i am an unrequited astronomer, pretend patient, gentle adventurer, pedal enthusiast, recovering calligrapher, occasional thespian and unfinished poet living in portland, oregon. contacting me via email is usually a good idea.
10:41 AM:
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i'm sleeping later. i consider that to be a good thing, as the floor and michael and amelia were really conspiring to wake me up at 5 a.m. so it turns out i can cook well enough for us both, though homemade dinners will depend quite heavily on our tolerance for pasta & salad.
brian & i have discussed how knowledge of something (say, stars) can lead to a greater appreciation of it. then he sent along this "contrary -- and elegantly written -- view from mark twain." but i actually liked twain's new description of the river, too. i guess there's some part of me that can shut that analytical view on and off, to go between, "oooo! pretttyyyyy!" to "damn! that's fascinating!", in part because someone who wasn't a riverboat pilot would find a different way to analyze the river (perhaps in terms of fishing, or flooding, or the habitat of its native grasses), and i would find that fascinating, too. i think the danger in subject knowledge is in thinking that's the only way to view the world, rather than just one way.
there's a link to other commentaries at the bottom of the article which is easy to miss, but in their own more elegant ways echo my sentiments.