Unexpected change always messes me up—that is, unless I am in a state of mind where I am expecting things to change. This is why I don’t deal well with people playing games around me, because I don’t see things coming. I prefer being straight up, or not say anything at all, because it likely something will ot matter and will pass with time. If I am expecting games, expecting change, I am usually fine with people and their bullshit. It is when I get lulled into thinking people are aligned with me and then they change things up on me, that I find myself in a bad state of mind.
I am learning to accept the tech sector as it is these days, and I will be approaching my work with a much lower bar for expected change, while perpetually operating with a full expectation that everything COULD change from week to week. Honestly, I don’t think it is just me. I think there is a lot of uncertainty right now and people tend to play the game they are most familiar with. I don’t think people are used to straight talk and being upfront about things, and that the normal mode of engagement for most is keep things close to your chest and every man for themselves—especially right now when you don’t know where people stand on what is happening in the country.
Poppy and I managed to pull off a ride this Saturday, and thoroughly enjoyed our two loops around Central Park. As we were making our way through the Upper West Side we saw a marching band making their way along with a small crowd behind. We pulled over and I happen to have my camera on-hand to take some shots. As the parade made its way by, they all gave Poppy some love, with Poppy generally wondering WTF is going on, but doing as Poppy does and just rolling with whatever happens.
I watched a video of an older woman who lost her husband due to some young person on a Citibike swerving into the runners lane in Central Park, hitting and killing him. I thought her response was thoughtful and wise. I am guessing she has done a lot of thinking on the subject. I like how she still called out the fools who were going too fast, but she also blamed the system, the lines on the road, and the role of the city in helping define and shape how we all make our way through the park.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FL4LxrN-iyw
Herbie Hancock had a great story of how Miles Davis approaches the world, which we can all learn from. Herbie had made a mistake chord on the piano and instead of Miles seeing it as the mistake Herbie interpreted as he adjust what he was playing to build on top of what Herbie did. Which provides an interesting look at how you can approach the world, and I’d say specifically how you can leverage improvisation to respond to whatever comes at you, just seeing the world as a series of changes you need to respond to.
As I write this newsletter it is snowing. We managed to get a couple of days this week that weren’t below freezing, allowing us to get outside and do some walks and bike rides. But now we have a blizzard coming with upwards of two feet of snow predicted. I am pretty sick of the snow, but rolling with it. I am learning to appreciate NYC winters. It isn’t about always liking it. It is a very NYC thing. You just accept and roll with it, with the promise that something better is around the corner—which you will respond to when it comes.
Someone I’ve followed for a long time, interviewed on my podcast, and has been doing important work on internet standards, had a great piece this week on openness. I am spending a lot of time lately thinking about open, why it matters, and how it has been exploited and manipulated. I am questioning everything I believe about open in order to achieve a new understanding and definition of what open is, so that I can approach it with the wisdom and experience that Mark brings to the table.
I read about Mosaicist Isaiah Zagar passing away in Philadelphia. I was not familiar with him or his work prior to his passing, but as someone who sees mosaics as something magical and special in this world I couldn’t help but pause and be thankful for this soul passing through the world. I will have to get more familiar with his work and see if I can find my way to some of it through Philadelphia, and celebrate his life and work some more long after he is gone, as I also think about how his legacy can inform my legacy.
I read about how the Supreme Court had ruled that East Indians were ineligible for citizenship in the United States back in 1923. I feel it is important to be aware of, and regularly talk about this historical moments, especially as we continue to dance with such thoughts as a country. Looking at our Supreme Court right now you can see how in other times we’ve had some pretty messed up views of who a citizen of the United States should or shouldn’t be, demonstrating why we need to regularly tell stories and talk about our history, not bury it.
The news of President Yoon Suk Yeol being sentenced to a life sentence after he declared martial law and threatened to unravel decades of hard-won democracy, and the former Prince Andrew being held accountable for his exploitation of women alongside Epstein and Trump made me feel a little less crazy this week. I don’t have any delusions about how conservatives in this country will cling to power, but at least other countries still have a moral compass in these times, despite the United States losing its fucking mind.
In addition to the books, I am loving the accumulation of Onion newspapers and Zines on our coffee table. I like being able to get stories offline. I miss newspapers and magazines a lot. Event with the digital being much more of a draw. It just feels more special. It isn’t that everything online has lost its value, it just feels like we’ve scaled things too far, and we have lost our ability to assess what truly matters. I hope that we can find ways to connect via local and regional zines, as well as invest in the local and regional news that matters.
Commune, a new email newsletter social network I am contributing to recently has many of the elements that I think still matter online right now. As things become more toxic and aggressive on the open web, email is one of the remaining things that we still have control over. We’ve solved spam for the most part, and our email has successfully remained federated, open, and all the things Mastodon, Bluesky, and others are seeking with their protocols. Ultimately I am not sure it is the technology that will solve the problems we are facing, and it will be something in how people respond to this moment.
I think that email represents a foundational aspect of the Internet that we should all be leaning into. Audrey has some interesting insights into how email was established as a standard and common tool of the masses in a time before advertising, social networks, and artificial intelligence. I think email can play an important role in how we communicate locally, supporting our neighborhoods and in-person engagement, but also our online networks we’ve established over the years and will need to maintain to work together to respond to this very digitally fascist moment.
"The greatness of a community is most accurately measured by the compassionate actions of its members." - Coretta Scott King
