I am reading Microserfs by Douglas Coupland and rewatching Silicon Valley season 1. I’ve dropped into what will ultimately be a short-lived obsession burn with tech and silicon valley. It’s so interesting to me that I was born and grew up smack dab in the middle of this area and the timeframe when all of this started, and kinda had no idea what was happening or what it meant. It’s so weird to read the protagonist talking aboout San Carlos and in that timeframe I was in San Carlos multiple times a week. It feels jarring and fun to have been so close to something with no visibility.
Is that a similar experience to people that grew up where I did at the time I did but had no connection to what was going on? My famiy and my historical family didn’t really touch tech. I come from lines of people that came here for reasons other than technology. In a way it feels really rare but maybe it’s not. It doesn’t mean anything, just another window to look through. I look through it and it makes me crave diversity and different things and people, and I know the Bay Area doesn’t seem like that but I hope deep down it’s still the way I saw it as a kid: with all the things I touched and all the things I didn’t touch.
I think I drop into this obsession burn because I try to connect with that feeling that I think a lot of people that come here and that came here for technology feel. It’s like the gold rush. What is it about the West Coast and the gold rushes? Is it because there’s nowhere else to go except hop on a plan and be on a beach? Can’t find much on a beach. Can’t build much on a beach. And who would want to? I took a class at Berkeley on Hans Christian Andersen and even he talked about California. How can I connect with it in that way? Is it that different than the way I already connect with it?
I guess maybe it’s a failure to connect with that rush feeling. Is that a sign of getting older? Is wanting quiet about getting older or is that how I’ve always been? how does who I’ve always been keep changing as I get older? how does who I was change as I get older? How strange to think of the past as something that can change but it does so much and as time keeps going it just keeps changing and changing. It’s so freeing to think of the past more like a cloud than a brick wall.
Anyway…the rush. I like watching and reading about the rush because it’s like a spectator sport. Does any of it really mean anything? Like anything it only means what you want it to mean, or what you think other people want it to mean. I think.
It’s spring break and I wish I took the whole week off. I don’t really feel like working. More people asking for your thoughts, suggestions, ideas, and where to they go? out the window. Doesn’t matter. I can always read a book when I’m done. What else is there? That’s why I wish I took the whole week off. That’s all there is and that’s the good stuff.
In a bonsai book they talk about how giving the trees a lot of sun can act as a natural way to suppress growth, thereby resulting in miniature trees. They give the example of how alpine trees on bare mountain tops are usually smaller than counterparts. They also talk about how water abundance can work against suppressing growth, resulting in bigger (more normal) trees. How fascinating that abundance can have anthithetical effects depending on what is abundant. I need to cut back on watering my trees maybe.
Went to the library today. Picked up a DVD hold and found a book on the history of direction (EAST/WEST/NORTH/SOUTH). Looked super interesting but I didn’t pull the trigger. I’m in a little bit of regret.
Are you ever really happy one day, like for most of the day, and by the time you get home it just fizzles? And there’s really no reason; like there’s no specific reason. It just feels a little bit like a letdown because maybe it feels like because you’re so happy there should be these fireworks or some award or some other person there with you that’s happy too or that you’re making happy by being so happy and so you’re both just swimming in this happiness and this giddiness and playfulness. But it fizzles because that’s not how life is. It’s like the happiness is the coming back up for air before you go back below the surface. Maybe that’s what we live on and some days it just hits harder that we have to go back below the surface. Maybe this is one of those days.
dirttoleaves.com 