Small Thoughts on a Small Island

Today is September 13, 2015. I flew to Maui for the funeral of my last surviving grandparent, my paternal grandma. By cruel coincidence, today is also apparently National Grandparents' Day.

I haven't been for 15 years. It may seem strange to avoid paradise for so long.

Fifteen years ago, I was a senior in high school. I had come here with my father to visit family. My grandparents, uncle, and schizophrenic aunt all lived on a small farm in Makawao -- upcountry, about 30 minutes from Kahului.

I remember less than I think I should have from this trip. I remember red soil, a red that stained and dirtied sneakers beyond salvation. I remember that it would rain intermittently at our elevation of three or four thousand feet.

I remember my grandpa showing me his angry, strict constructionist letters to to the editor of the local paper. I remember he gave me Will Durant's book, The Story of Civilization, and showed me his heavily annotated copy. I remember him threatening to shoot the people that stole his cherrymoyas, and my grandmother and father, not taking this threat lightly, said rather lamely in local dialect, "Let them take."

I remember my grandma, who complained about being a farmer, and who fed me lau lau, which, being polite, I ate, even though I hated the stuff.

(I still hate the stuff, though with less passion. All passions, it seem, including those of taste, grow less acute with time.)

But mostly, I remember my father and the AP Biology test.

***

I had brought an AP Biology prep book with me to Maui. My school didn't offer AP Bio, and I had taken Honors Bio as a freshman. Three years later, after determining that I was half a class shy of being a National AP Scholar, I decided to study independently for the AP Bio test. I had done this before -- I had taken the AP Chemistry test as a sophomore, as had four of my classmates. But this was different. For chemistry, I had had the benefit of taking Honors Chemistry that same year. I was on my own this time. And I was three years removed from formal coursework.

So I studied.

During that week, my father had at least one manic episode. Manic episodes with my father resembled volcanic eruptions -- some were sudden explosions, while others started more slowly. This was one of the latter.

He seemed crabby that day. He made some snide comments about how my mother had raised me. I didn't know what he had a problem with specifically, but I did sense the coming storm.

I was studying DNA transcription when he stormed into the house when he marched in. I think he had stormed in and out of the house periodically over the previous thirty minutes. I'm not completley sure -- I was blessed with the power to concentrate and tune out my surroundings.

Finally, he marched in the room. He was shouting at me, telling me I was a bad son, and that Mom had raised me badly. I tried to ignore it. I don't think he used the word "worthless", but that was pretty much the gist of it. He was offended because he was my father, and that I should obey him.

Now, for as long as I had remembered, I was told two things about my father. He was sick, and it wasn't his fault. I was often sad, or angry, but knew I wasn't supposed to be angry with him. (I also was told that I shouldn't work too hard, or feel too happy, or feel too sad, with the unstated implication that I would end up bipolar.)

But something inside me snapped. I told him off. I don't remember everything I said, but I do remember telling him, "You're a small man."

I don't know that I could've chosen worse words to insult his pride. Small man! Small man? I AM NOT A SMALL MAN! Your mother did a bad job! And so on.

He stormed out again. Tears running down my face, I turned back to the book. It took a while for the tears to clear, and for my mind to focus. But I went back to studying.

I honestly have no recollections from the rest of that trip. That May, I took the AP Biology test and got a 5. I also did well enough on my other AP tests (including Microeconomics, which I had studied for on my own) to get the National AP Scholar award.

At Harvey Mudd, I needed to study biology (again independently) and take a placement exam (again independently) to try to pass out of Introduction to Biology (Bio 52), which at that time was notoriously worthless. I ended up doing well enough to pass out of the class, but not well enough to be awarded credit. I was permitted to take Evolutionary Biology (Bio 101), which was a perfectly fine, fairly easy class.

So it didn't really matter that I had studied biology intensively three separate times. It didn't matter that I had gotten the National AP Scholar award. I didn't get an iota of credit from my 11 AP tests.

And yet it did matter. It mattered because it meant I had shit to do. I had a goal, born out of vanity, or ambition, or genuine curiosity, that compelled me to focus on work. It meant that I didn't have time to be patient with the ravings of my father. It meant that the normal precautions and rules dictated by my family, and my own personal anxieties, weren't front and center.

It meant that I could tell him off, recover, and do the job.

***

Fifteen years later, the grandparents are dead. My aunt is dead. My father is dead.  And the dream that I was chasing then is dead. I'm older. Just older.

All passions grow less acute with time. The passion to be right, or to be certain, is diminished. The conviction that something is owed -- resolution, restitution, violence, martyrdom -- by me, or him, or the universe, has been replaced by an accordioning of time and depletion of memory, a diminution of importance.

The house on the farm is half-empty now. I placed some incense at the Buddhist altar, remembering that my grandfather had once said, "Religion is between you and God." Alone, except for the watchful eyes of the god I doubt, I surrendered these memories and committed them to the cerulean sea.

Pausing, but not stopping, to remember the grandmother that passed, and the father who once loomed so unbearably large, but now grows smaller and smaller.

Oh Lord, we commit these bodies to flame, and commit their souls to your mercy. Be merciful to us, Lord, for we do not believe, and yet are saved by the forgetting. Amen.

Dastardly Remander: A review of three borrowed audio books and a confession of colossal stupidity

On my recent trip up north, I took some audio books. I borrowed them from the local library.

I had to make some difficult choices...

One of these is fanciful fiction of the most incredible sort.
The other takes place mostly on a boat.

I ended up settling on four books:

The Great Courses: Great Battles of the Ancient World (Part 1 of 2), Garett G. Fagan
At The Mountains of Madness, H.P. Lovecraft
Slaughterhouse 5, Kurt Vonnegut
Master and Commander, Patrick O'Brian

I ended up getting to the first three. Great Battles of the Ancient World and At The Mountains of Madness covered the trip up there, and Master and Commander covered the trip down.

Don't judge audio books by their covers.

I do judge people by their covers. Looks "academic" enough.

The Great Courses: Great Battles of the Ancient World (Part 1 of 2)lectures by Garrett G. Fagan
copyright 2005, The Teaching Company

I was most excited by this one, and so I cracked it open first. Fagan has a high, Irish accent, one that probably would grate on me in a social setting but perfectly suited to a set of lectures on ancient conflict. He spent a great deal of time on methodology and built a case for his views on ancient conflict. In short, Herodotus exaggerates and lies. Also, artwork and official accounts tend to skew toward the rich, overstating the importance and number of chariots and other elite units. I have no benchmark by which to compare his conclusions to those he discusses and demolishes, but they seem plausible, if somewhat less exciting.

Don't ask me for specifics on Sumer, Akkad, Megiddo, Kadesh, Troy, Lachish, Marathon, or Thermopylae. I was listening while dodging minivans who thought it fit to go 95 on I-5. Still, I did get a sense that the hoplite actually fought in a more open formation, rather than the traditional view of a bunch of dudes 8 deep pushing with unwieldy spears. I now want to find part two and get to Alexander and Rome.

"Disclaimer: The County of Los Angeles Public Library assumes no
responsibility for damage of any nature whatsoever to a customer's
equipment as a result of use of Library's materials."

Does this cover madness? 

At the Mountains of Madness
Written by H. P. Lovecraft
Performed by Jim Killavey
copyright 2014 by JimCin Recordings

I had read At The Mountains of Madness before, many years ago, and enjoyed it. I even liked the trailer for the upcoming movie!

(Spoiler: it's a fake, but it looked good. Wasn't so excited over a fan trailer since Titanic II. And yes, I have seen Encino Man.)

My first warning should have been the production company: Sounds Terrifying: Mystery and Thriller Audiobooks. What a groaner.

My second warning was that I probably read At The Mountains of Madness during a period of acute depression and unemployment, which probably meant that I was not of particularly discriminating or sensitive taste.

In any case, what can I say? I wish I could say that I could imagine, driving up highway 101 among hills, that I could visualize the forbidding titular mountains. But my god!--the voice droned and inflected in a way that sounded like it was trying to thread a balance between drama and narration, and failing at both.

Perhaps it wasn't the speaker's fault. H. P. Lovecraft is, unfortunately, perhaps a gawdawful writer. He was so redundant I thought I was listening to my mom tell me for the tenth time about a person I didn't care about doing something completely inane and boring. He stated the title directly in what seemed like no fewer than five instances. He stretched out the exploration of the abandoned city in a way that killed tension, rather than enhanced it. And, finally, he made the horrible decision to have his narrator break from the story to express hesitation about continuing so frequently that it lost all power.

The most terrifying sound I heard on the CD wasn't "Tekili-li!". It was "Please insert the next CD."

I hesitate to go back and read The Shadows of Innsmouth. I liked that book, too, but I wonder if it holds up as badly. I'll probably definitely not listen to it.

ARE YOU NOT ENTERTAINED?

Master and Commander
By Patrick O'Brian
Read by John Lee
copyright 2003 Books on Tape, Inc.

I have a close friend from college who told me he had read all of the Master and Commander books. I knew he was an anglophile and loved Napoleonic naval stuff. But I couldn't imagine why, or how, he did so. I can't remember if it was in grad school or high school; one seems a more likely time for a 20-novel bingefest than the other, especially because said friend grew up without a TV.

Also, I saw the movie, and enjoyed it.

I decided to get it because he and I tended to have similar tastes when it came to historical interests, though my knowledge of Napoleonic naval warfare was limited to some Wikipedia entries on the Battle of the Nile, itself prompted by Haydn's Missa in angustiis ("Lord Nelson Mass"). (The backstory on that work is great -- in my mind only eclipsed by the background of Shostakovich's 7th symphony, ("Leningrad").

This was a superb audiobook.

First, O'Brian is a delightful author, treating the neophyte with a slough of naval taxonomy that I couldn't follow, but still appreciated. He describes a constellation of characters that are interesting and diverse. A recent Atlantic article compared the series with Game of Thrones (which I have completely read but not watched). In some ways I can see that, though Master and Commander, by its nature, is more proscribed in its settings. But the dynamic of the two main characters -- Dr. Jack Aubrey and Dr. Steven Maturin -- surrounded by a maelstrom of characters, plots, conflict, and actual maelstroms -- makes for wonderful listening, and no doubt, engrossing reading.

I have been told that the series does get a bit repetitive -- it would be a remarkable feat to keep it completely fresh with a nautical setting across 20 novels -- but that it's still worth reading the first few novels. I am somewhat more convinced.

A word on the narrator: I think this performer did a fantastic job of subtly, but clearly, delineating the differences between the characters. He did so without too much affectation, though he did modulate his accent slightly. Sometimes, I think the effect was one more of modifying tone rather than timbre, which is fine by me. I consider this the best audiobook I've listened to, with Unbroken (not reviewed) second, on the quality of the narration.


Epilogue:
After returning home, I searched frantically for the 12th and final Master and Commander CD. I was tired when I finished the book, and driving at the time, so I had sandwiched it among the student notebooks and garbage that covered the passenger seat. After an 11 hour drive, I was spent and went to sleep.

After a couple days, I thought about it and started searching for the CD. No luck. Had I thrown it out with the garbage? Was it squeezed between the folds of the seat? Embedded in one of the multitudinous, seemingly self-replicating notebooks that I had?

Here I channel Lovecraft:

Dark dreams began to take hold of me, dreams in which I walked up the steps of the library of the cursed city of Leng, cradling a secret sin, 11 genuine CDs and one blank. Could I be capable of such evil? Azathoth was blind and an idiot, but wouldn't he know?

Here I hesitate to continue reader. Although guided by the same mission that I had obscurely mentioned multiple times before, I have to fill some space by expressing horror and disgust that I will continue (but yes, I will continue). It is only to prevent others from the same folly unending, and from unleashing unimaginable catastrophe, that I state what I am about to state, etc.

After spending nearly two weeks of searching with sporadic freneticism, I eventually noticed something:

As in, 11 CDs for Master and Commander. I checked: the 11th CD does end with "Here ends the reading of Master and Commander, by Patrick O'Brian..."

So I wasn't missing a CD. I had spent hours scouring through the detritus of lost civilizations that constitute my trunk and front passenger seat of my car, all because I failed to make the logical jump that, maybe, just maybe, I had miscounted the number of CDs consumed in an 11-hour, caffeine-directed, bladder-destroying drive from Garberville to Hacienda Heights. And maybe, just maybe, I should, I don't know, read the notes on the thing from the library.

I used to joke about being functionally illiterate. Must I add innumeracy to my manifesto of armchair diagnoses?

Also, apologies to Ethan Hawke. I'll get to Slaughterhouse Five if I can before the renewal date. I should -- it's too cute that there are exactly 5 CDs.

Because 5 is in the title, right? I'm expecting a laugh riot.

Doing something

I do not intend for the previous post to be nothing but self-indulgent emoting. I've been thinking a lot about what I can do.

In the discussions about what to do with any of the migration and humanitarian issues of the day, I've seen lots of criticism that we must look to our own citizens first. I've also seen critiques of aid agencies as being corrupt, or concerns about moral hazard exacerbating the power of smugglers and criminal elements, or -- in my view -- less rational arguments about racial or religious purity, terrorism, and claims that "we shouldn't have to do more if country/group X isn't doing anything".

I find all of them inadequate. Some may be grounded in a speck of truth. But I believe that ultimately, we as individuals shape our values and destinies by our actions and inactions.

I know that not everyone feels equally able, or equally responsible. The discussions tend to focus on one extreme or another, all-or-nothing views of service and duty.

I know, in my heart of hearts, that even images of drowned children will not cause me to part with everything I have, with the life I am building here. Nor, perhaps, should it. Philosophically, intellectually, and perhaps even at a bare emotional level, I do feel that our first duty is to our own citizens.

But it is not our only duty. And all-or-nothing thinking tends to rationalize inaction on all fronts.

So I've decided to be a bit more systematic, to explore and define where that line lies with me. It's potentially shameful how little I might find myself willing to do, but by looking for that line, and choosing to go up to that line, I'll do more. And that might have to be enough.

Direct Involvement:
Volunteering in Syria for at least a year
Volunteering in Syria for any amount of time
Volunteering in Turkey/Egypt/Jordan for at least a year
Volunteering in Turkey/Egypt/Jordan for any amount of time
Volunteering in the EU for at least a year
Volunteering in the EU for any amount of time
Volunteering at a local NGO for at least a year
Volunteering at a local NGO for at least 4 hours a week.
Volunteering at a local NGO for less than 4 hours a week.
Searching for a local NGO involved in relief efforts

That's all I feel capable of doing for now. It's depressingly low on the list, but it's more than I would do otherwise.

Financial:Donate life savings to an appropriate nonprofit
Donate $5,000
Donate $2,000
Donate $1,000
Donate $500
Donate $250
Donate $100
Donate $50
Donate $20
Donate $10
Donate $5
Donate nothing

I had Donate $500 highlighted for a good minute. But I struggled, and caved in to a lower amount. I'm not proud of that. It's been a good year for me. But it's more than I would do otherwise. I think I'll donate it to Doctors Without Borders -- they appear to be working at train stations directly, which seems like a good place for the money to work.

Now what about Americans? Don't I have an obligation to people here? Absolutely.

Direct Involvement:
Volunteer for more than 10 hours a week
Volunteer for 5-10 hours a week
Volunteer for less than 5 hours a week.
Look into volunteer opportunities.
Don't volunteer.

It's not a lot. I don't know how I found more time to volunteer at Mudd and carry a full courseload. Maybe I'm underestimating how much unpaid work I do. Maybe I am rationalizing my laziness. But I'm willing to cut out some Youtube and Wikipedia time to do so.

Now, what specific volunteering action should I take? I've long wanted to tutor children in shelters. I'm not sure if it's the best approach, given the limitations on shelter stay -- perhaps a long-term tutoring commitment at a local library or school is more important. But maybe I'm focused too much on my current skills/job. Brush clearance and trail cleanup might be a better option, though I think food pantry work would be more important.

Financial Involvement, Domestic:Donate life savings to an appropriate nonprofit
Donate $5,000
Donate $2,000
Donate $1,000
Donate $500
Donate $250
Donate $100
Donate $50
Donate $20
Donate $10
Donate $5
Donate nothing

$100 to the Inland Valley Hope Partners. Done. Sorry Bernie, but I'll give you something later.

Now, psychological research says that saying you're going to do something makes it less likely that you'll actually do it. To avoid that, I've submitted the donations before I posted this.

***

Look, I didn't do this to be a goddamn Pharisee about the thing. I don't think I did much. But again, I did more than I would've done otherwise. I had to grapple with just how little I was willing to do, but I made sure to do that.

It's important to really not give in to helplessness and figure out what exactly you will do. Not what you can do, but what you will do. And then do it. It's humbling, but it's necessary. It's perhaps not optimal, but what is in this life?

Make a spreadsheet. Conduct a more rigorous audit of your nonprofits. By all means conduct a more nuanced budget, building in persistent support instead of one-time gifts. But whatever you do, do something. Our values are reflected in both our actions and our lack of action.

Remember: you have something to give this world. Those who are most bitter, who are most angry -- they are the ones who feel the world owes them something, who feel, in their heart of hearts, too vulnerable to say, "I am of value, I have value to offer, and I give it with the confidence that, after I have given, I will be elevated, not diminished, as a human being." I know this because I struggle with it as well.

You do have value. Within my calculations of distant offerings, I am mindful of my need to also look nearer, and embrace you. I am rediscovering my better nature, and so I hope it will be manifest in my friendships, too.

Sorry for my long, lonely absence. I'm back. After a long, long journey, I'm back.

The Drowned Boy

Once upon a time, there was a father, a wood carver, who lived alone with a cat and a fish. He carved a wooden puppet of a boy and named it Pinocchio. He sighed and dreamed about what it would be like if he had a real son. That night, a fairy godmother, hearing the father's prayers, and recognizing him as a good man, gave life to the wooden boy, and enlisted a vagabond cricket to serve as his conscience and guide. She promises that if he proves himself "brave, truthful, and unselfish", she will transform Pinocchio into a real boy.

The father, upon waking, couldn't believe his eyes. He rejoiced and celebrated. He sent Pinocchio to school, with the cricket following. But Pinocchio was tricked by bad men, kidnapped and enslaved, and forced to perform as a stringless marionette to enrich his enslaver. He escaped with the help of his fairy godmother, who forgives his lies. But then was convinced by the same bad men to take a boat to Pleasure Island, where he indulged in vice and began transforming into an ass. He escapes, and flees toward home.

When he returns home, he finds that his father has gone looking for him, and was now trapped in a whale named Monstro. Pinocchio goes in search of him, but also becomes trapped. With his father, he hatches a plan to escape. They escape, but Pinocchio is found in shallow water, face down, dead.

He is mourned and honored for his sacrifice, but his fairy godmother, honoring his fulfillment of her command to be brave, truthful, and unselfish, restores him to life as a real boy.

By now, you have probably seen the images of the body of Aylan Kurdi, the three-year old boy who drowned off the coast of Turkey.

I've been thinking a lot about him. My grandmother died the same day, and yet I find myself mourning this unknown boy, not the mother of my father. This image, of a boy, face-down, in shallow water, is heartbreaking.

It's probably offensive to connect a real tragedy with a Disney story.

But is it so off the mark? 

Didn't his father celebrate when he was born? 

Weren't his attempts to explore the world or go to school cut short by evil men? 

Didn't he have to leave home, and, with his father, escape certain death of one type, only to meet it in the sea?

And finally, most shamefully:

If we are honest with ourselves, wasn't he not quite a real boy to us, not real at all, a construction, an idea, an abstraction -- was this boy not a real boy to us, until he washed up on a beach? 

Is he real enough now?

McKinley, according to Theodore Roosevelt (via Edmund Morris)

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/presidents/william-mckinley-1417412.html.
(Yes, I'm citing a UK paper for a pic of an American President.)

Mt. McKinley was renamed Denali. It's notable to me, personally, because my cousin Carolyn had just visited Alaska. We were discussing the mountain last week, and how Denali is the local name for the mountain.

According to history books, it was named by explorer Dickey. Later, however, he claimed to name it after McKinley to troll the miners (free silver people) that had harangued him for days with their politics. (Note to self: campsites are probably terrible places to have long-winded political argument.)

As expected, Ohio Republicans are freaking out, though their arguments contain some anachronisms.

Now, McKinley was president over a hundred years ago, and like many presidents who died in office, he was probably most remembered in our history texts for dying in office. Sometimes such an untimely end often cheats some presidents of greater prominence and admiration (see James A. "I-write-math-proofs-in-my-spare-time-when-I'm-not-working-my-way-out-of-poverty-or-fighting-corruption-or-defeating-superior-confederate-forces" Garfield). But in McKinley's case, he had the good fortune of dying in office and being overshadowed by a charismatic and influential successor.

To be fair, McKinley was wildly popular at the time of his death. He presided over a period of economic prosperity (rightly or wrongly attributed to "sound money" policies and protective tariffs). America had just fought the Spanish-American War and won decisively. This was the first major war fought by America against a foreign power since the Civil War, and so it played an often understated role of helping unify the country together in a way that Reconstruction and the Gilded Age hadn't, or couldn't.

His policies? Well, pretty pure Gilded Age stuff. But you can read about that elsewhere; Morris paints a far more interesting image of the man.

Some delightful quotes on McKinley from The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt, by Edmund Morris. (Bold emphasis added by me.)


McKinley as a drug-addled empty suit

Swaying gently against the cushions of the Presidential carriage, relaxed after a day of stiff formalities. William McKinley appeared to best advantage. Locomotion quickened his inert body and statuesque head, and the play of light and shade through the window made his masklike face seem mobile and expressive. Roosevelt could forget about the too-short legs and pulpy handshake, and concentrate on the bronzed, magnificent profile. From the neck up, at least, McKinely was every inch a President--or for that matter, an emperor, with his high brow finely chiseled mouth, and Roman nose. "He does not like to be told that it looks like the nose of Napoleon," the columnist Frank Carpenter once wrote. "it is a watchful nose, and it watches out for McKinley."

Not until the President turned, and gazed directly at his interlocutor, was the personal force which dominated Mark Hanna fully felt. His stare was intimidating in its blackness and steadiness. The pupils, indeed, were at times so dilated as to fuel suspicions that he was privy to Mrs. McKinley's drug cabinet. Only very perceptive observers were aware that there was no real power behind the gaze: McKinley stared in order to concentrate a sluggish, wandering mind." (612)


McKinley as a less-than-competent political leader (beholden to moneyed interests)

"The November Congressional elections were disastrous for the Republican party, due mainly to an unpopular tariff measure which William McKinley [then Speaker of the House] had pushed into law at the end of the last session. With prices on manufactured goods rising daily, voters threw the culprit out of office--severely damaging his presidential prospects--and filled the House with the largest Democratic majority in history." (436)


McKinley as a bought-and-paid-for pol

Mrs. Storer was a wealthy and formidable matron whose eyes burned with religious fervor, and whose jaw booked no opposition from anybody--least of all William McKinley, whom she considered to be in her debt. The Presidential candidate had gratefully accepted $10,000 of Storer funds in 1893, when threatened with financial and political ruin. Mrs. Storer was now, three years later, expecting to recoup this investment in the form of various appointments for her near and dear. (563)*


McKinley as a Jefferson Davis/flip-flopper/opportunist

"Not since the campaign of Crassus against the Parthians," in Roosevelt's later opinion, "has there been so criminally incompetent a General as Shafter." [the commander of forces invading Cuba during the Spanish-American War] Yet it was hard in the early days of June 1898 not to sympathize with that harassed officer, for President McKinley was proving an exceedingly erratic Commander-in-Chief. Bent, apparently, on acting as his own Secretary of War, he had been sending Shafter contradictory orders ever since the Battle of Manila. Dewey's overwhelming victory had turned both the President and Secretary Long into war-hawks overnight; their first reaction ot the news had been to endorse Roosevelt's naval/military invasion plan, over the objection of Commanding General Miles, on 2 May. General Shafter was ordered to prepare for immediate departure from Tampa (although the Volunteers were still in training), and on 8 May the President had increased the project landing force from ten thousand to seventy thousand. But then McKinley discovered that there was not enough ammunition in the United States to keep such an army firing for one hour in battle, and an urgent cancellation order flew to Tampa. Shafter's force force was scaled down to twenty-five thousand by the end of May, and the telegrams from Washington became querulous: "When will you leave? Answer at once" Shafter wired back that he could not sail before 4 June." (655-656)

*To be fair, sucking up to her is how the celebrated Theodore Roosevelt got his appointment as Assistant Secretary of the Navy.

Night Shift

After much tearing of clothes and gnashing of teeth, I'm actually, finally, going to Northern California for a short vacation. Headed to Fremont and Garberville. Fremont should be familiar to most of you -- it's Bay-area ish. Garberville is in Humboldt County. My cousin there is a "pharmacist",y which I mean she is actually a pharmacist, perhaps the only legitimate one in the area.

This has been an... interesting 24 hours.

First, my departure time. For whatever reason, I thought it would be a good idea to leave Monday evening. My septagenarian aunt can make the trip to Fremont in one day, but I thought I might need two. The initial "plan" (scare quotes appropriate in this case) was to spend the night around Fresno, spend the day in Yosemite, and the head to Fremont for dinner. But just as plague changed the course of human history, it changed the course of this human's story.

I guess you could say
(•_•) / ( •_•)>⌐■-■ / (⌐■_■)
The trip got off to a bumpy start.

So the " "plan" " became "head up I-5 until you get tired. I had to pull over after an hour because I had to field some questions about O. Henry's use of vocabulary in "The Gift of the Magi". The student is in 9th grade honors English -- but it's pretty tough. Solid vocab chops and a healthy appreciation of puns are needed. I'm actually pretty proud of how I was able to explain, and the student was able to understand, how the author uses beggar as a verb, and why it's funny. Explaining jokes is never a surefooted endeavor, but I managed to not shoot myself in the foot, or put said foot in my mouth, and the mother's offer for compensation for remote tutoring effectively that someone else would foot the bill for the hotel tonight. (O Henry? I don't owe him anything!)

So here's where it gets interesting. I got a text around midnight from the brother of that student indicating he needed help on his first calculus assignment. On that auspicious note I pulled off at Gorman and into a closed McDonalds lot to send off some texts.

A guy approached my car and asked, "Hey, can you roll down the window?"

I stared at him for a good second or two, and obliged.

He then tells me a story about how he and his buddy got stranded on their dirtbikes. I'm glad I checked my cynicism for half a second, because he seemed to be asking for more than a couple bucks for gas. He wanted a ride.

His name was Dante. I suppose a more bemused deity might've sent a Cain.

Now, prior to the trip, I did stop by at the library and picked up some audiobooks. Among the offerings was Malcolm Gladwell's Blink. I didn't take it, because I had read it a few years ago. But I suppose the principles he was outlining were operating, because I said yes before I really had processed anything.

He got in, and we started driving toward a dark, dead-end street, to "meet his friend guarding the bikes". I mentally thought, "Okay, this is going to be interesting."

As it turns out, Dante took over watch duty of the bikes. Ricardo and I ended up driving to their car, which, as it turns out, was about ten miles away over rough roads. It was then that I was able to realize why I had trusted Dante enough to give him a ride. If I'm honest, these were factors:

1. seemed clean-cut, middle-class
2. white
3. offered me money for help
4. I was by myself, and so the direct consequences of robbery/murder would be limited to me.

But perhaps the most important one: he actually had on all the protective gear. Either he was who he said he was, or he was a serial killer particularly committed to playing the part. I respect method actors.

I got to know the two guys a bit. They each have a strong internal locus of control. Ricardo had been in a terrible accident in 2009. A drunk driver had nearly killed him. Doctors warned him against pushing his body too hard, but he found that surfing, dirt biking, and rock climbing were better than Percocet. Ricardo was now a civil engineer for a private water company in Ventura. I knew less about Dante's background, but he had been in the army and had used his navigation skills to help them get out. (Ricardo's bike had started breaking down and a trip that had been planned for five hours turned into a fourteen hour ordeal.)

Through it all they had no fears of dying in the desert, either from biking itself or exposure. They had conserved their water, and had topped off their gas tanks. Before Ricardo's bike had started breaking down, they had been taking trails that involved tight turns exposed to 60-foot drops. Ricardo had tried to jury-rig a solution, but found that the bolt in his shifter had practically fused.

He calmly said, "I knew I wasn't going to die. If we had been trapped overnight, I would've dug a hole to help keep warm." They did have their phones, but had held off from calling 911. (The ranger station had closed at 5pm.)

Ricardo had said that another guy who usually joined them had declined to go today, as a mutual friend had died dirt biking the day before.

I happened to have two peaches in a cooler, and gave it to them. They were grateful. They offered me money again, but I just gave them my card. Somehow, I felt it would be good for me to stay in touch with them.

Hours later, I finally checked into a motel, where I had paid twice as much as I had expected, and where I found WiFi problems that compelled me to squat in the lobby at 5 in the morning. I started whining, furious that I was working on student questions, furious that the blase night receptionist was spraying for roaches in the lobby while I worked, and generally tired and pissed.

Then I thought, goddamn it, Ryan. You don't really pay attention to what goes on around you, do you?