Month: July 2016

The Spectrum of Uncertainty

Certainly in my lifetime, and probably over the course of the last 50 years or so, a trend has arisen concerning the stated opinions of others. An erosion in how we express ourselves has begun to expose the bedrock of uncertainty. I offer a spectrum of example statements, decreasing in rarity, of this uncertainty.

“It is a mathematical and scientific certainty that you, sir, are a jerk.”

“I have a working theory, which has not been disproven, that you, sir, are a jerk.”

“I hypothesize that you, sir, are a jerk.”

“I am pretty sure that you, sir, are a jerk.”

“I believe that you, sir, are a jerk.”

“I think that you, sir, are a jerk.”

“Like, you know, you are being kind of a little bit of a jerk, sir. Lol.”

“I feel that you, sir, are a jerk.”

Do you notice that as we descend down this list, that the language becomes more and more familiar? Such is no coincidence. In fact, it has become so common place to talk about what we like totally sort of think, or much worse, feel, that we do not bat an eye when news anchors, celebrities, and political figures use this vague language.

I have been struggling to excise using my “feelings” to talk about what are really my beliefs, thoughts, and in some cases, the products of scientific exploration. It is a challenge on the level of reducing the use of distractors like, well, like, umm or errr.

While it is not easy to remove common words from your vocabulary, the effort is worth it. With each step, I move from a realm of uncertainty, to one where I can more clearly unpack the value of my mind through my verbal expressions. Won’t you join me?

Pokémon Go and the Unpaved Road

Like millions of people, I too have been suckered into the Pokémon Go craze. I won’t talk about the mechanics or which one I think is the cutest (eevee). Instead I have a true story about how this game has created new human connections for me.

My wife and I were walking around the neighborhood hunting for Pokémon. We decided to track one down a road we have walked by dozens of times.

When you pass by it looks like a dead end. However, Pokémon Go includes a map of the roads and it would seem that this road merely bend’s out of view. It does in fact cut through to the road we live on.

Part of the reason that we never go down there is because it is unpaved. It just seems unfinished. As though you could never go there. It is difficult to perfectly explain why.

Well, we were playing freaking Pokémon and it said we could go there. Zen and I turned to one another, gave a tiny shrug, and headed down phones in front of us.

As soon as we did a tiny weiner dog started barking and I noticed a middle aged woman sitting on a lawn chair while her dogs inspected the fence, desperate for a way to close the distance between us and them.

The woman said hello, got up from her chair and met us at the fence. We could tell she wanted to chat. She asked where we lived and very soon after said, “they say this street is private.”

I thought great. She’s going to cordially tell us to piss off, like that asshole with the dock. But that’s not what happened.  She distinguished herself from that condescending mofo and instead said, “yeah, the city won’t pave this stretch of the road.”

“You see,” she continued, “the other half of the road does get paved. It’s not ‘private’.” This seemed crazy. But it was true, from there I could see the bend in the road ahead and it was paved! Both parts of the road have the same name (I checked after the fact ).

She elaborated that the city plowed there, but wouldn’t pave. What’s more,  each year they have a block party. The people from the paved half wear one kind of shirt and people from the unpaved road wore something different.  At the block party they meet in the middle and play tug of war. I kid not.
Long story short,  we were invited and I for one am looking forward to it.  All because of Pokémon Go.