Clearly I've Never Been

But, in the words of Addison Pratt, I'm a-going.

Simon Fraser and the Dangers of Wikipedia.

Simon Fraser was a Canadian Explorer. Simon Fraser was also a Scottish Lord--well several Scottish Lords, including one Jacobite martyr. Coming across the story of the latter a few years ago, I mistook him to be the namesake of the Canadian university in Vancouver. After all, how many guys named Simon Fraser could there be? Apparently lots.

Also, there are lots of bodies of water named Leven. Idly, I was reading about the River Clyde today. Among its major tributaries are the Rivers Leven and Kelvin. But apparently there are numerous bodies of water, within and without Scotland, called Leven.

The Aqueduct?

So, I wrote a memo where I mentioned the Roman empire, roads and aqueducts as an analogy. Clever, I thought. So, in keeping with the post-random-clips-from-youtube theme, here's what inspired it:

Swedish Lullaby

Here's another story I've told the wrong way before. And another reason for me to fall back in love with Jewel.

At age 17, I crushed on Jewel. I was enamored with her, watching her Hard Rock Live performance on VH1. Each thing I learned about her--born in Payson, grew up in Alaska--made me more smitten. Well, perhaps there were strikes against her--I cannot say that I was enamored with her every word, in her poetry book; or with every song, "Foolish Games". But from "Who will Save Your Soul" and "You were meant for me" I was hers.

I saw her sing Swedish Lullaby and melted. Beautiful. Defying description. At the time, I envisioned her picking up a tune and some Swedish from a grandmother who sang her to sleep.

Then, later I discovered that Jewel wrote the song herself:

This is a song I wrote in Swedish. When I was writing it I didn't know how to say man or woman yet. But I knew how to say wolf and dolphin.--Jewel

And so, an amazing, simple, and beautiful lullaby. In remedial Swedish:



Sov gott, vackra delfin
Sov gott, jag vita varg
Vi har kärlek för varandra
För varandra
För alltid
Sov gott, vackra delfin
Sov gott, jag vita varg
Morgonen vaknar
Då kysser vi
Kysser vi för alltid
Sov gott, för alltid

She had simply decided to up and learn some Swedish--something that speaks to my soul. Find me a girl who just decides to learn Swedish, and I'll surely forgive her for not having a piercing, angelic voice. In fact, I'll overlook a measure of sappiness,* to boot.

Btw. Did you know that Jewel's cousin plays Pocahantas in New World? Tell me there is another Kilcher for me out there.

(*While I think the story about using wolf and dolphin is cute, and that people who just up and learn Swedish are cool, it's a bit sappier than what I'd had in mind when hearing the song.)

10-31-1998

At the office Christmas party, I found out that my co-worker's husband, who is a really great guy, was at the same Phish concert as I was in Vegas in 1998. At that concert, Phish played as their second set the entire Velvet Underground album "Loaded." Somehow this came up in our conversation tonight. Pretty amazing.

A Day of Days.

After being told my whole like that I look like Fred Savage, today Fred Savage will find out that he looks like me.

Thoughts from McDonalds and Nihilism

Just got lunch at McDonalds in the mall and overheard 9-year old: "Let's eat over there by Starbucks it's all ghetto here."

Later, was discussing nihilism, in the wake of No Country for Old Men--which I had said some wrongfully label as nihilistic. That got me to thinking about Nietzsche.

Back in college, I came up with a few shorthand, crude but "existentialism-for-dummies" ways of talking about major philosophers so that I had something to say, in response to question #3 on the getting to know you list:
1. where are you from
2. what are you studying
3. really, what [good] is that?
(I'm not here to defend those shorthand, not necessarilly accurate spiels, the ideas that existentialism is philosophy, or the idea that it is particularly good philosophy. Nonetheless, to continue storytelling,)

At the time, I would accuse Nietzsche of making the following logical blunder.
(1) There is no objective meaning, purpose or truth in life. Or, phrased differently, there is no morality according to which you should live.
(2) Therefore, you should reject morality, become ubermensch and dominate, etc.

The logical blunder being, as I would say, is that he deduced from *there is no "truth" to tell anyone what he should do* that *one should act, think or believe a certain way.* I mean, if there's no point, there's no point, right? How can a "thou shalt" follow from "there are no thou-shalts."

Years later, with most of Nietzsche forgottenl, and with larger, denser clouds accumulating over what I might have once understood of his ideas, I had this epiphany: What if (2), above, is not a conclusion at all? I mean, he states his point--and then exhibits a will to power. (1) There is nothing to believe in! (2) Therefore, "You should do as I say."

That, in turn, made me think of Hans Lottenbach, upon handing out paper assignments: "If you cannot even spell Nietzsche accurately, how accurately do you think the reader will believe you can understand his ideas?"

EDIT: does anyone want an early German copy of Also Sprach Zarathustra?