Issue #189 - The Spaces in Between
Snow Blue
It’s been snowing most of the night, and the trucks are rumbling down the street clearing the roads, there are sparks as the plough catches the tops of the bricks that pave the surface. I’ve just been out to clear as much as I can, while it continues to fall. There are deer tracks in the path to our front door, signs of visitors in the night, moving silently through the neighborhood.
The family are home and schools are closed, I’ll work through the morning and then maybe this afternoon we can find some slopes to go sledding, and maybe even build a snowman.
I hope that you’re well and all is good with you. It’s been a good first week back, meeting new groups, figuring out how the semester is going to work. Everyone is a bit quiet, but I’m used to that. The first week too, must feel like overload to the students, there’s so much new information, new teachers, classmates, styles of instruction. We’ll see how it goes.
Teaching & Learning
Although feeling a little less prepared that I usually am, also because I’ve moved on from the more prescriptive structure of previous semesters, I enjoyed the sessions, getting to know the students, and setting out a plan for the course. The first week sometimes feels like a sell, teasing a few ideas, giving the students a preview of forthcoming attractions.
I welcomed a few returning students, it’s nice to see some familiar faces, and they said that they were back either because they wanted to build on previous classes, and some said they enjoyed the “vibe” in the room. I think this is interesting, mostly because I’m wondering what it’s like elsewhere, I think the classes are pretty straightforward, the atmosphere is open, and productive. Class sizes are usually a little less than they might have experienced elsewhere, so that might be something, my room can only fit around 24 students.
We’ll see what the coming weeks will be like, how things settle, and what the room feels like as we embark on projects. I’m excited, it’s going to be interesting.
Life Lessons
With all my energy focussed on new classes this week, I had little time to spend watching, reading or listening. I still came across a few things in the course of building courses, but it’s so easy to drift and fall down rabbit holes when you’re searching for materials, I bookmarked a couple of sites, and I’ll return to them over the weekend.
On my commute into city, I did listen to the second series of Things Fell Apart, the radio series presented by Jon Ronson, exploring the origins of the culture wars. I consumed the series in a week, it is remarkable and terrifying, and full of lost people who for one reason or another, have staked their reputations in strange, outrageous beliefs, that sometimes stem from a sadness, poor judgement, even tragedy in their lives.
We would know little about these people, but the internet, our social networks, and the industrial conspiracy complex, with its shock jocks, Fox news hosts, reddit threads, and dishonest, opportunistic politicians, and public figures, have distorted fragments of stories, beyond all imaginable realms, to divide and sow mistrust in our institutions, in attempts to unsettled the very communities that we live in.
I was left with a sadness of my own, that many are so ready to believe, that they find themselves adrift, angry, in a sea of contradictions, unable to live happily. Of course for some people, conspiracy is community, which is why it is so rewarding and self-fulfilling for them, which I find desperately bleak.
Lost and Found
Anyway, a few things to cheer myself up, from these winter blues. Actually everything is fine, I just need to contrast that last paragraph with something more uplifting, and I should say that Jon’s podcast is very funny in parts, and not at all depressing.
I have a couple of new articles coming out, and took a moment to re-read the first one on maker spaces that I wrote at CMU.
I still just about have a Flickr account, it’s been a while since I added any new photos, maybe I’ll do that this evening. The site just celebrated 16 years, so that was when I was a mac operator in a greetings card firm (oh boy), and I just found a new way to make the day go by easier, it was the best fun, and still in touch with a couple of folks from those days of posting and chatting online.
Flickr Commons is still an amazing resource, go and see.
Even more folks are leaving substack for ghost. This article, of All the garbage I found in one hour is chasening at best. What’s frustrating is that I pay every year to substack, and it really, really does have a moderation problem, and although it claims to sorting a few things out, for many reasonable people, it’s too little, too late. Oh, now it got all depressing again. sorry. Actually, at the end of this, I went to explore ghost, and now I have a decision to make.
Let’s finish with a new song from MGMT and a great video starring Inga Petry, who has a congenital limb difference. You might also notice that the first location this video was filmed as Pittsburgh.
Thank you
This is supposed to be a nice way to end, and honestly I didn’t mean this issue to be so tough. I suppose it’s a winter blues edition, the state of the world. I’m having so much trouble watching the news at the moment.
Okay, but there’s snow to enjoy this afternoon. We’re looking forward to sliding down hills, it should be fun.
I hope you’re well. Stay warm, wherever you are. Catch you next week.