Ep. 325: "Covered in Science"
Merlin: Hello.
Merlin: Hi, John.
Merlin: Hi, Merlin.
Merlin: How's it going?
Merlin: Coo-coo-coo.
Merlin: It's a real vista into island living.
John: It is.
John: You know, what our listeners don't know is that we skipped the first week of recording.
John: Although we've had two...
John: shows from here boy there could have been a third is that right i don't know i don't remember i'm really confused if i don't look at the spreadsheet i'm not going to remember
Merlin: Yeah, it's a lot to take in.
Merlin: I trust a lot of my brain to spreadsheets, and it's really mostly working out.
Merlin: You just got to remember to update the spreadsheet.
Merlin: I don't know how to use a spreadsheet.
Merlin: Oh, my God, John.
Merlin: You would love it.
Merlin: Here's what I know about you.
Merlin: You like looking at Romania on Google Earth.
Merlin: Yes.
Merlin: You like tagging MP3s.
Merlin: i mean i i will tag an mp3 you you like an immersive an immersive act of uh i don't know i mean of meta you like metadata you like stuff i'm just telling you that's right if you give me a stack of mp3s and and tell me to to sort through them yes i'll sort through them and give them some ratings now wait is that construction equipment
John: Oh, yeah.
John: Well, no.
John: No.
John: No one here is really... There's a lot of performative building.
Merlin: Performative building.
John: Okay.
John: Yeah.
John: I mean, a lot of fences get erected.
John: People drive around in trucks.
John: Okay.
John: But I don't see any... I mean... Well, let me correct that.
John: From one year to the next, you see new things here.
John: But you also see a lot of people with hard hats on.
John: Staring off into the middle distance.
John: Oh, it might be like what they call a make work project.
John: There's quite a bit of that, yeah.
John: I can't imagine... Oh, you know, that might... Who knows what that beeping was, honestly.
Merlin: Do you understand how a spreadsheet works at a high level?
John: You've got some... It's a table.
John: You've got columns going this way and columns going that way.
John: Yeah.
John: Rows and columns.
John: Rows and columns.
John: You add some words to a box.
John: Yep, yep.
John: So far, so good.
John: Then down...
John: somewhere else other things appear that populate because you added things to the box.
Merlin: You pretty much nailed it.
Merlin: Let me ask you this.
Merlin: You ever like to figure out how much money you're going to make?
Merlin: Oh, no.
Merlin: Okay, okay.
Merlin: No, that's terrifying.
Merlin: You could do a lot of what-if type speculation stuff with your rows and your columns.
Merlin: So the rows and the confluence of a row and a column is a cell, and a cell is a little bit of data.
Merlin: And so that data could be
Merlin: uh, you could have maximums and minimums.
Merlin: You can say model based on this, like tell me like what happens if these following things do or don't happen.
Merlin: It's very absorbing, very relaxing.
Merlin: If, if then statements, you can, you can also have conditional formatting.
Merlin: You can say, you could say when, uh, this is a high value, you know, give it a green.
Merlin: If it's a low value, give it a red.
Merlin: You can do that kind of stuff.
Merlin: It's very, I'm not here to, I'm not here to stand for spreadsheets, but they're really, really cool.
John: You know, I've been working really hard to bring more aloha into my life.
Merlin: This is so interesting.
Merlin: We talked last week about your extended stay there.
Merlin: I have a lot of questions about how that's going, if you want to talk about that.
Merlin: But it sounds to me like you've leaned in.
Merlin: You've leaned into the aloha lifestyle after some reluctance about having a Brooklyn accent.
Yeah.
John: I'm trying.
John: I'm trying to.
John: But, you know, so what happens is you're describing spreadsheets to me, and I'm thinking...
John: Is this aloha?
John: Or are spreadsheets not aloha?
Merlin: That's super interesting.
Merlin: See what I'm saying?
Merlin: Oh, no, I think I do.
Merlin: It's, you know, like, is this cool or is this not cool?
Merlin: Is this legal or is this not legal?
Merlin: This becomes a bar.
Merlin: You're doing an aloha evaluation.
John: And a couple of pretty valid questions, I think.
John: First of all, is the whole concept of spreadsheets and spreadsheeting
John: Is that aloha?
John: Or is it, is the aloha-ness dependent?
John: Is it data dependent?
John: Like, can one spreadsheet be aloha and the next spreadsheet be not aloha?
John: Or can some action within a spreadsheet be aloha?
John: But some other, you know, behavior...
John: Making a spreadsheet, interacting with a spreadsheet, that's where you lose Aloha.
John: Yes.
John: Honestly, I don't.
John: I'm still so new at Aloha.
John: It's very early there.
John: It is.
John: And I really don't know that much about spreadsheets either.
Merlin: Yeah, but you're bringing a spirit of aloha.
Merlin: I mean, let it begin with me.
Merlin: It seems like step zero is you're introducing this notion of the aloha evaluation.
Merlin: If we run this through the shape sorter, what do we arrive at?
Merlin: And you're also saying, let's be honest, this is the medium of the massage.
Merlin: Like, what are we talking about here?
Merlin: What are we talking about?
Merlin: Is this going to be a hang loose type situation?
Merlin: Is this a shaka bra?
Merlin: Can you shaka this?
John: It could be a full mahalo.
John: What I'm, you know, like, for instance, I've been trying to see a turtle every day.
John: Oh, that's a good.
John: See, it's important to have goals.
John: Yeah.
John: I just decided, like, look, every day I'm going to have it.
John: I'm going to see a turtle and I'm going to walk five miles.
John: So good.
John: So every day.
John: And so what it does is when I'm sitting here and I'm, you know, and I'm listening to the birds coo and I'm watching the leaves in the fronds because the leaves get in the fronds.
John: And the wind gets in the leaves, which are in the fronds, and pretty soon it's just like... I can feel the change in you already.
Merlin: You've become much more pastoral.
Merlin: You're like an early REM album.
John: I can feel it.
John: You're green, you're verdant.
John: The kudzu is all over me, and I think I've told you, I said that to Peter Buck one time, and he was like, no, that was our other album.
John: Hmm.
John: All the great albums.
John: I was like, wow, I love that album.
John: I could smell the kudzu, and he was like, no, that was our other album.
Merlin: Anyway... So there's turtle time, there's walking time, there's fronds and leaves and how they interact, and then you get to win your regular fucking Walt Whitman.
John: But when I'm... So in order to see a turtle... Because I don't want to see a turtle laying on a beach.
John: I want to see a turtle on the hoof.
John: You know, like in...
John: In Turtle Town.
John: I want turtle time in Turtle Town.
John: Okay.
John: So I've had to get my whole snorkel thing where I'm not scared anymore and I'm practicing that every day.
John: So I put my snorkel on.
John: I go down into the water.
John: I sail around.
John: I sail away, sail away, sail away.
John: I encounter some turtles.
John: We have some times.
John: And one thing I've noticed is that a turtle cannot...
John: Be not aloha.
Merlin: Turtle cannot be... Okay, okay.
Merlin: See what I mean?
Merlin: I think I do.
Merlin: You're saying a turtle is a natively aloha species.
John: Yes.
John: Everything that a turtle does is aloha.
Merlin: Oh, look at him.
John: He's taking his time.
John: Sure.
John: Yeah.
John: And, you know, the ocean comes and blows the turtle.
John: The turtle goes with the ocean.
John: Turtle doesn't fight it.
John: Turtle doesn't fight it.
John: If you come along with your snorkel on and say, you know, like... Yeah.
John: The turtle goes with it.
John: The turtle does not, you never see a turtle frown.
John: He doesn't overreact.
Merlin: He doesn't underreact.
Merlin: He just turtles.
John: That's right.
John: He says, I've been here a long time before you got here.
John: I'm going to be here a long time after.
Merlin: That's probably literally true.
John: Yeah.
John: Yeah.
John: So anyway, so I'm down there.
John: I'm like, okay, first of all, cool.
John: I'm in your world.
John: You're not in mine.
John: So I'm not going to be, I'm not going to do anything.
John: I'm not going to turn down his music or something.
John: No, no, I'm not going to touch him.
John: I'm not going to tell him he's doing it wrong.
John: You're not going to give him scritches and tell him he's a good boy?
John: Nope, not going to do that.
John: I am not capable of judging whether he's a good boy or not.
John: Oh, that is so aloha, let's be honest.
John: Right, I have only just started figuring out how to tell whether he's a boy or not.
John: Does he reply to lots of women's tweets?
John: Not to be turtle normative, but they kind of look alike to me.
John: I have a lot of turtle friends.
John: I know.
John: I have a lot of turtle friends, and some of them are good friends, but I can't tell them apart.
John: Yeah, you don't see turtle gender.
John: No, I don't.
John: Some are big, and I don't see color, but some are big, some are small.
John: That's all I can tell at first.
John: Now I know.
John: Oh, I see.
John: Like your tail is telling me a story.
John: There are other things that are telling stories here.
John: But but the primary thing is when I'm in the water, the only thing here's the key.
John: Yeah.
John: When I'm in the water, the only thing not aloha is me.
Merlin: Oh, my God.
Merlin: You don't know that.
Merlin: Well, that's it, though.
Merlin: I don't.
Merlin: You don't know that.
Merlin: The only thing.
Merlin: Well, you know, he wakes up every morning, say, I'm going to swim five miles and try to see a John Roderick.
Hmm.
John: That's possible, but I don't think that's... I'm not worried about his aloha.
John: That's the thing.
John: That's what my sister taught me.
John: I can't affect his aloha.
Merlin: You can't affect his aloha.
John: All I can affect is my own aloha.
Merlin: You're going to be there.
Merlin: You're going to inhabit the space and detect the aloha.
John: The thing is, in the spreadsheet of this experience and time, the only cell that has the capacity to either be aloha or not...
John: is me, as far as I can tell.
Merlin: Whoa.
John: That is surprisingly woke, John.
John: All the other cells are just, you know, there are other functions acting on them.
John: They have other capabilities.
Merlin: Interesting.
Merlin: The empty cells are like open water.
John: Yeah, right.
John: You've put different conditions on those cells.
John: So those cells, if X, then Y, if N, and, then 3, or.
John: But in the water, the only one that is like, if uncool, then not aloha, is me.
John: I think you'd really enjoy spreadsheets.
John: But then what's nuts is as soon as I get out of the water...
John: then the capacity for other non-aloha things just skyrockets.
John: Because there are cars, there are other people, there are music.
John: Other people are not aloha generally.
Merlin: So you're not there to detect the aloha of the turtle, but you can't help but notice the environmental aloha or lack of aloha once you're back on dry land.
Merlin: Exactly.
Merlin: You can see when somebody's being, I don't know what, not cool.
John: Well, but okay, so now here's my problem.
John: So I started walking through the resorts.
John: There's a trail that runs through like 25 different hotel resort environments.
John: And you're on the trail and you're like, you got the ocean on your right, you've got the hotels on your left, and you're in like...
John: Four seasons environment a four seasons cultivated environment and then you cross an imaginary property line threshold and now you're in like a boutique hotel Cultivated environment and you just keep walking and a quarter mile mile later.
John: You're in you know a Yeah, and they're you know, they're all nice hotels sure But so as I ran they brand their beaches John
John: Yeah, yeah, but and a lot of those hotels are situated up on a cliff.
John: They don't really even have a beach They compensate with pools.
John: Okay.
John: Okay But so walking through those different environments, you know, I'm on a north to south trajectory They are all hotels that are facing You know, they're facing east and
John: So they're on an east-west trajectory.
John: The people that are staying there wake up, they look out the window, and they're looking out to the east to the ocean, and they go, right.
John: If it's looking east, they get a sunrise.
John: Oh, I'm sorry.
John: No, they're looking west.
John: My bad.
John: They look out west, they get a sunset.
John: They get a sunset.
John: So they're all facing the sunset.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: I just want to point out, you have a better sense of direction than anybody I know, maybe excluding my wife, and you are so aloha at this point that the directions are just words.
Merlin: I don't even know what I'm doing.
Merlin: You're so deep in the cells at this point that you know, here's the direction you need to know, turtles.
Merlin: That's turtles.
Merlin: Is that a cardinal direction?
Merlin: I don't know.
Merlin: I have zero sense of where I am oriented in space or time.
Merlin: You're in the water or you're not in the water is the thing.
Merlin: And what is a compass even going to do for me in this situation?
Merlin: So they're up on a cliff.
Merlin: They're up on the Marriott cliff.
John: I have my compass.
John: They're looking out.
John: And then I'm coming through on us.
John: I'm going north-south.
John: So they see me enter the frame on stage right.
John: And they see me move across.
John: And then I exit stage left.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: And that's their only encounter with me, right?
John: We're like living in different time bubbles.
John: I'm like behind the bookshelf pushing books out trying to communicate with them.
John: Absolutely.
John: And they're just like, what was that speck in between me and the sunset?
John: They're traveling, but you're a traveler.
Merlin: Hmm, you know what I mean?
Merlin: But see I don't know your secret.
Merlin: They might be seeking continental breakfast But you're out there saying okay world have at me now normally I would be
John: Making a distinction like that, I would be like, oh, my God.
Merlin: I just did it.
Merlin: I just did it, didn't I?
Merlin: I did it.
Merlin: I'm in San Francisco, and I'm worried about all this rain that's going to come.
Merlin: And I'm being really fucking unaloha.
Merlin: I'm not saying anything about your aloha.
Merlin: See, God damn it.
Merlin: You're so good at this.
John: I'm tearing myself up about my lack of aloha.
Merlin: I don't think it's me or being good at aloha.
Merlin: No, it's all me.
Merlin: I'm the generator of the unaloha.
Merlin: What's the opposite of aloha, John?
Merlin: Is it aloha?
Merlin: Is there an opposite of aloha?
John: It's not mahalo.
John: It's not aloha.
John: I'm not sure.
John: Agape love.
John: In surfer culture, I guess it's a bummer.
John: Well, you know what?
John: The opposite of aloha is harsh toke.
John: Harsh toke.
John: Harsh toke is the opposite of aloha.
John: Because the thing about a harsh toke is...
John: Harsh toke is not quality of weed dependent.
John: You can get bad weed.
Right.
John: Or great weed.
John: It's the singer, not the song.
John: Right.
John: You could still potentially get a harsh toke out of either one of those.
Merlin: You're down there letting a turtle come to you in the spirit of Aloha.
Merlin: Maybe somebody throws a straw down.
Merlin: Which, as we know, as we've seen from photographs, goes straight up the noses of many turtles.
Merlin: That's a harsh toke.
Merlin: Am I wrong?
Merlin: Is that a harsh toke?
Merlin: Oh, that's a very harsh toke.
Merlin: I'm not saying that.
Merlin: I hope.
Merlin: God, I don't even know anymore, John.
Merlin: I hope I'm not saying that in a judgmental way, because I don't mean it that way.
Merlin: Or do I?
Merlin: Or do I?
Merlin: Am I so deep in my own harsh tokes that I don't even know what I'm doing anymore?
John: Well, so I know for my part, a straw in the water is a harsh toke.
John: It's not Aloha.
Merlin: Oh, yeah.
John: But you know what?
John: The land is moving into the sea and not in Aloha way.
John: I mean, maybe there is a world in which a straw in the ocean is Aloha.
John: I don't know.
John: I'm not big enough, Marilyn.
John: I can't see.
Merlin: You're the sky and the weather.
Merlin: The ocean can encompass many, many cells and possibly the occasional straw.
Merlin: We're looking through a little tube of toilet paper trying to figure out what the fuck's going on.
Merlin: And is the turtle happy?
Merlin: And does it matter?
Merlin: But I know that I'm here and this is sand.
Merlin: Is it sand or is it rocky?
Merlin: Isn't it kind of rocky in Hawaii?
Merlin: Both things.
Merlin: God damn it, John!
Merlin: I don't know if we can do this show anymore.
Merlin: I don't even know how to approach you.
Merlin: You've changed the paradigm.
Merlin: You've only been there for like five weeks and you've already changed everything.
Merlin: So I don't know.
John: Am I changed?
Merlin: Has it changed?
Merlin: Wow.
Merlin: Is Uncle Jack appreciating this?
Merlin: Is he absorbing all of this from you?
John: Well, so Uncle Jack, so what happened around here is that Uncle Junius...
John: And Aunt Joanne have arrived.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: So you covered that in Oregon where there wasn't coverage, and now there's a fresh supply of relatives.
John: But now we're all here together for two days.
John: Okay.
John: Yesterday when Uncle Jack woke up, it was still just the two of us, and he was having a bad day.
Merlin: He wasn't really able to stand up.
Merlin: You hear that phrase, but when you have an older relative, you hear that phrase, they have good days and bad days.
Merlin: Bad days suck.
John: Bad days were hard.
John: And it was one where, you know, like at 92 and 11 twelfths,
John: There's a feeling, and I think over the last three weeks, and I don't mean this.
John: You don't know how long you've been there.
John: You're an island time.
John: I don't.
John: And the thing is, there's a difference in him between when he came or when we came and now when I'm departing.
John: And a big part of that is that my sister likes to sit with old people and talk about death.
John: And so, yeah.
John: So Susan and he spent a long time with Susan saying, hey, man, whether you finish your memoir or not,
John: One day you're going to die and you're not going to know.
John: You're not going to know the difference.
John: That's pretty harsh.
John: Uncle Jack's like, well, but I've got to finish it.
John: I'm working on it.
John: She's like, yeah, I know, but then you'll be dead.
John: Yeah.
John: is this, is this like good for you or do you like it?
John: Is this how you want to spend your time or what?
John: And he's like, I've got, you know, work to do.
John: She's like, well, yeah, but work, I mean, you know, and then, and then we die.
John: And so she and he would have these like intense little powwows and then I would kind of have to come in and like, you know, sweep up the,
John: I mean, this is the old me, right?
John: Come and sweep up the toast crumbs.
Merlin: You come in and collect the harsh tokes.
John: Yeah, sweep up the cheese at his feet or whatever and say, Uncle Jack, it's okay, buddy.
John: You can keep working on your book and I'll help you.
John: And he's like, and so over the last three weeks, now he says things like,
John: I'm ready.
John: I'm ready for the next adventure, which is absolutely something that my mom said about death.
John: So I know Susan put it in his ear, but my mom was like, life is just an adventure and I'm ready for the next one.
John: And I grabbed her by her little cardigan sweater and I said, you are not ready for your next adventure.
John: This is my non-aloha past.
John: I was like, you have to stick around here.
Merlin: You can see that now with such clarity.
John: Yeah, well...
John: So anyway, so we had a bad morning.
John: It was like, uh-oh.
John: And from my standpoint, I was like, now what happens?
John: I mean, what do I call an ambulance?
John: If so, why exactly?
John: He can't travel, but he's also not like –
John: Like visibly dying, although who knows what visibly dying looks like.
John: Not me.
John: Anyway, so I got him up.
John: He's like, I can't feel my feet.
John: I was like, well, you know, here's the thing about feeling your feet.
John: Sometimes you do, sometimes you don't.
Merlin: You are the man for this journey.
Merlin: I'm way aloha now.
Merlin: I'm so aloha.
Merlin: You know, your feet... He probably forgot about that or hadn't thought of that.
John: He never thought of it.
John: His generation never did.
Merlin: No.
John: They were like, of course I feel my feet.
John: But then what happens if you don't?
John: I put on a suit every day.
John: Of course I feel my feet.
John: So I got him up on his feet.
John: I was holding him.
John: He's a heavy guy still.
John: He was...
John: Football.
John: He's still built like a football player, not like a football.
John: So I can get him up, and we're just, you know, and I'm not trying to walk him around.
John: It's not like I'm trying to walk a drunk guy out of his drunkness in order to put him up on his wedding day or something.
John: I'm just like, here we are.
John: Now we're on our feet.
John: How's it going?
John: And he's like, meh.
John: and i said all right well let's uh let you know let's just take this it's not even one day at a time it's not even really one step at a time it's just one you know like is this moment is this moment happening yes we're on our feet now we weren't a second ago and gradually he was like all right okay okay you know let go of me and then he's standing and then
John: You know, and I'm hands-off kind of like the first time you get a… Riding a bike?
John: Well, yeah, or like an RV-controlled drone that you get for Christmas.
John: There's that first time when you're like, whoa, it's flying.
John: And immediately he's like, fuck off, and off he goes.
John: And so I said, well, let's get out of the house and let's go visit the doctor.
John: We had a reason to be there anyway because he had other problems.
John: And we get there, and on the way out of the doctor's office.
Merlin: Did you drive him there?
John: Oh, yeah.
Merlin: Got him in the car.
John: Get him to the doctor.
John: He likes the doctor.
John: He doesn't like going to the doctor.
John: He likes this particular doctor.
John: Anyway, on the way out, I said to him, now, I looked down, and he's wearing these New Balance tennis shoes, and they're the exact same ones my dad wore.
Merlin: wore i don't know when new balance became like old man shoes velcro new balance are definitely the shoes of every elderly person i know because i remember there might be like some toms kind of scuffs for around the house but uh yeah it's always new balance i think they've got wide support a wide support that might be it help your appropriate reception when new balance first arrived on the scene my first remembering of them is that they were like technical running shoes for really advanced
John: cross-country people.
Merlin: Like Nike's are for wearing to the mall, but these are for performance.
John: This was performance, and I had a pair when I was on the cross-country team, and I think my dad started wearing them, and that was his first pair.
John: Maybe they liked the big N on it.
John: I'm not sure.
John: But I looked down at his shoes, and I said, oh, Jack, when was the last time you had a new pair of shoes?
John: And he was like, I don't know, 20 years ago?
John: And I said, yeah, those shoes look 20 years old.
John: He was like, they're great.
John: And I said, well, but the thing about it is the years take their toll on shoes, too.
John: And these shoes are what we call thrashed.
John: And so let's go to the shoe store and buy you some shoes.
Oh, my God.
John: Now, I might as well have said, let's take...
John: A bag of gold and throw it in the ocean.
John: It's so far to go.
John: And this guy, you know, this guy is like living in Hawaii for three months in his own three bedroom house.
John: It's not like it's not like a pair of shoes is that is going to make or break him.
John: But he is seriously like, what?
John: Shoes?
John: We don't know.
John: You know, just fighting me.
John: And I'm like, come on.
John: We're going to the fucking Aloha Mall.
Merlin: Do you have like a wheelchair or similar for him?
John: Nope, nope.
John: He won't do it.
John: Just like my dad, he wouldn't do it.
Merlin: But what about a walker?
John: No, no, no.
John: You're kidding.
John: He's bipedal all the way?
John: Oh, yeah.
John: And we move exactly at one mile an hour.
John: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
John: But we like to chat.
John: And that's the other thing about at what level of aloha you're happening.
John: It's another one of these time traveler things where everything is moving around you and you are...
John: Just moving so slowly.
Merlin: I don't like to use that as a verb, but you experience any environment so differently if you move through it at a different speed.
Merlin: I mean, it sounds silly, but it's absolutely true.
Merlin: I went through that just quickly.
Merlin: I went through that when we first had a kid because everything, every environment you've been comfortable with in the past is so different now.
Merlin: First of all, you have to bring 80 pounds of gear and something that rolls everywhere that you go.
Merlin: But you experience the idea of a restroom.
Merlin: You look at a restroom so differently because you think about, what if I had to change my kid in here?
Merlin: Just moving through a parking lot is so different.
Merlin: And in that case, I went through this with my grandmother when she had Alzheimer's.
Merlin: And it's like going out to dinner was such an undertaking and had so many twists and turns to it.
Merlin: It completely changed my POV about what that experience could be like.
Yeah.
John: It's so true, and it's particularly interesting when you're moving at a really slow speed with somebody, and it's also at any time possible that they might say, fuck you, to anyone, encountering them in any way.
John: Really?
John: Like in those words?
John: Yeah, oh yeah, because he is... He's candid?
John: Well, he's very frustrated with the fact that he is no longer...
John: uh young and in charge of himself and in charge of and you know but the men in my family always felt like in charge of the world and responsible for it and so when when he can't hear what someone is saying or when he doesn't understand what someone's doing he still wants to interject some of his authority into the situation yeah
John: And so we get to the shoe store, for instance, and we walk in and the very nice clerk comes over and says, you know, what's going on today and how do we help you?
John: And I said, well, we need some shoes.
John: And she says, oh, okay, well, what are you looking for?
John: And Jack says, I can't hear you.
John: And I go, well, Jack, first of all, you don't need to hear her right now because we're just having perfunctory conversation at the beginning of the transaction.
John: It isn't a thing that needs like a bunch of buy-in from you.
John: We're at a shoe store.
John: I'm going to walk you literally through this.
John: So just pull up a chair and like let go and let God go.
John: And partly, you know, he's trying to be in this situation because he hasn't had a new fucking pair of shoes in 20 years.
John: So anyway, but the best thing is we're in this shoe store and here's a question for you.
John: Tell me if this is Aloha or not.
John: Okay.
John: Okay.
John: It's a new segment on the show.
Merlin: Okay.
Merlin: I've learned a lot already, and I've learned how often I don't know what I've learned.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: I'm going to do the best that I can.
Merlin: So you're in the shoe store, and now in this text adventure game, the gal says, so what are we doing today?
Merlin: What do you want for shoes?
John: Yep.
John: And then she says, here, take off your shoes.
John: There's a pad on the floor that's about the size of a placemat.
John: And what you do is you start over here,
John: and you walk sideways across this mat so only one foot walks across the mat but you want to be walking not just standing on your foot you want to be walking so we see the stride and the pad is going to is going to evaluate the stride and the different pressure points of your foot as you pass and then it will put that into the computer and the computer will
John: we'll be able to process your stride so that we can find you the best possible.
Merlin: Let's make sure we enhance uncle Jack's performance.
John: That's right.
Merlin: You get the maximum performance out of his new shoes.
John: Right.
John: And wow.
John: So there's a part of me in that moment where I feel like I'm in, I'm at TSA and what we're experiencing is a little bit of security theater.
John: In this case, it's,
John: shoe it's it's art support theater shoe theater because the only thing she can sell us today is the shoes that she has in the back and whether or not they're not they're not taking this computer information and laser cutting
John: A special shoe for this man.
John: They have some shoes.
Merlin: It's almost a form.
Merlin: I was watching a YouTube video about psychics.
Merlin: No, actually, I'm sorry.
Merlin: It was John Oliver talking about psychics, but it's a form of almost like cold reading where now whatever she offers is going to seem like a scientific solution to the experiment that they ran.
John: Exactly.
Merlin: It's a basic kind of, forgive my saying, a pretty cheap magic trick to be able to do that and say, oh, okay, well, we know these two aren't going to be right for you.
Merlin: But given the performance characteristics of your 92-year-old feet, we're pretty sure this one's going to be right in your wheelhouse.
Merlin: Yeah, when she comes out with the stack of three or four boxes.
Merlin: Did she ask you if you wanted to do the performance review with the pad?
John: She said, you don't have to do this.
John: Okay.
John: But I said...
John: Hey, what I said is, look, this is your world.
John: We came into your world.
John: You're the turtle in this shoe store.
John: I am the snorkeler.
John: If in your shoe store world you are walking across this pad and that's what you do and that's the fucking seaweed that you eat here, then we'll walk across your pad.
John: And she says, hey, if you want to bring your own...
John: pre-assumptions about the fact that i've got some shoes in the back and i'm just going to go back and get some right i'll like live with you i'll go with your way because i because i work in a shop and i don't i don't have a massive investment in this computer either and frankly i know it's all fake too and i said uncle jack we're gonna walk across the pad okay
John: Now, and I don't know why, I don't know why I decide this, but I just, I'm like, look, we have, he and I are from a, we're from a group of people that have sought new experiences our whole lives.
John: And at any other point in his life, he would have walked across the pad.
John: So why stop now?
John: We've never we're not even when we know it's fake.
Merlin: I love this.
Merlin: I love this twist.
Merlin: This this shows you how on aloha I was.
Merlin: This is this is a great twist.
Merlin: You're you're Empowering him to be an adult man who gets the right shoes.
Merlin: Yeah, it's it's it's it's theater, but it could be some good theater It's it's hilarious theater.
John: So so then I have the excitement and the fun of standing with the shopkeeper and
John: And the thing is, he didn't wear his ear things this yesterday day either, so he can't hear anybody.
John: But people that have poor hearing can hear me because my voice resonates in their mandibles or something.
John: So I say, you start over here, you walk this way, and only your left foot hits the pad.
John: Well, we've been shuffling everywhere we've been.
John: he he's not taking big steps he's like going inch at a time but he puts his sits himself up and he takes one big step across the pad and comes out the other side and i'm like waiting to catch him like a like again a kid on a bike for the first time yeah and then he turns around and he does it again and then of course the second time it doesn't work so he has to set up and do it a third time oh boy but he's not complaining because we're in a we're in a new headspace
John: Like, this friendly turtle is helping us get magic shoes.
John: We're walking across this thing.
John: And then his stride shows up on the computer as a rainbow-colored, like, foot MRI.
John: And we're both fascinated by it.
John: So she goes in the back and she gets the five size 12s that she can lay her hands on.
John: But they come out and they're covered in science.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: Anyway, he puts on a pair of shoes.
John: He asks a couple of questions about how good these shoes are going to be in ice and snow because that's what we do if we're from Alaska.
John: And I reminded him that he's not going to be walking on ice or snow ever again because he can't really walk on pavement.
John: So he doesn't need to have shoes that work on ice and snow anymore.
John: And that's not a bad thing.
John: That's like...
John: You know, like if you finish your memoir or don't, one day you're going to be dead.
John: At this point in time, let's just leave snow and ice out of our list of considerations.
John: And he, so he starts walking across the store and he literally starts like kind of bouncing.
John: He's like, these feel amazing.
John: Really?
John: Yeah.
John: And so now he's standing up straight, his head's up in the air.
John: I mean, it's not like he's dancing, but I mean, he's like walking and... Well, it sounds like he's not shuffling.
John: No, no.
John: He's just like, oh, hey, look at these.
John: They feel great.
John: And I'm like, we'll take them and we don't need them boxed up or anything.
John: He's going to wear them out of the store.
John: And the lady's like, great, you know, bye.
John: And she puts his old shoes in a bag and...
John: And we walk out into the mall, or it's an outdoor mall, and I'm carrying the shoes in a bag, and he's like bouncing along.
John: And we get to the edge of the mall, and he says, do we want that bag of old shoes, or do you just want to throw them away?
John: Wow.
John: Which was like, what?
John: Wow.
John: You were very committed to these shoes an hour ago, like that these were some kind of thing you were going to pass on to your kids.
John: And now he's like, get them out of here.
John: So, but, you know, by the end of the day, like, he's walking around on his tiptoes in his new, like, and there's some kind of crazy Norwegian shoe that's, it's all, like, it's all hilarious.
John: I'm sure they're made in the same Chinese factory as everything else.
John: But he's sailing along, so by the time Junius and Joanne get here, like, we're in a great mood.
John: No one in the, they never would have guessed in a million years that the morning had started off so bad.
Mm-hmm.
John: But, you know, I'm just like, I'm just passing through time.
John: I'm not, I didn't really, I was just a, I was not a turtle.
John: I was not a straw.
John: I don't know what I was.
John: I was leaves and fronds.
John: I'm not sure what role I'm here to play or what role I was playing at that time or what Uncle Jack is.
Merlin: I don't either, but it sounds like you're playing it.
John: I'm not sure.
Merlin: Being there is a big part of it.
Merlin: Just, you know, however it ended up being the way that it is, your being there is a big deal.
Merlin: I mean, if you don't realize that today, you'll realize it tomorrow.
Merlin: Or whenever you get to leave.
Merlin: I'm not sure I'll ever get to leave.
John: But, you know, when I'm walking that trail, and I think you've been to where I'm talking about.
John: Have you been...
Merlin: Have you been to Wailea?
Merlin: Oh my god, that really sounds like it.
Merlin: Let me look it up.
Merlin: We stayed in, I want to say the northeast part of... So you were in Lahaina or something?
Merlin: Maybe, I'll see if I can find it.
John: No, not Lahaina, you were in whatever the... We got robbed by the people who owned the motel.
John: Like actually robbed or just overcharged?
Merlin: Well, Mother's Day Eve...
Merlin: Somebody broke into our room and stole all our shit.
Merlin: Oh, no.
Merlin: And you think it was the people?
Merlin: Pretty sure.
Merlin: Pretty, pretty, pretty, pretty sure.
Merlin: Mother's Day Eve.
Merlin: I got up early to work on the book I never finished.
Merlin: Everything was gone.
Merlin: The laptops, the cameras, iPhones, all gone.
Merlin: That's terrible.
Merlin: See, I got mixed feelings.
Merlin: But I'll find out.
Merlin: Wait, what island is it?
Merlin: Is it?
Merlin: Maui.
Merlin: Maui.
Merlin: Yeah, let me look here.
Merlin: Look at this.
Merlin: Boy, this is really taking me back.
Merlin: It's nice, right?
Merlin: It's a long time ago.
Merlin: Yeah, I don't know.
John: I don't want you to get your stuff stolen again, even in your imaginarium.
Merlin: Um...
Merlin: Okay, so I'll look it up later.
Merlin: It was very painful because now I'm spending my vacation looking at Hawaiian eBay trying to figure out where my laptop is.
John: Oh, that gives me so much pain.
Merlin: Oh, see, that's an aspect of Aloha, though.
Merlin: It seems to me, as an outsider, I'm not a snorkeler, nor a straw, nor a turtle, nor a shoe vendor.
Merlin: But it seems to me that in the state of Aloha, which is different than the state of Hawaii, you will become vulnerable in an interesting way.
Merlin: In order to get the Aloha, detect the Aloha, and pass along, absorb and pass along the Aloha, you must necessarily be slightly vulnerable in an interesting way.
Merlin: Not vulnerable in the needy way like me, but vulnerable in the way of like you're kind of open to what is happening.
Merlin: What is the uniform of the day for this state?
Merlin: That seems to me, I don't know.
Merlin: But you sound like you're in an interesting place.
Merlin: Not just because you can see turtles, but I mean more metaphorically as well.
John: Years ago, the first time I went to Europe, 1989, I'm pretty sure I have described a moment in my life where I was sleeping outside in a park near the train station in Avignon, France.
John: And in the middle of the night, I was robbed.
John: My bag was taken, and when I woke up in the dark, there was a man standing over me, like leg on either side of me, bending down, trying to figure out how he was going to get my passport from around my neck without waking me up.
John: And I got up and I chased him, and it was all a big bummer.
John: But in the end, in the final accounting, I lost everything I owned, and I was just living out of a bag.
John: And
John: Then, at that point in my life, I realized, oh, I didn't need any of that shit.
John: Like, I'm already a smelly 20-year-old, like, student youth hostile scumbag.
John: Yeah, the journals were in there.
John: Okay.
John: uh you know it was there were tons of bummers about it but once i realized i could just stand up wherever i was and just start walking and never look back because i didn't have anything i didn't have to look back and say do i have my stuff i was just like i was poetry in motion i could i could wake up from a from a deep sleep jump
John: Jump out into the world and continue moving.
John: And there was like I had no nothing holding me.
John: And it was really profound.
John: Now, I'm sure the people that I met, the people that accidentally sat next to me on a train or whatever, were like, oh, I wish that this kid would have a bath.
John: Yeah.
John: But for me, for several months after that, I just if it didn't fit in my pockets, it didn't come with me.
John: And that was really transformative.
Merlin: But years later, I left the house without my phone a couple days ago.
Merlin: I almost had a panic attack.
Merlin: I'm sure.
Merlin: How can I go to the bodega with just my LTE watch?
Merlin: Well, my pocket was empty.
Merlin: I kept tapping at it.
John: Every time I open my computer here, the Aloha goes right out of the room.
John: The computer like goes and fills the room with a noxious gas.
John: Or maybe it drains the room of Aloha.
John: Maybe.
John: Well, but the thing is, I don't think the computer and the internet, they don't want Aloha.
John: They're not taking it out of the room.
John: They don't have any use for it.
John: I think you open the computer and the computer just sends stuff into the room.
John: Okay.
John: Something might be taking the Aloha out of me, but it's not taking it anywhere to use it for something else.
Merlin: There's like less bioavailable Aloha after what's been introduced by the computer.
John: Yeah, right.
John: Possibly.
John: I'm not sure Aloha is transferable.
John: It's like energy.
John: Yeah, right.
John: Well, yeah.
Merlin: Maybe it is energy.
Merlin: Have you thought about that?
Merlin: It's kind of energy.
Merlin: It sounds like it has like a valence.
John: I don't know.
John: Well, the thing about the experience of getting robbed in Europe, many years later, I got robbed because that's a part of life.
John: You get robbed.
John: And I had told the story of the Europe getting robbed and a woman very close to me.
John: But I was living in a house at this point and I got robbed of some things that I was sad to have lost.
John: And she said, remember that story about in Europe, how you got robbed and you just felt free?
John: Like, maybe this is that.
John: And I was like, no, ma'am, it is not.
John: I do not feel free for having my computer stolen.
John: This is not a moment where I'm going to realize that.
John: And your silver ingot.
John: And my ingot.
John: Although this was a different time of getting robbed.
John: It wasn't the ingot.
John: You know, we get robbed.
John: It's what happens.
Yeah.
John: but i said i am then i was ready to to uh see that possessions only handcuffed us but right now i am not ready to see that i want my computer back yes i want to do my work on my thing today and i am this is not a message about non-attachment this is
John: This is me calling the police.
Merlin: Non-attachment can be a form of privilege.
Merlin: I mean, the Buddha rolled that way because that was his job, and he had the privilege to have the kind of job where you could even lose your bowl.
Merlin: But if you're a podcaster, you do kind of need a computer.
Merlin: You can do it on an iPad, but you really need a computer.
John: Yeah, but also, what if I wanted to look at Facebook and see if anybody had said anything funny?
John: Yes.
John: I mean, you can't do that with Aloha.
John: But weirdly for me...
John: I feel like a big part of my life the last 10 or 15 years has been... In the 90s, there was a little coffee shop on Broadway that was an outdoor coffee shop.
John: It was a little Vivace and there wasn't an indoor seating.
John: It was just five tables on the sidewalk.
John: And I worked on Broadway, so I was a member of the Broadway community.
John: And these little five tables were where... Vivace was what you would have called at the time a gay hangout.
John: So most of the people sitting and drinking coffee at these little tables were members of Seattle's very inclusive and very unusual gay community at the time.
John: We're talking about 1996 or 7.
Mm-hmm.
John: And one of the favorite things to do was sit at those tables and pretty openly mock and ridicule everyone who walked by.
John: Because...
John: The gay community in the 1990s was very based around snark, at least on Broadway.
John: We don't say catty anymore, but that's what we used to say.
John: Yeah, and it was the funniest shit you ever heard, right?
John: Couldn't even call it shade.
John: Would you call it shade?
John: It would have been some tremendous shade getting thrown.
John: Someone would walk by, and you could just hear it start from the cafe, like, mm-mm, miss thing, here she comes.
John: And just like, it's like who wore it best or those things in People magazine where they throw tons of shade on some actress who's wearing an outfit.
John: And just like, it's very brutal.
John: And back then, of course, nobody put any restraints on their language.
John: So they would just, I mean, it was, I would be rolling on the sidewalk.
John: And it was one of the great parts of my day.
John: Like if it was a sunny day and I was...
John: and it was an hour before I had to be at work, I'd go down to Vivace and sit with my friends and listen to them fucking do this television show that if you made it today, it would burn the world down.
John: And partly learning from that, and partly just my own innate, my inclination...
John: For most of my adult life, there's been a component of me sitting in a chair watching the world go by and going, oh, girl, you didn't.
John: And then my audience or whatever sits there and goes like, lol.
John: And as the years have gone by, we've tempered our language.
John: We've tempered our willingness to look at people and say, oh, my God, no.
John: That's not how we look at the world anymore.
John: But as long as you confine your target to affluent white people, you still can sit and go like, can you believe this?
John: Look at this.
John: This is awful.
Mm-hmm.
John: It's not quite the same as like, well, it's not anything like it was, but there's still that impulse.
Merlin: Social media has messed up a lot of this because there was no in there videotaping or transcripts of what they were saying.
Merlin: It was an ephemeral in the moment thing, right?
John: Well, and if the person who was walking and getting the business turned and looked at you and said, what did you just say to me?
John: then it was on then it was fucking then it was even better because then it turned into a because within the culture at the time within that within like gay summertime fashion walk down this boulevard culture at the time a catfight was like what you were hoping for you know beyond all other hopes um but yeah right social media you can't do that but anyway
John: I'm walking through these resorts every day because I decided that my five mile walk was not going to attempt to duplicate the turtle experience.
John: I was going to do the opposite.
John: I was going to go to the resort again.
John: it's not my world the resort you're bringing something like a similar state of mind to this yeah you're now you're the snorkeler on land right the the waves are washing up on the resorts people come and go but i am just snorkeling through and i wanted the contrast because i recognize that my
John: tendency and the tendency of everyone i know in the whole culture i live in would be to walk through those resorts and be like oh my god can you believe this oh my god look at this like it's people on vacation and they are ridiculous and they're in an all-inclusive resort and we're able to walk through but they can't escape and they they don't even know that there is an escape that's like a tourist zoo
John: Yeah, exactly.
John: I mean, they paid thousands of dollars to come to this place every night at dinner.
John: There's a hula show.
John: They practically line up to get their picture taken with the sunset every night in the same place.
John: There's, you know, there are people, there are actual like native Hawaiian people in Aloha shirts, bringing them icy drinks and being very friendly to them.
John: And they're going to go home to wherever and they're like this.
John: Oh, we had a great time in Hawaii.
John: Or maybe they didn't.
John: Maybe they know that this isn't actually fun and maybe they're miserable.
John: I don't know.
John: But passing through it, I was trying to.
John: pass through it without bringing my own tendency to make myself superior to them.
Merlin: Mm-hmm.
Merlin: It's hard.
Merlin: It's very, very hard not to do.
Merlin: Oh, so hard.
John: I went through that on the cruise.
John: Oh, the Joko cruise.
Merlin: It was very difficult for me to not go, like, what's their deal?
Merlin: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Merlin: Whether it was the Normals or the Cruisiers, I found it very hard, because I very much felt like a person standing on the outside in that experience for a variety of reasons.
Merlin: They were great hosts.
Merlin: Thank you.
Merlin: But at the same time, I was like, ugh, who does this?
Merlin: Ugh.
Merlin: Like, that's been my MO since junior high.
Merlin: It's very, very difficult to stop and just like throw yourself into the whole catastrophe.
John: Right.
John: And what's hilarious is that it's been my MO since probably, yeah, coming out of junior high.
John: And I realized a long time ago, I learned to do that.
John: I learned to be snarky and judgy.
John: Because, as a defense mechanism, because I was getting picked on, and I realized I could never fight these boys, really.
John: Like, they were athletes, and they were fighters, and they were older, and they were bullies, and they were going to do whatever they were going to do.
John: But what I had was the poison pen.
John: You know, I had the quip.
John: And the quip devastates.
John: The quip is a weapon as good as anything.
John: better maybe and the first time some bully squared off on me and i made a quip instead of cowering and the kids standing around all laughed i realized oh fuck i'm like superman and you know and i think that's why that kind of snarkiness is so popular in gay culture it was everybody learned it everybody learned it as a way of like
John: You can't, no matter what you say to me, no matter what ugly thing you say to me, I'm going to have a rejoinder that's better and you're going to die of shame.
Merlin: And now you've made it a different kind of fight.
John: Yeah, right, right.
John: Your sword just turned to nothing.
John: But so I'm walking through these, I'm walking through Hawaii and I'm just like, I cannot, if I'm going into Aloha in any way, shape or form, I cannot use Aloha as a cudgel anymore.
John: to bury these people because I don't know enough about Aloha to know.
John: Talking here about the denizens of the resorts.
John: Yeah, right.
John: I can't walk through and be like, oh my God, you guys are so not Aloha because that's not Aloha.
Merlin: It's true.
Merlin: You're right.
Merlin: It's not a cudgel.
Merlin: That's not what it's for.
John: No.
John: And so what would I judge them on?
John: My own standards that I'm bringing from Seattle about what the difference between cool plaid shorts and uncool plaid shorts are?
John: That's not Aloha either.
Merlin: A trip can be a nice opportunity to, as you say, try things on.
Merlin: You know, whether that's an idea, just a way of being.
Merlin: I do feel like if you're out of place long enough, it gives you a rather unique opportunity to put yourself into a state of mind for a while.
Merlin: Try something different.
Merlin: Adjust it.
Merlin: Do whatever.
Merlin: One obvious example is I'm terrible at vacations.
Merlin: It takes me days to unwind.
Merlin: It used to take me three to four days to get into what we were doing and not be like looking at my phone or doing whatever.
Merlin: But that's, that's one example where like by the time it isn't until it's time to leave that I'm having anything close to fun or feeling like I am engaged in what's happening here.
Merlin: But sometimes, sometimes you've got to be a dork.
Merlin: Sometimes you've got to, you know, you've got to like get into the spirit of things, but I don't find that easy to do.
Merlin: There are other times where getting into the spirit of things is maybe part of the problem.
Merlin: I imagine this is addressed by Aloha.
Merlin: Right?
Merlin: I mean, you know, it's one thing for you to go and sneak an egg roll off the hot bar, but it's another thing for you to, like, you're not just going to sit there and, like, piss in the plants in the lobby.
John: No, but also, I mean, there's a little eat, pray, love to it, which is, well, like, when I walked across Europe, I was very much, I was talking to God every day.
John: Are you there?
John: It's me, Margaret.
Mm-hmm.
John: What's the deal?
John: Like, there's something about what I'm doing that is like an essential oil, and only you can tell me whether it has lavender or not in it.
John: God?
John: God.
John: Okay.
John: And God was resolutely silent throughout.
John: Maybe I didn't speak German.
John: Although maybe, you know, when you look at situations, you're like, oh, wait, was God there the whole time?
John: I mean, there were lots of times when I got my fat pulled from the fire, and yet that's happened my whole life.
John: I never was like, thank you, God.
John: But at the end of the trip, there was no, I did not come out of the trip with any more or less God or aloha or anything, as far as I could tell at the time.
John: And the eat, pray, love problem was,
John: oh according to this book like it is possible to go into a thing like a trip around the world and to just kind of hedonistically or whatever self-involvedly pursue um adventure and also have epiphany and true love and also you know like everything worked out in that book in a way that uh in my experience nothing works out in that same way you don't get what you're looking for really
John: And one of the things about Turtle Town was that I kind of started to feel that if I was looking for turtles, I would not see them.
John: But if I did not look for turtles... You would find them.
John: I would find them.
John: And it's extremely hard to go to Turtle Town and get in the water to see some turtles and not look for turtles.
Mm-hmm.
John: yeah but but every day i would be in the water and i'd be like looking around for turtles where are the turtles i wonder where they are let's go over here those are turtles and then i would say oh you're never going to find turtles if you're looking for them and i would just quiet my breath and start looking at fish and rocks and stuff and one day i did that and i never bumped into a turtle and i got out of the water and was like didn't see a turtle today and i tried looking for them and also not looking for them but
John: Today it wasn't up to me.
John: But trying to come here, spend two and a half weeks, and get Aloha and take it back to Seattle with me and have that Aloha change the way I do things is also not Aloha.
Merlin: Oh, it's more like getting your hair braided.
John: Yeah, it's exactly getting your hair braided.
John: And so I don't know.
John: I didn't come here to eat, pray, love.
John: I just came here to get my uncle some shoes.
John: And I'm trying to be aloha, but also I don't know if I can export it or if that is even what I'm looking for.
John: Or do I go home and go on a juice fast for three days?
John: Do I...
John: When Jason Finn calls me up and says, do I say, hey, bro, I'm just aloha right now.
John: No, I can't come back here.
John: I can't go back to Seattle and be talking in a patois that I picked up at two weeks of living somewhere.
John: But I'm, oh, Merlin, I've never been more ready for something to be different about me.
Merlin: Oh, really?
Merlin: You're ready for a little break from what you've been doing?
Merlin: I'm ready just to turn left at Omaha.
Merlin: I got a big idea.
Merlin: We don't need to go too much longer.
Merlin: I got a big idea that I'm going to have trouble fitting into the shape of this podcast, but it involves several slightly related things.
Merlin: A couple of slightly related things.
Merlin: One is, it might have been you, it might have been Hodgman that said this, but a working vacation is not really a vacation.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: So like if you you know, when you go somewhere, even if it's as a performer or as a whatever, like there's an element of like, hey, cool, like free trip or discounted trip or whatever.
Merlin: But there's also the element of like when you're in public, you're still on.
Merlin: You're still going to have to be places and hit your mark on time.
Merlin: There's all of this.
Merlin: You don't disappear.
Merlin: It's not a getaway vacation.
Merlin: For example, when you go somewhere with a task in mind, which I think is what's happening with you.
Merlin: So somebody could look at this from the outside and go, wow, Boohoo Johnny's got two and a half weeks.
Merlin: But like you, you're doing stuff.
Merlin: It's not, it's not, I'm not, that sounds like a preemptive defense.
Merlin: I don't mean it that way.
Merlin: I mean it more to say that when one has not been the author of this particular novella.
Merlin: Like, you are going to have to go along, get along, and really pick up some fucking aloha in order to get your head into the game, even if that involves going to the mall for shoes.
Merlin: So that's one aspect of this.
Merlin: It's like, when one is compelled to travel to do something, I think it's easy to call that a vacation.
Merlin: To me, a vacation could be, I just don't have to do anything at home for five days.
Merlin: I mean, it's vacation, whatever you want to call it.
Merlin: But to be a vacation, you have to have a certain amount of...
Merlin: It's ironic because I want to say control.
Merlin: That's not the exact word I mean.
Merlin: But you have to have a certain amount of agency about what you have to do, even if you don't have total control over what it is that you do.
Merlin: And the other aspect of this that's too big to fit into this episode is the... I used to get...
Merlin: This is maybe a form of proto-privilege that I would see in others that would make me mad.
Merlin: But I always felt envious or angry about the very confident kids in high school and college.
Merlin: A phrase I would use today is they've never really had their ass kicked.
Merlin: They've never felt desperate in life.
Merlin: And I feel like, and I really, I mean, even through and after college, I could still eyeball somebody and go like,
Merlin: No matter what adventure you've ever gone on, you never really had to worry that your life would fall apart if things didn't go well.
Merlin: There's a safety net you didn't know was there, maybe.
Merlin: One reason you're confident is because you've never been desperate.
Merlin: You've never been truly desperate.
Merlin: As in, like, there's something big that's going to happen to you or you're going to run out of money and food or whatever that is.
Merlin: And I feel like there's a commonality in those kinds of things.
Merlin: And it does center, to some extent, around control, which is, like, the kind of travel.
Merlin: And certainly, like, you were able to, whatever, come up with the cash to go to Europe and walk around and do what you did.
Merlin: But, like...
Merlin: There's something to be said for a kind of travel writ large that ends up planting you somewhere where you don't have that much control of the situation.
Merlin: I think it's, like I say, I think it's a little bit monkey balls to say, well, oh, that's a vacation.
Merlin: You went somewhere I've heard about on a map and it's warm, so that's a vacation.
Merlin: Well, believe me, helping my mom pack her house was not a vacation.
Merlin: Helping my grandmother through the final stages of Alzheimer's, not a vacation.
Merlin: Helping mom with her broken hip, not a vacation.
Merlin: Yes, they were all in Florida.
Merlin: So in your case, like you're an interesting situation because, yes, you did accept somewhat willingly the need to go and do this thing, this family thing that everybody was participating in.
Merlin: But it's also put you into an interesting state.
Merlin: Right.
Merlin: I mean, it seems to me like, did you go into this knowing that you'd be thinking about this stuff along the way?
Merlin: Speaking of the vulnerability, I find that I get vulnerable in interesting ways when I get repotted to somewhere else and have to show humanity in a way that I think I can prepare for, but I really can't.
Merlin: I get super involved in doctor's visits and medication and
Merlin: And like what kind of dessert we're getting for grandma tonight.
Merlin: There's all this kind of stuff that just becomes part of this 24-hour quest every day to like go to the next thing.
Merlin: Maybe it's like you say, is it the first step?
Merlin: Are we taking small steps?
Merlin: No, we're taking small everything.
Merlin: Like this is an entire enterprise composed of small everything.
Merlin: And I think it can't help but change you a little bit.
Merlin: for a little while and maybe for a while after.
Merlin: I don't know if there's Aloha in Seattle, but if there's anything like Aloha, you might be more open to seeing it because you've become vulnerable.
Merlin: If I may say, I'm guessing, something's different.
Merlin: You're noticing something and you're interested in at least interrogating what that thing is.
Merlin: And I bet you have some of that at your house right now.
Merlin: I bet it could be there.
John: Well, it has to be because my uncle's primary project at 92 is...
John: Documenting his life in a manuscript and then evaluating that manuscript as though he were an editor or a critical reader.
Merlin: Boy, that's ambitious.
John: And it is the type of thing that I would do at 92.
John: And I'm watching him and I'm hearing my sister's voice like, well, then you die and then what?
John: And I'm watching him wrestle with that.
John: And then he and I are having long, long, long conversations about what a great tight end he was for Yale in 1948.
John: And also about Ted Stevens and why Ted got an airport named after him.
John: And all this other stuff that on one level, at my sister's level, she's like, what does any of that matter?
John: Who cares?
John: Ted Stevens is also dead.
John: And at my level, I'm like, well, this is all historically fascinating.
John: And I wish people could hear this story, which he's never going to write down.
John: And he's like, you know, what does this all mean?
John: Like, in the end of the day, did I do good?
John: Did I make a change?
John: And I'm watching that and realizing, oh, maybe those are really fruitless questions.
John: Maybe we do not get to know the answers to those.
John: And if I can see that in him, then I have to be able to see it in me.
John: And if that's true, how can I, at 50 years old, start doing things differently so that I'm not here at 92 shuffling through a thousand reams of paper about all the things that I've done, trying to figure out if it all adds up to something?
Merlin: Yeah.
John: Okay.
Merlin: Yep, yep, yep.
Merlin: I had not thought of that.
John: Mm-hmm.
John: And, you know, his stories are great.
John: And I keep saying to him, like, look, look, you know, like...
John: Descartes did not know that he would one day be Descartes.
John: he just knew that he was like renee who you know renee from the block um yeah i mean like uh van gogh was mainly a guy who was eternally poor and couldn't get along with girls yeah right that was his i mean like like i used to say no lobster thinks of themselves primarily as food right the two the two little uh the two little bugs in the glass of champagne um but uh
John: but I can't also be not me and a futurist in those moments and say like, uncle Jack, you're the first, I said him to the other night.
John: I was like, you're the first generation that came into color or I guess came into black and white is what I'm saying to him for the future.
John: Like 20 generations from now,
John: If someone 20 generations from now is curious about their history and they say, who was my great, great, great, great, great, great, great 20 times grandfather.
John: They'll be able to go online and find some, some, uh, like you in your own voice.
John: Right.
John: Like my great father.
John: 20 times grandchildren will be able to listen to this you and me if they want which they won't know but if they did they could they could in a way that we cannot we cannot go back and and we don't know anything about them we barely you know past like five generations we don't even know their names and I said all of that history will be like the 50,000 years of unrecorded history to people of the future
John: But you have, at 92, have stepped into the circle of light long enough that you've left an afterimage that will be visible to the future.
John: So you're the first.
John: You're walking on the moon here.
John: And...
John: He doesn't, I mean, he'll either take that or either that is some comfort or not.
John: I'd have no, I have no idea.
Merlin: He's not going to feel a comfort until or unless he's finished something.
Merlin: Yeah.
Merlin: Or, you know, is in some way distracted from it.
Merlin: But yeah, that's the dilemma.
Merlin: He can't, I mean, he probably can't, I'm speaking for him here, but I mean, he might not feel capable of doing that.
Merlin: Maybe like another Roderick I know.
Merlin: It's difficult sometimes to be able to appreciate the story that you have because you're not happy with how you've written it down yet.
John: Yeah, right.
John: And he's not going to get happy with the way he's written it down.
John: It's the most incredible thing.
John: Well, you've got a lot to take away from this.
John: I know.
John: I know.
John: To sit in a room and I'm like sitting over here reading Bob.
John: Your sister's over here.
John: You're going to die.
Merlin: You're going to die.
John: You're all going to die.
John: Stop talking.
John: Everybody dies.
John: Everybody dies.
John: And all the riches in all the world's museums won't stop you from dying.
Merlin: Is that supposed to help?
John: I don't know, man.
John: Have you talked to her about it?
John: Oh, you know, if you pull her aside and say, what's this all about?
John: She'll turn it right on you.
Merlin: You're going to die too.
John: What's what all about?
John: You hear that ringing in your ears?
John: It's not going to get less.
John: I can't feel my feet.
Merlin: Of course you can't feel your feet.
Merlin: You're going to die.