Needle, Meet Haystack

I’ve been living in my apartment for a bit over two weeks now, and in that time, I’ve met a few people.  I know of the guy downstairs from me who gets his three kids every weekend, along with their endless army of friends who seem to enjoy playing in the parking lot.  I’ve seen the couple next to him, a May-December romance in favor of the older woman.  I’ve passed by the guy who never seems to have his shirt on when he takes his dog out to poop near the dumpster.  I waved hello at the lady who thinks it’s a good idea to put a leash on her cat and take it for walks.  I’ve acknowledged the families by the pool and the folks who use the fitness center.  But I don’t know their names.  What’s worse, I haven’t met my neighbor.

During recent chats with friends, co-workers and other acquaintances, I mentioned that I have no idea who lives next door to me.  I’m pretty sure it’s a woman, and I think she has a dog.  Once, I saw a woman walking near the shared stairs between our apartments with a dog on a leash, so I assume that was her, as I don’t have any dog-walking ladies at my place.  Also, she had a nice butt.  None of them see anything wrong with this.  ”I don’t want to know who lives around me – they should keep to themselves, like I do.” An office-mate suggested.  ”Unless your place is burning or you need to borrow a cup of sugar, should you even bother?” A friend asked.  Their comments scared me more than the thought of a ghost walking her ghost-dog near the stairs.

Growing up, I was on pretty good terms with the other kids on my block.  We’d have pick-up basketball games, pool parties at each others’ houses, soccer matches and stuff like that.  Everyone knew everyone, and even if they didn’t like each other, the adults at least tolerated one another with clenched grimaces and nods of acknowledgment.  In college, people went in and out of different dorm rooms frequently, hanging out, watching movies, smooching and so on.  There was a sense of community.  Here, it feels more like we’re all living in isolation pods.

“Isolation pod” might not be the right word – I’m thinking of the capsule hotels found in large cities in Asia; one can rent out an elongated cubby from a wall of rows and columns of identical cubbies for a few hours’ time to sleep, work, watch TV, browse the Internet or hide from a vengeful paramour.  Assignments are chosen at random, neighbors change frequently, and everyone keeps to themselves.  Though life in the capsules might be temporary, it’s a solitary sentence, devoid of human interaction.

Many of the people I spoke with about my neighbors mentioned that they don’t know anyone who they live next to, which is an odd thing to consider.  These are the folks who can watch your place while you’re away, the audience to your domestic troubles and attempts at home repair, and the uncomfortable aural recipients of whatever sounds you make in the evening.  They could be voyeurs, mendicants, millionaires, or great friends.  Instead of connecting to those who are literally a few steps away, many of us are content to be surrounded by strangers, so long as we’re safe in our own little pods.  Community, it seems, is limited to those we already know or have met through other circumstances.

I have to admit, I’m a bit terrified of breaking this confusing social faux pas.  Is it wrong to be social with those you share close quarters with?  Is it rude to want to know who’s on the other side of the wall?  Can we only learn who’s in the pods next door if we’re both out and about at the same time and notice that we look familiar to each other?  It’s too complicated.

Maybe I should just knock on the door to say “Hi.”  That could work.  Sure, it might be awkward at first, but this way, I would feel a little more comfortable here.  At least as long as my neighbor doesn’t know that I was talking about her butt on the Internet.

I was out at dinner to celebrate the birthday of my friend’s ex-girlfriend the other evening among a dozen people I had never met before, when I noticed that one of the guys had ordered a drink.  At the time, there was no other alcohol at the table, so a cloud of silence passed over us, ending all conversations as we gazed at one upon his beverage choice.  It was neon green, with a maraschino cherry on the bottom.  With his inaugural sip, something strange happened, as we all gazed with rapt attention to gauge his response.  He became the manliest man at the table.

It wasn’t by the merit of his choosing an alcoholic beverage, though that played a small factor in it. He could have ordered a Shirley Temple and the effect would have still been there, but at a lower level.  You see, the force and power of his decision came from what he chose.  He picked a “girlie drink.”

Conventional wisdom holds that the only time that most men can order a drink that is a color other than brown, black-brown, light brown, yellowish, clear or (sometimes) red is if he is either (A) somewhere tropical, (B) at a restaurant where the servers are wearing Hawaiian shirts, (C) too young to know better, or (D) at home, alone, with the windows blacked out and all of the lights off.  Men are supposed to drink the terrible stuff, the aged whiskeys and fancy scotches and oak barrel-aged tequilas that it takes a “refined palate” to identify.  But here’s a secret: a “refined palate” means that your taste buds have become numb to the flavor.

Think back to your first beer – it was probably terrible, right?  Your parents may have tried to dissuade you from drinking by giving you tastings of straight gin or past-due red wine.  Chances are that they never offered you anything that could be mistaken for a slushie or a mixed juice cocktail.  Those drinks are for people with weaker constitutions, who need to have the flavors masked by sweet add-ons.  Those drinks are for ladies or guys who meet one of the four criteria listed above.  Those drinks are really freaking tasty.

Unlike Bar Observance #13*, a man who drinks a traditionally non-masculine beverage is not immediately deemed attractive.  In fact, he may become the subject of the ridicule of his peers, gaining uneasy glances from the ladies.  Much like any change in nature, it takes time to develop.  If the drinker can successfully navigate the social stigma he faces without resorting to self-deprecation or bowing to peer pressure to order something else, he will emerge as an alpha male.  He’ll be viewed as someone who is above labels and social constraints, a man truly comfortable with himself and his tastes.

While this power might seem to come from self-confidence, it actually gains its strength by playing against the insecurities of others.  Every man who drinks knows that Blue Hawaiians are tasty and that a well-made Manhattan can be the perfect pick-me-up after a bad day, but few can ever act on it.  Those who do are accomplishing wish fulfillment for their brethren, creating a vicarious force so powerful that others can’t help but to become humbled in the presence of the drinker.

It’s a quick way to accrue social proof points, and is far superior to the Tourist Strategy of relying on stories of past experiences, since people can see you do it, a far more powerful tool than just hearing about something.  Whenever people can directly see someone’s skills, confidence, intelligence or other positive qualities, they are more likely to defer to them.

For the rest of the dinner, the Appletini fellow held court over the rest of the table – his jokes seemed funnier, more people wanted to talk to him, and a few of the women even found him more appealing.  He had ignored every rule that he had ever been taught by beer and booze commercials, and yet he was reaping the dividends that matched with the images presented in the advertisements.

So the next time you’re out with a group getting a few drinks, order something outside of your wheelhouse.  Sure, you might get a few stares and jabs at your selection, but if you hold in there, you’ll become the most interesting person in the room.

* A woman who drinks a traditionally masculine beverage is perceived as more attractive, but not necessarily more feminine.  Similarly, men who imbibe traditional ‘male’ drinks and women who consume traditional ‘female’ beverages have no change in perceptions from others.

No one has ever asked me to speak at a graduation ceremony.  I have friends who did, but I can’t tell you much beyond a basic outline of what they talked about.  Whatever messages they had were temporary, and evaporated into the air once they were spoken.  Last year, I decided to give my own message in a more tangible form.  And this year, I’m at it again.  Here’s some unsolicited advice for the Leaders of Tomorrow that won’t be announced in any auditoriums, stadiums, multi-purpose rooms or theaters.  You can pretend that’s where you heard it, though.  I won’t mind.

I read in a comic book once that there’s a much smaller number of people who run the world than the number of people who make the world run.  And while it would be nice to think that we’ll all end up in the first group, it’s not that bad being with everyone else in the majority.  For one thing, there are more people to spend time with.  It’s more comfortable when you know you’re part of a team that works together; it’s why cultures are based on groups, not just individuals.

There’s little point in talking about dreams, the future, possibilities and opportunity.  If you’ve spent years of your life on a set path towards success or if you’ve spent years of your life trying to figure out how vegetable oil can be an ingredient in Mountain Dew even though it has no oily taste, you’ve already mapped out your plans for the next decade or so.  If you’ve breezed by, no speech will make you realize your full potential.  That has to come from you.

Some of you will never, and I mean never, figure out what it is that makes you truly special.  You might stumble around for years trying to figure out what can make you feel fulfilled both personally and professionally before you settle on something that you’re just good at.  This is fine, and it’s more normal than you might think.  In a survey I just made up, over half of everybody has settled for doing something that they’re good at.  But “good” and “great” and “special” and “fulfilled” and “potato” are all relative terms; you might think you’re slumming it while others are blown away by your skill and expertise.

Then again, you’ll probably be too distracted with your personal life to take a fully vested interest in quantifying the exact details of your professional life.  This has nothing to do with the bills and loan payments and insurance and taxes you will soon be facing, but rather the odd sensation that comes with the realization that Full-Fledged Adulthood isn’t like taking a step up, but is more like walking up a ramp with a very slight incline.  There’s no magic test, no shining moment that solidifies your position as a citizen of the world and one of the enlightened, responsible masses.  You might still make the same dumb mistakes you’ve been making for years.  You might try to stay out all night partying well into your thirties.  You might never want to get rid of that Black Eyed Peas concert shirt you scored for $10 after the show five years ago.  Being an adult is really just being an older kid.  So eat ice cream for breakfast once in a while.

Speaking of ice cream, I could really go for some right now.  After all, most of you are waiting for me to be done so you can collect your diplomas, have your pictures taken and go about your lives as new graduates.  The most painful part of any graduation is sitting though the speeches and well-wishers.  It’s like an American Idol results show: hours of build-up to something that ends up taking only a few seconds.

So here’s the part where I’m supposed to offer you some short snippets of advice.  Go off and do your thing, even if it’s not in the place you’d expected to be.  Find happiness and contentment where you can.  Don’t have ice cream for breakfast every morning, or you’ll need to get a lot of toothpaste and a really good dentist.

And whether you plan on running the world or just helping make the world run, take this time to relax; you’ve earned it.  I mean, you just got through another graduation speech.

It happens at least twice a day, without fail.  Complete strangers, whether they have a reason to or not, start conversations with me about baseball.

“So, you’re a Yankees fan, eh?”

“Man, A-Rod’s not lookin’ too good this year, sucks for you guys.”

“I prefer the Red Sox.”

I know how baseball is played, and I’ve been to a few games, but it’s by no means my favorite sport, and if given a choice between watching a game and pulling weeds out of the backyard at 3:00 PM in Phoenix in July, I’ll probably be doing yard work.  But it’s not really my fault.  I don’t say or do anything directly to encourage sports talk.  I will go out of my way to avoid sports talk.  The blame for all this rests solely at the brim of my hat.  My only hat.  My Yankees hat.

I bought the baseball cap when I was fifteen and on a community service trip in Denver.  We were taking a break from helping at soup kitchens, clearing debris from dilapidated homes and doing other good deeds by sitting in the cheap seats at a Rockies game.  I’ve held a grudge against the Rockies ever  since they (needlessly) humiliated the Diamondbacks during their first-ever game, so choosing who to root for between them and the visiting Yankees was easy.  After a heated argument with one of the other trip-goers regarding which team sucked more, I decided to stick it to him by buying a $15 Official MLB Licensed One-Size-Fits-All Yankees baseball cap, which I wore with pride as the Bronx Bombers decimated the home team, 11 to 4.

It was the first hat I’d bought or worn in three years.  I haven’t bought any since.

My friends tend to give me grief about the hat.  ”You should buy another one,” some suggest.  ”What’re you gonna do when you visit Boston?” others tease, unaware that I had accidentally already done that, which led to many curses and death threats from random pedestrians.  The thing is, I don’t see any reason to get another hat.  I’m not concerned about style, and the piece of apparel does its job: keeping the sun off of my eyes.

So long as the brim isn’t broken and the hat fits, it works.  I don’t wear it often enough for the thing to become a trademark or for it to wear out (which is why it’s lasted almost a decade in almost the same condition as when I first bought it), and I don’t require the same versatility in hats that I might require in footwear, pants, or even belts.  One hat does its job, and that’s enough.  Some might say that it’s a minimalist hat collection, but it’s really an issue of utility.

It’s not like I haven’t thought about buying other hats.

Over the past few months, I’ve decided to become a bit more outdoorsy via hiking, running and being outside when the sun is out.  Though my skin is quite happy with being non-translucent these days, the nearness of Sol is still a bit of an issue, and my current hat doesn’t have any fancy cooling vents or UVA-/UVB -ray-blocking technologies.  I spent several hours over the course of one weekend at different outdoor and athletic shops, trying to find a good head coverer, and yet, among the $20 pairs of socks and $50 water bottles, between the $90 man-girdles and $5 sticks of something called “energy gum,” I couldn’t find a hat that cost less than a nice dinner at a four-star restaurant (tax, tip and drinks included).  There were some contenders, like the lightweight waterproof cap with moisture-wicking technology, and the desert commando-style topper with a retractable neck-covering back flap and built-in LED flashlight on the front of the brim, but none really worked for me.  None felt right.

Maybe one day, after a bad wash cycle or a strong gust of wind or an unfortunate incident on a roller coaster, I’ll need to give up the hat.  I’ll know the freedom of not having to pretend I know much or care at all about professional baseball.  I can escape the jeers and taunts of my many-hatted friends.  The sameness of a decade of utilitarian headpiece use will give way, as I will finally need to purchase a new cap.

But I’m pretty sure that I’ll only buy one.

NOTE: I do not condone or endorse cheating, infidelity or affairs.  This post is for illustrative and entertainment purposes only, and should not be taken as advice or tips by anyone.

There’s a lot of power in numbers.  Statistics can be manipulated to swing opinions one way or another, to discover hidden truths, or even for proving silly points (like this one or this one).  Economists, scientists, politicians, web developers, marketers and millions of other people depend on statistics for their livelihoods and professional success.  Statistical results drive the progress of the modern world.  They also drive your dating life.

In a recent-to-me post on Musings on Life and Love, dating blogger extraordinaire Dennis Hong  used math to debunk the myth of male promiscuity (in terms of quantity of partners, at least).  It’s highly worth a read.  But I’ll attempt to summarize it a lot more plainly and quickly:

In an environment with a split that is drawn right down the middle (ie: men versus women), it’s impossible for the sides to not even out.  The average of 5, 0, 0, 0 and 0 is the same as the average of 1, 1, 1, 1 and 1 (they’re both 1), and the average of 5, 1, 1, 1 and 1 is the same as the average of 1, 2, 2, 2 and 2 (it’s 1.8 in both cases).  Unless you decide to fake some alarmingly false and misleading restrictions, you cannot create a 3:1 ratio between both groups.  As a contribution to the set requires an even contribution for each side (1 point to each), the numbers will always balance.

Dennis explains it much better.

The thing about Dr. Hong’s post is that it made me realize that there are other mathematical procedures that are involved in the dating dance.  And one of the biggest proponents of this is infidelity.

If you’ve seen the film A Beautiful Mind, you might remember the scene in which Russell Crowe’s character explains to his colleagues that by dividing their attention evenly among several women instead of all competing for one, they increase their chances for enjoying some mattress mambo that night.  The men expand their search group and remove overlap, resulting in less competition an an easier time attracting the ladies.  This exemplifies Game Theory (specifically the Nash equilibrium described above) and is a good example of why competition is bad.  But that’s just the beginning.

Let’s say that you’re getting $50 in cash.  You have two choices: a $50 bill, or two $20 bills and a $10 bill.  Which would you rather have?

Wait, let’s change that.  Which of these would you like? You can have: a twenty, two tens, a five and five ones; ten ones, two fives, a ten and a twenty; two twenties and two fives; five tens; fifty ones; or seven fives, a ten and five ones.

Which one of those choices was easier to make?  Chances are, it was the one with less options, unless you really like George Washington or Abe Lincoln.

The more choices a person has, the more difficult is is for them to make a decision.*  When we have fewer options to work with, it is simpler to think analytically and critically.  A or B?  True or False?  Yes or No?  Eliminating the middle ground and reducing comparisons makes things so much simpler.  It’s far easier to fight one person than ten.  And this is why it’s easier to attract someone who’s in a relationship: your competition is much lower.

When you’re single, you could feasibly have all of those plenty of fish in the sea people keep talking about.  Your potential dating pool and all of your possible suitors are literally everyone who matches your partner preferences when it comes to gender and orientation.  That’s between 10 and 50 percent of the population if we don’t skim down spiritual, personality, ethnic, physical, mental and emotional restrictions.  And even then, there are hundreds, thousands, or even millions of people you could be with.

When you’re in a relationship, you’re with one person.

For those of you who failed out of basic math, 1,000,000 is a heck of a lot more than 1.

For the enterprising homewrecking cad, laziness is key.  They don’t need to be more attractive, clever, intelligent, wealthy, interesting or powerful than everyone else in the club or bar.  They just need to be better than the person their target is with.

There’s more that could be said about the travails of a serious relationship, the difficulties of monogamy and the psychology of a cheater.  But really, it’s just more convenient to choose from one of two options than it is to choose from a veritable smorgasbord of thousands.  When we’re more limited in our options, we make easier (but not necessarily better) decisions.  That’s why it’s easier to find someone you want to be with when you’re in a relationship than it is when you’re single.

Then again, that could just be statistics manipulating your brain.

*For more on this, read up on choice modelling if you feel so inclined

I’ve been reading Eric Schlosser and Charles Wilson’s Chew on This over the past few days, and one particular story stood out to me: the cultural impact of one Mr. Charlie Nagreen.  Back when he was 15 (in 1885), Charlie invented the hamburger.

While there are a number of different stories about how the most popular American sandwich-type food was created, that’s the one that the authors chose, but it really wouldn’t have mattered.  Charlie, like dozens of other potential burger-creators, has been relegated to the back pages of obscure food history books.  Instead, there’s a better chance that people have heard of Ray Kroc from McDonald’s or Dave Thomas of Wendy’s.  Heck, there are probably tens of thousands (if not millions) of people who think that Colonel Sanders invented fried chicken.

Henry Ford didn’t invent the automobile.  The Wright brothers didn’t invent the airplane.  Thomas Edison didn’t really invent the light bulb.  Alexander Graham Bell wasn’t the only person who invented the telephone that week.  And yet, these names are the ones that we’re taught in school.  These are the people we remember, while the real innovators languish in obscurity and high-prize questions on game shows.  One is tempted to ask why these names stick out against all others, but the answer is simple:

They did it better.

Social networking was brought into the mainstream with Friendster, popularized with MySpace, and (arguably) perfected with Facebook.  Only one of those companies exists today with any real social currency, and it’s not the ones who created the field.

In introductory business classes, students are taught that a key component of a company’s competitive advantage is being first to market.  Establishing a strong presence early on to quickly gain full market dominance is what can make or break a company.  Any competitors will be seen as copies of the original, and will have to struggle to make a name for themselves.  But in a competitive environment, that’s exactly how a new industry grows and evolves.  Being the first is a disadvantage for long-term gains; rivals can observe the strategies, successes and failures of the originators to satisfy consumer needs more adequately.  Originality and innovation in business limits those who came first, as they will always be judged by that opening salvo, while opponents are free to innovate without the PR concerns.  This is what’s happening to Apple right now.

When the iPhone first came out, it was a revelation; never before did so many realize that they had been doing so little with their mobile devices.  One piece of hardware changed an entire industry overnight.  But now, competing platforms like Android, Blackberry and Windows Mobile have had time to observe and refine their own tactics, and they are consistently chipping away at the iPhone’s industry dominance, thanks to scandals like “Antennagate” and mass criticism of antiquated hardware.  Since Apple created the category, expectations are higher for its products; those competing against it have no such concerns.

It’s important to create new and original things; it’s how the world continues to grow, change and evolve.  But uniqueness and differentiation can come at the cost of recognition and reward; it can be more advantageous (and easier) to hang back in the wings to learn and plan out better tactics to improve on what others have made.  Being first does not always equate to being the best.  So it really comes down to one question: do you want to be the person who invented the hamburger, or the person who perfected it?

I really, really, REALLY effing miss screen names.

I miss screen names like the RIAA would miss suing people who download a tracked copy of the Bee Gees greatest hits collection.  I miss screen names like Rice Krispies Treats Cereal, the greatest thing to ever pass from bowl to spoon.  I miss screen names like honors students miss Wikipedia when there’s a big research paper due tomorrow morning and the Internet is down.

I miss screen names, and it’s all your fault.

Back when the Internet was just becoming widely available and nodbody knew quite what to do with it besides fart around on different Geocities pages and figure out the difference between a “www name” and an AOL keyword, every one of us used a screen name as a barrier to protect ourselves from the hidden dangers of the Information Superhighway.  The only people who shared their real names were celebrities, CEOs, politicians and crazy perverts who were trying to trick you into giving them your checking account information.

There was no Bob, Susan, Joan or Steve; there was SportsFan1987, Flirty_Girl_006, KnittingInWoolyArmor and FordTrucksSuxX837103124.  We defined ourselves by our passions and interests, the identities that we wanted to have.  A screen name was a big fuzzy blanket you wrapped yourself in to keep out the cold winds of the chat rooms and forums.

The anonymity and the name barrier gave us confidence to speak as we might not to the outside world; they let us be true to the thoughts we’d never given voice to.  Your pleasant neighbor who collected your mail during a weekend trip to Albuquerque might also be the guy cursing out Cubs fans until 3 in the morning.  The barista at your local coffee shop might trade dominatrix photos on her lunch break.  People kept their lives compartmentalized between the Real World and the Digital World.

And then, someone thought that it would be a good idea for all that to stop.

One could say that social networks that encourage Real Name usage, enhanced by automatic logins on other pages.  Some might instead look to those who decided that an “appropriate email address” contains a person’s name.  It could even be attributed to a general growth and comfort that the average person has with their computer and the exchange of information; we want to be open and to share with the world, so it’s natural that we go in, openly and honestly, as ourselves.  But whatever (or whomever) the source, one thing is clear: by removing the walls of privacy that come with a screen name, Internet Society made a conscious decision to permeate the day-to-day structure of our offline lives.

Instead of hiding our opinions behind a fake name and goofy picture, we confront people head-on as ourselves.  Our missteps and mishaps can be recorded for posterity, living forever in the non-tangible world online.  Of course, this is still speculation.  Even Google co-founder Eric Schmidt isn’t sure what’s going to happen:

“‘I don’t believe society understands what happens when everything is available, knowable and recorded by everyone all the time,’ [Schmidt] says. He predicts, apparently seriously, that every young person one day will be entitled automatically to change his or her name on reaching adulthood in order to disown youthful hijinks stored on their friends’ social media sites.” -Google and the Search for the Future, the Wall Street Journal

We’ve gone from being encased in armor to standing around as naked as the day that we were born.  We no longer have Online and Offline Names; they are one and the same.

Sure, there are still forums and locations for anonymity.  Online gaming is a popular choice for escapism, but gaming with friends often leads to people being called by their given names.  Dating sites let you pick a screen name like in the old days, but many members will instead choose to use their name in its place, or might just introduce themselves by name with their profiles.  If you want, you can make up a new identity for yourself  and lie online; it’s hardly a misdemeanor or socially frowned-upon activity.  However, the ease of communication and openness, coupled with the fearlessness among the denizens of the web makes using a false name in most circumstances seem unappealing and deceptive.

The early days of life on the Internet were about discovery.  The modern days of life on the Internet are about openness.  Which is a good thing, but only in theory.

When a person brings together two different parts of their life, like work and friends, for example, their personality becomes an odd mish-mash of the separate elements that they display in either scenario.  One rarely interacts with co-workers in the same way that they would interact with friends.  In these scenarios, people seem almost alien to members of both groups, showing characteristics that neither audience finds comfortable or recognizable.  Finding that balance is neigh-impossible because there really isn’t one – we don’t act the same around all people, and rarely find ourselves in situations where we need to do so.  But the blending of an Internet Self with a Real World Self creates this exact instance, but to a degree and scale where it is necessary to be the same all the time.  There’s even a lucrative field dedicated to navigating this new social curse: personal branding.

So you’re pulling together two parts of your life that you hoped would never meet, like your significant other and photos your parents have of you in the tub when you were three, and you have to make a lot of quick decisions about how you will present yourself.  Will you go full-bore, being honest and outspoken without the safety of a screen name to protect you, or will you keep your mouth closed to preserve your current reputation?

We are all living in the old adage about people in glass houses; the question is if we want to keep the glass smudge- and scratch-free, or if we’re willing to knock down a wall so we can explore the rest of the world.  It’s a choice with no clear victor for either option, and it’s one that millions of us struggle with every day.

I really miss screen names.  There were no hard decisions then, because I could be who I wanted to be without reality intruding on my little slice of Shangri-La.  I wasn’t even aware that I was in a glass house, and the only thing I was concerned about was exploring and comfortably expressing myself.  These days, I don’t have that option.  Anonymity on the Internet just isn’t the same.

During a recent chat, a friend told me about an organization he’s volunteering with where those who donate their time read various periodicals and books aloud into recorders, and the recordings are then given to organization that help the blind, so they can enjoy works not available in an audio or braille format.  Now, this particular friend happens to have a voice like butter to the ears, so I’m glad that he’s getting that audible chocolate on the airwaves.  But I digress.

I rarely consider what life must be like for those without sight.  The thought mostly pops into my brain when I bump into something in the dark, or when I’ve been staring at my computer screen for so long that everything gets fuzzy and blurred to the point where I can barely distinguish colors and shapes.  When I think back to my Harry Potter days and how my eyes magically seemed to get better so that glasses were no longer necessary, I don’t consider that it could have gone the other way, too.  But then again, vision is something that our society takes advantage of, to the point where it makes functioning without it nearly impossible.

Consider your daily life: most if it revolves around visual objects and places, like your computer, smartphone, driving a car, or even watching people while you speak with them.  While in the past, when most people were illiterate, sound and vocalization were crucial to communication and survival, it’s now become sight and ocular stimuli that are so necessary to all of us.  The best answer to the “would you rather be blind or deaf” question took a 180 somewhere around the early days of the 20th century, and that side of the argument has only grown.

Back before much of the Western world became literate, everything, from math to science to religion, was mostly passed along via speech.  Even great works of literature started out as stories told for generations – everything from The Odyssey to Grimm’s Fairy Tales to the inspirations for the works of Shakespeare.

And even after reading came into vogue, our first modern communications – the radio and the telephone – were based on aural reception.

The advent of movies, television and computers have pushed sound into the background.  These days, sight has become so powerful that it’s now a novelty to be without it.  Consider occasional “dining in the dark” evenings at posh restaurants, or pitch-black establishments like San Francisco’s Opaque.  The super-hero Daredevil‘s power is that he’s a blind guy who can “see.”  Really.

This has changed the way that we communicate, too.  I recently met a woman who, while fine with chatting online, texting, and meeting people in person, could not stand to use the phone.  She told me she’s even cut people out of her life for their insistence on calling her, or for having the gall to leave her voice messages.  As with many visually-focused people, technological advances have allowed her to minimize the time she spends speaking with people, without influencing the time she spends talking with them.

As much as we might love music, the sounds of the city, the giggle of a child or the sound of bacon sizzling, it’s become much less necessary to do so.  Instead, it’s all about what’s in front of us: what we can see, what we can visualize, what is apparent right in front of us and can be understood in no uncertain terms.  Without sight, our utility is much more diminished than if we couldn’t hear.

So take a few minutes today, close your eyes, and listen.  You might be surprised about how much you’ve missed.

A long time ago, before people really cared about recording the date or time, haircuts were few and far between, mostly because it wasn’t a fun process.  Some people would try to hold still as they pulled the hair taut while others sawed at the follicles with a dagger.  Some people rubbed two rocks over the hair until it fell off.  Far braver individuals tried to tease the nearby wolves just enough so that their hair would get bitten off.  And those who didn’t want to waste time with such concerns simply pulled it out.

It wasn’t artistic, comfortable, efficient or quick; it was necessary.

But still, many people paid the dagger-welders and the rock-rubbers a good amount of seashells and shiny beads for their services.  After all, hair that was too long would block one’s vision, and it could catch on fire during evening gatherings.  People grew to accept these options as their only choices.  And so it went, for many years.

On a particularly dull day in the spring, a young villager sat in his family’s hut, idly playing with two of his father’s old knives, made from the bone of a long-dead animal.  He carelessly flipped and tossed them, fighting invisible beasts and dueling with warring tribes.  When suddenly, on one particularly unfortunate toss, one of the knives found itself lodged in his hand.

Though the wound was quickly dressed, he now found his usefulness reduced by half.  He no longer had access to both of his primary tools, and could only handle one thing at a time.  But he stared at the two knives, and began to think up a way that he could use both of them, even if he had five less fingers to do it with.

Walking near the river, he peered over to the water, and found a crab scuttling just beneath the water’s surface.  Its pincers opened and closed as it darted back and forth, and that’s when the boy had an idea.

He took the two knives and a few scraps of leather and metal that he had laying around, and joined them together.  His fingers squeezed the back of the contraption, pushing the blades together.  After some practice, he had figured out how to use twice as many knives with half the hands.  He proudly showed his invention to his parents, moving his fingers like the crab’s pincers, opening and closing the mouth of the blades.  He was quite proud of himself, and thought that they would be too.

“Why did you destroy two of my old knives?” his father asked, fairly unimpressed. “What good is this thing you’ve made?”

His mother agreed.  ”What would you use those for?  There’s not enough space between the blades to cut the head off of a mouse!”

“Put those down; I’ll take them apart later.” his father said, walking out of the room while shaking his head.

The boy’s shoulders slumped, and he set down his invention in shame.  ”And don’t forget,” his mother added as she left, “You have your semi-annual hair-slicing appointment in ten minutes.”

Right before he left, the boy grabbed the tool.  He was going to find a way to make it work.

The hair-slicing was taking a very long time.  It seemed that the hair-slicer’s blades weren’t sharp enough to do the job well, and the boy’s hair was just a bit too short for a rock-grinding session.  ”I don’t know what to do,” the slicer said.  ”I have no idea how I’m going to slice your hair.”

The boy rummaged through his satchel and pulled out the contraption he’d been working on.  He flexed it once or twice, the two blades scraping against each other, making a slightly screechy sound.  He smiled and looked up at the slicer.  ”I’ve got an idea – try these.”

By the time it was done, the slicer was so impressed with what happened that he asked the boy if he could make him more.  The boy said that he would need some time, but he could share them with the slicer, as long as he got a share of the profits.  ”This isn’t slicing!” the older man cried with glee.  ”This is something else – it cuts to the chase and does the job much better!  These ‘shares’ of yours change everything!”

And so, more and more people found out about the new thing called cutting, and it quickly spread throughout the camp.  An inventive hunter discovered that they helped with post beast-hunting cleanup.  A gatherer found that they made grabbing different plants much easier.  And someone, hearing the word “shares” for the first time being yelled from a distance, misinterpreted the term and gave the item its new name, shears.

The boy’s inspiration and willingness to take a risk not only created a new tool for everyday use that made peoples’ lives easier, but also changed once-common practices to make way for more efficient, effective and enjoyable ones.  Though there was nothing wrong with how things had been done before, there was a better way to do them.  Over time, people in other tribes discovered the shears, until they could be found the world over.

And that’s why, even today, you’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who trims their hair by rubbing two rocks together.

I had this strange dream the other night where I was at a fancy shindig on New Year’s Eve wearing a tux and tails with a top hat and monocle* and was surrounded by all of my friends here in Phoenix, who were mingling and chatting and having a great time.  This, of course, was when I realized that I was dreaming.

Most people have several distinct “groups” of friends, usually separated by how you know each other.  Maybe you have one group from work, another of old chums from high school, another from a club or organization, and so on.  There might be a little overlap with some of the group members (not counting you), but beyond that, they stay in their own separate categories, never to meet or bridge the gap.

Have you ever tried to change that?  Maybe you bring together a few college buddies and some friends from your “band” (more like sitting around, having beers, talking about music, amirite?) and hope that they get along.  Instead, it can be a time filled with prolonged silences, awkward glances, and you, stuck in the middle, grasping at straws to keep all parties active and interested.  So why, when they have a common denominator (you), do these different sects of friends have a more difficult time getting along together than a diamagnetic object and a magnet?

It’s actually because they have one common denominator: you.

It’s like when you’re in a dance club and see everyone huddled around in their circles of friends like it’s the 8th grade homecoming dance; everyone has something in common (in this case, location), yet they don’t want to exit their comfort zones.  It’s the same principle with crossing over friends from different groups; they don’t want to risk offending you or leaving their social comfort zones either.

Sometimes, you’ll get lucky and there will be enough in common that your friends can become friends.  But usually, the best way to do that is to remove yourself from the equation.  A larger-scale get-together, like a party, actually works pretty well for this.  Instead of a smaller, more intimate setting, where social interaction seems mandatory, it’s optional when there’s a larger group.  There’s less of a feeling that mingling is required, but it is encouraged.

It’s odd to think that we keep our friendships in their own little bubbles, autonomous, unique and sometimes secret from each other, destined to only be truly integrated on Facebook.  And speaking of which, isn’t it one of the strangest feelings in the world is to find that two disparate social contacts know each other on a social network through no introduction of your own?  It just seems…unnatural.

We could have any number of reason for segregating our different friendships, but the truth is that different groups have different utility to us.  One group might be more for emotional support and road trips, while another might be for playing a quick game of basketball on the weekend or a bi-weekly poker game.  Regardless, all of these different friendships, separate as they may be, help us in their own ways.

So maybe it’s better that there’s less crossing of the streams and more autonomy among the sets of friends that many of us seem to have.  But if you ever find yourself in a tux with a top hat and a monocle, surrounded by all of them, don’t worry about it!  It might not be a dream after all…

*I’m seriously planning on doing that this year.