i approached things with an open mind, as if they had something to offer me. i was usually disappointed. one man, a corporate player, talked about how important it is to know how to bs and how important it is to hob-nob with higher-ups, disgusting me and convincing the materialistic kid on the other side. these are for the most part the sort of person you find on a ski lift -- the corporate elite.
i tried to act as an emissary for my subsection of the snowboarding community. as previously noted, snowboarding is hard. really hard. and i tried to explain to as many people as would listen that we snowboarders are often out of control not because we're reckless but because snowboards are just that much harder to control than skis. i try to not get in anyone's way, but the only way to do that is to go sufficiently slow that you're always in everyone's way.
all told, i talked to like six or seven people on ski lifts, some by volition, some not. only one seemed harmless, seemed inoffensive to my sense of justice in the world, and she was still a stereotype, the semi-popular, not arrogant, not vapid high-teens girl. nothing wrong with that, but you'll forgive it for not making my day.
January 12, 2002: january 5, 2002, airplaners. the boy sitting next to me in line is 14, trying to pretend he's 25. we're sitting on the ground; i always sit on the ground while waiting in line at the airport gate, since i see no reason not to. this may be the first time i've ever seen anyone else doing so. i wonder how old he thinks i am.
we exchange pleasantries about the excess security, nothing really of interest. i mention that i went to high school in new york and that i was in school when the world trade center bombing happened in 1993, looking for a reaction. i get none and am disappointed; it appears that i finally look my age, or perhaps two years older. he recounts a parallel tale about how he was evacuated from high school because his high school is across the street from the san diego zoo and there was a bomb threat there.
i'm approaching this situation very differently from the last one, just trying things out. i'm gauging reactions, i'm circling around and investigating his personality. he's a bit off. it's not just that he's 14; it's that he slurs his speech in a way that's obviously due to thought and not physical constraints. he cuts into the conversation we're having at times. it's jagged and jarring, this young teen pretending he's an adult. it occurs to me that in a couple of years he may very well be in a misogynist gang.
at this point i'm called out as a person with no checked baggage to go on an earlier plane, and none too soon; this is starting to get tedious. on this plane, the guy to the left of me is reading an instruction booklet for madden 2002; i contemplate talking to him about this, but decide not to. i've dealt with too many people like this: cool kid, baggy pants, bandanna, smokes, does some drugs, looks down on intelligentia, likes playing football and basketball. i engage the character to my right, whose name must be tony.
again, disappointing. he's a better stereotype, but a stereotype nonetheless: the guy who has all his shit in order. the guy who just isn't really emotional, who treats his life in a very matter-of-fact, planned way. a future investment banker, though right now he's in college, majoring in networking with people. he's clearly older than me; i wonder how old he thinks i am. evidently not very, since when i told him i go to berkeley. he assumes i'm a freshman or sophomore. i tell him i do math, and it brings up the usual conversation; he "was never very good at calculus." this is the response of about 50% of people; they're unduly impressed because math was hard for them.
this is frustrating to me. what i do is not that complicated, and given something on which to draw i could explain it in around 30 seconds. but in conversations one doesn't have something on which to draw, and i really need the diagrams to explain the math i do. i settle for telling him that i have nothing to do with calculus. he chuckles. i give the quick schpiel about how everyone hates math because they only see the ugly part (since that's what's applicable to other fields), but i see the bounds, and i don't push it too far. as we're entering the vicinity of san diego, we see a field of green lights down below. he asks me why this is; i think he expects me to know the answer, since people like this equate math with science. i have no idea; it's some sort of frequency filtration thing, since these lights are not green on the ground, but it has baffled everyone i've talked to about it.
we land, and part with few tears shed.
January 4, 2002: the 2002 project kicked off on the night of january 2, 2002. earlier that day, it had almost started when i spied a person through a doorway in university hall, but that is detailed later.
at around 9 pm, i went out to the berkeley marina to go running and collect my thoughts. it's a good place to run; there's this long pier that someday will be a good distance to time myself on. when i'm in shape. right now since i lack the ability to pace myself i just run sprints then walk for awhile then more sprints. but i digress.
the pier that night was awesome. fog had descended thickly over the bay; usually, even on foggy nights, you can see the lights of san francisco, but that night there was nothing. every now and then there would be the disconcerting noise of a plane; you could see nothing, but you could hear how close it was. there was a man there who reminded me of tom dorsey, a character in the math department. at first i thought it was tom, which would be great, since tom has always seemed interesting to me, but it wasn't. i passed him running one way; he was just leaning against the railing, looking up at the sky. on the way back i stopped on the other side of the pier from him and tried to get up the nerve to go talk to him.,
eventually i did. it was incredibly awkward; i had no idea how to begin. i stammered something like "don't worry; i'm not threatening." it was pretty terrible, and i think my utter lack of suaveness doomed my attempts to draw up an actual conversation. despite that, though, things went well. he turned out to be a musician who had gone to the berklee college of music in boston, which was neat; he has his home studio where he produces synthetic industrial-veined music. unfortunately, he doesn't have it anywhere on the web, so i am unable to obtain a souvenir. we talked? about nothing in particular. about texas a bit, since he'd lived there. he wasn't scared of me. he didn't really have a bad first impression. we just didn't have much to talk about. hopefully as the year goes on i will get better at this.