I’ve been happily organizing slides of hundreds of paintings I did in previous decades. Never able to sell any, but then I never really tried. Grateful for the aesthetic experience, happy at how life turned out.

When I get into one of those contemplative funks about how differently life might have been “if only,” it helps to consider myself a literati artist. Those ancient Chinese painters, known by only a score or so of existent works, if that many, claimed to paint only for themselves and friends. I admire them and feel kin. Then I become properly attuned to the universe and heave a sigh of relief when realizing how badly things might have turned out “if only.”

Before I gave it up painting altogether 20 years ago, I made an honest living creating software projects, until I retired from that about 10 years ago. More unknown projects, gone with the snows of yesteryear, fun in their time and at least I got paid. But now I have much more left of my art than I do of my software.

Of course those artifacts too will vanish in another decade or so. Most lives are fully unknown outside a small circle. I salute them, join them, and realize we have all been just as meaningful and infinite as anyone who briefly adorns museum walls and history books.

Blinders are devices placed on a horse so it can only see straight ahead. Avoiding slowing distraction. Our current term is “focused like a laser.” That is often a useful tool when trying to accomplish a defined task. It is a tragedy as a guide to life.

We evolved, after all, with luck and pluck by being able to be aware of and quickly evaluate everything in the environment. Those who ignored the various surrounding possibilities of danger and advantage were probably not the most successful members of ancient tribes.

Beyond individual problems, blinders often prevent people from participating well in society. Since, above all, our species only exists as highly social animals, that is a massive handicap for the person, and a possible tragedy for everyone else.

Blinders came to the workplace with the industrial revolution. And their success there encouraged wider efforts to adapt focus to social and philosophical tasks. A great error, always ending in an ironic, incomprehensible swamp of seeming contradictions. Life and consciousness is so complex it overwhelms targeted organization.

I think we need to throw out the blinders and limit the lasers. They have done enough social damage. It is time for each of us and our collectives to accept that distraction is just as important and more central to our well-being as dedicated narrow concentration.

Global era mantra “It’s a Small World After All” has been drilled into our minds for decades. An era of instant travel and electronic communication shrinks time and distance. We need to accept that this is a tiny shared globe, shrinking daily.

Except that it isn’t, at least for each of us. We may view real-time feeds in Japan, or take a jet to Florida, but to walk across town still takes a while. Walking 100 miles is a significant accomplishment requiring time, energy, stamina. Outside cities, there remain vest stretches of terrain, perhaps not wild, but not suburban or urban paved over.

More than that, each of those actual places, viewed as we walk, contain infinite marvels. We may never notice much from a plane or a car but the fantastic variety of life goes on, fractal in intensity and meaning.

Yes, I know it is different now. Humans change the climate, could destroy the biosphere with doomsday weapons, affect every ecological nook and cranny evolved over the last millions of years. We are a nasty invasive species. Everywhere, all the time, and that was never true before.

But I go forth daily, and the immediate world is still large, and gives a clue to how vast a planet really is. There is a lot of space. And everywhere is not quite so crowded as our immediate area may be.

Hopeful. 

Beauty is a core of human experience, one reason why AI will never be like us. There is, of course, a logical type of beauty which machines might appreciate, akin to the clear cold calculations of mathematics. But such logical and digital beauty is just a tiny fraction of the beauties available to any one of us any moment.

Beauty is truly sensed as a surprising rightness. A shaft of sunlight in a forest, a raindrop falling on still water. Anything at all. We are struck by the unexpected, magically formulate how everything seems to fit together, and are washed by a profound peace.

Any attempt to formulate the rules of beauty _ often done in the art world _ is futile. What we automatically accept as correct is better described as fashion. There is that lacking element of surprise. More fundamentally, fashion requires a severe restriction of our world, to consciously ignore most of it and only contemplate what fits into our preconceptions.

Beauty is the whole thing. The universe widely open. Feeling “out of the box.” And, I hate to admit, not really susceptible to formulation or description. Those who cultivate a sense of wonder and everything all the time are the most immersed in the beauty of existence. And often, unfortunately, those least able to succeed in a technological society. 

Wall Street Journal editorials often sound as if they were written by Malory describing Camelot. “Once upon a time the United States was happy and bright, bound by the shining morality of Protestant christianity.” The latest piece proclaims that “see, everyone is less religious, things are still awful, you can’t blame religion for anything in the past.” Okay. 

Actually what I blame for most evil (not caused by the universe and nature itself) is fanaticism. Any fanatic with any weird cause _ religious, nationalistic, economic, utopian, or just plain kookiness _ is a menace to what most of us consider normal civilized life.

Because, when you get right down to it, civilization is mostly happy and bright because people get along. That involves extremely complicated tribal and intertribal adjustments, a mix of tolerance, rules, support and tension that somehow are never logically complete but which work to allow societies to function.

What kills any civilization is the ascendance of fanatics with sharp simple views of the cosmos. Barbarians from outside looking only for wealth or mass murder. Charismatic leaders from inside seeking to kill or change anyone who doesn’t believe as they do.

The glorious times nostalgically referenced by the WSJ were times not so long ago when fanaticism itself was regarded as the worst sin.

Probably the biggest mistake made by the scientifically industrializing world has been the idea and requirement that individuals must specialize into one expertise of work in order to have value. Experts get paid more than dilettantes. Besides, we are told, it takes a lifetime of concentration to learn to do anything well.

Perhaps at one time that made sense. At one time, so did raising monoliths, leveling forests, and slaughtering anyone not in your tribe. But civilization also evolves to meet new conditions, and expertise has become a residual anomaly which can quickly turn cancerous.

The professional disease of expertise is the proverbial “rabbit hole,” obsessively concentrating on one facet of thought as the rest of existence vanishes. It’s not new _ theologians have always been prone to the issue. But in a world filled with experts, its ramifications are becoming calamitous.

We are composed of discrete and expert chemical interactions. But we transcend all that. We are able to focus to accomplish tasks. But our lives are _ or should be _ much more than tasks fulfilled. Rabbit holes may bring prestige, but rob us of true human happiness.

The old adage to “smell the roses” remains as true as ever. And it does not mean to start a perfume factory.

Celebrating the “Glorious Fourth” sounds increasingly ironic. Everyone these days feels increasingly victimized, in spite of living a better life than anyone ever has in the past. Folks marinate in simmering resentment dawn to dusk, only briefly cheerful as the fireworks explode.

Most likely, that is due to the expansion of the idea of “meritocracy” towards the end of the previous century. We always knew that some people were better than others at some things. The poison was the increasing belief that such success was always the result of hard work, as opposed to luck and circumstance. Kings, after all, had been mysteriously selected by God, regardless of mundane qualifications.  An aura of intrinsic value concentrated on one’s absolute amount of wealth.

Well, most people work hard. And most people do not become the best. Obviously, by meritocratic belief, such folks deserve their fate. But equally obviously those folks know how hard they tried. So someone or something else must be to blame.

Self-described victims find reinforcement in “their” newspapers, or television channels, or social media networks. They are reinforced by all those worthy institutions catering to extremes to increase advertising dollars. And the tone shifts from “glorious” to “apocalyptic”. 

We were patriotic when I grew up in the ’50s. The country had just won a great war. Those times seem golden in retrospect, but only against a background of what had gone before _ depression, war and all.

Today, life could indeed seem glorious. But we squander the opportunity and prefer to cultivate our sullen anger.

My father had been advised to become Episcopalian to help his business chances. He dutifully  did so, paid contributions, and sent me every week. I learned the Bible stories, listened to sermons, sang in the choir, and hung out in youth groups. Then I grew up and moved away.

So I had the background. I remain cosmically religious, I use prayer to center my thoughts. Never actively rebelled against religions or their adherents. I see such tribes have social use and power. But…

Well I do see rituals as just bonding rituals. Beliefs as unifying, thoughtless, pleasant fantasies. I think there is a lot more to the universe than we can know, perhaps a purpose. But I cannot see anthropomorphic gods as more than daydream superheroes. And Jesus is just plain weird. Even in church every week, I could not get into that part of the ceremonies.

I’ve led a fortunate life and I have sympathy for all those whose road has been more difficult and nasty. But my own existence has been and continues to be what many would consider heaven. I believe it is my duty to accept that and appreciate it. My world is filled with joy, beauty, and majesty, none of which I have earned nor deserve.

Sun, birds, flowers, health, daily and ongoing miracles. Life is amazing and infinitely wondrous. I try to make every day a special holiday in that sense, no need for chocolate bunnies.

This culture spends a great amount of time rushing from one activity to another. “No time to say hello goodbye.” Ferocious moves in traffic to gain a second or two. Must get to_ what?

Most rushes end up in trivial activities and a lot of wasted time and waiting. Sitting at a restaurant, looking at the media, simply bored. Our laser focus rapidly scans but finds little worth seeing.

Oh, I did my share when I was younger. Modern life demands that we at least go through the motions. Everyone _ including beggars in the street _ must think that they are overworked and overwhelmed.

Everyone calls periodically for a kinder, gentler, more laid back lifestyle. But, like pedestrians crossing the street, anyone going too slow will simply get mowed down and eliminated. Fast bastards win, not least because they get the cars.

Sadly, none of this rushing seems to have actually made anyone more deeply happy. In fact a lot of rushing seems to explicitly try to disguise how unhappy the quick pace is. We wear out, but are too tired to rest as we rush to the bathroom for sleeping pills.

Little ants, and not a cheerful one in the bunch.

Never been to the city, but I think The Chicago School of Economics did a great disservice to civilization. Its basic idea was that any economic institution such as a corporation _ by extension any institution at all _ should be stripped to its core function and mercilessly concentrate on only that. In the case of a company, only make money and ignore all other distractions.

It’s a kind of religious argument to assume that there can be only one core purpose in any human activity. Even a simple goal of making money, for example, has questions as to how much, for how long, and under what circumstances_ not to mention at what sacrifice. People, after all, are free to ignore the products of a business they detest.

But the main problem is in considering any human institution as a pure machine. A steam engine may be tuned to perfection but any tribe _ which is what any team becomes _ is a constant balancing act. Paying employees “too much” may lead to a short-term loss of profit, but stabilize revenue in the long term by increasing retention.

And as far as society as a whole, the Chicago model can be corrosive. Institutions blinded by pure purpose easily become as evil and corrupted as any political tyranny. And just as abusive to anyone inside or outside its reach.

The idea that people can be reduced to cogs and gears, and that their desires can be simply located and easily bottled, has been one of the worst notions of the previous century. Chicago Economics is a dangerous delusion.