.  We can't control everything, and too strong an inner need to attempt to control everything leads to madness, and in that madness, self-medication.

So what brings up this topic at this time?  My daughter.  She was due to begin camp today.  We had everything packed, she was all ready, and then we arrived at camp.  She checked in, then checked in with the nurse.  And the nurse found head lice.

I was horrorstruck.  I had seen the signs at the day camp where Audra and Jackson are spending their days this summer that they had two confirmed cases.  "Doesn't affect me,"  I thought.  "My kids are clean."  Guess what?  That doesn't matter.  I was still operating under the assumption that only dirty people get lice.  So not true, I found out.  But this isn't about me.  This is about my daughter.

My wife broke the news to my daughter like a doctor breaking the news to a cancer patient.  "I'm so sorry," she said.  I watched Audra's reaction.  I also watched her for a reaction to the news she has head lice (had - first stop was Walgreen's for a lice treatment kit and we are still washing every bit of washable fabric in the house and spraying the rest).

There was maybe a flash of disappointment as the news hit home...and then she was off and playing and joking with her younger brother again like nothing had happened.  And I wondered, is this healthy?

I didn't want her to have a fit.  Or break down in tears.  But a little more disappointment seemed a little in order to me.

Of course, this is also the girl, who upon being told that her errant behavior in kindergarten made both me and her mother very said, "Oh, do what I do.  If something makes me sad, I just don't think about it."

And she still doesn't.  I wonder how it is to be that way.  Everything in my life that has ever hurt me or disappointed me or caused me emotional pain seems to within arm's length at any given time.  I can distinctly remember the pain of being rejected by peers as a child and by employers as an adult with just a casual foray into my memory.

This doesn't seem to exist for my daughter.  And I wonder.  Will she be happier than me?  I certainly hope so.

Prufrock, or that damned snickering eternal Footman.

The entire poem is here: Prufrock

This is the poem that often runs through my head.  It is the song that, while I recognize its flaws, I will probably always consider it my own special song.

T.S. Eliot.  A genius.  And I don't consider him a genius because of "The Wasteland," that work of his that gets so much attention.  That poem is for smart people.  When I have to refer to footnote after footnote to catch references in order to even begin to understand it, then I have a hard time putting any kind of emotional investment into it.

Ah, but Prufrock.  I get this poem.  It speaks to me, and affects me.  The language is simple, the main character is...well, me, and conversely the me I'm glad I'm not.

I have seen a poster utilizing one of the lines from the poem as a caption, "Do I dare disturb the universe?"  This line, in isolation, is inspirational.  In the context of the poem, however, it is a sad statement concerning the doubts that assail each of us when we consider endeavors that will draw attention to ourselves.  Sad, because for the main character of the poem, that answer is no.  And while this is a great line, it is not the line that keeps me awake at night.  Sometimes, yes, I do dare to disturb the universe.  Maybe not as often as I could, but universe-disturbing should probably not be a constant labor.

The line that always gets me is "and I have seen the eternal Footman hold my coat, and snicker/and in short, I was afraid."  Oh, poor Prufrock.  He knows there will be no posterity for him.  He never asserted himself, he never pushed anything to a conclusion because he was afraid the answer would be no.

Fear is awful.  Fear of failure is worse than failure.  Failure teaches.  Failure hurts, but it is also an opportunity for growth.  Fear of failure is simply paralysis.  Nothing changes, nothing gets better.

I regret most often the times I didn't try because of fear of failure.  Currently, I'm experiencing a lot of failure, and it hurts.  But I also believe that I'm growing.  Even at this late date in my life, I'm growing.  If nothing else, I'm growing more compassionate for others who have faced failure.

But what if I had tried harder earlier, what if I hadn't let the fear of failure stop me?  Where would I be?  I don't know, and that kind of speculation is really pointless.  Regret is useful only to the extent that it drives us to not repeat the circumstances that brought about the regret.  I must try now.  That is all that matters.

I will disturb the universe at times.  I will eat a peach.  And yes, the mermaids will sing to me.  I may fail, but those mermaids damn sure will be singing for me.

Things To Think About When Writing a Zombie Apocalypse Novel

So I've been writing a young adult zombie novel.  This gives rise to some serious and not so serious considerations.

Serious consideration:
What do zombies represent in the American consciousness, the zeitgeist, the deeper meaning?
I've done a little reading considering zombies.  I'm talking the George Romero-Night of the Living Dead zombies, not those wimps from the Caribbean and Central and South America in The Serpent and the Rainbow.  Werewolves represent the onset of adolescence, vampires represent awakening sexuality, so what about zombies?  To me, they represent the transition from adolescence into adulthood.  We go from being  lively, curious, and emotional to a dead, grasping, emotionless, decaying state.  I addressed this matter to a PhD friend of mine, and she pointed out that zombies want to eat living brains in much the same way the current educational system wants to transform children into "productive members of society."


Not so serious consideration:
If zombies eat, do they also poop?
Okay, so I've been thinking way too much about how zombies could really function.  So much so that I have to occasionally step back and remind myself that animated corpses are impossible.  I've read quite a bit about possible causes of a zombie apocalypse, and I've formulated several ways I could justify their existence in a work of fiction.  But the simple fact of the matter is that it just doesn't matter.  Too many people overexplain causes.  I've determined that the majority of people don't care about the how or the why, they just want the what next?  That's not to say I don't address it in my novel.  But it really isn't important.  I guess I'm a story teller, more interested in thrusting people into difficult circumstances and seeing how they deal with it rather than dwelling on the scenery and vehicle for the action.  See also this: Do zombies poop?

Serious consideration:
By the time I finish this novel, will zombies be passe?
There is a chance that could happen.  Recently, we've gone into and out of the vampire craze, and are well into the zombie craze.  I looked at direct-to-Kindle published books on zombies.  There's only, like, 700 of them.  Of those I sampled, some were awful, and some were quite good.  There was everything from historical zombies to romantic zombie stories to adventure and horror.  But I'm not writing just to be riding the wave.  I think I have something to say.  I think I'm writing a good book that happens to take place in a zombie apocalypse.

Not so serious consideration:
Why don't characters in zombie novels and movies know that they are facing zombies?
My wife asked me this question the other night.  We've watched The Walking Dead, Zombieland, and she is currently reading David Moody's Autumn series.  I like Robert Kirkman's (creator of the graphic novel upon which the television series The Walking Dead  is based) response to this question:  The novel/series takes place in an alternate world where George Romero never made Night of the Living Dead .  From a writer's point of view, this almost has to be the case.  Post apocalyptic novels have been written, certainly many inspired by the Cold War.  But a scenario in which the dead rise and walk?  We all think about how we would deal with it.  Many of us know the "rules" and survival techniques.  But what fun would it be to write that?  Actually, it might be fun to write that, and have the biggest zombie survival experts fail miserably, while the bumblers survive and thrive.  Oh, wait.  That's been done in Shaun of the Dead.

Serious consideration:
How much can I change the "rules" and still appeal to zombie apocalypse fans?
Things we know about zombies:
They eat people (sometimes specifically brains).
They can only be stopped by destroying their brains.
In large groups they are unstoppable.
They move slow.
And of course, all these rules have been broken at one time or another by one author or another.  So I think I can change the rules quite a bit and still have a zombie novel.  My apocalypse, my rules.  The only thing I have to have is dead people who refuse to go gentle into that good night.

Not so serious consideration:
Why I must never use the word "zombie" in my zombie apocalypse novel.
'Cause it's low rent.  That word is not used in any zombie novel of substance I've come across.  "Zombie" is a term applied by fans to all the creature-driven works of fiction inspired by Romero who was in turn inspired by Richard Matheson's I Am Legend, written in 1954, well before the more recent Will Smith debacle which butchered the key idea behind the novel, which was that we never really know who the monsters are, especially when they are us.  Zombie is a cheap term for a complex representation of human hopes, fears, and nightmares.  But everybody knows what you are talking about when you use it, so go on ahead.