Wednesday, October 12, 2011
Friday, September 23, 2011
Keep on the Borderlands; III
As a child they said to me, “You have no place in this atmosphere,” and they said to me, “Did you make any friends today?” and I looked away, preferring to pretend that I had not heard and hasten home to be alone once more forever.
The apothecaries were summoned, as you might imagine. I was given tests. I was measured in this way and in that way. Solutions were proposed.
The meat suit was mine.
Dinners were a hurried affair, brisk but inclined toward added value and ventures undertaken to better know my sisters and myself. “Families who eat together stay together,” Mother would often say, thinking back to lonesome nights alone with a heavy pan and mewling brethren, father heedless and her own mother bested by another spell. In her heart she dreamed of future construction.
Big would eyeball the table’s length and call out our lapses in protocol. We had done too much of this and too little of that. She would use her napkin and then use my father’s, too engrossed to spare attention on her own place and missing forkfuls, staining blouses.
Little did her best to eat nothing. Portions were separated, divided into smaller and smaller pieces, presumably to create the impression that their total volume had decreased somehow. She would tuck the odd nugget of food beneath her napkin, a floret up under the table ledge, a crust into the dog’s mouth.
I employed similar methods but with meat specifically. Only the smallest slivers could be safely secreted into pocket or sock without raising suspicion. The suit would require so much more meat than I had originally thought and I had found no other means of procurement, so gather I did hungry or no. It was a slow process and my digestion suffered for it.
Assembly took like forever and the thing basically stank. Movement was accomplished by means of metal rods driven through each appendage and waxed line cables connecting each to the series of levers operated from the driver’s recess, a pod of sorts inside the construct’s abdomen. It was simple and inelegant, driven less by clever mechanics than by the necromancy I was at last resigned to employ. That is how such things begin, I suppose. Mike and I at the library had found a record on which Vincent Price explained how such things might be accomplished and we dutifully transcribed each line, marking intonation, together planning to attack Saddam Hussein with death magic when we were better men. From Vincent’s clues I puzzled out some elementary principles, the rudiments of offhand cantrip and simple countryside nonsense, Mike having already forsaken the whole project as unseemly. And it was. With tubes down the throat and another astride my crotch I wondered again at the wisdom of this course, if it was not better to simply play alone.
I lumbered out into the company of others and they said to me, “Ambient temperature seventy-six degrees,” and they said to me, “All systems nominal.”
The apothecaries were summoned, as you might imagine. I was given tests. I was measured in this way and in that way. Solutions were proposed.
The meat suit was mine.
Dinners were a hurried affair, brisk but inclined toward added value and ventures undertaken to better know my sisters and myself. “Families who eat together stay together,” Mother would often say, thinking back to lonesome nights alone with a heavy pan and mewling brethren, father heedless and her own mother bested by another spell. In her heart she dreamed of future construction.
Big would eyeball the table’s length and call out our lapses in protocol. We had done too much of this and too little of that. She would use her napkin and then use my father’s, too engrossed to spare attention on her own place and missing forkfuls, staining blouses.
Little did her best to eat nothing. Portions were separated, divided into smaller and smaller pieces, presumably to create the impression that their total volume had decreased somehow. She would tuck the odd nugget of food beneath her napkin, a floret up under the table ledge, a crust into the dog’s mouth.
I employed similar methods but with meat specifically. Only the smallest slivers could be safely secreted into pocket or sock without raising suspicion. The suit would require so much more meat than I had originally thought and I had found no other means of procurement, so gather I did hungry or no. It was a slow process and my digestion suffered for it.
Assembly took like forever and the thing basically stank. Movement was accomplished by means of metal rods driven through each appendage and waxed line cables connecting each to the series of levers operated from the driver’s recess, a pod of sorts inside the construct’s abdomen. It was simple and inelegant, driven less by clever mechanics than by the necromancy I was at last resigned to employ. That is how such things begin, I suppose. Mike and I at the library had found a record on which Vincent Price explained how such things might be accomplished and we dutifully transcribed each line, marking intonation, together planning to attack Saddam Hussein with death magic when we were better men. From Vincent’s clues I puzzled out some elementary principles, the rudiments of offhand cantrip and simple countryside nonsense, Mike having already forsaken the whole project as unseemly. And it was. With tubes down the throat and another astride my crotch I wondered again at the wisdom of this course, if it was not better to simply play alone.
I lumbered out into the company of others and they said to me, “Ambient temperature seventy-six degrees,” and they said to me, “All systems nominal.”
Wednesday, September 7, 2011
Camera Phone
The leg extended past my corner position to bisect the distance between where the body had begun and the chair beside me. The passage was cramped enough to cause some discomfort. Her pitch rose and fell, delighted exhalation fixated upon the squeaking visage camouflaged in paints and arching brow. Body followed leg and settled in the vacant seat while arms slapped at the air like carp to best illumine some special moment of dialogue. Then, greetings having been properly observed, it was time to consider other matters.
“Do you want to see what I’m doing for my birthday? Are you sure?”
“Uh, I guess?” replied the newly seated.
The first waggled at the phone for a moment and then held out the screen triumphantly. “This!”
“Oh, my God! It’s so big!”
“Yeah,” she cooed. “His name is…flying into New York to meet me…I’m not going to marry him, I’ve just always liked big guys…”
You can still see the hull breach where the initial damage occurred. Cracks, especially under the eyes about which foundation could do nothing. Pretty shoddy workmanship. I hunkered over the table and busied my hands.
The lighting bristled overhead, collecting the microbial plant and animal life that thrive here in teeming clouds of umber vapor. They move about under the auspice of hidden barometric pockets and unfelt winds. I often catch the others glancing up but we never discuss this. We don’t really discuss much, actually. I prefer that to the alternative. It’s okay because I belong in Halloween Town. I am necessary.
The windows behind were rimmed in frost. Beyond that the ground fell away. Crepe paper bats rotated in the squinting light.
“Do you want to see what I’m doing for my birthday? Are you sure?”
“Uh, I guess?” replied the newly seated.
The first waggled at the phone for a moment and then held out the screen triumphantly. “This!”
“Oh, my God! It’s so big!”
“Yeah,” she cooed. “His name is…flying into New York to meet me…I’m not going to marry him, I’ve just always liked big guys…”
You can still see the hull breach where the initial damage occurred. Cracks, especially under the eyes about which foundation could do nothing. Pretty shoddy workmanship. I hunkered over the table and busied my hands.
The lighting bristled overhead, collecting the microbial plant and animal life that thrive here in teeming clouds of umber vapor. They move about under the auspice of hidden barometric pockets and unfelt winds. I often catch the others glancing up but we never discuss this. We don’t really discuss much, actually. I prefer that to the alternative. It’s okay because I belong in Halloween Town. I am necessary.
The windows behind were rimmed in frost. Beyond that the ground fell away. Crepe paper bats rotated in the squinting light.
Tuesday, August 30, 2011
Foxes
Cavities of your body,
the charm of any cave.
The hollow of your chest
a den of foxes.
Leaves and sticks and clumps of hair -
the by-products of wanting.
the charm of any cave.
The hollow of your chest
a den of foxes.
Leaves and sticks and clumps of hair -
the by-products of wanting.
Friday, August 26, 2011
Youth
If I could, by cunning,
touch my fingers to your lips,
Then later on
I'd touch my own
Pretend that we had kissed.
In all the world
what boy could dream
A finer dream than this?
touch my fingers to your lips,
Then later on
I'd touch my own
Pretend that we had kissed.
In all the world
what boy could dream
A finer dream than this?
Wednesday, August 24, 2011
Angst
by David Eagleman
As humans we spend our time seeking big, meaningful experiences. So the afterlife may surprise you when your body wears out. We expand back into what we really are - which is, by Earth standards, enormous. We stand ten thousand kilometers tall in each of nine dimensions and live with others like us in a celestial commune. When we reawaken in these, our true bodies, we immediately begin to notice that our gargantuan colleagues suffer a deep sense of angst.
Our job is the maintenance and upholding of the cosmos. Universal collapse is imminent, and we engineer wormholes to act as structural support. We labor relentlessly on the edge of cosmic disaster. If we don't execute our jobs flawlessly, the universe will re-collapse. Ours is complex, intricate and important work.
After three centuries of this toil, we have the option to take a vacation. We all choose the same destination: we project ourselves into the tiny, delicate, three-dimensional bodies that we call humans, and we are born onto the resort we call Earth. The idea, on such vacations, is to capture small experiences. On the Earth, we care only about our immediate surroundings. We watch comedy movies. We drink alcohol and enjoy music. We form relationships, fight, break up and start again. When we're in a human body, we don't care about universal collapse - instead, we care only about a meeting of the eyes, a glimpse of bare flesh, the caressing tones of a loved voice, joy, love, light, the orientation of a house plant, the shade of a paint stroke, the arrangement of hair.
These are good vacations that we take on Earth, replete with our little dramas and fusses. The mental relaxation is unspeakably precious to us. And when we're forced to leave by the wearing out of those delicate little bodies, it is not uncommon to see us lying prostrate in the breeze of the solar winds, tools in hand, looking out into the cosmos, wet-eyed, searching for meaninglessness.
from Sum: Forty Tales From the Afterlives
As humans we spend our time seeking big, meaningful experiences. So the afterlife may surprise you when your body wears out. We expand back into what we really are - which is, by Earth standards, enormous. We stand ten thousand kilometers tall in each of nine dimensions and live with others like us in a celestial commune. When we reawaken in these, our true bodies, we immediately begin to notice that our gargantuan colleagues suffer a deep sense of angst.
Our job is the maintenance and upholding of the cosmos. Universal collapse is imminent, and we engineer wormholes to act as structural support. We labor relentlessly on the edge of cosmic disaster. If we don't execute our jobs flawlessly, the universe will re-collapse. Ours is complex, intricate and important work.
After three centuries of this toil, we have the option to take a vacation. We all choose the same destination: we project ourselves into the tiny, delicate, three-dimensional bodies that we call humans, and we are born onto the resort we call Earth. The idea, on such vacations, is to capture small experiences. On the Earth, we care only about our immediate surroundings. We watch comedy movies. We drink alcohol and enjoy music. We form relationships, fight, break up and start again. When we're in a human body, we don't care about universal collapse - instead, we care only about a meeting of the eyes, a glimpse of bare flesh, the caressing tones of a loved voice, joy, love, light, the orientation of a house plant, the shade of a paint stroke, the arrangement of hair.
These are good vacations that we take on Earth, replete with our little dramas and fusses. The mental relaxation is unspeakably precious to us. And when we're forced to leave by the wearing out of those delicate little bodies, it is not uncommon to see us lying prostrate in the breeze of the solar winds, tools in hand, looking out into the cosmos, wet-eyed, searching for meaninglessness.
from Sum: Forty Tales From the Afterlives
Sunday, August 21, 2011
The Illusion of Competence
by W.I. Miller
"People tend to hold overly favorable views of their abilities in many social and intellectual domains. The authors suggest that this overestimation occurs, in part, because people who are unskilled in these domains suffer a dual burden: Not only do these people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it. Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly overestimated their test performance and ability. Although their test scores put them in the 12th percentile, they estimated themselves to be in the 62nd. Several analyses linked this miscalibration to deficits in metacognitive skill, or the capacity to distinguish accuracy from error. Paradoxically, improving the skills of participants, and thus increasing their metacognitive competence, helped them recognize the limitations of their abilities. It is one of the essential features of such incompetence that the person so afflicted is incapable of knowing that he is incompetent. To have such knowledge would already be to remedy a good portion of the offense."
from Humiliation and Other Essays
"People tend to hold overly favorable views of their abilities in many social and intellectual domains. The authors suggest that this overestimation occurs, in part, because people who are unskilled in these domains suffer a dual burden: Not only do these people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices, but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realize it. Across 4 studies, the authors found that participants scoring in the bottom quartile on tests of humor, grammar, and logic grossly overestimated their test performance and ability. Although their test scores put them in the 12th percentile, they estimated themselves to be in the 62nd. Several analyses linked this miscalibration to deficits in metacognitive skill, or the capacity to distinguish accuracy from error. Paradoxically, improving the skills of participants, and thus increasing their metacognitive competence, helped them recognize the limitations of their abilities. It is one of the essential features of such incompetence that the person so afflicted is incapable of knowing that he is incompetent. To have such knowledge would already be to remedy a good portion of the offense."
from Humiliation and Other Essays
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