Mental Pivot #34: Fleeting Moments, Library Cards, Combustion
Watching the kids grow up, supplementing ebook and audiobook consumption with a paid library card, and an engaging visual explainer on the internal combustion engine.
It's 2008, and I'm sitting in my grandmother's living room trying to enjoy a conversation with her as six young children—a mix of my kids and their cousins—scurry about amidst a raucous game of hide-and-seek.
I'm annoyed by the noise and constant interruptions. My grandmother isn't; she's enjoying the moment. She smiles and maintains an even tempo with her rocking chair. She's in the twilight of life, but her face remains youthful, in part, because of her ever sunny disposition.
“Enjoy this dearie,” she tells me. “These are precious times. It all goes by so quickly. They'll be grown up before you know it.”
I nod in agreement, but fail to appreciate the point. It's a refrain that, as a young parent, I hear over and over from others. “They grow up so fast!” everyone informs me. No they don't, I think. Not so long as I can't get a decent night's sleep, not so long as they're high maintenance, clingy, and overly dependent on me.
I assume much of the "growing up" will come in some far off future date. I imagine it will be defined by a big milestone like getting a driver's license, going to prom, getting a summer job, or graduating from high school.
I was mistaken.
It's a warm spring afternoon in 2011, and I'm picking up my daughter from school. She is in 3rd grade. Her school is near San Francisco's Civic Center in a six-story building on a busy urban block. I approach the pickup location amid the buzz of passing cars, pedestrians, crossing guards, and children eager to return home.
As usual, I see my daughter waiting at the designated pickup spot with her friends and teachers.
“Little bear!” I exclaim as we make eye contact. My daughter grimaces. Reflexively, I take her hand and we set off toward the nearby subway station.
Halfway down the block, she pulls away, stops walking, and faces me. She has a serious look.
“Dad?” she says, tentatively. “Can we not hold hands?”
She glances back over her shoulder to where her friends are as if to reinforce the point.
“Oh,” I respond, her meaning slowly dawning on me.
“I mean not anymore when you pick me up from school,” she says to make things crystal clear.
“Yeah, sure. No problem.”
“Also,” she continues and then pauses, considering how best to communicate her next thought. “Could you not call me 'little bear' anymore?”
A small piece of my heart must have visibly broken in that moment. I expected as much come adolescence, but—perhaps naively—not so soon. Not now.
Perhaps my shoulders slump or my face belies my bewilderment. My daughter, ever perceptive, reads me well and offers a balm.
“But,” she adds, “you can still call me that at home, okay? Just…not out here.” She proffers a smile which all but settles the matter.
“Okay,” I say as we start walking again, still side by side, but slightly farther apart than before.
This morning I walk my youngest into school. He's in the 3rd grade; the same age as his sister when she gave me "the talk." The air is cool and my hand sits warmly in my jacket pocket. My son reaches out and finds my hand with his. I pull away initially, but then I remember my grandmother's admonition; I immediately take his hand and we round the final corner to the school entrance. I give him a squeeze and he double-squeezes me back.
I know these moments will end in the not-too-distant future. Kids grow up quickly, after all. I've slowly come to appreciate this fact. As for today though, it's enough to enjoy this fleeting moment for as long as it lasts.
Now onto this week's recommendations…
What's Old on the Blog:
I'll be highlighting archival content from the blog when I don't post anything new.
Paid Library Card Memberships: Cost-Effective Access to Audiobooks & Ebooks
If you are a voracious consumer of ebooks and audiobooks, public libraries are a fantastic way to access this content for free (especially if you spend more than you’d like on Audible and Kindle books). Unfortunately, the quality of a digital library collections varies from system to system. Some library systems provide extensive ebook collections while others are sorely lacking due to insufficient funding and patronage. If you do live in an underserved part of the U.S. or just want to supplement your local library’s digital book collection with that of another one, a paid library card membership might be a solid option for you.
This article looks at the handful of paid membership programs available to American citizens (apologies to my non-American readers, I've only investigated the sources available in my country), focusing on their OverDrive collections, a service that offers Kindle ebook titles and downloadable audiobooks.
Articles:
Before You Answer, Consider the Opposite Possibility: Embrace a diversity of ideas and opinions to generate better thinking.
The Best Note-Taking Method Is the One You Have with You: "If in your method of choice there is anything creating friction between you and this basic act, then I strongly recommend you try reducing it and seeing what happens."
The Five Types of Legal Argument: Excellent overview of Wilson Huhn's framework for the lay-person. The five types: 1) Argument from text, 2) Intent and purpose-based arguments, 3) Precedential arguments, 4) Tradition and custom-based arguments, 5) Policy-based arguments.
How Humanity Gave Itself an Extra Life: A look at the innovations that have doubled the average life span: vaccination, pasteurization, antibiotics, chlorination, and oral rehydration therapy (O.R.T.)
Most Innovation Never Happens: Chris Butler considers an idea he calls a "progress jam." It's an idea analogous to a traffic jam whereby interesting and sometimes superior technologies get clogged in a slow-moving system of consumers and suppliers and ultimately "lose out" in the progression of innovation.
On the Link between Great Thinking and Obsessive Walking: Does walking change our brains and positively impact our creativity and memory?
Two Simple Ways to Stand out as a Writer: Two strategies for distinguishing yourself: 1) "The Sega approach" in which you position yourself as a contrarian brand and 2) "The mix-and-match approach" whereby you create a unique combination of elements (e.g., Tim Urban's popular "Wait But Why" blog combines stick figures with in-depth explainers).
Podcasts
Destroying Primeworld with Jesse Singal: Host Coleman Hughes interview with Singal on his new book The Quick Fix which examines the replication crisis in psychology and psychological fads like self-esteem, grit, and posing.
Michael Shellenberger on Nuclear Power, Progressive Hypocrisy on Energy Policy, and His New Book, 'Apocalypse Never': A conversation about environmental alarmism and ideological biases that frequently obstruct rational solutions to serious environmental, economic, and social problems.
This Is Love: On the Way to Dinner: On August 28, 2000, Danny Stewart entered a subway station in New York City and noticed a small bundle on the ground. It turned out to be an abandoned newborn. What unfolded would profoundly change his life.
Why Conversations Go Wrong: Linguist Deborah Tannen discusses how differing conversational styles can create unintended conflicts and misunderstandings and how we can communicate more effectively with others.
Odds & Ends:
Bartosz Ciechanowski's incredible visualization of the Internal Combustion Engine is a tour-de-force of visual and interactive explainers. Using a sequence of informative graphics, Cienchanowski walks interested readers through the ins and outs of one of the most transformative inventions of modern times. Many of the visuals are three-dimensional animated objects that can be rotated and viewed frame-by-frame.
The Programmer's Brain is a forthcoming book by Fielienne Hermans from Manning Publications that explores cognitive strategies for becoming a better programmer. The book is not yet published, but much of it can be read online for free as part of the publisher's early access program (aka MEAP). There's interesting material on memory, reading, and learning. Note, to access the text you may need to use the "liveview preview" and register to obtain additional time-metered access.
Despite being a hands-off, long-term buy-and-hold investor, I check FinViz's Market Maps periodically to get a quick overview on what's shaking in the stock market.
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Great post Dovid, really flexing the writing skills here 🔥
I don't even have kids but still hit me square in the soft spot 🥰