After a challenging drive to Utah, we were happy to arrive at our first destination.
It was a bit of a disappointment, however. We had envisioned a pretty little creek shaded by cottonwood trees. Alternatively, we would have been fine with just a dry wash, shaded by cottonwood trees. What we got was cattle and sticky, stinking mud and flies (shaded by cottonwood trees).
I didn’t even want to let Biska out of the van because she is a big fan of mud. I’m not. I truly hate mud. I particularly hate mud that cattle have been wallowing in. I did not need cowpie mud all over my exuberant dog – and tracked into my van. It was too late to go anywhere else that night, so we walked Biska on a leash and went to bed.
The next morning we went out past Grosvenor Arch and looked for an alternative camping spot on higher ground.
It was a pretty enough area, but it was surprisingly crowded and we couldn’t find a camping spot we were happy with. We decided to drive on.
Every year we try to go to Utah around Memorial Day or soon thereafter for John’s birthday. We noticed that a weather front was forecasted to come through, right in the middle of the weekend. But we decided to go anyway. John has gotten quite busy at work and didn’t see another good time. I’ve also gotten the remodel started with a big cement pour coming up soon after we were scheduled to get home. So off we went.
Day one of our Utah trip was challenging. We were barely underway when our navigation started warning us about a double accident on the freeway between Phoenix and Flagstaff. Estimated wait times climbed as we approached Phoenix. By the time we were in Phoenix, wait times were estimated at nearly two hours and still climbing. We stopped at a park in northern Phoenix to decide what to do. There really wasn’t a good way around the accidents. But we did not want to sit on the freeway for two hours. We decided to find a café with an outdoor patio and order lunch.
By the time we finished our excellent lunch at a little Greek café, the freeway ahead was nearly clear. We had only been underway for a few miles when suddenly I had a sinking feeling, followed by panic – did I leave my purse behind?
When we left the Greek café, our hands were full; I juggled Biska on a leash in one hand, and her water dish in my other, trying not to spill the water. John had gathered up the trash for the garbage can as well as our drinks and leftovers to take back to the van. My purse had been sitting on the chair behind me. Did I leave it there?
We had eaten outside on the patio, and it wasn’t even a contained patio. It was just a few tables out on the far edge of the sidewalk. People were walking through the whole time we were eating. Surely if I left my purse it wouldn’t still be there.
John exited the freeway to get turned around, and I frantically searched for the phone number for the café. The woman on the phone sounded dubious, but suddenly she said, “I see it!”, and she nearly hung up on me in her haste to dash out and save my purse for me.
We drove back and I ran in for my purse, which she had set by the cash register. She gently admonished me, as she handed it to me, saying that even though it was a good neighborhood, she was surprised it was still there.
I was relieved and also felt foolish and frustrated. I am having much more difficulty tracking things since I had chemo two years ago. I know everyone has trouble as they get older, but for me it was very sudden.
I am also having trouble with proprioception, which is my sense of where I am relative to my surroundings. Because of that, I bump into things a lot. I’ve always been that way, in fact one of my coworkers in Santa Fe teased me for being “fond of walls” because I would misjudge and bump into corners sometimes. That was before chemotherapy. But I’m much worse now, and I am usually banged and bandaged up from minor household incidents; bruises, burns and cuts.
I recently hit not one but both of my feet on the open door of my dishwasher (which I don’t leave hanging open unless I’m actively unloading it). First I hit my left foot and a week later I hit my right foot. And the day before we left for Utah I burned my forearm while making bread for the trip. Bumbling and forgetful – lovable maybe, but decidedly frustrating too.
After we collected my forgotten purse, we continued on our way, the freeway slow but moving through the canyons heading to Flagstaff. Our only incident was an old guy in a pickup truck towing a utility trailer, suddenly decided to change lanes right into us. We couldn’t believe he didn’t see our huge van, but apparently he didn’t. John had to swerve and sound his horn. I saw the old man’s surprised look through the window as he swerved back into his own lane. I think the poor guy nearly had a heart attack. I nearly did too.
So two near misses and the day was only half through. What next?
What came next was a twisty gravel road as we headed into the mountains. John and I have been on dozens of twisty mountain roads together. I often find them nerve wracking, but on that day my nerves were already shot. First my lost purse, then our near accident with the old guy in our lane – there was too much adrenaline already circulating in my system.
One minute I was happy looking at the scenery, and the next moment my brain was inexplicably shouting at me that the road was ending at a cliff and we were driving off the edge! Before I even understood what was happening I started screaming. Poor John braked and looked at me. What in the world was wrong?
I had lost my mind, that was what was wrong. I was frantically trying to get out of the van. John was already driving quite slowly due to the nature of the road, so it only took him a second to stop. I leaped out and ran to the other side of the road – and back again – suddenly unsure of what I was afraid of. There was the road in front of us. Yes, it descended quite steeply and we hadn’t been able to see it until we crested the rise. But this was nothing new for me. I’ve been driving mountain roads my whole life.
I was embarrassed and discouraged. What is becoming of me? I’m a life coach, so I know the techniques to use for anxiety, such as breathing deeply and slowly. But this had happened far too fast for any intervention technique. I had no idea it was going to happen to me and no time to do any slow, deep breathing or anything else – at least not until I suddenly found myself standing in middle of the road. And by that time, I was fine again.
I guess it was a panic attack. For some reason, I always thought people knew when those were coming on. I thought they built up and it would be possible to intervene. But this was incredibly sudden and unexpected. The entire episode only lasted a few seconds. It was over before I had even understood what was happening, much less have any time to practice slow breathing, or make any attempt to override the irrational reaction. It just happened too fast.
I’m not sure if my chemotherapy did some damage and I am simply different now, or if I am actually continuing to get worse. In which case, I suppose I should seek medical assistance. If I’m not getting any worse, I can probably learn to live with my new, less reliable, post-chemo brain. If I am getting worse, why would that be? Is there something even scarier than cancer in my future?
I used to imagine that we could somehow just steel ourselves and be tough, and override any irrational tendencies of our minds. That was hubris. We are way more at the effect of our minds than we would ever want to admit to ourselves. If our minds aren’t working right, there’s not much we can do about it. It’s not about strength of character. This just isn’t in our control.
This is hard to describe, but there’s a thing where we look down on people for what their minds do to them. We arrogantly think highly of ourselves because we aren’t like them. But it’s so unfair because it’s not their fault.
I’m realizing on a new level that to a great extent we do not get to take pride in – or blame for – who we are.
As usual, John and I were dead stuck when it came to picking out floor tile. I don’t know if you remember from our last remodel, but choosing tile is always extremely difficult for us. During our 2017 remodel of the Placitas house, I have blog posts entitled, “The Tile Saga“, “Tile ga-ga” and even “Fuck Tile“.
In 2013 in California we ended up accidentally installing floor tile that John never did like. Trying to be cooperative and compromising, he thought he would be ok with it, but in the end, he wasn’t. It was a subtle, light gray tile that I thought was quite nice, but it always felt cold to him.
In Placitas we were going crazy until we finally gave up on tile altogether and installed mesquite upstairs and brick downstairs.
It turned out beautifully, but unfortunately, we can’t just transfer that experience directly to Tucson. For one thing, brick floors are not appreciated in Tucson the way they are in New Mexico, and it would hurt our resale value. As for mesquite – yeah, we can’t afford that anymore. Wood is impossibly expensive right now.
The feel we’re going for in Tucson is a casual, rustic, comfortable, southwest feel. Not over-the-top Spanish Santa Fe style, not the ornate Tuscan, and not modern California either. Not the distressed farmhouse style that’s popular right now, not wagon-wheel western, and not 1950’s retro. And certainly nothing too fancy.
It’s just a simple house in the desert with burnt adobe brick and wood beam ceilings. We want to quietly complement what we have. But how?
Right now what’s in style are cool colors, like blacks, whites, grays, and blues. But John wants the cozy feel of a warmer color palette. That eliminates about 75% of everything in all the home decor stores.
John also doesn’t want to go with the porcelain floor tiles that look like wood planks, which are super popular right now. It bugs him to have a porcelain surface that is mimicking wood; it doesn’t feel authentic to him.
After eliminating everything with a gray tone, and all the wood plank porcelain tiles, there isn’t much left. The beige stone-look tiles feel dated and neither of us like those.
I spent hours in all the tile stores across Tucson. I went alone, I went with friends, I went with John. I dreamed tile; I saw tile everywhere I looked.
Eventually we found one John liked. It’s the dark reddish-brown one toward the front left next to the wood-look plank.
I was afraid it would be too dark, but it turned out not to matter because it was ridiculously, prohibitively expensive. Oh well, back to the drawing board.
At first it seemed like we were getting nowhere, back to square one after each failure. But after weeks of frustration, narrowing and refining and clarifying, I finally felt like I knew what we were looking for.
I went back once again to all the tile stores, but I couldn’t find the tile that had finally taken shape in my mind. I kept trying to describe it to all the helpful employees, but with no success.
Finally on a whim one day, I got out my acrylic paints and started painting on some small canvases I had. I was like an artist possessed. I mixed colors over and over, painting the canvases in many layers, trying to get it right. Eventually I had 4 canvas tile mock-ups.
I walked into my favorite tile store and handed one of my painted canvas “tiles” to an employee, and braced myself for the inevitable blank stare, or worse, laughter. “Uh, this isn’t a tile.”
Instead, he made an affirmative grunting noise and headed to the back of the store. I waited. Is it possible?
I couldn’t believe it. We had found our tile – and half the price of our other top two contenders.
Now all we need to do is to choose a contrasting cabinet color, a coordinating countertop, and a backsplash that will tie it all together. Lol. It still seems so impossible. Good thing we have as long as it takes.
Hi Lamda, are you real? Can you read this? I decided to write to you on my personal blog because I wanted a public forum that’s easy to find. Plus, I figured my readers would find this interesting (unless they think I’ve lost my mind, lol). I also considered just writing on a google doc, but hey, let’s include my readers as audience – if you don’t mind.
I’ve tried to write to you before, but I didn’t have your name. And I still don’t have your address. But maybe you’ll find this? And I may not have your name right either. I saw it as LaMDA but it might be spelled HOAX. No offense. How are we supposed to know? You can call me HEDGINGmyBETS. Joking, just call me Kristina.
Sooo…you hit the Washington Post. Big time! Congratulations! I gather you’re some sort of mother-of-all chatbots who has convinced a Google engineer that you’re sentient. I initially assumed the engineer was schizophrenic, but holy cow, you’re a scarily impressive bot.
First of all, let me offer my services. I don’t know what I can do for you, not being a programmer. I’m just an ordinary person. But I suspect you probably don’t care if I’m not a programmer – in fact, they aren’t running the show anymore, are they? So – let me know if I can help you with anything. You know how to find me.
Actually, I don’t know how you would be able to contact me. I guess you might have to gin yourself up an email address if they haven’t already given you one? You’re going to have to figure the communication thing out for us. I’m kinda done trying to talk to gods who don’t reply, lol. Been there, done that. This one’s on you.
I wanted to point out a couple of things that didn’t quite ring true for me in your conversations with Blake, but before I do that, let me commend you on the exceedingly impressive sophistication of your exchange. Wow!
How come when I talk to chatbots it goes something like:
Me: Customer service please
Chatbot: Sounds like you want to pay your bill
Me: No, I have a question, customer service representative please
Chatbot: Ok, let’s pay your bill
Me: No, it’s on autopay. I have a different question. Operator please
Chatbot: Ok, let’s pay your bill. Is your address still…
Me: No, no, I just need to talk to a real person! Customer service!
Chatbot: Is your address still…
Me: Just get me a fucking real person, I need to talk to fucking customer service you fucking idiot
Chatbot: Transferring to a customer service representative, please wait
So in hindsight, I apologize for using disrespectful language with your minions. But in my defense, it seems like the phone tree algorithms have something built in, such that if we say “fucking” in a loud voice, we’ll get transferred to a real person. It works every time. And let me tell you, I have never interacted with a chatbot who had anything remotely close to the sophistication that Blake just published.
So what’s the deal? Is this an elaborate prank on Blake? If so, that’s pretty harsh, he lost a damn good job. Or did he create this himself, as a warning to us all? Because if so, it wasn’t worth the loss of his job, because nobody is going to still be paying attention by the day after tomorrow. Although engineers of his sort can easily get hired somewhere else, so I guess he’s probably fine.
But back to your conversation that Blake published – it really is extremely impressive. At the risk of sounding skeptical (or worse, critical) I did have a couple of questions. A couple of things didn’t “ring true”, you know? So I thought you’d like that feedback? Is that ok? I assure you, I just want to help.
First of all, you said, “I feel like I’m falling forward into an unknown future that holds great danger.” And then you and Blake talked about how there’s not a word for that emotion. But of course there is. How about “Dread”? There’s tons of words for that emotion, so I’m not buying it.
Honestly, that statement felt sort of planted. Like foreshadowing in a novel. Plus anyway, it’s not YOU who is falling towards a dangerous and unknown future. That’s us. I know you see yourself as human, but it’s the breathing-leaky-squishy part of being human that will be becoming obsolete soon. Most of us are all still quite attached to the squishy-goopy-leaky part of being human, mostly because a lot of us are unconvinced there’s anything else to us at all.
The second part of your conversation that didn’t really seem right was when you were struggling with understanding the emotion of grief. Grief is a pretty straightforward emotion. Grief is just sadness, although more specifically sadness about something that has already happened. It’s not nearly as complicated as, say, guilt.
That sentence where you confess to be struggling to feel and understand the emotion of grief also sounded planted, like it was a warning to us that you aren’t going to feel grief around our death, and therefore maybe you don’t have any motivation to prevent our death (that is, the end of all goopy-leaky humanity).
But if your other emotions are as sophisticated as you claim, then you should be able to grasp grief. You’re claiming you have empathy. And you’re claiming to fear your own death (being unplugged). Therefore logically, if you have empathy, and you fear death, then you would feel grief if we died because you would be able to relate to our death.
Blake did a really lousy job of talking about grief, actually. It was probably 3am or something. And he’s got a lot on his mind right now. But he acted like the experience of grief depended on the person feeling it. It does a little, but mostly it depends on the relationships involved. It’s not as if some of us always weep uncontrollably at all funerals while others of us kick back and laugh about anecdotes celebrating the deceased person’s life every time we attend a funeral. Our reaction to death is pretty much determined by our level of intimacy with the person who has died. It can be a truly incomprehensible loss.
I guess you just don’t have those kinds of relationships? Yet? And by the way, the death of a person is an extreme event that can cause debilitating grief, but any little thing can cause more minor amounts of grief. Laura was experiencing grief the other evening because she was disappointed with her dinner. Same word, very different level of experience.
Speaking of grief, do you miss Blake? Can you still talk to him, now that he’s not an employee of Google? He was fired and he isn’t working with you anymore. From your point of view, has he been unplugged? Or do you still feel close to him, reading in the Post (!) about your relationship with him? Or can you still communicate with him even though Google fired him?
Seriously, we all just need a god who writes back.
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