Witnessing Hell

I just watched a reconstruction and a documentary of 9/11. I didn't expect to spend 3 hours on this, but that's what I did.

I started with 9/11 De-Edited, Reconstructed & Synchronized, an hour and forty-five minutes of various coverage. The documentarists gathered all the news and video sources they could find, from dozens of sources, and synchronized them each passing second, presenting the entity without comment or opinion. Powerful stuff.

For some reason I felt I had to watch this whole thing. Not to try to make sense of it -- that's beyond me. Not to see falling people and wonder what it must be like to jump from a burning building to sure death. As one firefighter asked, "How bad is it up there that the better option is to jump?" Later someone says "it was raining bodies."

I watched because of my own need to have compassion, to witness tragedy so that maybe those who suffered, those who died can, however distantly, have had one more human being in their company.

On one of the top, burning and smoking floors I saw someone waving something white from a window. I can imagine them thinking that maybe somehow someone could still save them. I can imagine them thinking: "please don't let me die alone here, with no one caring."

We all die alone, whether on a bed or a morning jog or when we hit the ground from 70 stories up. Not much anyone can do about that. But just like ten years ago when it happened, I feel like I have to do something.

So I watch. I witness. I care. That much I can do.

Then I watched 9/11 Documentary (The Naudet Brothers), which gives amazing in-building and on-street views of the firefighters inside the building and on the street. This is a documentary, with high-quality filming, so you can see a lot of detail. I felt like I was there. The expressions on the firefighters' faces, the eyes of people on the street. The aftermath.

In retrospect, the firefighter crew's initial confidence is astonishing. But then again, is it? We do what we've always done, day in and day out, because it's what we know. I've seen disasters unfold and they always start just like the non-disaster version of things. You have to deviate from what you expect, and that's hard to do until you're sure. You have to recognize the world has shifted. You have to do something you've never done before, which is hard.

Ten years later, 9/11 is still shocking, outrageous. All the unanswered questions about what really happened and who was really responsible don't change that people's lives turned to dust and ash that day.

What happened? "Hell is what happened," said someone. It's worth remembering that hell happens to someone on this earth every day. And even if we can do nothing else, we can have compassion, we can be witnesses, we can care.

Hugs and Kisses from Death Valley

A funny thing happened to me when I slept in the high desert of Death Valley last week...

I saw one of these...

...and I heard the song of crickets, as never ever before...


...and a strong, sweetly scented, laughing breeze nuzzled my face and played with my hair...

...and I understood that "Death Valley" is a noun, not a verb; that sometimes it is harder to look at a thing than to be afraid of it; that magic comes in many forms.

xxoo, as they say.

Cell Phones Don't Kill

It's hard to tell how many auto collisions are caused by drivers who talk -- or, powers forfend, text -- on a cell.

Why? Says WA state patrol: "In a speed or DUI related crash, investigators have physical evidence they can rely on. But a crash caused by cell phone use or texting requires self-reporting by the causing driver. Only in the most serious collisions can troopers get a search warrant to examine someone’s cell phone."

So what do those serious crashes say? The national safety commission says that hospital records indicates that drivers who talk on cell phones -- hand-held or hands-free, folks -- it doesn't matter -- are four times more likely to crash.

And, says the NSC, thousands of deaths annually can be directly linked to cell phone use. That's thousands of people who might be alive otherwise. What if one of them was your mom? Or kid?

I drive a car. I ride a motorbike. A bicycle. I also walk and jog in this fair city. I think I have some perspective.

And I use my cell phone a lot. But not while I'm driving. Lives depend on me knowing exactly where I'm pointing my many tons of deadly steel.

Lives. Depend. On me.

Studies clearly say that driving while using a cell phone is just as unsafe as driving drunk, hands-free or not. You knew that, right?

I'm standing at a city corner, waiting to cross, cars streaming by me ignoring pedestrian right-of-way laws, and as I watch something like one out of every four drivers is on their cell phone.

This is still a $125 ticketable offense.

You probably know that if you're driving drunk and you kill someone, you'll go to jail for many, many years. But did you also know that if you're talking on a cell or texting and you kill someone you'll merely pay a fine for that killing? I think it's about $250.

I'm not sure it ultimately matters what society does to you for killing someone accidentally while driving, because at that point your life is a massive mess -- because you've killed a human being. You've taken a life, without cause, without intent. It changes you. You can never, ever undo it.

So tell me: what is so essential that it needs talking about while in a moving vehicle on city streets? What phone conversation is so critical that it can't wait? Why not pull over?

What could possibly matter more than not accidentally hitting a fellow human?

Cell phones don't kill people. People who are foolishly, stupidly, and lamentably distracted by social media kill people.

If you drive, hear my plea: hang up, pay attention. Lives depend on you.

Playing with the Dark Side

What the heck, I thought, I'll just start reviewing dark chocolate. I mean, come on, I've been eating it for decades, I'm opinionated and snotty, and I write pretty good.

The Chocolate Atlas has just put up -- may I say "published"? -- the third of my reviews. So if you're in my area and you have opinions (and dark chocolates), send 'em my way.

In my first article, I talked a bit about two Trader Joe's dark offerings. There's more of that, of course. In the second, I zeroed in on something really excellent: Taza Chocolates. Then I visited Chocolopolis and learned about art.

Me and chocolate. We got a thing goin' on.

Ah, Life. Ah, Tango.

I'm at the dance studio coaching a woman who has only had a couple of classes. She's a bit wide-eyed at the whole Argentine tango, which is something I see fairly often, given how -- well, much of a muchness tango can be. She looks at my feet, notices that I'm wearing jazz slippers -- soft shoes with a very flat, barely there heel on them -- and she says, "oh, those must give you better balance, right?"

I've been dancing this dance for a years and her question catches me in a web of considerations. It's a bit esoteric, how dance shoes work in tango. On top of that it's individual, since those of us who dance in heels (women, yeah, mostly) have very different feet and very different movement patterns.

I asked similar questions early on, about flats, stiletto heels, thick heels, high and low high heels. I'd get a different answer every time, and my experience almost inevitably contradicted them all. Wrong for me maybe or wrong for where I was at then.

What no one told me is that what you need in a dance shoe changes as your skill and balance changes, as your style matures, and as your partners improve. Also, it depends on the condition of your feet. I never knew feet could be buff.

It depends how the particular shoe fits your particular foot (not feet, because each foot is different); the more control you have, the less wiggle room (literally) you want in the fit. But that's calculated after your feet have swollen from dancing, not before.

This is all too much to explain to someone who's had three lessons.

By now my silence has gone on a handful of seconds. She says "well, of course it's easier!" and laughs at herself, as if to admit her question's answer is obvious and simple.

But it isn't. I say so.

I explain that as she gets better, as she wants more smoothness and control in turns on the ball of her foot, thinner heels provide an advantage, because you've got less heel to get off of to make the turn. That for linear movements, the thicker and lower heel might be more stable, but for circular movements, it's the thinner heel that -- ironically -- gives you the better stability in motion.

Kinda like life, you know. We gather things to ourselves -- people, places, beliefs -- that have low, thick heels, to give us stability in our linear movements. And then we realize we want to do turns, we want to try something new, maybe wacky, with a whole different perspective. Suddenly the very things that kept us stable through all those linear years and linear concepts make it hard for us to turn gracefully. Hard to do new things.

Ah, life. Ah, tango.

"Dedicated to the Idea"

If you listen to public broadcasting long enough you'll hear:

...brought to you by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, dedicated to the idea that all people deserve the chance to live a healthy and productive life.

I bet Bill and Melinda paid a pretty penny for that phrase. Maybe even two. Did they get good value?

Let's assume that the B&M Foundation is, truly, as claimed, dedicated. Dedicated to an idea that -- well, let's just take as given that this idea is good, and good for people, and set aside the specifics.

Sounds good, right? I mean, they're dedicated.

To?

To an idea about something that's good for people.

So -- dedicated to something that's good for people?

No, not to the something. To the idea about the something.

Not even to the people?

Nope. The dedication is to the idea.

Chew on that for a moment and contrast this tagline with what is probably the most powerful opening to a position statement I've read this lifetime:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that...

Yes, that one.

...that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

A bit stronger, eh?

What if Bill and Melinda had, instead of being all measly mouthed about this idea they're dedicated to, put it as directly and powerfully as that? Let's try it:

We hold as true and self-evident that all people deserve the chance to live healthy and productive lives.

Not bad.  Almost sounds like the real thing. We could even weave in "dedicated", which Bill and Melinda seem to like so much, and tighten it up a bit, and get:

Dedicated to giving all people the chance to live healthy and productive lives.

Clean, clear, and direct.

Dedicated to action, not ideas about action. Dedicated to people, not ideas about people.

Doesn't that sound better? Indeed, doesn't that sound like something you could actually support?

For that matter, doesn't it sound like what they probably actually meant?

Your Brain in the Future

Thoughts inside

One of the cool(est) things about having a brain is being able to think what you like in the privacy of your own head. Whatever you want, any time.

Can you tell what I'm thinking right now? Can you? No! Cool, huh?

But technology and computers are making interesting headway (hee hee) in this arena and -- without jest -- I advise you to enjoy your brain's privacy while you still can.

To illustrate, I (im)modestly recommend my recently accepted story "Mirror Test" for The Tomorrow Project anthology, Tomorrow Project: Seattle available later this year, details of  which I will have announced on my publications announcement mailing list.

What, you may well ask, is The Tomorrow Project? It is, to quote their web site:  "an anthology of science fiction based on science fact, featuring an original story from Cory Doctorow." The antho will include "short fiction, comics and short screenplays based upon current scientific research and technology development... currently being conducted by the University of Washington and Intel in the fields of synthetic biology, computer security, robotics, DNA sequencing and bio/chemical sensing, minute architecture, ray tracing/virtual reality and computer vision."

Fiction sponsored by futurists. Not a half-bad idea, if you ask me.

In my story I postulate that facial recognition technology and machine learning computers will pretty much take away your privacy of thought. Ah, the future! Isn't it just...glorious?

Here's your brain now, mentations all cozy and hidden. And there's your brain in the future, where the rest of us know what you're thinking.

Privacy of thought? Cool. Enjoy it while you can.

A Mountainous Crush

Since way back when I was a young snap of a critter I would roll my eyes at adults who fell all over themselves admiring flowers and views. Surely, I reasoned, in my very mature child's mind, there must be more important things to do in life than stare at mountain ranges and coo over wildflowers.

Recently had occasion to drop by the Olympic mountain range. Just kind of, you know, in the neighborhood. With much tromping I ended up at an elevation near 6,000 feet and turned my gaze upon the world and there did my eyeballs feast themselves on these stunning rocks of upthrust (yes, that's what they call it).

Oh my.

Suddenly I had a bit of a crush.

Maybe, being used to sea-level air, my good sense was addled by lack of oxygen. Or maybe the mountains aren't really static bits of rock at all, but magic beasties, and they got to into me fair and square.

And so, maybe, this is kind of a love letter. Crush letter.

Hey, ahh, Mountains. Busy? Hope you don't mind -- I looked up your number on the net. Nice having coffee with you the other day. Pretty weather, wasn't it? Enjoyed getting to know you.  Uhm. Yeah. Uhm. Busy Friday?

And there were wildflowers. And yeah, I hung out with them, too. Could smell 'em on the clear alpine snow-spiced air.

I got a crush on a mountain range.  Cause he's so cute!

My younger self would cringe to hear me say such things. Mountains?  Flowers?  C'mon! But hey, I also played in the snow, scrabbled up rocky inclines, ran down steep mountain paths, talked to strangers and bothered the rangers. So none of that mature stuff, k?

It was something.  I am not going to use that word.  But, mountains. Yeah.

A Compass, a Magnifying Glass, and a Lawyer

Want to park in Seattle?  Bring a compass, a magnifying glass for small print, and a lawyer to resolve multiple and often conflicting directives.

I got my first parking ticket in this city shortly after arriving, courtesy of a set of signs very much like this one.

Legal parking in Seattle requires not only exceptional eyesight and an unerring sense of direction (even when the streets aren't on a grid), but also the ability to resolve confusing and unclear language.

Let's think about this for a moment. If the city really cared about making parking effective rather than skimming dollars off people who aren't clever enough or lack sufficient time to decipher these various signage clues, these signs would be clear and unambiguous.  It's not that difficult to make clear signs.

I don't have anything against parking limitations. What I object to is revenue enhancement apathetically (and pathetically) disguised as civic infrastructure.

This is just one more way that Seattle shows it doesn't care about its citizens' welfare anywhere near as much as it cares about their dollars.

Humans Shouldn't Drive

Humans shouldn't drive.  We're just no damned good at it.

See this rumpled backside of minivan? I watched this accident happen. The driver correctly and legally stopped for two pedestrians -- myself and a companion -- only to find that the large pickup truck behind her was going too fast and following too close.  We winced as the inevitable happened. Loudly.

After everything came to a stop, we directed traffic around the scene and went to see if everyone was all right.  We found the minivan's driver, a woman, holding the two girls who had been riding with her.

"I'm just so glad they're all right," she said.  "I'm just so glad."

The driver of the pickup truck?  A young woman, dressed nicely,  looking dazed. Based on her speed, I guessed she was trying to get somewhere. I wanted to say, "What, you were running late?"

Tons of steel. Distracted human minds.

People shouldn't drive. Just no damned good at it.

Dev Women: Request for Opinions, Anecdotes, Etcetera

I've started a project about women in technology, inspired by the many times I've been asked by those in a managerial or hiring capacity, "how can we get more women?"

More women, meaning engineers and developers. Women, if you're interested, here's the longer description of the Dev.Women.Voices project.

Help me answer companies who want to know how to find, hire, and retain women developers. Submit an article, write me email, or chat with me on IM about your thoughts. You can also help by forwarding or retweeting this call for submissions.

Opine! Rant! Tell me what you think!

Hacker Humor: Programming Languages as Religion

Yes Devpals, this one has been making the rounds for years, but I hadn't seen it for a while and had forgotten. I think hacker humor tells us a bit about where our geek lies. For me it was the one about LISP that really got to me:

Lisp would be Zen Buddhism - There is no syntax, there is no centralization of dogma, there are no deities to worship. The entire universe is there at your reach - if only you are enlightened enough to grasp it. Some say that it's not a language at all; others say that it's the only language that makes sense.

The Rejection Saga Complete

The Rejection Saga is finally finished. I have made a collection of the correspondence between myself and Dr. Emmons of the Journal of Universal Rejection for your chronologically ordered reading pleasure.

This is my first published meta fiction of which I am inordinately proud. Enjoy.

Not a Real Pocket

The other day I bought some capri pants (just below the knee for those of you who don't know that word). They have pockets on the sides, which is cool for those times when you want to carry a little something like a key or some dollars without ruining the lines and bop out onto the fashionable city sidewalks.

Except, of course, that -- well. You know where this is going.

It's a pretend pocket. On the other side, it's a real one. "Real" as in "useful". "Pretend" as in "sewn shut with sufficient artistry that one might be (understandably) deceived about its utility until one actually tried to unbutton it."

Now why go through the trouble to make something that looks so very much like a useful container in which one might carry things of value? Why pretend?

I know, I know, it's women's fashion, and making sense is not its primary purpose.

But still. ARrrrrggggghhhhhhgggghhgghhh. Gggghhh.

There, I feel better. Mostly. I still don't have a pocket where I need one.

Rejection Saga: Satisfaction at Last

As you may recall, in his last letter Dr. Emmons, Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Universal Rejection, gave me my first assignment which was to reject a particularly tenacious submission.

I took on that assignment with pleasure. Here is my letter to the author:

Dear Ms. Lyris,

Rarely do we see such talent. Your provocative characters and intense drama kept us deeply engaged until the brilliant ending, after which we felt the need to plant forests and work at soup kitchens.

To be blunt, your stories have brought us the personal transformation and transcendence we might otherwise have spent a lifetime seeking.

On behalf of the Journal we must reject your submission on the grounds that our readership is simply not mature enough for this sort of insight. We're sure you understand.

Should you decide to submit again you might consider something more light-hearted. We understand that Dr. Isaac Asimov wrote limericks in between Nebula and Hugo acceptance speeches. Perhaps you can do likewise.

Sincerely,

Sonia Lyris, Editor

Ahhh, satisfaction! I have my rejection, finally, from this most prestigious publication. I ask you: is there any reason for me to seek further rejections from lesser publications?

For those who want to hear about my non-rejections, please sign up at my publications mailing list.