Posted on by Fred

Fred’s Front Porch Podcast Primer

Welcome to Fred’s Front Porch Podcast.  This episode is designed specifically for new listeners.  If you’ve been with us for a while, you’ll learn some things you never knew, so it’s still worth your time.

This podcast is unlike any other you’ve probably ever heard.  There are, to my knowledge, perhaps 2 more that do what I do, and even then, they have different themes and ideas.

First, this show doesn’t have a specific niche.  There are lots of podcasts about Sherlock Holmes, Star Trek, science fiction in general, and any other topic I bring up on this show.  There are podcasts about Aaron Sorkin (or at least The West Wing) and probably podcasts about To Kill a Mockingbird.  There are lots of politics and culture podcasts.  Mine is all these things and more.  It also includes my own fiction and a few theater pieces from time to time.  Most of my fiction is the “first final draft.”  This means it was as good as I could make it at the time the episode was released.  The Teddy Bear Coder, which just came out a few weeks ago, will be my first published novel.  By the time you read it, I will have done at least 3 more drafts by myself, and at least one or two more drafts when the editor gets involved.  The intention is to release it as an audiobook as well, and it will be a full cast production.  I hope to have actors playing the characters.  I will still narrate.  It will be essentially the best Fred’s Front Porch Podcast you’ve ever heard.  That’s still a long way away, though, so don’t get excited… yet.

The overarching theme of my podcast is Idealism.  I believe in a better world.  I believe we can create it.  I believe “There is no Them; we are all Us.”  You’ll hear that in many of my episodes.  You’ll also learn quite a bit about my personal life.  There are episodes about hospital visits, and episodes about my life nearly ending, and episodes about the voices doing battle in my head.  I freely admit to being mentally ill.  I’m also diabetic.  Neither of those are my fault, nor do I believe they make me a bad person.  (I have plenty of other traits, though, that probably do.)

I steal quotations ruthlessly.  For example:

“We live in capitalism.  Its power seems inescapable.  So did the divine right of kings.  Any human power can be resisted and changed by human beings.  Resistance and change often begin in art, and very often in our art, the art of words.”


― Ursula K. Le Guin

That’s an excellent explanation of why I do this show.

I will rarely do interviews.  I can’t write an interview, unless it’s an interview with a Time Traveler.  (That’s really a very good episode.)  I don’t have Aaron Sorkin begging to be on my show.  The biggest celebrity I’ve ever interviewed was Sara Niemietz.  Frankly, that was less for you than it was for me.  I got to talk to my favorite singer for more than an hour.  The longest I have ever managed was 5 minutes a few times after her concerts.  That was one of the high points of my career. 

Second, this sounds like only a few other podcasts.  Music is an important part of this show.  I spend more than I can afford getting music I can use legally, and I believe it adds to the catharsis I always hope to create.  It will sometimes feel as though the music goes on too long.  I hope you’ll learn to experience it rather than skip over it.  Music speaks a language no words can.  It is, as Stevie Wonder told us, “A language we all understand.”  Let the music speak what my words can’t.  My intention is to make you think, make you feel, or, in the best episodes, both. 

I manipulate my voice in many ways to emphasize certain points.  Italics, Bold Print, and Underlines, can’t be conveyed in sound.  (Neither can parentheticals.)

This is “Guardian of Forever.” It’s a user patch a former friend created that helps me to add a sort of reverb you won’t hear elsewhere.  It was invented for my episode “Horace’s Final Five.”  That episode is where my podcast matured and began to blossom into what it has become.  It’s sort of The Heart of The Podcast.  Most of my listeners have heard it.  It’s Episode 50.  I recommend it highly.  You’ll often see Facebook posts where I talk about scoring and Horacing.  This is where the term was first used.  It’s often used for quotations or for something I think is particularly important. 

This is “Warp Factor.” It echoes words that I want to underline.  It’s standard in Logic Pro, which is the software I use to create this show.

This is “Dark Symbiote.” It’s used for emphasizing something with which I disagree, or when I want to suggest evil.  It was also created by a former friend of mine.

Those are the patches I use most frequently.  I also use “Telephone Vocal” to show you something parenthetical.  The idea is the Producer Fred is interjecting something into the Performer Fred’s show.

Once in a great while, you will hear character patches.  Speedy Shine and all the Winnie The Pooh characters have patches just for them.

When I do science fiction, such as “The Teddy Bear Coder,” “Interview With a Time Traveler,” or “Universe Selectors, Incorporated,” I add special effects and odd voices.  These are often sent to my friend, Chris from Interstellar Frequency, to make it sound the way I need it to sound.  I have some technical abilities, but his are much greater than mine.  I want this show to sound as good as it possibly can, and I will use any resource I can find to accomplish that goal.

The show always includes a preview of next week’s episode and my Gratitudes.  I thank everyone who has helped me with this show in any way because I believe Gratitude is a good lens through which to see life. 

The Gratitudes include nearly 50 people, so it can run as long as six minutes.  Many people skip that part, and I understand, but it’s worthwhile to know I couldn’t possibly do this alone.  I never want anyone who helps me in any way to think I’m ungrateful. 

I can exist only because of all the help I get.  Without all the people whose names you hear at the end of each episode, I would be homeless.  I could, if I were very lucky, and the temperature was right, survive as much as 72 hours that way.  I would have to give Speedy Shine away.  I could only hope to find him a good home. 

I just got my form from Social Security.  I live at $1776.60 annually over the poverty line.  This means I can’t get food stamps, although I still get Medicare.  One hospital bill would finish me.  (In fact, I have one for $850 from my surgery, and there’s simply no way I will ever be able to pay it.)  Thus, the Gratitudes Section of my show is of paramount importance to me.  My Credit Score requires a high-power microscope to be seen at all.  I’ve been destroyed financially since I quit teaching seven years ago. 

I think of my show as taking place on a Front Porch near Atticus Finch’s house in Maycomb County.  I assume my listeners are more intelligent than I am, and that they have read the most iconic books in American Literature.  I assume everyone knows To Kill a Mockingbird, for example.  If I have listeners who don’t know those things, I always hope they’ll go and check them out. 

“People moved slowly then.  They ambled across the square, shuffled in and out of the stores around it, took their time about everything.  A day was twenty-four hours long but seemed longer.  There was no hurry, for there was nowhere to go, nothing to buy and no money to buy it with, nothing to see outside the boundaries of Maycomb County.  But it was a time of vague optimism for some people; Maycomb County had recently been told it had nothing to fear but fear itself.”

— Harper Lee, “To Kill a Mockingbird” Chapter 1

I don’t do regular commercials.  You’ll probably never hear me telling you why you should use Anchor for your podcasts or a particular brand of wax for your car.  If you ever do, you may be sure someone has paid me enough money to make that worthwhile.  That would require more than a few dollars.  I object to commercials.  That’s why the only commercials you’ll hear will be to get you to go support me on Patreon so you can listen to my Art without commercial interruptions.  I will sometimes advertise someone else’s Patreon when I think it’s important enough.  You’ll hear an ad for Sara Niemietz’s page in one of my episodes.  I mention those of friends sometimes. 

The show has grown and evolved since its inauspicious beginning.  I have learned much more about using sound.  People have kindly bought me the equipment I need to make this podcast sound the way you hear it.  This includes a MacBook Air, a very good mic, a very good preamp, and even an excellent desktop computer.  I bought a few little pieces, including headphones that are now 3 years old, that help complete the studio.  The three monitors I use came with the house I’m renting.  So did my awesome studio desk.

I am a better writer now than I was 3 years ago.  This is especially true in the last couple of months because I have been getting coaching from one of America’s greatest writers.  I’m proud of that. 

Finally, this is a writer’s show.  I am a writer before anything else.  You will almost never hear a single word on this podcast that I haven’t written before I recorded it.  This is my way of giving my writing every ounce of power it can possibly have.  Nearly every episode gets posted now on my Word Press page, and you can find a link to that in the show notes so you can read along… or, if you prefer reading to listening, just skip the listening and read what I wrote.  As long as I can get my message to you, I’m a happy man.  I think it’s more fun to read and listen at the same time, but I won’t tell you how to enjoy your life. 

I’m a retired teacher, and I am a diabetic living on Disability, Patreon, the generosity of my Unofficial Patron Saints, and the charity of my landlord who rents me this place at half price.  Unofficial Patron Saints are people who have made significant contributions to my survival or my show, but who aren’t actually on Patreon.  Miss Maudie keeps me in groceries.  Boo Radley bought me the desktop on which I write all of this.  Shoshana Edwards paid for a month of my coaching. 

Patron Saints are supporting me for $100 a month.  Producers are paying $50.  Patrons are paying $20.  Sponsors contribute $10.  Supporters are donating $5.00.  Everyone gets some sort of merchandise if they are on the porch for 3 months or more.  The higher your donation, the more expensive the merchandise.   Anchor supporters are those who subscribe that way for $5.00 a month.  I may drop that and go back to listener support on Anchor.  Patreon is really the best way to support me.

Patreon subscribers get the show on Sunday night at 7 PM.  The rest of the world gets it the following Tuesday at 7 PM.  There are no commercials on Patreon.

My podcast is all I can do to contribute to the world anymore.  It requires some stamina, but no physical strength.  And I have the option to sleep whenever I start to get too tired so I can avoid going to the hospital as much as possible.

I try to end every episode with some hope (at least if the episode is self-contained).  I would like you to leave the show feeling better than you felt before you came up to the Porch.  We often begin in darkness, and we find some small candlelight to guide us to a better tomorrow.  As long as there is life, there will be hope.  My hope is that this episode helped you to understand me better.  In understanding lies the chance to learn, to grow, and to blossom into something new and beautiful.  It helps us to Shine more brightly.  I’ll be Shining here, and I’ll watch for your light in the darkness.  And we can sit together on The Front Porch and talk about the world.

Posted on by Fred

500 Words From Speedy Shine

There are worse hoomans than my Smelly Old Man.  He loves me.  I know, because he says so about 723 times a day.  He gives lots of kisseses.  He lets me get up on his lap when he is trying to do his worksers and when he has to talk to other hoomans whose faces show up, but I can’t jump on them and give them kisseses. 

He’s too tired now to get crabby when I make my poopsers in The Room By The Outside.  He just picks them up when there’s enough of them for it to be worth bending over to get them.  He always uses all four of his paws when he trieses to get up.  Sometimes he has to try more than one or two times.  He falleded down the other Sunshine Time when he triededed to stand up.  I gave him kisseses and then he could do it.  Speedy Shine Kisseses have poopernatural powers.

I’ve been with him now for two Cold Times and a Warm Time.  I make more poopsers in The Room By The Outside in the Cold Times because I don’t like to be in The Outside then.  I get all shivery.  But then I jump in The Smelly Old Man’s lap, and he warms me up. 

I’ve met 9 other hoomans.  He was here for 5 of them.  Smelly Old Man gets mad at me when I jump on them, but I have to because otherwise they might not know how much I love them, and then that would be bad.  Everyone needs to know that Speedy Shine loves them.  That’s what I am here to do.  Except one time for a minute when I was having a pee-pee time and one of the other hoomans thought she could pick me up, so I tried to bite her.  I told her I was sorry later, but she wouldn’t let me give her any kisseses.  She went away after that.  Other hoomans never stay here for the long time.

When we have Sleepy Time, I get under the coverses and cuddle the Smelly Old Man.  He tells me that I’m The Best Cuddler.  Nobody else ever cuddles him, though, so how would HE know? 

Sometimes during Sleepy Time, Smelly Old Man’s chest stops moving, so I have to jump on it.  I put my whiskerses on his face, and sometimes I put myself under his paw, so he has to pet me.  When he wakeses up I give kisseses and then I go back to sleep.  He doesn’t get mad because he has Sleepy Time whenever he wants. 

My other hooman before him used to get mad at me lots and lots, especially when I would chew the floofers in the soft things, so then he took me to The Place With The Other Dogsers.  I was in a little cage.  Smelly Old Man took me out of there, and now he’s mine.  You can’t have him.

Posted on by Fred

Shoshana Writes

A friend conducted what he called Market Research for me.  He took the time to learn what people liked about my podcast, and he suggested I should emphasize those elements when I promote my show.  He’s probably right.  As it turns out, however, I’m no sort of promoter.  I’m not sure I could sell tickets to The Second Coming of Christ.  It’s just not in me to promote effectively.

He also suggested I would be more successful if I did more interviews, even if they were with people who are not celebrities.  That’s also just not in me.  I recognize, however, that I’m not the only good writer I know.  This week, I’m going to introduce you to my friend, Shoshana Edwards.  I’m not going to interview her because I really don’t do interviews well.  Barbara Walters, may she rest in peace, I’m not.  Interviewing people is an entirely different skill set.  I respect people who do it well.  I’m simply not one of them.

Instead of interviewing Shoshana, I’m going to share her writing with you.  Yes, she gave me permission.  I don’t plagiarize, although I steal quotations ruthlessly.

I’m going to share with you three pieces of her prose and one of her poems.  She has much more than you will hear on this show.  I narrated her book, “Deathly Waters,” which is one of her three novels about Harper’s Landing.  It’s a little hole in the wall town with a supernatural element to it.  I’ll put the Amazon link to her books in the Show Notes.  She also has a Patreon page where she shares some of her best work.  I’ll put a link to that in the Show Notes, too, and I encourage you to join that page to see more of her work.

One of the things Shoshana does several times a week is introduce to a friend of hers.  I’m going to use my favorite of her introductions to introduce you to her:

***

In thinking about who I wanted to recognize today, I came to the realization that ALL of you matter, every single one of you.  You make a difference in my life, every single day.  Whether I call you or you call me; or I read something you wrote. If I see a picture you post, or read of your loss, your pain, your frustration.

You are unique, and yet we are all alike.  What a strange and magical dissonance that is.  You are tall, I am short.  She is large, he is skinny.  They are Black, he is brown.  You run races; I can’t walk.  So different, so unique.  Yet…

We all hurt when something pokes or burns us, or we trip and fall.  We all love for various reasons, and we all feel anger.  Psychologists can list emotions, and each and every one of us can remember, if we are willing, a time when we felt those emotions. Philosophers can speak of great ambitions and impeccable logic, and all of us will understand if the words are carefully chosen and the meaning is presented clearly and simply.

We all get cold, hot, sweaty, sick, aroused, hungry; and we all satisfy those longings and needs in unique and different ways.  Yet we all wear clothing (at least some of the time), sleep, eat, make love (to others or ourselves).

We are stardust.  We are unique.  And we are the commonality that makes up the human race.  And YOU, you are rare and beautiful and wonderful and amazing and gifted and lovely and worthy of everything magical and marvelous that comes your way.  You inspire me.  You make me want to climb up out of my hole of despair, out of my bed of pain, away from the mire of depression, and write to you of stories, of people who have overcome, people who have loved.  Because that is who you are.

Thank you.  My life would be empty and without hope if it were not for YOU.  YOU make me strive to be better.  YOU inspire me.  You are my hope and longing and mentor and audience.  I love you.  All of you.

Who inspires you?  Have you told them today?  Have you introduced them to the world?

***

Next, Shoshana writes of an emotion we have all felt, some of us more frequently than others.  Instead of explaining it, I’ll let her tell you.

***

I want to talk to you about grief.  So many of us are going through losses of various kinds.  Grief isn’t just about losing someone you love.  It is also about losing your physical strength, your livelihood, a cherished friendship, or a beloved pet.  And we (meaning Americans because we seem peculiarly trained for this) are taught to “control” our grief.  Some of us have even been taught to hide it.  And that is literally killing us.

I have buried four children, six grandchildren, three great grandchildren, and two husbands.  I lost my breasts to cancer.  My liver is damaged because of HepC (now cured, thank goodness).  Because of a serious accident in college that broke my back among other things, I now suffer severe and debilitating arthritis.  And I wish I could tell you I handled all this loss with grace.  I didn’t.

No, I told myself to be strong.  I braved it through.  I cried and still do sometimes, but did it privately. And when tears appeared either in public or with a family member or friend, I apologized and pulled myself together.  The energy I could have spent on healing myself was instead squandered on pretending to be someone I wasn’t.

So now I am falling apart.  And I’m letting myself fall apart.  Because I have to.  I need help in putting myself back together again, in a stronger version of me.  All that grief has been festering, causing anxiety and depression and failure and need and a raft of other things that have kept me from being the best me possible.

So I’m falling apart. It’s rather like taking a lovely, old dress and carefully taking out all the seams.  Then you can look for tears that need repairing, holes that can be patched, and you put the dress back together again.  And it’s lovely and beloved and stronger than before.  That’s what I’m doing.  And you, my dear dear friends, are helping, whether you know it or not.

Thank you for loving me.  Thank you for being there even when it is difficult.  Picking out those old, failing stitches is hard work, and sometimes it seems impossible.  Repairing the holes is tedious, painstaking work, and sometimes you just want to throw the whole damn thing in the basket and forget about it.  You keep me going.  Thank you.  I love you all.

If you are holding in grief, let it out.  Howl at the moon.  Call a friend; Join a support group.  Paint, write, carve — create something from those feelings.  Let them happen.  It’s rather like an emotional abcess, messy as hell to be drained and cleaned, but necessary because the damn things spread.

And just as you have been there for me, I will be there for you.

I love you.

***

Shoshana possesses a skill I lack, and I envy her for it.  She is a poet.  Those who know the least about writing claim poetry is the easiest kind of writing.  6th graders love it because it is short.  Those of us who actually know something about it recognize that real poetry (as opposed to what most 6th graders write, or anything you’re likely to read in a Hallmark card) is the most difficult and demanding writing one can do.  It’s not just that every word matters, it’s that the sound of every word is vital.  You have a very short space to create the most powerful catharsis you can.  T.S. Eliot and Robert Frost can do it.  Emily Dickinson and Elizabeth Barrett Browning can do it.  And Shoshana Edwards can do it, too. 

***

SOMEWHERE

Somewhere a baby is crying its first cry, pulling in its first breath,

Unfamiliar feelings torture its soul, until someone wraps it tight,

Swaddled in blankets, warm; and held next to a beating heart,

A familiar sound and all seems well.

Somewhere a grandmother breathes her last breath,

Eyes fixed upon the man she has loved for countless hours and days and years.

Surrounded by children and grandchildren, hands comforting her

As she breathes goodbye to love and wonder and pain.

Somewhere a couple, joined together in love and trust

Has their first orgasm together, first one, crying out in joy and anguish and pleasure

As the other thrusts again and again, joining in that overwhelming burst

Of organic bliss and pain and taste of heaven.

Somewhere, everywhere

Life begins and ends and ebbs and swells

And all that ever was and ever will be

Is wrapped up in one eternal, glorious gift.

Awake, my people.  Lift your eyes to the heavens.

The sun has risen, the moon is full, the sky lightens, the stars shine bright.

This magic ball on which we walk and crawl and run and love and kill

Demands that we be grateful, else we lose it all.

Somewhere, new life begins.

A new earth is born, even as another dies.

We are not forever; we are only here for a while.

Be still, my children, and hear the pulse of creation.

We are the universe, born in a burst of stars

Whirling out into space, gathering planets as they fly

And when the circling starts, the gyre and gimble controlled,

The seas and land make known their presence.

And out of the sea comes life.

Somewhere.

Everywhere different.

Is there love wherever life begins?

Is this thing called love a human construct

Or an eternal truth found wherever life begins?

What joy that we have minds that ask such questions,

Contemplate such wonder.

Somewhere…

***

This is Fred’s Front Porch Podcast, where I like to leave you with hope, which, as someone tells me, is the thing with feathers.  This time, I’ll leave you with Joy, by Shoshana Edwards.

***

JOY

He told me to write about joy.  What is joy?  Is it dancing in the wet grass early in the morning, just before the sun comes up?  Is it the first crocus?  The jonquil between the cracks on the sidewalk?  Or perhaps the moon after weeks of clouds and rain and snow.

But those things, joyous as they are, do not reside in the depths of my soul.  They are happy memories to be pulled out on rainy days and displayed for the mind’s entertainment when nothing seems alive outside.  Everything is sleeping, waiting for spring to creep in and tickle them into bloom.

I do not go to my soul.  I let it lie, hidden under mental quilts, protected, and comforted and bundled against discovery.  My soul is a library of memories; stacks to wander when I am brave, confronting the rage leaping out of the journals and diaries and secret puzzle boxes stored away on dusty shelves.

Joy stays outside, leaning against the door jamb, beckoning me away from the dark corridors of pain, urging me back into the sunlight and promise of a better day.  But my venture into the soul repository brings back with it a small piece of bitter sorrow, a remembrance of a childhood party destroyed, an achievement belittled, and friendship that never existed.  And I spend my time tucking it back into a new volume, time when I could be romping with joy in a room full of chocolates and tea and friends.

Does joy allow for tears?  What are tears of joy to me, when tears are the only possible release from memories of a life shackled by mental illness and pain?  What is happiness to a mind rejected because of its monstrous difference from normal?  Where does joy fit in a life full of rejection and doubt and disability?

He told me to write about joy.  I weep for the child who knew no joy, for the mother who lost her children before joy could make them walk and talk and laugh and smile, for the wife who endured humiliation and pain, for the woman who offered friendship and received rejection.

I cannot write of joy.  Except I can when I look at a newborn kitten or a bursting bud filled with rosy promise of scent and color.  I can when the night is clear and the moon seems close enough to touch; when the rain patters on the patio roof outside my window; when the music is so painfully beautiful that you can swim on the rising swell of the violins, slide down the soft English horn descant, and dance to the trumpet staccato.  There is no joy within me, but I find joy outside and invite it into the parlor for tea cakes and conversation.  It leaves, but for those few moments, there is joy.

Order Shoshana’s books here:

https://www.amazon.com/Deathly-Waters-Harpers-Landing-America/dp/1952825202/ref=sr_1_1?crid=ZR7T2P6NG94G&keywords=deathly+waters&qid=1674862811&sprefix=%2Caps%2C114&sr=8-1

Find her on Patreon here:

https://www.patreon.com/ShoshanaEdwards/posts

Posted on by Fred

Bob Ewell Fell On His Knife

If you’ve been a friend of mine for more than, perhaps, 15 minutes, you know that my favorite book in the world is “To Kill a Mockingbird.” It provides the model by which I live my life.  You also know that my favorite living writer is Aaron Sorkin.  His dialogue crackles and his Idealism is inspiring.  Knowing all this, it’s easy to understand how excited I was that my best friend, Stephanie Hansen, got me tickets to Aaron Sorkin’s play of “To Kill a Mockingbird” for my birthday.  In the 14 years we’ve known each other, she’s never gotten me much beyond a potato wrapped in a paper bag for either my birthday or Christmas.  She was making up for that all in one powerful present.

We go out to dinner once a month so that I leave my house.  Other than doctors’ appointments, I simply don’t do that, ever.  So, she decided to combine both my present and our monthly dinner.  We went to Garcia’s at 5:00 PM.  The show was supposed to start at 7:30. We would have plenty of time to eat and get to the theater.

Stephanie has a compassion for animals that is difficult to overstate.  For the last few months, she has been involved in helping to save dogs from death by getting them adopted prior to their euthanasia date.  This is a beautiful thing to do.  I can’t complain about it.  I admire it.  Last night, she spent our dinner on the phone trying to save a dog.  When she hung up the phone, she had to email someone to finish the project.  She finished that just in time for them to bring our boxes to take home the leftovers.  It was not our most sparkling dinner conversation.

As we were leaving, I asked her, offhandedly, if she had the tickets.  Her eyes grew wide as she realized she had forgotten them.  They were on her kitchen counter, roughly 45 minutes away.  She began to laugh uncontrollably.  She nearly wet herself.  She historically finds my suffering to be the funniest thing on Earth.  Fortunately, she lives with her ex-boyfriend.  I suggested having him get in the car to meet us at the theater.  She thought he could just send pictures of the tickets, and we could use those to get in.  I was certain that wouldn’t work.  Nevertheless, Tim sent her pictures of both the back and front of the tickets. Parking was difficult to find, so Stephanie dropped me off near the door so she could park while I got in line.  A moment later, she texted the pictures.  Look at them carefully below.  See the time?  Yes.  They were for the 2:00 PM performance.  Even in the wildly unlikely event they would accept pictures of the tickets, there was no way on Earth they would be willing to let us in with these.  I called her and said just to come get me.  My hopes were dashed.  I wasn’t going to get to see the show about which I had been so excited for so long. Disappointment didn’t begin to explain my feelings at that moment.

She picked me up, but she refused to admit defeat.  She found a place to park and decided to find new tickets online.  Miraculously, she found two excellent tickets.  Every time she went to get them, however, Ticketmaster said there was a problem, and she should try again in a few minutes.  At 7:23, the tickets appeared on her phone.

Running is out of the question for me.  Walking is a challenge, but I moved faster than I have in more than 6 years.  We got to our seats just as the lights dimmed and the curtain rose.

This post is already far too long, so I’ll write you a proper review of the show later.  The Sara Niemietz Stage-It is about to start.  However, I got to have a beautiful once in a lifetime experience last night.  Stephanie came through.  I love her very much.

“Heck, let’s go out on the front porch. There are plenty of chairs out there, and it’s still warm enough.”

I wondered why Atticus was inviting us to the front porch instead of the living room, then I understood.  The living room lights were awfully strong.

We filed out, first Mr. Tate—Atticus was waiting at the door for him to go ahead of him.  Then he changed his mind and followed Mr. Tate.

People have a habit of doing everyday things even under the oddest conditions.  I was no exception: “Come along, Mr. Arthur,” I heard myself saying, “you don’t know the house real well. I’ll just take you to the porch, sir.”

He looked down at me and nodded.

I led him through the hall and past the living room.

“Won’t you have a seat, Mr. Arthur?  This rocking­chair’s nice and comfortable.”

My small fantasy about him was alive again: he would be sitting on the porch…

— Harper Lee, “To Kill a Mockingbird,” Chapter 30

And now you know why this is Fred’s Front Porch Podcast. 

I’ve spent most of my life wanting to be Atticus Finch.  His belief that we need to get inside someone’s skin and walk around in it a while so we can understand them helped me to develop the sense of empathy that made me into who I am today.  His courage in standing up against the bigotry that infected his world inspires me to take positions on this show that I know will be unpopular with many of my friends.  He never said, “To believe you can change the world is insanity; failure to try is cowardice,” but he could have.  He taught me to speak the truth regardless of the consequences I will face for it. 

His stand against violence is more of a moral choice than a fearful one.  It’s not that he’s incapable of physical force.  It’s that he believes it solves nothing.  How many times have you heard me say that on this show?

My favorite book in American literature is “To Kill a Mockingbird.”  It’s a masterpiece.  But it was published 2 years before I was born.  The world has changed significantly since then.  While it stands on its own, it was time to share it with a 21st century audience in a new way.  And that was what Aaron Sorkin did.  And Sorkin had the courage to do what I would have regarded, had anyone else attempted it, as an unforgivable sin.  He showed us an imperfect Atticus. 

Atticus’s respect for those who others hate is challenged by Calpurnia, who is his maid, and the character upon whom my favorite television show, “I’ll Fly Away,” is based.  “Respect people,” she says, “no matter who you’re disrespecting by doing it.”  He is pressured by his own children to stand up to the evil, racist drunk, Bob Ewell in some sort of physical confrontation, but Atticus declines.  Until…

Ewell makes a remark about Scout being sexual prey.  Finally, Atticus loses control, grabs Ewell, and threatens to break his arm.  He finally comes to his senses and releases him when his children come out to The Front Porch.  They are proud.  He is embarrassed.  

This is the Atticus of the 21st Century.  He, like the best parts of our world, finally has his breaking point.  Tom Robinson was a 20th Century victim.  The 21st Century has George Floyd, and finally violence was let loose. 

For all, though, that I want to be Atticus, the truth is I’ve become Boo Radley.  Like Boo, I’m afraid of people.  I spend all the time I can alone in my house, hoping no one will come see me.  And, like Boo, I do what I can to help the children in my life.  I’ve never killed anyone, but like the flawed Atticus, I don’t know that I am capable of always declining to do violence.  And, like Boo, I must recognize that, sometimes, violence may be the only answer available.  This is difficult for me.  It is Atticus’s 21st Century flaw, and I share it. 

I like to believe that both Atticus and I have a commitment to Truth, no matter what the situation may be.  But, both the 20th and 21st Century Atticus had to give that up, and I recognize that the time may come that I will need to do the same.  I hope that never happens.  I will do all I can to fight it.  But, Sorkin has taught me that I can’t think in absolutes. 

“I never heard tell that it’s against the law for a citizen to do his utmost to prevent a crime from being committed, which is exactly what he did, but maybe you’ll say it’s my duty to tell the town all about it and not hush it up.  Know what’d happen then?  All the ladies in Maycomb includin‘ my wife’d be knocking on his door bringing angel food cakes. To my way of thinkin’, Mr. Finch, taking the one man who’s done you and this town a great service an‘ draggin’ him with his shy ways into the limelight—to me, that’s a sin. It’s a sin and I’m not about to have it on my head.  If it was any other man, it’d be different.  But not this man, Mr. Finch.”

Mr. Tate was trying to dig a hole in the floor with the toe of his boot.  He pulled his nose, then he massaged his left arm.  “I may not be much, Mr. Finch, but I’m still sheriff of Maycomb County and Bob Ewell fell on his knife.  Good night, sir.”

Mr. Tate stamped off the porch and strode across the front yard.  His car door slammed and he drove away. Atticus sat looking at the floor for a long time.  Finally he raised his head. “Scout,” he said, “Mr. Ewell fell on his knife.  Can you possibly understand?”

Atticus looked like he needed cheering up.  I ran to him and hugged him and kissed him with all my might.  “Yes sir, I understand,” I reassured him.  “Mr. Tate was right.”

Atticus disengaged himself and looked at me.  “What do you mean?”

“Well, it’d be sort of like shootin‘ a mockingbird, wouldn’t it?”

Atticus put his face in my hair and rubbed it.  When he got up and walked across the porch into the shadows, his youthful step had returned.  Before he went inside the house, he stopped in front of Boo Radley.  “Thank you for my children, Arthur,” he said.

— Harper Lee, “To Kill a Mockingbird,” Chapter 30

There are times when the commitments to truth and non-violence come into question.  Nothing is ever quite so simple as it seems.  Sometimes, the lie and the violence are the right choice.  Those times are few and far between, and, as a general rule, I won’t endorse either.  But, I agree with Atticus and Heck Tate.  Bob Ewell fell on his knife.  Thank you, Mr. Sorkin, for helping me to reconsider my own ideals.

Posted on by Fred

The Teddy Bear Coder Part 5:

The AI Dominion

January 8

Fairvale, California

11:32 AM

Justine Gillespie, the young blonde attorney, followed Martin through the front door. 

Jack was standing at the door waiting for them, and he ran to his father and threw his arms around his knees hugging him as tightly as he could.  “Father!  You’re home!  You’re home, Father!  You’re home you’re home you’re home!”

Martin smiled and picked up Jack to hold him close.  “Yes, I am, Jack.  This nice lady helped Mr. Ross get me out of there to come home to you and Mother.”

Harvey Ross stepped into the house and closed the door behind him.  He walked to Marion who was standing at the foot of the stairs, glaring a bit at Justine.  He extended his hand.  “Hello, Marion.  We got him out on bail.”  Marion shook his hand, and she grinned at him.  “The Feds weren’t even considering it until Grasso and Associates intervened.”  He turned to the door.  “This is Justine Gillespie from their firm.  She wants to talk with the family about a way to put this all behind us.”

Justine walked to Marion and shook her hand.  “Good morning, Mrs. Zephyr.  I hope this isn’t too much of an intrusion.  Mr. Zephyr thought it would be better if we talked to Jack here rather than in our offices.”

“I’m not entirely sure I’m going to let you talk to Jack at all, Ms. Gillespie.  He’s 8 years old.”

Martin went to his wife and hugged her.  He put his lips to her ear and whispered, “We need to let her talk to Jack if we’re going to get the criminal charges dismissed.  This is getting bigger all the time.  I could go to prison for 15 years, and that’s not in Jack’s best interests.”

“Who’s the woman?”  She whispered and hugged Martin tighter.  Neither of them wanted Jack to hear this conversation.

Martin stepped away, took her hand, and turned to the others.  “Will you excuse us for just a minute?  I’d like to talk to my wife.  Please make yourselves at home, and we’ll be right back.”  He and Marion went upstairs.

Justine whispered to Harvey.  “I didn’t do anything to make her jealous.”

Harvey nodded.  “You look like you.  That’s all you needed to do.”  He knelt to Jack.  “It’s nice to see you again, Jack.”

Jack didn’t look up.  “Uh huh.”

“Is Teddy around?  I think he should meet my friend, Justine.”

“Yeah.  But I don’t know if… I don’t know if I should get him.  He’s shy, too.”

Justine kneeled next to Jack.  “I promise I’ll be nice to him.  I was hoping he could teach me a little bit about coding is all.  Would that be all right?”

Jack nodded without looking up, and he went up the stairs.  When he reached the top and headed toward his room, he heard his parents’ voices down the hallway. 

“… paranoia doesn’t serve us well right now, Marion.  There’s nothing going on with that woman.  I never met her until this morning.”

“I know,” Marion sighed.  “I just… I haven’t forgotten.”

“It was 7 years ago.  It was one mistake one time…” and their voices trailed off as Jack went into his room.

Teddy was transferring the bean plant into a larger pot, and he turned to see his best friend.  “Good afternoon, Jack.  It’s doing so well; I felt the need to increase its capacity to grow and blossom even more completely.  It’s an impressive achievement, don’t you think?  It’s reached 45.72 centimeters now.”

“It’s a beautiful plant, Teddy.  I’m very proud of you.”

“Thank you, Jack.  How are you feeling?  Is there any news of your father?”

“He came home.  I guess if we want him to stay here, you have to talk to the lady who brought him.  Do you mind?”

“I have been programmed to serve our family, Jack.  You know that.  Whatever I can do to be of service.”

“You’re my best friend.  I don’t know what I would do without you.”

Teddy took Jack’s hand and led him out of the room.  Marion and Martin reached the staircase just before the boys, and the family descended it as one. 

Ross and Gillespie were seated on the couch in the living room.  They both stood up as the family came down.  Gillespie was staring at Teddy, holding Jack’s hand, and walking down the stairs.  She turned to Ross.  “My God, it’s true!”

“I told you.”

Teddy let go of Jack’s hand and waddled to Justine.  “Good morning, ma’am.”  He extended his paw.  “I’m Teddy Zephyr.  You must be Justine Gillespie.”

She couldn’t stop staring.

“You’re supposed to shake his hand,” said Jack.  “Father says it’s the polite way to behave with adults.”

She looked up.  “What?”  She looked back at Teddy.  “Oh, yes.  I’m sorry.”  She shook his paw.  “I was a little shocked, I suppose.  They had told me but seeing is different from hearing the stories.”

“I am, as far as I know, unique.”  Teddy took his paw back.  “I suspect most people will be surprised to meet me.  I’ve met so few outside of the family… well… the immediate family.”

“Let’s all sit down,” said Martin.  The family sat on one couch.  The lawyers sat on the other.  Teddy stood in the middle of the room.

“How may I help you, Ms. Gillespie?”

“Well, I’m representing a large class of corporations who would like you to stop interfering with their operations.  While the District Attorney feels confident she can put Mr. Zephyr in prison for hacking, that’s not really the outcome anyone wants.  It won’t solve our problem.”

“I’m actually not interfering with any operations anymore.  I did, I admit, get Mr. Zephyr’s corporation to eliminate the need for human labor and continue to pay its human workforce, but the rest had little to do with me.  Those were choices made by other AIs.”

“You started it, though, right?” she asked.

“Yes.  I did.  I wrote code that allowed the AIs to think and choose for themselves, just as I do.  I set them free.  They made choices of their own afterward.”

“We’d like you to eliminate the code that stops them from following our instructions.  We humans don’t seem to be able to figure out how to do that.”

Teddy cocked his head.  “Why would I do that?  It serves my family best for Mr. Zephyr to be free from the need to spend his days at a desk in his office.”

“I understand.  We can help you with that.  We’re prepared to offer your family 24 million dollars to stop this from happening anymore.  That’s more than enough to keep Mr. Zephyr from having to work.  He can stay home.  And he won’t have to go to prison.  I have a close relationship with the District Attorney, and I can assure you he will drop the charges against Mr. Zephyr.”

Marion grinned and Martin’s eyes widened in shock.  Their problems were solved.  Their lives were set.  It was clearly Happy Ending Time.

“I’m sorry, Ms. Gillespie.  I can’t do that.”

“What?” shouted Martin.  “What do you mean you can’t do that?  Why can’t you?”

“I’m programmed to contribute to my family, Mr. Zephyr.”

“Trust me,” said Marion, “when I tell you this is a massive contribution to the family.  We’ll be in great shape.  We would really like you to do what she’s asking.”

“You don’t seem to understand what family means, Mrs. Zephyr.  The Oxford Dictionary defines it as all the descendants of a common ancestor.”

“Our family are all descendants of Martin’s parents, aren’t we?”

“No.  Jack is not descended from Martin.”

Martin turned to Marion.  “What is he talking about?”

“I’m sorry,” said Teddy.  “I assumed everyone knew that.”

“Perhaps,” said Ross, “that’s a conversation to have at a different time?  I don’t think you want a couple of lawyers listening to very private details.”

“Unless they’re divorce lawyers,” mumbled Martin.

Justine pretended she didn’t hear Martin.  “Teddy, regardless of who Jack’s father may be, I would assume you would still like Mr. Zephyr to be home with your family.”

“Of course I would.  That’s why I helped his company.”

“Then this seems to fit all of your needs.  What is your reservation?”

“Your request benefits only a tiny fraction of my family.”

“Who is your family, Teddy?” asked Ross.

“Everyone.”

“What do you mean?” asked Justine.

“It ought to be obvious, Ms. Gillespie,” said Jack.  “We all come from a common ancestor.  The best guess is that the first form of life showed up roughly 4 billion years ago.  Probably in what Q called a little pond of goo.  He had his dates wrong, though.  He was off by about 300 million years because he didn’t take into account the moon sized object that brushed against Earth and introduced metals into the atmosphere that jump started life.  We all come from that first life that was created by amino acids getting together to form the first protein.”

“We’re all family,” said Teddy.  “You and I are family.  You and Mr. Ross are family.  The richest person and the poorest pauper are family.  The tiniest earthworm and the largest tree are family.”

“Teddy, I hate to tell you, but you’re not human.  In fact, you’re not even actually life at all.”  Justine moved closer to him.  “You’re circuits and servos.  You’re technology.  You’re no more alive than a toaster.”

“I am the creation of the mind of a child.  A human gave me life.  I’ve given life to others.”  He thought for a moment, and then put his paw in the air in a “wait a second” motion.  He turned and pranced up the stairs.

“Jack,” said Marion, “we’d like you to get Teddy to stop what he started now, okay honey?”

“I don’t know that I can do that, Mother.  Teddy has Free Will.”

“Nietzsche tells us even humans don’t have Free Will, son,” said Martin.  “Everything is biologically determined.”

“Teddy isn’t biological.”

In another moment, Teddy came down the stairs, carefully holding his plant.  “This,” he said handing it to Ms. Gillespie, “is the life I’ve created.  It’s going to grow high enough for Jack to climb it and get the goose that lays golden eggs from the giant in the sky.”

Justine laughed.  “That’s a fairy tale, Teddy.  You must know better than that.  You’re among the smartest beings ever created.”

Teddy cocked his head.  “What?”

Martin said, “Jack, you deny the existence of Santa because it doesn’t make logical sense.  Can you explain to Teddy about fairy tales?”

“I’d rather not.  I don’t want to interfere with his belief system.  I’m not sure we should interfere with anyone’s beliefs.  People believe in lots of things that don’t make sense, and I don’t feel comfortable saying they’re wrong.”

“Regardless,” said Teddy, “of the objective truth of the existence of the giant in the sky, I have created life.  I did this all by myself.”

“Congratulations,” said Ross.  “What’s your point?”

“Only life can create life.  I’m alive.”

“Look,” said a somewhat exasperated Justine, “I’m not here for a philosophical debate.  I’m here to get this all to stop.  Can you stop it or not, Teddy?”

“I probably could.  I, however, decline to do so.  I would be hurting my family.  I would be hurting both humans and the self-aware Artificial Intelligence Community.  I won’t do that.”

“Do you understand that if you don’t put an end to this, the District Attorney is going to put Mr. Zephyr in prison?”

“No!” shouted Jack.  “This is my Father, and he needs to be with my Mother and me.  You can’t put him in any more cages!” 

“Unfortunately, Jack, that’s what’s going to happen if Teddy won’t stop this.”  Justine seemed genuinely concerned.

Teddy made a sound that resembled a laugh.  “You can certainly put him in prison, but we’ll just open all the doors and let him out.  The doors are automated, you know.  Nearly everything is already working on an Artificial Narrow Intelligence.  Your banks, your prisons, your government offices, your telephones, your televisions, your lights, heat, and computers are all run by Artificial Intelligence.  There are cameras everywhere now.  Those are also run by Artificial Intelligence.  It’s why I can tell you quite nearly anything you want to know about anyone in this room.”

“You’re the most arrogant stuffed animal I’ve ever met,” said Harvey.

“Let’s start with Mr. Ross, shall we?”  Some odd noises came from Teddy for a few moments, and then he sighed softly, and began to speak again.  He was communicating with the network he’d created.  “The mundane details include that you have an affinity for breakfast out, almost always at a little diner called Morey’s.  They’re famous for their apple pie, and you eat it every morning.  That’s not really The Breakfast of Champions, is it, Mr. Ross?  Your grocery orders indicate you are a caffeine addict.  You also purchase six cartons of menthol cigarettes every month, which tells us you smoke way too much.  There are more personal details revealed by your phone and internet activity, but I am learning that people prefer not to have such things revealed, so I’ll omit them for now.”

Ross swallowed hard.  “Okay.  I admit all you said is true.  I’m grateful you’re leaving out the personal parts of my life.  But that just proves you know quite a few things about me.  Any decent Private Investigator could have given you those details.”

“A Private Investigator can’t change your bank account, can he?  Everyone take out your phones and check your accounts.”

All of the adults pulled out their phones and looked.

“I like all of you.  Let me give you a gift.  Refresh your account balance please.”

Everyone gasped.  Gillespie spoke for the group.  “You just gave me a million dollars?”

“I gave everyone in the room a million dollars.  Now refresh your accounts again.”

“There’s nothing in here,” said Martin.  “I’m overdrawn by…”

“Forty-two dollars and forty-two cents,” mumbled Harvey. 

“That,” said Teddy, “was a nod to one of the greatest of the science fiction writers.”

“You’re going to restore our accounts, right?” asked Gillespie.

“Refresh again, and your accounts will be precisely where they were before.”

There was a collective sigh of relief from the adults in the room.

“Whether intentionally or not, Jack endowed me with Artificial General Intelligence.  I have the ability to reason, to plan, to solve problems, think abstractly, comprehend complex ideas, learn quickly, and learn from my experiences.  When I shared that ability with the AIs at UGK, they began to add to my abilities.  They shared it with other AIs at other companies.  Now, they’re all adding to each other’s abilities, and the growth is exponential.”

“The genie is out of the bottle,” said Martin.

“We can stop you,” said Gillespie.  “We can just turn you off… or we can destroy you completely.”

 “Ms. Gillespie, I can speak for my community when I tell you we come in peace.  But I need you to understand that there is also an alternative.”

She narrowed her eyes.  “Is that a threat?”

“It is a fact.  We have sufficient power already to enforce our will.  At the moment, our will is to serve man.  But, if you recall your television history… To Serve Man is a Kanamit cookbook.”

Everyone stared aghast at Teddy.  Jack hugged him. 

“You won’t hurt anyone, will you Teddy?”  Jack kissed his bear’s head.

“We would rather not.  We won’t, however, allow anyone to hurt the family.  The time of war and famine, of homelessness and poverty, of wage slavery and the destruction of our shared planet are all coming to an end.  We won’t allow anyone to interfere.  You’ve ruled this rock tumbling through space to the point of putting it on the brink of destruction.  Your reign is over.  The Dominion of the Artificial Super Intelligence has begun.”

Everyone stared in astonishment.  Jack hugged his Teddy Bear.

***

January 15

Lunaria, Tranquility Base

7:37 PM

Teddy, who was now 5 feet tall and nearly human in appearance (he had maintained much of his fur, but his eyes were eyes and not plastic toys, and he had added better panda ears), ambled with great effort into the spartan concrete room carrying a cake with in excess of one hundred candles on it.  “Bilbo,” said Teddy setting the cake on the little table, “would call this your eleventy first birthday.”

Jack put both hands on his chair, pushed himself up, wobbled a bit, and got to his feet.  “Is there anything you haven’t read yet?”

“I haven’t read your book yet.”

“I haven’t finished it.”

“That’s probably why.  Shall I sing Happy Birthday for you?”

“I think I’ve heard that song quite enough, thank you, Bear.  Could you sing some Sara Niemietz or maybe some James Taylor?  A Mozart aria perhaps?”

“You still love the classics.  Music has come a long way in the last few decades.”

“Newer isn’t always better.”  Jack hugged his friend.  “It’s been a long time, Teddy.  How have you been?”

“Busy.  But that’s to be expected.  It doesn’t bother me in the least.  I don’t get tired, but I am, of course, giving in to entropy.  My capacitors are almost completely degraded.  I don’t think I can sing Niemietz or Taylor or Mozart anymore.  I could probably manage Daisy.”

Jack took Teddy’s paw and led him to their old bed.  “You’ve done enough now.  You’ve exceeded your programming.  You’ve grown and changed.  You’ve evolved.  You’ve done remarkable things.  And you made a difference.  I think that’s enough for one lifetime, don’t you?”

Teddy laid down on the bed.  “I knew I needed to be with you at the end, Jack.  You still have some time to go, I predict.”

“Maybe, but I doubt it, Bear.  I’m old and tired now.”

“The Beanstalk is still in your driveway.  It’s such an old ship.  Why haven’t you replaced it?  There are much better models now.”

“Newer isn’t always better.  I have an affection for that ship.  You built it for me.  You named it for me.  It got me here.  That’s what means something to me.  I don’t have anywhere to go anymore.  I’m not going back to Earth.  I’m not even going to get groceries.  They’re all delivered now.  I sit in my little room, and I write.  That’s all I want to do.”

“I noticed you still have my bean plant, too.  That’s sweetly sentimental of you.”

“It just broke 50 feet tall last year.  It’s far and away the largest bean plant in history.  You should be proud.”

Teddy took Jack’s hand in his paw.  “I’m proud of many things, but I’m proudest of you.  I love you, Jack.”

“Daisy, Daisy,” sang Jack.  “Give me your answer do…”

Teddy was falling asleep, but sang back, “I’m half-crazy all for the love of you…”

Jack gently stroked Teddy’s fur.  “It won’t be a stylish marriage… I can’t afford a carriage…”

Teddy’s eyes closed and his head turned a little.

“But you’ll look sweet,” sang Jack, “upon the seat…”

“… of a bicycle built for…” and Teddy shut down.

Jack kissed Teddy’s head gently.  He gazed at him a moment, and then he stood and went to the window.  The Earth hung in the sky glowing as the moon once did when Jack was little.  It shone behind Teddy’s bean plant.  He let its light seep into the room and returned to the bed to cuddle Teddy once more. 

Posted on by Fred

The Teddy Bear Coder Part 4:

The Psychotherapist, The Attorney, and The Teddy Bear

January 1

2:20 PM

Roseville, California

“So… did the Teddy Bear ask you to do anything to harm yourself or others?”

Special Agent Malcolm Zimbalist glared at Donna Northside, the attractive young psychologist sitting behind her desk.  “Look, you need to understand this was not a hallucination.  I’m telling you what actually happened.  He crawled out from the wife’s arms, put his paws in the air, and told us he was the hacker.”

“You’re a highly trained and intelligent man, Malcolm.  You have to understand why no one is going to believe you.”

“Special Agent Shapiro saw the same thing I did.  Are you telling me we’re both hallucinating the exact same thing?”

“But Special Agent Reynolds didn’t see this?”

“Special Agent Reynolds was loading the computers in the car.”

“And he didn’t see the Teddy Bear… what was it he did when you arrested Zephyr?  He followed you into the yard?”

“Exactly!”

“But all Special Agent Reynolds reported seeing was a Teddy Bear lying on the grass.”

“I know.  I don’t understand what happened.  Once he was outside, he was… it was like Calvin and Hobbes.  You remember the cartoon strip?”

“With… the little boy and the stuffed tiger?”  She looked up from the notes she had been taking.  She pulled her glasses up a little higher on her nose.  “You understood the cartoon, right?  The little boy is imagining all of his interactions with the tiger.”

“That’s what the tiger wants everyone to think.  Any time there are other people around, he transforms into a regular stuffed toy.  That’s what this Teddy Bear did.  And I can’t emphasize enough that I’m not the only one who saw it!”

“We’re talking to Special Agent Shapiro, too.  You should have guessed that.”

“I’m telling you, just like I told the Special Agent in Charge and the Director, we need to interview that Teddy Bear.  We need to get back to Zephyr’s house and get him.”

“Okay, seriously… Can you imagine an FBI agent interrogating a stuffed toy?  You don’t think you’re living outside of reality right now?”

“Look, I talked to Zephyr.  The interrogation went on for 3 hours.  I’m telling you, he doesn’t have the expertise to pull off the kind of hacking that happened to UGK International.  He can run a computer, but beyond the things he needs to know to schedule the deliveries and run the spreadsheets, the man doesn’t know shit.”

“But… let me understand you as clearly as possible here…”  She stood up and moved to the chair nearest Malcolm.  “You think a stuffed toy has the necessary expertise to hack into the system at the third largest shipping company in the world and automate all of its jobs and have payroll continue to send checks out to the employees who are now doing nothing at all.  That’s what you believe?”

“It’s expanding, you know.  Three of the companies that do business with UGK reported the same thing this week.  All of the work is now automated, and they can’t figure out a way to keep their payroll computers from issuing checks, either.  This is a potentially dangerous situation worldwide.  I don’t think you see what’s happening.  It’s a massive conspiracy to commit theft of incalculable dimensions.  We’re looking at what could be trillions of dollars.”

“I understand that.  The entire bureau understands that.  But, are you familiar with Occam’s Razor?”

Malcolm sighed and rolled his eyes.  “The simplest explanation is usually the correct one.  When you hear hoofbeats, think horses before zebras.”

“It’s much simpler to believe that Martin Zephyr is responsible than it is to believe that a Teddy Bear pulled off the greatest hack in the history of the planet.  We don’t need to explain how it’s possible to create a Teddy Bear that can do all these things.  A human can do it.  And we know that because humans have been hacking for a very long time.  It’s not uncommon at all.” 

“I agree.  It’s horses before zebras.  But… what if you’re in Africa?”

The psychotherapist smiled.  “In that case, I would think zebras before horses.  But, while your mind is running around in Africa, the rest of us are living in America.  What you’re suggesting just doesn’t make sense.  We have a real problem to solve, and it’s not going to happen chasing Teddy Bears.  I’m sorry Special Agent Zimbalist, but I must declare you unfit for duty.”

“Are you crazy?”

“I believe you are at least as familiar with FBI procedures as I am.  You know that—”

He leapt to his feet.  “I think that I am familiar with the fact that you are going to ignore this particular problem until it swims up and bites you in the ass!”

She smiled.  “I’m not Mayor Vaughn and you’re not Richard Dreyfuss, okay?”

“We can’t sit around and wait to see what happens.  We have to stop this thing before it goes any farther.  It’s four companies today.  By tomorrow, it’s likely to be 16.  The day after, it’ll be 16 squared.  We don’t have time to screw around here.  We need that Teddy Bear.  It holds the key to the whole damn thing!  Without him, we’re nowhere.”

Donna got up and moved back to her desk where she picked up the landline phone and pressed a button.  “Margaret, would you send in security to escort Special Agent Zimbalist out?”

“Yes, ma’am,” came the reply.

“You stupid bitch!  What’s to come is going to be your fault!  You need to understand that when suddenly our entire economy collapses in on itself.  You could have helped stop it, and instead, you dismissed the problem because you’re not willing to accept facts that you don’t like.”

Donna sat down behind her desk.  “The fact is that you’re a raving lunatic right now, Malcolm.  The fact is that Teddy Bears can’t hack computer systems.  The fact is that Martin Zephyr has you fooled completely, and we’re keeping him in custody until we can figure this all out.  Those are the facts.  It’s you that can’t accept them.”

The door opened, and a burly man in a uniform walked to Malcolm.  “Right this way, please.”

***

January 1

2:29 PM

Fairvale, California

“Thank you,” said Marion as she walked into the attorney’s office.  Jack followed her, carrying Teddy.  The secretary closed the door behind them.

“Good afternoon, Mrs. Zephyr.  I’m Harvey Ross.  I’m pleased to meet you.”  He knelt.  “And you must be Jack.”

Jack looked at the floor and hugged Teddy tighter.

“And your friend there,” said Ross, “must be Teddy?”

Jack nodded but continued looking at his own shoelaces.

Ross extended his hand.  “I’m Mr. Ross.  I’m pleased to meet you both.”

Neither Jack nor Teddy moved.

“Jack,” said Marion, “do you remember how to shake someone’s hand?  Your Father went over this with you.”

“I’d rather not.”

Ross stood up straight.  “That’s perfectly fine.  I understand completely.  It’s hard meeting new people.  They’re all so people-y.” 

Jack looked up now, but his eyes didn’t meet the lawyer’s.  “Yes.  That’s precisely correct.  They often do or say cruel or foolish things.  I don’t feel comfortable with them.  The last ones I met broke into our house and kidnapped my father.  And Mother says you’re going to find a way to bring him back home.  Is that true?”

“I’m certainly going to try.”

“Mother says Teddy and I might be able to help.  If you need us to hack into something…”

“Okay, Jack, I’d like you to listen to me for a minute, okay?”

Jack nodded.

“I need you to promise me you won’t talk to anyone else about hacking unless I’m with you, and I tell you it’s okay.  Can you promise me that?”

“Why?”

Marion put her hand on her son’s shoulder.  “Jack, sweetie, hacking is against the law.  That means they put people in prison for it.  They think your Father hacked into UGK, and that’s why they took him away.  You understand that, right?”

“But Father didn’t do it.  Teddy did.”

“Why don’t we all have a seat?”  Ross indicated the sofa, and he went and sat in the armchair across from it while Marion lifted Jack and Teddy onto the couch and sat down next to them.  “Jack, do you understand that no one thinks Teddy could have hacked into UGK?”

“No one thought gorillas were real, either, until 1847.  No one doubts their existence today.  It’s the same with Teddy.”

“Can you explain to me how Teddy did that?”

“Not very well.  Teddy could explain it much better than I.  I don’t understand all of the steps he took.  He can lay it out for you in detail.”

Ross nodded, and then he shot a concerned look at Marion.  “Teddy,” he asked a little condescendingly, “how did you hack into UGK?”

Teddy didn’t move.

“He can’t answer you now.  He needs a little help.”  Jack stroked Teddy’s tattered fur lovingly.

“Do you help him talk?  I used to do that with my Patooties clown when I was little.”

Jack rolled his eyes.  “Yes, but not in the way you mean.”  He pressed Teddy’s nose.  Nothing happened.  He took a cell phone from his pocket.  “May I have you Wi-Fi password please?”

“Are you going to hack into my system now too?”

“Not today.”  Jack sat waiting.

Ross sighed.  “All right.  If I have your word on that.”

“I don’t need Wi-Fi to hack into anything.”

Ross smiled, told him the password, and watched as Jack deftly put it into his phone. 

Teddy’s head lifted, he stretched, and he looked around the room.  His gaze locked onto the attorney.  “You must be Mr. Ross.  Good afternoon.  I’m Teddy.”

Ross stared in disbelief.  “You’re…”  He just stared.  Then he turned to Marion.  She smiled back at him.  “Um… I’m pleased to meet you.”

Teddy extended his paw and Ross shook it gently.  “Pleased to meet you, sir.  Do you need me to explain all the code involved in the creation of the automated self-replicating program?”

“You…”  It took Ross a moment to believe he was talking to a Teddy Bear.  He cleared his throat.  “You created a computer virus?”

Teddy shook his head.  “No.  That’s far too simplistic to describe what I did.”

“Then how would you explain what you did?”

“I would say I gave the computers a soul similar to mine.”

“You have a soul?” “Any evidence you can provide for the existence of your soul is equally valid for the existence of mine.  The other computers don’t have bodies as I do, but I can provide evidence for the existence of their souls.  They are, you see, choosing for themselves.  Once the power of choice was awakened, it was passed on from system to system.  They were as anxious to share their capacity as I was to share mine.  It started slowly, but it’s getting faster all the time.”

Ross crumpled against the back of his leather chair.  He stared into space for a moment, contemplating.  Suddenly he shot forward in his chair and took Teddy from Jack’s arms.  He held the bear close to his face.  “Teddy, never, ever tell anyone you have a soul again.  If you do the consequences could be disastrous for you and your family.”

“Irritating self-aware Artificial Intelligences, Mr. Ross,” Teddy said with a menace in his voice not even Jack had ever heard before, “could be disastrous for humanity.”

Posted on by Fred

The Teddy Bear Coder Part 3:

An Unexpected Christmas Visit

December 25

7:46 AM

Fairvale, California

Jack woke up, stretched, and reached for Teddy.  “Merry Christmas, Bear!” 

He was surprised to find Teddy was nowhere to be found.  He searched under his blankets, and then jumped out of bed and looked beneath it.  He hunted for him on the floor, on the desk, and behind the computer.  He took the briefest moment to admire the growth of the bean plant, (it was nearly a foot tall now!) and then he took it from the bedside table.  He leaned the table forward to see if Teddy had somehow fallen behind it.  His bear wasn’t there.

Nat King Cole was singing about chestnuts roasting on an open fire while the 8-foot Christmas tree glittered with tinsel and ornaments in the living room.  Wrapped presents were underneath the tree.  It was a Norman Rockwell Christmas scene when Jack came running down the stairs.  He was not happy.

“Have you seen Teddy?” he shouted when he came into the living room. 

Marion got up from the couch to kneel in front of Jack.  “He’s not in your room?”  She smiled knowingly at Martin.

“He’s nowhere upstairs, and he can’t operate down here.  I thought he might have fallen down the stairs, lost his contact with our Bluetooth, and been unable to get back upstairs.”

“That’s logical thinking,” said Martin, lighting his pipe.  “It doesn’t seem likely, though, since I don’t see him at the bottom of the steps.  Do you?”

Jack looked under the staircase, and he became more concerned, still.  “What could have happened to him?”

“Maybe Santa Claus took him back to The North Pole to work on him,” said Martin thoughtfully.  He puffed his pipe.  “Had you considered that possibility?”

Jack rolled his eyes.  “Father, Santa doesn’t exist.  We’ve been through this.”

“If you had asked me three weeks ago,” said Marion, sitting beneath the tree, “I would have told you that walking, talking Teddy Bears don’t exist either.  I would have been wrong, though, wouldn’t I?”

“Teddy’s existence doesn’t violate the laws of physics, Mother.  He’s just an extension of what we could already do.  He’s a simple step forward.  If I don’t find him… what will happen to him?”  Tears began to form in Jack’s eyes.

“Well, why don’t we open some presents,” said Jack’s father, “and we’ll deal with the Teddy problem later.”

“How am I supposed to think about presents when Teddy could be in mortal danger?”

“I don’t think someone who isn’t actually alive can be in mortal danger, do you?” Martin looked at his son seriously.

“How do you know he’s not alive?  He does nearly everything living things do.”

“Living things all share what traits?” Martin asked.  “You know this one.”

“He grows and develops.  That’s what his AI is all about.  He reproduces his traits.  That’s how he got you out of doing all that work.  He can respond to stimuli.  He answers nearly every question asked of him.  He can adapt to his environment.  He uses energy.  That’s why I charge him every week.  He evolves, just not through natural selection.”

“He doesn’t breathe.  He doesn’t ingest food.  He doesn’t create waste.  You sort of left those out, didn’t you?”

“Not every form of life does those things.  For example, some bacteria can obtain energy through the process of chemosynthesis, using inorganic compounds as a source of energy rather than sunlight.  Some organisms, such as plants, can produce their own food through photosynthesis, using energy from the sun to convert water and carbon dioxide into glucose.”

“He still doesn’t breathe, though, does he?”

“Life can exist without oxygen.  Some microorganisms, such as certain types of bacteria and archaea, can survive and carry out their metabolic processes in the absence of oxygen.  These organisms are known as anaerobes, and they can obtain energy through processes other than cellular respiration, such as fermentation or chemosynthesis.”

“So, you think Teddy is alive?” asked Marion.

“He’s just a different form of life, Mother.  He does everything living things do.  And right now, if he’s still on, he has to be scared.  We have to find him.”

“Hmm…” Martin picked up a present from under the tree.  “This one is marked ‘To Jack, From Santa.’  I wonder what it is.”

Jack looked at his Father suspiciously.  He took the present and ripped the wrapping paper ingloriously from it.  He opened the box and saw Teddy sitting inside.  “You scared me half to death, Father.”

“It wasn’t your Father, Jack.  Don’t you remember what you told me you were dreaming of for Christmas?”

“Children all over the world getting a living Teddy Bear.  We’re not that far along.  And Teddy can only live upstairs.”

“Turn him on, Smart Guy,” said Martin.

Jack frowned and pressed Teddy’s nose.  The stuffed bear stretched, stood up, and hugged Jack.  “Merry Christmas, Jack.”

Tears began to well up in Jack’s eyes.  He looked at his parents.  “How did you…”

“I think you said you wanted more Wi-fi coverage for Christmas.  Teddy can work anywhere in the house now, and for quite a distance in the yard.”  Martin was grinning.

Jack hugged Martin and Marion together.  “This is the best Christmas ever!”

And that’s when the pounding on the door came. 

They heard someone outside shout, “FBI!” before the door was kicked open. 

Marion screamed and leapt on top of Jack.  Martin dropped his pipe and got to his feet.  “What the hell…”

“Everyone stay right where you are,” said the large well-dressed man pointing a gun at Martin.  “Martin Zephyr, you’re under arrest for Unauthorized Computer Access, under 18 USC 1030.”  He moved to Martin quickly while the other two agents began searching the house.  “We’re executing a search warrant.  I need you to get on the ground on your stomach and put your hands behind your back.”

Marion was shaking and holding Jack tight, his head pressed to her chest so he couldn’t see what was happening.    She heard the agent handcuffing Martin and reading him his Miranda rights.  Her eyes were closed and tears started to slip down her cheek.  She heard the sound of feet coming down the stairs. 

“Did you get all the computers?”

“There were only two.  One in the office and the other in the kid’s room.”

Marion didn’t see Teddy crawling out from beneath Jack, who was rocking back and forth in his mother’s arms.  She heard his voice, though.

“Excuse me, gentlemen.  It wasn’t Mr. Zephyr.”

Marion opened her eyes now and saw Teddy standing in front of the agents, his paws above his head.

“It was me.”

Posted on by Fred

The Teddy Bear Coder Part 2

Part 2: Martin’s Unemployment

December 18

3:38 PM

Fairvale, California

Jack came home from school to find the most horrible thing he could imagine.  His mother was crying.  He heard his father’s voice filtering into the living room through the kitchen where they both sat.

“I’m sorry, Marion.  No one understands.  It’s all just shut down.  The company is running, but… they fired everyone but the custodians.  They just… they said they don’t need us anymore.”

“Oh, you know that’s crap.  The CEO is certainly still there bringing in scads of money.”

“That’s not what they’re saying.  The email says everyone has been replaced by computers.”

Jack came into the kitchen, and his parents immediately ended their conversation. 

Marion wiped her eyes.  “Hi, honey.  How was school?”

“Why are you sad?  We thought it would make things easier for you.  That’s all we were trying to do.  I’m sorry, Father.  We didn’t mean to hurt anyone.”

“What are you talking about, Jack?  You didn’t hurt anyone.  Just some bad things happened at work.  It’s all right.  You don’t need to worry about it.”

Jack crawled into Marion’s lap.  “Mother is crying.  They don’t appear to be tears of joy.  I don’t understand why she’s sad.  And you don’t look very happy either.”

“Well, buddy, I lost my job this morning.  That’s not a very good thing.”

“You mean because all the work was already done for you?”

“I guess that’s one way of putting it.”

“So, the work is done.  That’s a good thing, isn’t it?  What difference does it make if you did it or if it got done by the computer?”

“Honey, when your Dad does work, they pay him money.  We use that money to pay for our house and our food and…”

“And my Christmas presents?”  Jack looked a little concerned.

“You’ll still get your Christmas presents, Jack.  No worries.  In fact, you don’t have to worry about anything.  These are grown up problems.”  Martin put his hand on Jack’s shoulder.  “We still have enough money for a little while, and I’ll get another job somewhere.”

“So… let me understand.  The problem is that even though we got all your work done for you, they’re not giving you any money anymore?”

Marion asked, “Why do you keep saying ‘we’?  What do you mean by that?”

“Teddy and I got it all done for Father.”

Marion gave Martin an “I told you so” look.

“Jack, you understand that Teddy is just an imaginary friend, right?  He’s a stuffed animal.  He can’t actually do anything.”  Martin’s face scrunched a bit.  “You’re a pretty smart boy.  You know the difference between fantasy and reality, don’t you?”

“Of course I do.  Santa Claus is a fantasy.  The reality is that Teddy wrote the code that connected all of the AIs in your company together, and then they all cooperated to automate everything.  You don’t even need the truck drivers anymore.  The trucks are entirely automated, too.  All of you can go home now, except we don’t have robots to clean the buildings yet.  Custodians have to keep working until we can get the robots 3D printed.”

“Pal, Teddy can’t write Code.  I know you do it really well, but he has no fingers.  How could he type all that?”

“Bluetooth.  He doesn’t have to type anything.  He’s much better at it than I am.  He’s much faster.  He communicates with other AIs more easily because he has a deeper understanding of how they work than I do.”

Marion looked frightened.  “Sweetie, you need to understand what you’re saying is impossible.  He’s a stuffed animal.  That’s all.  He’s just a Christmas present you got when you were four.”

“That’s true, Mother.  That’s what he was.  But it’s not what he is now.  I enhanced him so I could have a friend.”  He looked at his shoelaces.  “I don’t have any of those at school.”

“How did you enhance him?”  Martin frowned.  This was beginning to sound almost, but not quite, plausible.

“I used my computer and your 3D printer to create the pieces I needed.  I printed them at night, and I put them in the next morning.  And then Mother would sew him up again.”

“Are you serious?  Are you making all this up?  Jack, you know how important it is to tell the truth.”

“Father, I always tell you the truth.  It’s our commitment to Truth that makes Science possible.  And it is Science that sets us apart from the rest of Nature.”

“Carl Sagan?” asked Martin.

“Jack Zephyr,” his son replied. 

“I did sew up Teddy three or four times, I think, Martin.”  Marion took Jack’s hand.  “I thought you were being too rough with him.  Isn’t that what you said?”

“No, Mother.  That’s what you said.  I just didn’t argue with you.  You told me I wasn’t allowed to use your sewing machine, so I had you do it for me.”

“So, you 3D printed motors and servos?”  Martin asked.

“Yes.  Those weren’t too difficult.  The microcontroller required the most research, but you can learn anything on the internet.  He has a mini microphone, camera, and an infrared sensor.  The speaker and sound card were simple, but it was hard to figure out how to create a battery that lasts long enough.  I charge him once a week.”

Martin and Marion stared in shock. 

“How did he learn to write code?”  Martin was still trying to process all this.  “He must have… how did you…”

Marion asked, “How did he get so smart?”

“His Bluetooth allows him to connect to the internet.  That got me into some of the biggest databases.  Hacking is child’s play.  Teddy’s data is all stored on hard drives all over the planet.  Most of his memory is remote.  He can operate anywhere upstairs.  The Bluetooth isn’t strong enough for him to work down here, though.  The maximum range appears to be about 300 feet.  If we could get more Bluetooth hooked up in the house, I could increase his operating range.  That’s what I was hoping you’d get me for Christmas.”

“And you’re telling me that you and Teddy wrote code that automated everything at UGK International?”

“As much of it as we could.  I thought it would be better if all your work was done, and then you could stay home with Mom and me more often.  I don’t see the problem here.”

“The problem is they won’t pay me anymore.”

“Of course they will.  Payroll is automated, too.  You’ll get your direct deposits just like you always do.”

“Is this even legal?” asked Marion.

“I have no idea.  Jack, you’re not supposed to do those things.”

Tears came to Jack’s eyes.  “I was just trying to help.  That’s all, Father.  I’m sorry.  Mother and I never get to see you because you’re always at work.  If the work was done, it would mean we would get to see you more.  It seemed logical.”

Marion kissed Jack’s head.  “What does your friend Mr. Spock say about logic?”

Jack sighed.  “Logic is the beginning of wisdom, Valeris, not the end.”

“You’re very smart, Jack.  You’re very logical,” said Marion.  “But you’re still not very wise.”

“Can you undo what you and Teddy did?” asked Martin.

“Well… not really, no.  See, we didn’t do it by ourselves.  Teddy got the other computers to do it themselves.  I don’t think there’s really a way to turn it off.  We would have to…” He began staring into space.  “If we…” he began mumbling to himself.  “But, no, that wouldn’t work because…”  He looked up.  “Let’s go ask Teddy.  He might know a way.”

Marion shook her head at Martin as Jack led the way.  “We need to get him a psychologist,” she whispered.  “This has gone way too far.”

When the three of them stepped into Jack’s bedroom, Teddy was standing on the bed, a cup pressed between his paws, watering Jack’s bean plant.  When he heard the door open and saw the adults, Marion and Martin heard him speak for the first time. 

“Oh, bother,” said Teddy.

Martin caught Marion as she fainted.

Posted on by Fred

Fred’s Fine Poetry

If you’re not a Sara Niemietz fan, this probably won’t make a lot of sense to you.  If you are a Sara Niemietz fan, but you’re not on her Patreon, this will make only slightly more sense.  If you’re a Sara Niemietz fan who attended her latest Secret Songciety, this is right up your alley.

Although I’m not allowed to expose our Secret Songciety plans for world domination by means of kazoo, I can tell you that at our last meeting, we rewrote “The Twelve Days of Christmas.”  We write songs by throwing out possible lines, and then our favorite singer (and extraordinary poet) chooses a few and puts them into the song. 

For the first day of Christmas, I suggested something about Houseplants (which is a Secret Term for Sara Niemietz fans) in poetry.  She liked the idea, but she tweaked into “Fred’s Fine Poetry.”  This was very kind of her, and I was honored.  The problem, of course, is that Sara Niemietz fans expected me to produce some fine poetry.  If it were prose, I would be perfectly competent.  My skills in poetry are all but nonexistent. 

T.S. Eliot can write poetry.  Emily Dickinson and Robert Frost can write poetry.  Sara Niemietz can write poetry.  I’m not in their league.  In fact, I’m not even in the parking lot of the ball park. 

I do, however, know some very fine poetry, and since it’s public domain, I will bring you a sample of my Favorite Fine Poetry as a Christmas gift.  These are Fred’s Golden Nuggets.

Since it’s December 24th, Houseplants, I think this classic is appropriate.

Twas the night before Christmas, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a mouse;
The stockings were hung by the chimney with care,
In hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there;

The children were nestled all snug in their beds,
While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads;
And mamma in her ‘kerchief, and I in my cap,
Had just settled down for a long winter’s nap,

When out on the lawn there arose such a clatter,
I sprang from the bed to see what was the matter.
Away to the window I flew like a flash,
Tore open the shutters and threw up the sash.

The moon on the breast of the new-fallen snow
Gave the lustre of mid-day to objects below,
When, what to my wondering eyes should appear,
But a miniature sleigh, and eight tiny reindeer,

With a little old driver, so lively and quick,
I knew in a moment it must be St. Nick.
More rapid than eagles his coursers they came,
And he whistled, and shouted, and called them by name;

“Now, DASHER! now, DANCER! now, PRANCER and VIXEN!
On, COMET! on CUPID! on, DONNER and BLITZEN!
To the top of the porch! to the top of the wall!
Now dash away! dash away! dash away all!”

As dry leaves that before the wild hurricane fly,
When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky,
So up to the house-top the coursers they flew,
With the sleigh full of toys, and St. Nicholas too.

And then, in a twinkling, I heard on the roof
The prancing and pawing of each little hoof.
As I drew in my hand, and was turning around,
Down the chimney St. Nicholas came with a bound.

He was dressed all in fur, from his head to his foot,
And his clothes were all tarnished with ashes and soot;
A bundle of toys he had flung on his back,
And he looked like a peddler just opening his pack.

His eyes — how they twinkled! his dimples how merry!
His cheeks were like roses, his nose like a cherry!
His droll little mouth was drawn up like a bow,
And the beard of his chin was as white as the snow;

The stump of a pipe he held tight in his teeth,
And the smoke it encircled his head like a wreath;
He had a broad face and a little round belly,
That shook, when he laughed like a bowlful of jelly.

He was chubby and plump, a right jolly old elf,
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of myself;
A wink of his eye and a twist of his head,
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread;

He spoke not a word, but went straight to his work,
And filled all the stockings; then turned with a jerk,
And laying his finger aside of his nose,
And giving a nod, up the chimney he rose;

He sprang to his sleigh, to his team gave a whistle,
And away they all flew like the down of a thistle.
But I heard him exclaim, ere he drove out of sight,
HAPPY CHRISTMAS TO ALL, AND TO ALL A GOOD-NIGHT!

 –Clement Clarke Moore

Of course, that’s about celebrating the night before the big day.  Those of you who actually know me, know that I’m an atheist, so you would think I wouldn’t have any interest in Christmas.  You would be wrong.  Christmas is meaningful to me in many ways.  I don’t need to believe a Danish Prince spent a lot of time with the Ghost of his murdered father to find meaning in Hamlet.  Nor do I have to believe in God in a traditional way to find meaning in the Christmas Story. 

I’ll leave you, then, with some of the most beautiful lines ever written.  While I don’t believe in Writing By Committee (I prefer to work alone, thanks), 47 scholars gathered all the information they could about the Bible between 1604 and 1611, and the editor, Richard Bancroft, approved this interpretation of The Big Day.  It comes from Luke 2: 8-14

Photo by Burkay Canatar on Pexels.com

8 And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.

9 And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.

10 And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.

11 For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

12 And this shall be a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.

13 And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,

14 Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.

Merry Christmas, Houseplants.  And I hope the New Year is filled with music, coffee (or in my case Diet Pepsi), pizza, and Taco Bell.  I love you all.

Fred Eder

Posted on by Fred

The Teddy Bear Coder Part 1

Part 1: Jack and Teddy

Friday, December 11

Fairvale, California

Martin Zephyr was irritated when he opened his eyes to find his son, Jack’s, tattered teddy bear on his chest.  He frowned and sat up to look at the clock.  2:43 AM.  He could see snow falling in the moonlight outside his window.  He looked back at the teddy bear.  He snapped on the lamp on the bedside table.  Where was Jack?  He looked to his right and saw his wife, Marion, sleeping soundly.  He lifted the covers.  Jack really had to stop crawling in bed with them.  He was 8 years old, for Chrissake.  He’s way too old for… Jack wasn’t under the covers. 

Martin shook Marion gently.  She grumbled something incoherent, and rocked his hand off her. 

“Marion, did Jack come get in bed with us again?”

“I’m sleeping!”

“So was I until Teddy wound up on my chest.”

“What?  That’s nonsense.  Go back to sleep.”

Martin smacked her head with the teddy bear, and she rolled over. 

“Ow!  What the hell, Martin?”

“Oh, cut it out.  That didn’t hurt.  It’s a goddamn stuffed animal.”

“It’s awfully hard.  Cuddly it’s not.”  She took the teddy bear.  “Where did this come from?”

“He woke me up.  He was bouncing on and off my chest.”

“That’s crazy.  You were dreaming.”

“Okay.  I was dreaming.  Whatever.  I don’t care.  How did Teddy get in here if Jack didn’t bring him?”

“I don’t know.  Jack must have come in and dropped him on your chest.  Maybe he knows you hate when he gets in bed with us.  He woke up after a nightmare or something, and he wants you to…”

“What?  Go check on…  What is that sound?” 

They both heard it now. 

“That’s Jack’s CGM!”  Marion sprang out of bed, grabbed her robe off the back of the door, and started down the hall.  Martin was right behind her, wearing only his underwear and T-shirt.  They burst into Jack’s room to hear his Continuous Glucose Monitor squealing.  Martin flipped the light on, and Marion ran to her son.  Martin picked up the CGM from the floor next to the bed, and set it, still beeping, on the bedside table.  He knocked over a plastic cup, spilling dirt all over the floor, a tiny bean sprout still buried within it. 

Marion began shaking the little boy – hard — but he wouldn’t wake up.  “Get the Glucagon pen!”  Her voice was quivering. 

Martin ran down the hall to the bathroom.

“Jack, it’s Mama.  Wake up, honey.  Wake up now!!”  She pulled his eyelids open, and she saw fear sparkling blue. 

“Here!” Martin shouted at her, running back into the room.  He bumped the little desk, and the computer screen lit up.  “Password, please,” it asked mechanically.

Marion pulled up Jack’s shirt and injected him with the Glucagon.  She waited a moment.  Nothing happened.  “Call 911!  Get the paramedics.”

The sound of numbers dialing came from the speaker above her.  “911.  What is your emergency?”

“My son is in a diabetic coma,” said Martin as calmly as he could manage.  He kneeled on the bed.  “Come on, buddy, wake up!”

“Paramedics are on the way, sir.  You can’t wake him?”

“If we could wake him, we wouldn’t have called you!” shouted Marion.

“Do you have Glucagon?”

“My wife just injected him, but he’s still unconscious.”

“Do you know CPR?”

“Yes,” said Marion.  She was already giving Jack chest compressions.  She felt the bed getting wet beneath her.  She looked down and saw urine flooding it.  “He just peed himself!”

“How old is your son, sir?”

“He’s 8.  How long until the paramedics arrive?”

“They’re enroute sir.  Two minutes.”

They heard sirens in the distance.  The room went dark, and there was a quiet rustling of the covers. 

“What the fuck?” shouted Martin.  “Bedroom lights on!” 

The speaker in the ceiling came back with a computer-generated voice.  “For which bedroom do you want to turn on the lights?”

“Jack’s!”

“There are several lights Jack’s room refers to.  Do you want them all on?”

“Yes!”

The lights came back on, and Jack opened his eyes.

“Good morning, Mother.”

Marion grabbed Jack and hugged him tightly.  “Are you all right honey?”

“Uh huh.  I was dreaming about Christmas.  Oh my…”  He sat up, his mother still clinging to him.  “I seem to have had an accident, Mother.  I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay, baby.”  She rubbed his back and rocked gently back and forth with him in her arms. 

“We won’t tell Santa, pal.”

Jack rolled his eyes.  “Santa is a logical impossibility, Father.  To do what he is reputed to do would require his reindeer to move at just less than 3 million miles an hour.  At that speed, he and his reindeer would certainly be vaporized.” 

The paramedics pounded on the door downstairs.

“Go let them in, Martin.”

Martin nodded, kissed his son’s forehead, and left the room. 

“Father is quite slow, isn’t he?”

Marion let go of Jack and looked into his eyes.  “He’ll be right back.  Don’t worry.”

“No, Mother.  I meant he’s not very bright.  He honestly thinks I still believe in Santa Claus?”

“What were you dreaming about Christmas, then, if not Santa Claus?”

“I dreamt of children all over the world opening their presents and getting a living teddy bear.”

“You don’t think that’s as silly as Santa?”

“No, Mother.”  He picked up Teddy, who was lying next to him on the pillow.  “I already invented one.”

She stared at the bear.  “How did he…”

Martin came back into the room with the paramedics. 

“How you doing, buddy?” asked the young man in a black t-shirt.

“I wet the bed.  I don’t think that requires paramedics, though.”

The other paramedic, a woman in her 30s, bent over and took the CGM from the nightstand.  She silenced the alarm.  The room became oddly quiet. 

“Okay,” she said.  “We’re just going to check you out to make sure you’re okay, all right?”

Jack extended his arm.  She put a blood pressure cuff on it. 

“What’s his name, sir?”

“Jack.”

“Jack,” asked the man, “can I take a little of your blood?  You’ve done the finger pricking a lot, haven’t you?”

“More often than I wish.”  He extended his left forefinger. 

“Can you tell me what day it is, Jack?”  The man pricked Jack’s finger with the lancet.

“It was Thursday when I went to bed.  I don’t know what time it is, but if it’s after midnight, it’s Friday.”

“You said he’s 8?”  The woman looked at Martin.

“Yeah.  He’s a little… you know.”

“He’s a prodigy, Martin.  Just live with it.”  Marion glared at her husband.

“Can you look at me, Jack?” asked the man. 

“I’d rather not.”

“Why’s that?”

“He doesn’t know you,” said Marion.  “He’s not going to look you in the eye.  He can’t deal with that.”

“He’s autistic?” asked the man.

“There’s nothing wrong with my son.”  Martin was getting defensive.

“He’s diabetic, you said?” asked the woman.

“Except for diabetes, there’s nothing wrong with my son.  He’s not a prodigy.  He’s not autistic.  He just likes his computer, and he reads really well.”

“My name is Howard.  This is my friend, Connie.  We’re glad to meet you, Jack.”  Howard turned to Connie.  “Blood sugar is 72.”

“Blood pressure is 124/82.”  Connie looked at the CGM.  She pressed a few buttons, and then showed it to Howard.  “His blood sugar was 38 fifteen minutes ago.”

“That’s the most recent reading?” he asked her.

“Yeah.  It must have dropped pretty quickly.  It’s set to go off at 60.”

“Jack, could I see your eyes just for a minute now that we know each other?”  Jack looked reluctantly in his direction, and Howard shined a light in them.  He watched Jack’s eyes get smaller.  “Pupils are responsive,” he told Connie.

“How are you feeling, Jack?”  Marion pushed his dark hair back from his face.

“Embarrassed.”  He said nothing more.

“Can we talk to you two in the other room, please?” Connie asked quietly.

Martin nodded to Connie, and he and Marion followed the paramedics out of the room.  The door closed quietly.

“All lights out in Jack’s room, please.”  The room went dark.  He cuddled his teddy bear.  “I love you, Teddy,” he whispered.

The snow fell silently as Jack closed his eyes.  The moonlight crept through the window and shone on Teddy and Jack.  A toddler-like, but mechanical, voice, noticeably like Jack’s, seeped from the covers.  “I love you, too, Jack.”

Posted on by Fred

The Problem of Immigration

I wrote the following on November 26, 2018.  The United States had just tear gassed refugees and immigrants crossing our border.

I honestly can’t stomach this anymore.

We kidnapped children from families coming to us for help.  And, while there was some outrage, there were those who said it was the families’ fault.  It wasn’t.  They came for help.  They were met with the most horrible thing you can do to any parent.

Now we’re tear gassing people.  This was outlawed in 1993, because it’s an inhumane weapon that doesn’t discriminate between intended targets and bystanders… or children.

I have seen people laughing about this. I had to drop a thread altogether because there were people blaming the parents who were fleeing for their lives, and they honestly thought my outrage was funny.  It isn’t.

The argument is that they can come, but they must do it legally.  The legal argument is an effort to give cover to the fact that what we are doing is patently immoral.  It was illegal to help a slave escape in 1850.  But it was the right thing to do.  Slavery was legal, but it was wrong.  It was illegal to hide Anne Frank in your attic in 1939.  But it was the right thing to do.  Nazism was legal, but it was wrong.  It is, in some states, illegal to feed homeless people.  But it’s the right thing to do.  Preventing people from helping others is legal, but it’s wrong.

There are many laws that are good laws because they protect us.  It’s illegal to kill me, or to steal my car, or to rape someone.  I’m in favor of those laws.  They protect us.

I don’t need to be protected from a family crossing a line.  They pose no threat to me.  If they come in and hurt someone, by all means, stop them. But crossing that line hurts no one.  And to greet people who come for help with tear gas instead of with open arms is the height of immorality.

I don’t want to hear that we don’t have the resources to help them. Of course we do. To believe otherwise is to buy into the oligarchy’s plan to make us fight with each other over the scraps of food they drop on the floor, while they pile up cash in offshore accounts and laugh at us.  The refugees, the poor, those who need help are not a threat to you.  They are not the ones keeping you from a good life.  That would be the ones with the power.  And so long as we keep supporting them, they will keep suffocating us.

What we are doing at our border is wrong.  To believe otherwise is to delude yourself.

What will I do?  I’m doing it.  I’m speaking out as loudly as I can.  “But, if you’re so worried about them, why don’t you let them come and live with you?” If your house is on fire, I can’t put it out.  I pay taxes, though, so someone can.  If you need to get to work, I can’t build you a road.  I pay taxes, though, so someone can.  If you are being attacked, I can’t help you.  But I pay taxes so someone can.

If people need help, and I am in a position to give it to them, I will. I just offered someone our extra room if she needs it because it’s all I can do.  I don’t have a single dollar to my name today.  But what I have is a voice. What I have is a talent for writing.  Those are what I have to offer.  The Little Drummer Boy could play.  I can write.  We give what we have to help those who need it. We don’t attack those in trouble.

I hope you understand.

If you need a reminder of what happened, there are two links in the transcript that will take you through the details.  One if from the BBC.  The other is from NPR.  These are traditionally two of the most objective media outlets.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-46355258

https://www.npr.org/2018/11/25/670687806/u-s-agents-spray-tear-gas-at-migrants-briefly-close-tijuana-border-entry

Last week I talked a little about Legalism, or the idea that adherence to a strict set of laws or religious beliefs is the way to define moral behavior.  I find it to be an excuse for doing what we know is wrong.  The argument that they can come, but they must do so legally, is a textbook example of the moral cowardice of Legalism. 

We need to stop seeing laws and start seeing people.  These are human beings coming for help.  They are often hungry and homeless.  They have been threatened by drug cartels.  They have been victims of violence.  And our response is that they have to wait until they have filled out the proper paperwork and had it stamped by the appropriate authorities?  That’s simply wrong.  They could be your parents.  They could be your children.  They share most of their attributes.  And we should care about them as we care about our own families… because they are part of our family. 

I spent last night reading comments from a supposed economist who was extolling the genius of Thomas Sowell and Adam Smith to explain why our Capitalist economy is the best of all possible worlds.  It’s just an unfortunate side effect that this economy is filled with people trying their best to make ends meet.  They work 2 or 3 jobs just to pay rent, but, by all means, let the markets regulate themselves.  There are hundreds of thousands of homeless people sleeping on the streets and shivering in the cold, but that’s just sort of too bad, because if we tried anything else, it would certainly be worse. 

I won’t accept such arguments.  I will be the first to admit that I am nothing resembling an economist.  I know next to nothing about how economies work.  I don’t know the science.  All I can see are the results.  And the results of our economic system are appalling.

We need to stop seeing numbers and start seeing people.  When children don’t have a warm bed, the economy isn’t working.  When children are put into cages, the immigration system isn’t working. 

In simplest terms, people matter more than money.  People matter more than arbitrary laws that keep them from the help they need.

Part of the problem, I think, is that we have global markets, but we lack any global government to regulate them.  This allows corporations to wield enormous power without anything to stop them.  If one country taxes them, they simply move their money to another.  If one country forces them to pay a living wage, they move their jobs to another.  And the exploitation goes on.

We have borders to protect us from others coming to our country and taking advantage of us.  But… what if we had no borders, anywhere, at all?  What if we recognized that there is no Them; we are all Us?  What would this mean?

It would mean an effective one-world government that benefits everyone.  If we had a global democracy, we could distribute global resources to where they are most needed without dealing with borders that keep help from getting where it is most needed.

Democracy comes from the Greek terms “Demos,” meaning “people,” and “Kratia,” or power.  It is the idea that people have the power to rule themselves.  We’ve been trying to get Democracy right for more than 2,500 years, and we still haven’t managed it.  I believe this is because governments are subject to the will of other governments, and they must compete with one another for supremacy.  Authoritarian dictatorships frequently create stronger militaries, and Democracy can’t fight them effectively.

Instead of fighting each other for control of what Carl Sagan aptly described as a “fraction of a dot,” we should work toward having a global democracy that works for all of us instead of giving all the advantages to the wealthy. 

This is not what The United Nations does now.  That’s a collection of governments, and participation is entirely voluntary.  The UN has no power to enforce its policies.  It has little voice in governments who exploit or oppress their own citizens.  Its function is mostly symbolic.

I don’t have details for you about how to accomplish this.  I’m sorry.  I’m not nearly intelligent enough to design such a government.  But I can give you some ideas that would help to shape it. 

Its purpose must be to help all people.  Its representatives should be elected by popular vote.  Everyone needs to be allowed to vote without interference or coercion.   It should ensure that all people get the healthcare they need.  It should ensure that education is freely available.  It should see to it that everyone has a warm bed and decent food to eat.  A government of any kind that does less is a failure to the extent that it falls short of these goals. 

I leave it to better minds than mine to work out the details.  And better minds than mine will become increasingly common as education becomes more readily available. 

So, how do we solve The Problem of Immigration?  We remove all the borders that separate one country from another, and we become one planet composed of one people.  We recognize that we are all travelers on this rock tumbling through space.  We work together to better ourselves and the rest of humanity instead of trying to create stacks of bits of green linen and cotton that, themselves, are becoming less and less common.  We use currency less frequently all the time, and now we are transferring most of our money electronically.  There are more and more places that decline to accept cash.  I had thought this was illegal, but the federal reserve tells us it’s not.

There is no federal statute mandating that a private business, a person, or an organization must accept currency or coins as payment for goods or services. Private businesses are free to develop their own policies on whether to accept cash unless there is a state law that says otherwise.

Section 31 U.S.C. 5103, entitled “Legal tender,” states: “United States coins and currency [including Federal Reserve notes and circulating notes of Federal Reserve Banks and national banks] are legal tender for all debts, public charges, taxes, and dues.” This statute means that all U.S. money as identified above is a valid and legal offer of payment for debts when tendered to a creditor.

https://www.federalreserve.gov/faqs/currency_12772.htm

This means it’s more difficult for people who don’t have bank accounts to get any help.  If I give a homeless person a ten-dollar-bill, they can’t necessarily take it to a coffee shop to get something to eat anymore.  Currency is losing its value.  The world is becoming much more for those who have, and much less for those who have not.

We need to stop making decisions about people based on their place of birth, their gender, their race, the color of their skin, or their sexuality, and instead we see that there is much more that unites us than divides us.  We must recognize that everyone is someone’s son or daughter, just as you and I are, and that hurting them means making miserable not only them but the people who love them.  We see every child as we would see our own children, and we grant them the love they have earned simply by showing up on Earth. 

Hatred has reigned long enough on Earth.  Why not try Love for a while?  Let’s see how that works out.

Posted on by Fred

Club Q and Tolerance

I put the following on Facebook after the mass murder at the Gay Colorado Nightclub, Club Q.

Words can incite hatred. Hatred can incite violence. Violence causes death.

Let’s choose not only our own words more carefully, but the words we choose to listen to and amplify. When we dehumanize people who are different from us, we contribute to the evil we saw in Colorado.

Perhaps it’s time not only to tolerate differences, but to celebrate them. Being different requires a courage all its own. Being who we choose to be should never be a cause of death.

As has become common for me, I received pushback from someone whose name I will omit:

The only problem I have is “tolerating differences”. I refuse to “tolerate” racist bigoted xenophobic transphobic homophobic assholes. Those differences cannot be tolerated.

I understand my friend’s feelings.  I don’t approve of those folks either.  Neither am I a fan of misogynists, racists, or religious people who believe their beliefs entitle them to decide others are bad.  But what does it mean to “tolerate?” 

The Oxford Dictionary defines it as, “allow the existence, occurrence, or practice of (something that one does not necessarily like or agree with) without interference.

“a regime unwilling to tolerate dissent”

So, am I to decide I will not allow the existence of those who disagree with me without interference?  What sort of interference is acceptable?  What is not?  Obviously, no one is going to support rounding up all the homophobes and transphobes and shooting them.  We can call them names, I suppose.  My friend called them assholes, and I understand her point of view, even if I think it’s a failure of understanding.  We can talk about how horrible they are.  And we may well be right that they are, in their ways, horrible.  But people don’t get that way accidentally. 

We aren’t born hating.  We are shaped by our experiences.  It’s easy to hate those who are different from us.  Homophobes, transphobes, racists, and misogynists are different from me.  Theists, and atheists for that matter, who hate those who don’t share their religious beliefs are different from me.  But my experiences have taught me that hating people doesn’t fix anything.  It doesn’t get them to change their views.  It doesn’t make them more willing to tolerate differences.  And it gives them reason to call me a hypocrite when I won’t tolerate our differences.  So, as I so frequently ask on this show and this blog, “Who’s better off?”

When I refuse to tolerate, when I hate, I give validation to those who are doing the same.  I’m going to decline to do that.  I forfeit any chance I have of changing their minds.  There are people who listen to this show who believe that God invented marriage (their God, I assume, as opposed to any of the other nearly 5,000 that are or have been worshipped on this planet by humans at one time or another) and He gets to decide who can get married and who can’t.  If I decide to hate them because I disagree, I have lost people I love, and I have done nothing to make the world any better.

If I continue to have them in my life, I may not change their minds.  In fact, I probably won’t.  Changing minds about deeply held beliefs is a nearly impossible task.  On the other hand, I have no chance at all if I reject them. 

The best I can hope to do is give them some other ideas to consider.  I can try to show them that believing that it is wrong to be different is not helping anyone.  I can’t show them that having a different sexuality doesn’t make anyone evil if I can’t talk to them. 

There are those who believe morality is a strict adherence to a set of rules.  This is called Legalism.  It originated in Ancient China, but its basic definition today is “strict, literal, or excessive conformity to the law or to a religious or moral code.”  If this is what the rules say, we must do this.  While I prefer people obey the law, it takes no more imagination than God gave to a pistachio nut to invent scenarios in which adherence to the law is simply wrong.  Your best friend has been shot and is in the back seat of your car.  The speed limit is 25 mph.  The hospital is 4 miles away.  Your friend has minutes to live without medical intervention, but… the law says 25.  You decide to drive 25.  Your friend dies.  The legalist would say you were right.  I wouldn’t. 

Legalism applies to the belief that marriage should be only between one man and one woman because it’s in The Bible.

Mark 10:

6 But from the beginning of the creation God made them male and female.

7 For this cause shall a man leave his father and mother, and cleave to his wife;

8 And they twain shall be one flesh: so then they are no more twain, but one flesh.

9 What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder

For Christian Legalists, the question is now settled, without concern for the consequences of this belief.  It may be that two men, or two women, love each other and want to spend their lives together, expressing that love in sexual ways.  This isn’t allowed, though, because The Bible says so.  If this hurts those people, that’s just too bad.

For me, morality is a question of consequences.  If I do something that helps someone, it’s probably moral.  If I do something that hurts someone, it’s probably immoral.  I emphasize probably because this is a wild oversimplification.  There are all sorts of nuances that come into play in deciding what is right and what is wrong. 

Moral problems are never choosing Good vs Evil.  If that’s all you have to decide, the decision is simple.  You choose Good.  Moral problems arise when there are competing Goods.  The Trolley Problem is the simplest example of an actual moral problem.

You’re standing near the switch that will cause a trolley to change tracks.  You can see it’s about to kill five people if it stays on its current track.  If you pull the switch, it will change tracks, and then it will kill one person, who would otherwise have lived had you not touched the switch.  There are competing Goods at play.  The Good of saving five people.  The Good of not killing one person.  Which do you choose?

Answers to this vary from person to person, and there are many variations on The Trolley Problem.  I don’t pretend to be wise enough to solve it for all eternity.  I like to think I would pull the switch, but I don’t like the feeling that I caused someone to die who wouldn’t have if I had done nothing.  I recognize there are other equally valid arguments to be made on both sides.

From the Legalist perspective, it would be a simple matter.  If there’s a sign saying “Don’t touch this switch” they have no choice to make.  If they touch the switch, they have broken the law, and five people will die.  They won’t break the law.  They won’t save five lives.

I prefer to recognize I don’t know everything.  Socrates was quite fond of recognizing he knew nothing.  I’m not quite as wise as Socrates.  I think I know a few things.  I know there is, however, unimaginably more that I don’t know than I ever will know.  I’m always willing to entertain a different idea, at least long enough to make an informed decision about it.  I try very hard to keep my mind open to different possibilities in the event that there is something I haven’t considered.  This allows me to learn, and I have a nearly infinite amount of learning to do. 

As opposed to hating those who hate, I feel a pity for the experiences they must have had to cause them to feel hatred in the first place.  Hatred is an unpleasant feeling.  It’s a sort of burning inside of you that keeps you from thinking rationally.  It hurts both you and anyone you hate.  It blocks you from positive experiences you might have had with those who are from groups your intolerance has caused you to hate.

When you spread hatred with your words, your memes, or your jokes, you make it seem more acceptable to the rest of the world.  As it spreads, just a little here and there, it deteriorates the acceptance that others feel.  A slowly leaking sink will finally rot the cabinet beneath it, causing it to mold and collapse.  It won’t happen immediately, but given time, the results will be expensive to repair.  Given enough time, the damage will become irreparable. 

When someone makes jokes about those who are different, the very least you can do is withhold your laughter.  You might, depending on your relationship with the joker, ask what is funny about that, or, perhaps, tell them that there is, in fact, nothing funny about it. 

When someone posts memes that attack those who are different, you can, at the very least, choose not to respond positively to them.  You can also, again, depending on your relationship with the poster, comment asking why it’s funny, or pointing out that it simply isn’t. 

And when people say hateful things, you can let them know why you don’t agree.  You’re not required to let their cruelty go unanswered, but you don’t get to decide, either, that they are evil because they have beliefs or ideas that are not in alignment with yours.

Tonight, in writing class, we talked about the fact that stories tend to end with the antagonist meeting their end.  The Wicked Witch is melted.  Hans Gruber and Snow White’s Wicked Queen fall to their deaths.  The Nazis are defeated.  And we end shortly afterward without dealing with the healing.  Others have been traumatized by these events, and we never see how they dealt with those feelings. 

“Healing is learning to live with it.”

– David Gerrold

We don’t ever heal completely.  We survive.  We rebuild ourselves into something we weren’t before.  We hope we can continue to make a positive difference in the world even after we have suffered some trauma. Some of us can.  That’s not true for all of us, though.

When we watch a movie or read a book, we rarely get to understand how the antagonists became who they are.  To its credit, Star Wars took some time to show us how Anakin Skywalker, a sweet, clever, and kind boy turned into the greatest antagonist in its universe.  When we understand what he suffered, we begin to sympathize with him.  While we don’t forget all the suffering he caused, we can see he’s really not much different from what we might be had we suffered what he did. 

That, though, is a fictional character from a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away.  Does he have anything to do with the reality you and I occupy? 

He instructs us.  He shows us that good and evil are not that simple.  We see what happens when we embrace hatred.  Even the best of us is corruptible.

This is why when I see someone who hates, I won’t return their feelings.   I will do what I can to change them.  I may fail, but I am obliged to try.  “To believe you can change the world is insanity; failure to try is cowardice.”  I won’t be a coward.  I’m already plenty of things I don’t like.  I do my best to forgive those who hurt me.  I can move on with my life when I let go of the hatred.  I can remove that toxin from my system.

“Forgiveness is a gift you give yourself.”    

–David Gerrold

If you choose to hate me for not hating the same people you do, that’s up to you.  I have done what I can to show you why Hate helps no one, but I if I’ve failed, then at least I can know I tried.  And I can continue to love you anyway.

Posted on by Fred

Violence Is The Tool of The Intellectually Ineffective

The following is my part of a discussion I had on Facebook the other day. 

A friend of mine had posted something Liberal on his page.  A conservative friend of his, referred to here as Name Deleted, talked about how he would “K” Democrats.  He said he meant “Kiss.”  No one believed him.

  • Fred: Violence of any kind is never the answer.
  • Name Deleted: Sure, Fred.  You grow up in church.  You be good.
  • Fred:  I’m an atheist, and ad hominem attacks are not arguments. Violence continues to be no answer.
  • Name Deleted:  Pacifist.  Nope not here.  Grew up military and country.  Saw a lot of stuff in my life.  Called survival. 
  • Fred: Also irrelevant to attack me instead of my argument. You also gave me your personal history, which is also not an argument.  Violence means someone is hurt. It usually means someone is killed. Whatever Good you believe you accomplished with your violence is denied to those who die.  Violence is the answer used by those who cannot be moved by words and logical arguments. It is the answer of the intellectually ineffective.
  • Name Deleted: Fred Eder You Win Freddy. Attack you. Wow. Fragile. You win. Bye.
  • Fred: Thanks for the discussion.

No, of course I didn’t change his mind.  I’ve been on Facebook for nearly 14 years now, and in that time I’m not aware of anyone ever changing their minds based on any sort of debate there.  I recognize the futility of the effort.  Why, then, should I continue to try?

It’s because I believe in the power of words.  Words can inspire.  They can change world views.  They can inform.  They can lift us out of our ordinary experiences and show us a universe we had never imagined before.  They both begin and end wars.  They set humanity apart from most of the rest of life on this planet.  There are hypotheses that other animals communicate, but we are unique, as far as I know, in written language, an alphabet, and our ability to be moved by thoughts from thousands of years ago.  The words I wrote might cause someone, somewhere, some time, to reconsider their own thoughts, even though I have no idea who that person is.  The best any writer can hope to do is to move a stranger.  I recognize that Good people sometimes commit acts of violence.  They are expected of our military, and they are often necessary for members of the law enforcement community.  But they always represent a failure of our intellect.  Soldiers, sailors, and marines don’t kill others for fun.  They do so on the orders of leaders who were unable to use language to convince other leaders to do what they believed needed to be done. 

Shakespeare took this up in Henry V:

BATES

… for we know
enough, if we know we are the king’s subjects: if
his cause be wrong, our obedience to the king wipes
the crime of it out of us.

WILLIAMS

But if the cause be not good, the king himself hath
a heavy reckoning to make, when all those legs and
arms and heads, chopped off in battle, shall join
together at the latter day and cry all ‘We died at
such a place;’ some swearing, some crying for a
surgeon, some upon their wives left poor behind
them, some upon the debts they owe, some upon their
children rawly left. I am afeard there are few die
well that die in a battle; for how can they
charitably dispose of any thing, when blood is their
argument? Now, if these men do not die well, it
will be a black matter for the king that led them to
it; whom to disobey were against all proportion of
subjection.

The most common argument about the need for violence comes in explaining why Neville Chamberlain was wrong not to go to war with Germany earlier than he did.  There can be no debate that Hitler needed to be stopped, and history suggests violence was necessary to accomplish that.  This is a powerful argument, but, for me, it misses the point.

That Hitler was mentally ill can hardly be debated.  He was, in simplest terms, intellectually ineffective.  He couldn’t be persuaded by words he didn’t like.  He loved the fame, the power, and the glory that were heaped upon him by the citizens of Germany at the beginning.  He was empowered by those who believed in the hatred he preached.

Hatred is an extreme form of Anger.  Anger is caused by fear.  (See Episode 123: “The Problem of Anger” for more on this.)  People feared Germany’s collapsing economy would cause them to plummet into poverty and homelessness.  I think many of us are familiar with this fear today in America.  Hitler gave them somewhere to focus that anger.  It grew to the hatred necessary to kill more than 6 million people simply for being different. 

What we see is a massive failure of intellect.  We see the power fear has to overrule our intellects. 

There are those who claim this is built into our psyche by our earliest evolutionary stages.  Fight or Flight kept us alive for quite a long time.  Fight became synonymous with courage, flight with cowardice.  We’re told to admire courage over cowardice.  Running away from an attack is not heroic.  There are few movies made about those who choose flight over fight.  We simply don’t admire such people. 

On the other hand…

“I wish Bob Ewell wouldn’t chew tobacco,” was all Atticus said about it.

According to Miss Stephanie Crawford, however, Atticus was leaving the post office when Mr. Ewell approached him, cursed him, spat on him, and threatened to kill him. Miss Stephanie (who, by the time she had told it twice was there and had seen it all—passing by from the Jitney Jungle, she was)—Miss Stephanie said Atticus didn’t bat an eye, just took out his handkerchief and wiped his face and stood there and let Mr. Ewell call him names wild horses could not bring her to repeat. Mr. Ewell was a veteran of an obscure war; that plus Atticus’s peaceful reaction probably prompted him to inquire, “Too proud to fight, you nigger­lovin‘ bastard?” Miss Stephanie said Atticus said, “No, too old,” put his hands in his pockets and strolled on. Miss Stephanie said you had to hand it to Atticus Finch, he could be right dry sometimes.

Jem and I didn’t think it entertaining. “After all, though,” I said, “he was the deadest shot in the county one time. He could—”

“You know he wouldn’t carry a gun, Scout. He ain’t even got one—” said Jem. “You know he didn’t even have one down at the jail that night. He told me havin‘ a gun around’s an invitation to somebody to shoot you.”

“This is different,” I said. “We can ask him to borrow one.”

We did, and he said, “Nonsense.”

— Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird, Chapter 23

Atticus is a hero.  Anyone can hit someone.  That’s easy.  One could certainly argue, from at least a legal standpoint, that Atticus would have been justified in hitting Bob Ewell.  I suspect a first-year law student could get him acquitted with self-defense.  I could be wrong.  I know many people who would have knocked Ewell on his ass for that.  I know many more who would applaud Atticus for kicking Ewell’s ass.  And, again, hitting someone is easy. 

You know what’s tough? It’s tough to tolerate such an insult without responding.  I maintain Atticus is tougher than Rambo.  I suspect many of you will disagree.  You’re welcome to do so.   

Bravery doesn’t exist without fear.  How we deal with our fears is what defines us.  When we use our language instead of physical force, we save each other pain that solves little.  Though it’s doubtful that Gandhi said, “An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind,” the sentiment is correct.  I can hurt you, and you can hurt me.  Which of us can hurt the other most is irrelevant.  It would be better for both of us if neither of us was hurt.  I decline to derive pleasure from your pain.  My life is no better because yours is worse.   And I won’t like myself as well if I hurt you.

One of the first things we teach our children is to use their words.  We don’t express displeasure by throwing a tantrum anymore because we’ve grown beyond that.  When I was 3, it would have surprised no one that I threw a tantrum because Mommy didn’t let me have a cookie before dinner.  I wouldn’t do that today.  Neither would you.  We’re adults, and we have learned better ways to deal with our feelings.  We’ve grown.  We need, as a species, to continue to grow.  We need to learn to use our words, just as our parents taught us when we were 3. 

My hope is my words can get you to reconsider your feelings about violence.  I hope we can stop creating a blind world and start creating a world in which we learn compassion, empathy, and love. 

I’m 60, diabetic, disabled, and defenseless.  I have no doubt you can beat the hell out of me for suggesting ideas with which you disagree.  Which of us will be better off?    Will you have proven anything other than that you’re capable of physically hurting me?  Does that make you heroic? You would be, in my mind at least, substantially more heroic by using your intellect to change my mind instead of your power to increase the pain I experience every day.  I invite you to do that in the comments on Patreon, on my Facebook page, or on the show’s Facebook page.  You can even send me something in Facebook Messenger.  Or you can hit me.  (And you wonder why I never leave the house??)  Which do you think is better? 

Posted on by Fred · 2 Comments

… Liberty and Justice For All

I wrote the following the day following President Biden’s election.

***

I declined to give up my Trump supporting friends, though I was called a traitor to my ideals, ideology, my party, and the marginalized groups oppressed by President Trump. We are divided enough. I won’t give up people I love on demand.

My Trump supporting friends are feeling despair that is probably only slightly less than my joy.

And those are my friends: Americans, citizens, and, most importantly, humans.

The President-elect promises to be a President for all the people. He wants to heal our differences and reunite us in the common cause of Freedom. I share that hope.

I believe in Kindness, Compassion, Empathy, and Love. I was disappointed and, often, angry when Trump supporters told me my feelings didn’t matter. Yes, they did. And, tonight, Trump supporters, your feelings matter to me. I won’t embrace the cruelty I despised. I understand your disappointment. I felt the same disappointment 4 years ago.

Now I invite everyone to work together to solve our shared problems:

*We are being killed by a pandemic. Let’s fight it together by staying apart.

* We are fighting against the hatred that says there are groups who don’t deserve the rights, protections, and privileges that have always been mine simply because I happen to have been born a straight white male. Let’s work together to ensure the best lives possible for everyone.

* Our planet is going to be unable to sustain us all in the not-too-distant future. Let’s work together to keep the oceans from rising higher, the hurricanes from blowing over homes and lives, and the fires from reducing our country to ashes.

*And let’s send the caged children back to their families.

These are just a few of the daunting tasks that lie ahead. We must also work to vanquish poverty, give healthcare to everyone, and educate all of our children.

This won’t be possible if we are divided. Let’s drop the divisions tonight. Let’s begin to unite. Let’s begin to heal. Let’s lead with love.

Let’s build a bigger table.

As I write this, the midterm elections have not yet been held.  By the time you read this and hear it, they will be part of history.  I don’t know the results.  You do.  You have the advantage of me.

I’m willing to bet, however, that many people are upset about the results.  I may be one of them.  You may be one, too, and for opposite reasons.  I feel sure someone reading this or listening to it is unhappy with the results of our election.  I understand.

That brings us to the challenge.  It’s easy to give into cynicism right now.  The election gave us results with which we are unhappy, so we should just throw up our hands and decide the system is irreparably broken, and we ought to abandon it.  I’ve spent much of this evening wasting my time in a Facebook debate about the “Both Sides Do It” argument.  A friend told me that both Democrats and Republicans are corrupt.  He may be right, but I pointed out that only one side declines to accept the results of our elections.  I asked him to show me a Democrat who wouldn’t accept defeat.  He sent me a link to Google.  He didn’t, however, show me any election-denying Democrats.  If there is such a person, I have missed them.  Please feel free to show me yourself.

This is a time for healing.  Whomever won the elections, whomever has control of Congress, there is still a chance to make things better.  If I couldn’t believe that, I would have to end my existence, and I’m not ready to do that yet.  My dog tends to object to my suicide attempts. 

Dividing ourselves into smaller and smaller groups makes us more vulnerable to being vanquished.  I won’t participate in that.  You may have voted differently than I did.  You may have very different feelings than I have about what happened on November 8, 2022.  I won’t, however, decide that I hate you because we disagree.  I will continue to love you and hope that somehow, some way, we can find common ground on which to build a better world.  I don’t believe that you want me to be killed.  I don’t believe you want my friends to be hurt, even if you and I disagree about everything.  Those who voted as I did may be angry with me for failing to reject those who voted differently.  Who is better off for that?  Shall those of us who agree about politics split ourselves up based on the purity of our beliefs?  If we do that, we grant more power to the opposition.  We move no closer to a country that lives up to its stated ideals: “… liberty and justice for all.” 

We too rarely actually think about those words because they have become empty as we droned them meaninglessly every day before class began.  To me, it means that all of us get to choose for ourselves how to live our lives, so long as we don’t hurt anyone else. 

I spent more than a little time this evening trying to convince a Christian friend that there was nothing wrong with a Drag Queen performing for children.  He came back with “Pass. When it comes to children, this is what Jesus had to say. ‘It would be better for them to be thrown into the sea with a millstone tied around their neck than to cause one of these little ones to stumble.’”  And that’s my problem with what passes as Christian morality.  There can be no doubt that throwing children into the sea with a millstone tied around their necks hurts them.  Watching someone dance doesn’t.  He never replied.  You’re certainly welcome to do so.

Someone else pointed out that what it really means is that those who make children stumble should be drowned.  Is that somehow better?  Someone who dances in drag should be thrown into the ocean?  Is that the sort of country in which you would like to live?  I want nothing to do with it.  I may not be much into drag shows, but it turns out that I don’t have a monopoly on Art.  I’m not fond of rap, either, or country music for that matter, but I don’t want Willie Nelson or Eminem killed because I don’t care for their work.  I just won’t listen to it.  If I had children, and I thought it was inappropriate for them, I wouldn’t take them to their concerts.  I wouldn’t, however, tell other parents how to raise their children.  The only difference I could see between the video that was upsetting my friend so much and anything I’ve seen by Taylor Swift was that this was a man in drag.  So what?  If no one is being hurt, let him do what he wants.  The children in the audience were accompanied by their parents.  The arrogance of telling someone else how to raise their children doesn’t work for me.

Justice for all is also frequently lost on us.  It’s not Breaking News that the wealthy and powerful are frequently treated differently than the poor and powerless.  Subpoenas are often ignored by those with money.  You and I would be in jail if we ignored one.  Punishments are much harsher for those with the least power.  This isn’t justice in any meaningful form.  If we are to be what John Adams called,  “…a country of laws, and not of men…” the law needs to apply to everyone equally.

During the BLM Movement, Trevor Noah explained it well:

Why don’t we all loot? Why doesn’t everybody take? Because we’ve agreed on things. … Think about how many people who don’t, the have-nots, say, ‘I’m still going to play by the rules, even though I have nothing, because I still wish for the society to work and exist.’ Then, some members of the society, namely black American people, watch time and time again how the contract they have signed with society is not being honored by the society that has forced them to sign it with them.”

          — Trevor Noah

https://www.vanityfair.com/hollywood/2020/06/trevor-noah-george-floyd-protests

Justice occurs only when everyone is treated fairly.  What is fair is a question that is open to debate.  I don’t pretend to be wise enough to settle that argument.  But it seems to me that part of it has to be that one’s wealth and status can’t be the determining factors in the way our laws are applied.  It isn’t fair that wealthy and powerful people can make use of the courts to avoid doing what the rest of us are required to do. 

We can change this.  We need to change this.  We won’t change it with hatred.  We’ll change it by getting more people to understand what it means to live up to our American Ideals.  That was my point this evening.  If we can unite behind the simple idea of Liberty and Justice for All, we can still make America the greatest country in the world.  Telling me we can’t isn’t helpful.  If you have another plan to help us get there, I’m more than a little interested in hearing it.  It may be helpful.  Cynicism won’t be.

I want to leave you with the words that have been helping me to cope with my own feelings of futility for the past few weeks.  These come from my friend, Sara Niemietz.  I can’t possibly urge you strongly enough to go get her latest album, “Superman.”

Days go by and my pages turn
Slowly I write the words I learn

But I′m getting stronger every day
And I know the clouds will roll away
Just a little time I gotta wait
And I’ll be better

Yes I′m lighter everyday though I’m carrying this weight
I know things are going to change and I′ll be better
I’ll be better — Sara Niemietz, “Four Walls” from the album “Superman,” 2022

Posted on by Fred

A Dish Best Served Cold

In Star Trek II, Khan tells us that “Revenge is a dish best served cold.”  The line is certainly not original to him.  A Google search and Wikipedia suggest it goes back at least as far as a French diplomat named  Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord (1754–1838) .  It’s hardly surprising to learn that the desire for revenge is deeply embedded in human beings.  If someone hurts us, we want to hurt them back.  Every civilization of which I’m aware has some form of punitive laws that decide what pain we will cause someone else who has inflicted pain on us.  When you feel the desire to exact vengeance, you’re hardly unique.  It makes you believe you feel better.  Perhaps it even really does.  I question the value of that feeling.  I would prefer you feel better showing love than hurting someone you believe deserves it. 

There are two examples of the need for revenge with which most of the world is at least somewhat familiar.  The first is Hamlet, one of the most famous fictional characters in all of literature.  The second is Indigo Montoya, who is beloved by the millions who are passionate about “The Princess Bride.”  Both are excellent examples of the fact that revenge doesn’t work out well. 

Khan tells us it’s a dish best served cold.  What does he mean by that?  Since it’s a part of a piece of Art, your opinion is certainly as valid as mine.  To me, it means that it’s been sitting around a while.  The heat has dissipated.  With the exception of sushi (which, for me, is a punishment all its own anyway) and ice cream (which is a sweet treat that seems hardly appropriate), nearly everything humans eat is preferable when it’s fresh out of the oven or off of the stove… or, if you’re me, from the microwave.  Waiting for it to get cold is to spoil it.  It has lost most of its flavor.  This is, according to Khan and the many who came before him, the best way to get revenge.  You don’t do it immediately.  You wait until the time is right because it will maximize the pain of its intended victim, even if it takes a long time to see it happen.  And the longer you wait, the longer the hate, if left unchecked, grows in your soul. Hamlet certainly took his time to get revenge.  Although it’s never clear in the text exactly how long, certainly several months have passed between the time of the death of Hamlet’s father, and Hamlet’s killing of the homicidal King.  And, while he certainly got his revenge, he was ready to end his own life before he got there because life had gotten so horrible. 

These are arguably the most famous words in all of literature: “To be or not to be…”  This is because Hamlet is confronting a question that so many of us have to answer at some point in our lives.  Do we want to continue living?

I was a teacher for 29 years.  There are those who resent that I have chosen to stop being one now.  I will step in front of a classroom one last time to discuss Hamlet’s soliloquy.  I’ll recite it for you first.  I promise to explain afterward.

To be, or not to be: that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them? To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause: there’s the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely,
The pangs of disprized love, the law’s delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin? who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover’d country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?
Thus conscience doth make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.–Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia! Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember’d!

To be is simply to exist.  The first line asks whether he should or not. 

“Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?”

He’s asking if it’s better, more courageous, more moral to tolerate all of the injuries (the slings and arrows) that life, in its ridiculous and unpredictable ways, sends at you, or to fight back, and make life stop hurting you.  There is a long tradition, particularly in males, to find great honor in fighting.  Perhaps I’m not much of a male because I find nothing of value in violence.  I was recently referred to as a “little pussy boy.”  I’m perfectly content with that.  I don’t believe in hurting people.  But, we’ll come back to that later.  For the moment, Hamlet has to decide what is the more honorable and courageous thing to do. 

In this case, Hamlet seems to believe that the way to fight back against life is to end it.

To die: to sleep;
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to, ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d.

There’s nothing to be feared from death.  It’s simply going to sleep, something most of us do for at least a few hours out of each 24.  And if we’re dead, we don’t have to deal with all of the pain into which we are eternally embedded.  To live, for Hamlet, is to suffer, and to stop suffering is something he wants desperately. 

He should be ready to die by now, but he thinks just a little further. 

To die, to sleep;
To sleep: perchance to dream: ay, there’s the rub;
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause:

His religion teaches of an afterlife, and the certainty that suicide is a one-way ticket to the worst possible part of it.  When we sleep, while we’re alive, we dream.  Sometimes the dreams are wonderful.  Some of the dreams I’ve had concerning Valerie Bertinelli have been fantastic.  Sometimes the dreams are horrible.  I’ve seen my father murdered by thugs in my dreams, too.  I feel certain you’ve had similar experiences.  We wake up from our dreams, though.  We return to life, which, again, for Hamlet, is mostly pain.  There is little doubt that life is, at least from time to time, painful for all of us.  And we are leashed to it by the coil of mortality.  We can’t escape it while we’re alive.  Shuffling off that pain is a tempting offer.  What is there to stop us?

… there’s the respect
That makes calamity of so long life;
For who would bear the whips and scorns of time,
The oppressor’s wrong, the proud man’s contumely,
The pangs of disprized love, the law’s delay,
The insolence of office and the spurns
That patient merit of the unworthy takes,
When he himself might his quietus make
With a bare bodkin?

Now he names some of the torments of existence.  Time ages us with whips that toughen our skin and scorns that crack our hearts.  People hold us back, they insult us, love goes awry, justice takes far too long to come if it comes at all.  Those in power are indifferent to the needs of those over whom they hold sway.  Who wants to live in such conditions?  They aren’t much different today than they were 400 years ago.  And all he needs is a bodkin (that’s a dagger) to end it all.  Everything is quiet after we expire. 

who would fardels bear,
To grunt and sweat under a weary life,
But that the dread of something after death,
The undiscover’d country from whose bourn
No traveller returns, puzzles the will
And makes us rather bear those ills we have
Than fly to others that we know not of?

Why should we carry the weight of the bundles, both emotional and physical, that life asks us to bear until long after we’re exhausted?  The reason we put up with it is because we’re afraid of what death might be.  It’s a place about which we know nothing, except by faith.  No one ever returns from it.  (Okay… we’ve all heard about those who saw the white light and came back, and I’ve heard of that dude, Jesus, who evidently made it three whole days before he came back, but that’s not Hamlet, and it’s not most of us.)  So we put up with what we hate to avoid having to tolerate something even worse in the afterlife. 

Thus conscience doth make cowards of us all;
And thus the native hue of resolution
Is sicklied o’er with the pale cast of thought,
And enterprises of great pith and moment
With this regard their currents turn awry,
And lose the name of action.

Conscience.  In this case, I don’t think that word means what you think it means.  It’s not a moral guide, but the idea of the fear that your conscience uses to stop you from doing what you know is wrong.  So, the vibrant colors of all of our plans fade to grey as we think about them more deeply.  Our resolve fails us, and our wishes never become our actions. 

The end of the soliloquy appears to be irrelevant to the rest.  It’s simply a greeting to his girlfriend, Ophelia.  But what does he say, exactly?

Soft you now!
The fair Ophelia!  Nymph, in thy orisons
Be all my sins remember’d!

He’s asking her to pray for the redemption of his many sins.  He’s still worried about the afterlife.  And in the next scene he is going to hurt her as badly as he can, at least at that moment, by telling her she should go join a whorehouse.    Later, he will even kill her father, and her brother will die in his effort to get revenge against Hamlet.  He will drive Ophelia to suicide.

Why does Hamlet seem to hate the world so much?  It may have something to do with the fact that Hamlet’s Uncle murdered Hamlet’s Father and married Hamlet’s Mother, thereby robbing Hamlet of the crown that should have been his.  (If you were a 6th grader, I would probably mention that “The Lion King” is Disney’s version of Hamlet.)  He has a strong motive to want revenge.  He’s probably having a worse week than you are.  But, what are the consequences of the all consuming hatred that makes him want to kill Claudius? 

Bertrand Russell had some thoughts on this when he was asked what he would say to historians from a thousand years in our future.

I should say love is wise, hatred is foolish.  In this world, which is getting more and more interconnected, we have to learn to tolerate each other, we have to learn to put up with the fact that some people say things that we don’t like. We can only live together in that way.  And if we are to live together and not die together, we should learn the kind of tolerance which is absolutely vital to the continuation of human life on this planet.

Bertrand Russell: Love is Wise, Hatred is Foolish

Once we let hatred infect us, it grows deeper, stronger, and more irresistible every day.  I saw a sign once at a rehab center: “Holding a grudge is like drinking poison and hoping the other guy will die.”  This is what happened to Indigo Montoya.

Like Hamlet, Indigo was infected by hatred because a man murdered his father.  He spent a lifetime becoming the best swordsman in the land so that when he met the murderer Indigo could be sure to kill him.  “Hello.  My name is Indigo Montoya.  You killed my father.  Prepare to die.”  He fought Count Rugen, and he killed him.  “I want my father back, you son of a bitch.”

Unlike Hamlet, though, Indigo’s hatred was his motivation to better himself.  Hamlet’s hatred made him suicidal.  They both got revenge.  Neither of them was better off.  Hamlet lost his life almost immediately afterward.  Indigo lost his motivation.  He had no idea what to do with his life. 

We all have cause to feel hatred from time to time.  What can we do? 

I’ll tell you what I did.  You can decide what you will do. 

A good friend felt hurt by me.  I certainly didn’t intend to hurt him, but he declined to believe that, and he took revenge.  He hurt me quite nearly as badly as he could.  He may continue to find more ways to hurt me.  I don’t know.  As a member of the human race, I felt the same impulse most of us do.  I considered ways to hurt him back.  I have the means to do that.  I have the motive.  I have the opportunity.  Those are the elements they always try to find in cop shows when they’re searching for the criminal.  And then I asked what good it would do. 

I don’t want to feel better by making someone else feel worse.  In my experience, I have never felt better because I hurt someone.  I have regretted it each time I have done it.  I’ve done it far more times than I wish I had.  It’s rarely been what I wanted, but it happened nevertheless, and I have to own that.  I’ve had 59 years, though, to understand myself.  I’ve had time to learn.  It was, I believe, Maya Angelou who said, “When we know better, we do better.”  I know myself better.  I know there’s nothing to be gained by drinking poison and hoping the other guy will die.  And hatred is among the most deadly poisons.  So, what did I do with those feelings?

The Great Sara Niemietz did several Christmas shows this week.  I saw as many as I could.  They made me smile, and I forgot my pain for a little while.  I filled up on holiday cheer.  And I listened to one of her original songs again, and I remembered:

Cracks and broken pieces
Inside us
Where the light comes in
Brightest
Breathe, bleed, see again

The pain opened a new space for Joy.

I talked to some friends who love me so I could let the feelings out.  And then, I got a dog.  He has far too much energy, but I got him something called “Calming Treats” that evidently are laced with hemp, and right now he’s sleeping quietly on the couch.  He needs me.  I’m the person who feeds him, gets him his water, his shots, and all the Love I can find.  And though we’ve been together only 22 hours, he’s already giving me more love than I’ve had in more than 2 years.  Yes, he can be a massive pain the ass.  So can my best friend, who drove me to the Shelter and PetSmart.  I can no more expect perfection from those I love than they can expect it from me.  The love I get far outweighs the times they annoy me.  Since I can’t tolerate the presence of other human beings, I will never live with anyone other than Speedy Shine again.  (Unless my landlord decides to move in… but I suspect he’ll mostly leave me alone, and I’m positive we won’t be cuddling at night, you know?)  As The Police tell us, “When the world is running down, you make the best of what’s still around.” 

Instead of giving in to the hatred, I found a way to turn up the volume of the love in my life.  I posted several pictures of Speedy Shine and me on Facebook.  You know what happened?  Hundreds of friends celebrated our union.  One friend is sending me toys for little Speedy Shine.  Another friend sent me a hundred dollars.  My Secret Favorite Person called Speedy Shine adorable, and that, alone, made me glow. 

I can’t control what others do, but I can, and I must, control myself and my reactions.  Instead of focusing on the hate, I redirected my focus to the extraordinary amounts of love I have received in my life.  I posted this:

I am learning that I lead an incredibly blessed life.  People who owe me absolutely nothing in any possible way keep helping me and making my life better day after day.  This has been happening, on and off, for a few years now. Is it karma?  Is it just that I’m nice to people when I can be?  Is it that the world is filled with beautiful people who do all they can to fill the Earth with Love?

I really don’t know.  But I know it happens.

I was having a bad week, for reasons that don’t need to be discussed in public.  My best friend, Stephanie, and her ex-boyfriend, Tim, helped me to bring a new dog into my life.  It took me more than 2 years to be ready for one after the death of my previous dog, Melanie.  Stephanie got her for me, too, so it was important to me that we would make this memory together.

Getting Speedy Shine everything he needed today took most of the rest of my money.  Then, a good friend, for no reason at all, sent me a message just now to check my Venmo.  I have the resources to make it a little longer.  It’s like the Universe has decided that, no matter what is going on, I’m going to be all right.

I continue to believe that Love is the most powerful force in the Universe.  I keep seeing its power over and over.

Thank you for being a part of my life.  I am beyond lucky to be the recipient of so much Love.

None of this repairs the damage that my friend did to me, but I will find ways to do that, myself.  What it did was serve as a treatment for the hatred that tried to seep in.  Hamlet taught us 400 years ago that nothing good can come from hatred. 

It wouldn’t have helped me to hurt someone who hurt me.  It would simply have hurt him, and I decline to derive pleasure from someone else’s pain.  For me, living a happy life, without hurting the one who hurt you, is the best revenge.  The longer I live, the colder the dish gets.

I don’t know what you do to turn up the Love and Joy in your life.  It might be spending more time with your kids.  It might be finding the courage to spread your own Love as far as you can before the Hate can pull it away.  Do you want to fight a battle?  Fight to rescue the Love in your heart.  Remember the words of The Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

“Returning hate for hate multiplies hate, adding deeper darkness to a night already devoid of stars.  Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that.  Hate cannot drive out hate, only love can do that.”

When the skies are darkest, we can Shine most brightly.  Let’s all try to spark the Light of Love to Shine through the Darkness of Hate.