I come home after a long night at the Bistrot. I'm pretty dead. The TV is sitting there. Feed the cat. Okay, what's on. Answer: crap. Well, there's Comcast on Demand. No decent free movies, of course, so let's check in with Mad Men. Someone to drink with.

This must be quite obvious. We watch our shows basically because we feel emotionally invested in them. They become our virtual friends in our lonely situations. (Even Ken Burns' Baseball series is rooted in this manipulation. We grow to care about Lou Gehrig. And I don't really have a problem with that, as Gehrig was an interesting guy.) I find myself feeling for Don Draper. It's a success of the show, and this is why people say of whatever it is, 'that's my show.' As if they owned it.

Then there's me, the barman, who shows up regularly every week, waiting for people to come. He talks with regulars, has a laugh, maybe shares a drink, gets updates, reports on his own affairs. And at the end of the night, after everyone's gone home and long since in bed, he goes home, pours himself a glass of wine and finds something for himself to do. Year in, year out.

I guess if you're capable of emotional investment in created characters, it's a good thing, a practice of empathy. Not like you wear it out using it. But it says something, we have to turn sometimes to fake people, not the potential real friendships we might make.

Anna Karenina belongs to eternity for the light it sheds on brain circuitry and function. (The Buddhist will continue to study it, if no one else.) Intersections, shared pathways, the basic similarity or cooperation between different outward functions, shown in the two principal characters, present the brain in action, as good a portrait as had been produced in the form of fiction. And it seems there is a message here, that erotic considerations and romantic depth of thought are both excellent for the health of intellectual activity, perhaps as physical action is to the body. Anna's clarity is Levin's clarity, both revealing a fine brain. For some reason, the author saw fit that she falls to tragedy, which strikes us as a departure from the art. Perhaps Tolstoy felt conflicted for underscoring the good health of 'adulterous' thinking, as it contradicted church teachings. He wanes then into his own moralizing, and the reader feels left short.

The intelligent and the accurate have always been bawdy, earthy, 'perverted' around the edges. It's much the same circuitry, part of a finely tuned versatile brain. The nobly romantic and engaged are rooted and wired in all the brain's wide considerations, high and low. And this is why being hypocritical doesn't lead to the highest kind of thinking.

Only the sort of Jesus who drives a Bentley would try to 'cure' certain modes of human sexuality.

In the context of the excellent new book The Shallows, What the Internet is doing to our brains, by Nicholas Carr, a barman's life is not over-stimulated. Well, maybe he is, in the sense of his coping with a busy night, full of drink orders, full of people, full of movement, full of interchanges monetary, verbal, etc. But his job is not involved with any communications outside of his immediate environment. Take it or leave it. Furthermore, those people he talks to, most likely, he has talked with before, if his spot is a neighborhood joint.

My generation, we had a chance to grow up before we were proliferated. We had radio, we had TV, we had record players. And we read books. And I grew up out in the country, in some form of special circumstances, in that I got not just new music, but the long natural spaces and time of being out there. And, again, I had the opportunity to grow up surrounded by books.

When I went away to college, when I sat down and watched my classmates interact, I had a subconscious sense of some form of shallowness to their worldly sophistication, to their abilities to express themselves quite confidently. I sensed that these people, my same age, had an early form of adulthood upon them. They had egos. They liked to hear themselves talk. They liked to argue. They didn't seem to need to think much in order to hold the floor. And their minds seemed to me to work awfully quickly. And they were from a world of the city. And where I grew up sort of unwittingly, the child of liberal arts, surrounded by books and art and architecture, modest, imaginative, broad without that air of sophistication of being a 'know it all,' here I was, with perfect know-it-alls. Again, they liked to talk. And I did not particularly like being around their conversations, which struck me with the feeling that I had been dropped into a support group for divorcees.

I found some mates, definitely, in those days, and they were contrarians like me, even if I was the hick of the whole bunch, prone to being, as they put it, a wild man. I thought that's how you learned, by testing your limits, and following your instincts. And I did learn some things. While they were more controlled than I, and had a prep school sophistication I would never have.

My generation stood at a crossroads, at a point in time. We grew up, when we were little, in quiet days, way before the internet, when going to a movie even was a huge deal. We grew up with long spaces of silence in which to go explore a stream or a wood, a swamp, country roads.

And for my generation some had already been exposed to the seeds of what was coming, a globally connected world of mass and instant communication. Some already smelled it, and sensed that life is adaptation, so adapt.

And then there were those of us who in some ways chose to be left behind, not as conscious ignoramuses or idiots wanting nothing to do with society, but because we had some form of values, ones we sensed but couldn't express beyond a form of art. It was as if some of us chose to be part of an arcane oral culture of winks and nods and eye contact and song. We had a sense of vitality.

And this is my fascination with the music of Shane MacGowan, born Christmas Day, 1959. He grew up, in summers at least, on a farm in Tipperary. He grew up in an oral culture on a real farm where everyone played a musical instrument. At that particular time, he had a chance to live in a way that soon was to disappear. Here he learned, placed up upon a table at age 3, how to sing, traditional songs. It's obvious that he was well-taught, learning from talented singers and musicians. His music reflects a sensibility, a lack of distraction hard to find now.

One finds his music inclusive, broad, covering expanses of life. In a world of specialists, he is a generalist, as all artists should be, sprung from nature, depicting nature.

One senses it as his own form of dirty secret, that he can't ever be fully engaged, at the pace and scale required, with the world wrought by the economic reality of bowing to the technology of the internet. And here, it seems, no one can find a separate peace.

A writer is attempting to describe in the course of his work that beautiful yet often imprisoned thing, the human brain. It's perhaps a similar function to the mating ritual a bird performs, showing off his brain, but with a broader less selfish reaching, an attempt to find 'like minds' through a higher form of communication.

Whereas other work shows off products of the brain--the kind of 'here, look at this,' kind of stuff we find in shallower media--the writer's quiet work reveals how and what we think on an intimate level, as if to instruct the reader that he or she also can think big thoughts in big ways.

That's why people like to read love stories (Anna Karenina), for showing the finest and most courageous acts of the mind, even when they may seem ostensibly misdirected (A Tale of Two Cities). Or it could be a tale of some form of patriotism, the acknowledgment of an ideal to be protected, the endurance of oppression, the magical vitality of an art form taken up.

The brain is its own thing, to be perpetually discovered and rediscovered, a resilient organ of marvels of ingenuity. We mortals live our lives as partner to our brains, instinctive caretakers, defenders of the brain's style of work. Shy and enigmatic, we court it, allowing for its own quiet ways.

That is the source of bravery, that we know we have such a fine instrument within, a secret in the modern world which the modern world still needs to come to terms with, never being able to escape the brain's reality.

I think it's fair for the artist and the writer to say, 'it was not my choice, not my will, but something I was obliged to do out of some real sense of honor and duty.' So is the writer always looking for 'his country, his people.' That is his politics, which, by the way, happens to coincide with the protections of freedom and liberty nations make constitutions out of.

The writer will endure a lot. Even treated like a dog, he will have within a secret source of perfect dignity.

Some people are writers. They get the effort. They see the beauty of it. And some people are not writers, and if you were to ask them about something literary, they might shrug and say, 'eh, it's not so important to me, the latest of Milan Kundera's thoughts on the history of the novel; I'm too busy reading things more pertinent to economic survival, and besides, I get more from non-fiction.'

If you are a writer you'll do yourself the favor of writing a novel and discover a great silence. It's a feeling you might get from having done something inappropriate. No one wants to mention it, for they know that they must upbraid you one way or another.

But there are, you may discover, a few people who do respond with depth and interest, making it clear that their reaction is positive, that they see you've actually accomplished something. The more a writer they are, the more positive they will be. For it is so that anyone who cares seriously enough to write, just by physical laws of machines and the appropriate instrument for a task, will do a darn good job at it. Yes, there might be some minor issues to sweep aside to get at the book's accomplishment, but that is small stuff in comparison to opening the door to experience a book's simple resounding greatness.

In contrast to the certain light-filled people who get books, the lack of response makes one think of a dullard world. A world on Fox, etc.

I find it interesting that I found work that allowed for a very old technology. I was a cog in a tool that allowed for public conversation. I was, in other words, a bar man. It's as old as the hills. People come down to eat, have a drink and relax, listen to some piped-in music that doesn't offend but rather eases, and break into, as awkward as it is, a conversation.

In fact, one of the first stories I ever wrote, inspired as I was by Tolkien, was of a kid who works for a public house pitted, along with his respected wizardly elder, against the stark blighting force of an evil sorcerer (who'd gut forests just for kicks.) We met the kid delivering what sounded like very interesting libations, ale and mead. Funny how things go.

Now I grant, or warrant, that manning the pouring end of a restaurant bar, besides being work, did not lead to the most glorious of conversations. And indeed, the conversations that happened within the establishments I worked maintained a separate reality from the busy work and strivings and no-nonsense practicality of the modern city blossoming as a great crossroads of international relations and domestic politics. But, in speaking, memories, more than anything came up, and I must believe that memories are hugely important--in fact, that it all a great understatement. No, they were not maudlin memories, they were in fact very healthy ones that showed active brains and vivid interaction and trust for the venue. And I could sit back and enjoy, sort of impersonally, that fine thing that was going on, a person and their memories, their footing in the modern world.

The book now, come to hear, from wise circles, is too becoming something of an old 'historic' technology. Do we have time for them? Have our neural pathways gone to mirror the hyper linking bits of information found on the computer, no longer a habit of ours to sit down and take that long slow time with a book that's 'not that interesting'?

What will happen of our brains and our thoughts, our sympathies for our fellows?

It's interesting to me at least that my work brings me to a place where people meet to enjoy a very old and natural technological achievement, wine. (To Hemingway, 'the most civilized thing.') Wine brings mellowness and memory; it eases the blows and self-inflicted wounds of the day; it opens us up to memory and song; even if we might get a little silly, a little maudlin, wine will snap us out of it.

And a great book, say Moby Dick, is told with the ease of a brain on a moment of good wine.

I hop around too much. I think I can tell my brain has been affected (or infected) by the medium of the times, the information super highway that takes us hurtling, for a ride, not sure of which exit to get off, of if we take one, not sure we shouldn't be somewhere else and thereby end up at that which is simple easy pleasure narcotic.

Like the grape that is the most essential part of the wine, we, human being, writer, character, person, are the most essential thing in any intelligent consideration. Let's remember not to forget ourselves in all this.

I say that because when I go out at night in a city I see a lack of attention, a lack of curiosity, sympathy, empathy, and in place of all that--this is nothing new perhaps--highlight on the shallow and the surface, meaning that there is less interplay with an inner world of sensitivity taken seriously, places within that have nothing to do with show.

Oh, well. Hamlet himself said it, not so long ago, but enough to be trustworthy, "man delights not me." The inner workings, yes, the memories, yes, the tale-telling... but the rest... just dull, expected. Try blending in with a Friday night crowd these days (though I'm not completely pessimistic.)

So, really, am I crazy for writing a book, for channelling my prose to the mind's memory banks in hope of some enlightenment? The enlightenment is not in the answers, but in the activity itself.



The internet, the general shapes of our lives, it seems to me, require a lot of downtime, a lot of time to digest, a lot of time to sleep and dream.

Something scary

Technology spokespeople tend to emphasize the good about stuff.

"Wiring the Classroom," Sunday NY Times Magazine Section, by Maggie Jones, p. 62. September 19, 2010. "Technology is redefining what it means to be a student--or a teacher."

Here the emphasis is on the cyber math tutor Isabel. She's watching you work through a set of problems, and through her silicon board of zeros and ones, yeses and nos, she is diagnosing your problems.

This is about such "internet tutors," who are not real people, but programs.

"Some will be assigned to tutors who match their sex and races. Others will be given tutors who do not match. Students will be hooked up to sensors monitoring sweat (which indicate excitement or anxiety), the pressure they place on their mice (frustration) and how much they fidget in their seat cushions. A tiny camera atop the computer will register the slight furrow of the brow, the smile, the tilt of the head and the eye movements that indicate attention, nervousness, satisfaction. The resulting information will be used to tailer the tutors' encouragements to achieve the maximum education outcome."

I am getting a really bad vibe here, about these 'affective pedagogical agents.' LIsten to the tone here. Is this writer someone you want to talk to?

Next, and final paragraph continues: "'Computer tutors are never going to completely replace human teachers or be 100 percent accurate,' Picard warns. But if Isabel keeps students engaged in math with her emotion-friendly style, she will have done plenty."

Jesus, I guess we've all been replaced by machines. Including the faculties of the New York Times. Is this what it's come to?

Oh, no, really, 'it's all good.' Yeah. Get me out of here.

Spirituality is depth, and we live, may be, in shallow times.

We are afraid of goodness. We take it to be a little creepy. It doesn't fit in. How to achieve good anyway these days? Where is its refuge? Where does it gather strength? A church, as it is there too as everywhere else, just highlighted.

Maybe we take goodness too lightly, by habit, thoughtlessly. Kindness and a $1.50 gets you on the bus.

I wonder if drinking wine is an attempt to ease the pain of being spiritual, of having the huge reservoirs of good that are natural in anyone but which leave you feeling baffled to do anything about. What do you do with all that excess? Conviviality seems one outlet, but then that has a way of going too far.

I wrote a book about a kid who's trying to be decent in the modern world. He's trying to take things very seriously. He wants to know why we really read Paradise Lost or Shakespeare, etc. He tries to represent some vague sense of spirituality, a sense of meaning, of being here for a reason. He gets bad grades, gets taken for being a weirdo.

Do you come to loathe your own goodness? Is that what the world does to you? Make you want to disown it for its lack of popularity and caché, leave you mystified and tired?




I was out on a bike ride out past the Beltway, near the Mormon Temple, and my bike chain breaks. Never happened to me before. Not a dollar in my pocket. I'm near a Metro. I walk there, my hand covered in chain oil. I ended up calling a cab. But I wondered, maybe I could ask someone, 'hey, could you loan me two bucks for the metro?' I couldn't find the words to do it. I lacked, I guess, faith.


When I am feeling as if imprisoned by my life, I am reminded of the thought that people come into our lives, for good reason, to highlight certain elements of existence, each serving ultimately to strengthen our faith and help us endure, living in the right as best we are given to.