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October 2011

 

bullet October 31, 2011

While I can't claim to have reached this outcome, this observance of depression is incredibly apt for me.

Posted at 11:19 AM
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bullet October 30, 2011

Squirrel!

Posted at 10:03 AM
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bullet October 29, 2011

There is no true morality in the world, only self-interested views propagated by individuals, organizations, and cults. Any sense of a true human morality - something that puts us above the animals and shows us to be supporters of our fellow man, our Earth-sharing animals, and the world itself - any expression of true morality is spurned or considered a weakness to be exploited.

We as a species truly do not deserve to exist when we have been given such potential, only to shun the tenants of that potential as unprofitable, unenlightening, and irredeemable - when in fact such potential, used and given freely, is exactly the opposite of each of those. True profit, enlightenment, and redemption come from true morality, not from anything else. And no amount of personal power, wealth, fame, or narcissism will match even the smallest amount of that potential.

Posted at 10:33 AM
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bullet October 28, 2011

Senility is tiring for everybody involved. In fact I feel older every minute that I'm taking care of my grandma. One of us is going to die from exhaustion; the question is which one of us.

I'm tired. She's tired. We're both getting by but that's about it. There should be more to life than this, but I've been saying that same thing my whole life, so I guess I should have just wised up by now.

Posted at 11:11 AM
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bullet October 27, 2011

What is the point of setting up accounts with user names, passwords, PINs, and keys that remember those things so you can autofill them when you need them? The idiotic people running companies and organizations will change one or more of those things every year or two and you'll have to fight your way through just to access your own account, get outrageously frustrated, and live to expect EXACTLY the same thing to happen in a year or two more.

What the hell is wrong with companies and organizations? Why even set things up at all if you're going to switch things around without notice on a far-too-frequent basis? So you really think that frustrating and pissing off your customers is good for business? Huh?

Posted at 9:28 AM
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bullet October 26, 2011

Why does it all have to hurt so much?

Posted at 10:57 AM
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bullet October 25, 2011

It's bad enough that I have to do yard work when I hate it so much (looking at flowers and shrubs and trees is wonderful but trimming, watering, and raking up after them is torture), but it's even worse that Mother Nature has been conspiring against me on the rare time I have Tuesdays and Thursdays to get things done while my grandma is at day care. Today, for once, was clear and sunny (defying the forecasts of rain) and I was able to finish up most of what I've had to do. That's only been possible because I worked every day over the weekend for a couple hours each day while I had my grandma take a long nap in bed - something that worked alright this time but is too chancy really for regular use since my grandma is too fragile and unpredictable now.

So the yard work is done - except for the non-stop leaves which will continue to accumulate from now until eternity - and I've got almost everything set up and prepared for the coming winter. And it's a good thing, too, because this past week of running around and doing these things has been exhausting.

Now I can try to refocus on other things that have been waiting to be done. I may have gotten mostly caught up with the yard work but that hardly means I'm caught up with everything. There's still far too much to do ... but at least the yard work is done and over with before the first snow fall.

Posted at 4:02 PM
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bullet October 24, 2011

I have so many things to do I think my head may explode just from trying to keep track of everything, not to mention the stress of trying to accomplish all of it or at least as much as possible.

On a comparable but totally unrelated note, my migraine is kicking into high gear again and my head may explode from that as well.

Good times, good times.

Posted at 9:04 AM
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bullet October 23, 2011

Incremental progress is still progress, right?

Please say it is!!

Posted at 8:10 AM
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bullet October 22, 2011

Today is the first day of the rest of my life.

NOOOOoooooooooo!!!!

Posted at 9:17 AM
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bullet October 21, 2011

Oh goody, another day where she won't even try to stand at all. The fun just never ends ...

Posted at 11:17 AM
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bullet October 20, 2011

When's it get good?

Posted at 9:20 AM
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bullet October 19, 2011

Why must I always feel like I'm under the gun, running around and trying to get a million things done with no hope of accomplishing them all and with a whole list of things to do that have already been put off due to a lack of time in the previous days and months? Shouldn't I have learned by now? Shouldn't I just give up?

Posted at 11:03 AM
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bullet October 18, 2011

Today I'm tired and a bit achy, and I'm just beginning a very busy week full of errands, tasks, and projects to be begun and largely completed - hopefully. It would be a lot to do even under normal circumstances, but with my grandma requiring so much more attention - and with me being quite tied - it's going to be a very full and tiring week. Hopefully I'll get as much done as I hope or near to it. That would at least make up for the even greater exhaustion. Time will tell, though.

Posted at 10:57 AM
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bullet October 17, 2011

My grandmother has been getting less and less sleep during the night. She wakes up at some point and decides it's time to get up rather than go back to sleep. It can be dead quiet and pitch black dark all around her, but that doesn't change things. And it's even more ridiculous because she can't get out of bed on her own so there's no reason not to simply go back to sleep. Add to that the fact that she's tired most of the time and it makes even less sense that she doesn't go back to sleep ... but senility doesn't have to make sense, we have learned.

The night before last I don't think my grandma slept much at all, and consequently she was even more tired than usual and thus a mess at standing and eating and anything at all. She even fell asleep while sitting in her chair during the day, something which used to happen fairly often but hasn't been something she's done for almost a year.

Today, even after letting her sleep in, she is still very tired - to the point of falling asleep during her lunch. I'm struggling to keep her awake and eating, hoping I can make it to a long afternoon nap and hoping also that such a nap might make at least a little impact.

As things stand now it's very difficult, and it's already been quite difficult without this. Adding to the struggle makes things nearly unbearable.

How, I ask again, did I wind up here?

Posted at 12:15 PM
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bullet October 16, 2011

I am exceedingly tired of the media treating the Occupy Wall Street protesters as if they are hippies with no purpose, no demands or expectations, and no leaders. First and foremost I am angry that the media is treating this movement completely opposite the way they treated the Tea Party - even in its earliest days and with its most obvious nutjobs. Second, I think it is outrageously poor reporting not to simply understand that protests are meant not to provide leaders and solutions but to PROTEST the actions of a group and expect them to change or stop whatever offenses they are committing. And thirdly, there actually ARE leaders with ideas of what is important to these protesters and with ideas of what to do. Every time they show up, however, the media try to ask questions to make them seem like extremists or - as was evident from YouTube clips of FOX News interviews that were never broadcast - there are in fact quite a few intelligent, eloquent people expressing their concerns and their ideas for how to improve the economy, the jobless situation, and economic disparity (which, HINT HINT news media, is what this is all about!)

An article on Daily Kos this morning takes a look at the history that led to our financial debacle and expresses why Occupy Wall Street protesters are upset AND what they want done to rectify the situation. The media can keep sticking their heads in the sand if they like, but the voice of the people will get out regardless. Hear it now:

Three strikes against Wall Street

"What if" is a game for suckers.

What if you'd bought Apple stock when it was $20 a share? What if you'd majored in engineering instead of English? What if we'd known what those men were up to when they walked onto planes the morning of September 11. Whether it's something small or something very large, playing the what if game just invites useless regret and pointless woolgathering. It leads to fantasies of what might have been, rather than dealing with what is.

On the other hand, there's more to history than just a catalog of dead facts. Or at least, there should be. If we don't look to the past for examples, if we don't extrapolate, if we don't learn, then it's not just the past that's dead. It's us. We need to study those points where decisions were made for good or ill, where history took a turn. We need to understand how things went wrong if we ever expect to set them right.

There are many who are still intent on forcing Occupy Wall Street to cough up a list of demands and a set of leaders to present them. But Occupy Wall Street isn't about demands, it's about making a statement. It's a statement that the current system isn't working for the average American (and based on the the worldwide events this weekend, it's not working for a lot of people in a lot of places). It's a statement that the common people seem to have been abandoned by a government that cares more for corporations than for workers, more for the rich than the poor, more for the powerful than the weak.

The system as it stands is definitively broken. We've so wrecked the balance between workers and corporations that many people are willing to accept anything, anything, if they're told that it means a pay check. So how did we get there? Where was the crossroads where we hooked right when we might have gone straight or taken a left? Is it capitalism itself that's at fault? No... and yes.

It's only relatively recently that people began to think of capitalism as something that didn't include the government; that it was somehow preferable to have a "pure" market, and that this represented some more American system (though it is nothing like the system on which the nation was founded). This may be the most cancerous idea to take root in in a century.

Take a look on the field this week as baseball finishes up league play and heads into the World Series. In addition to the two teams, there are also a handful of umpires on the grass and behind the plate. There's also a lengthy set of rules that define balls and strikes, outs, balks, and such arcana as the infield fly rule. Do you think the game would function without those men and without the rules? Would it be better if innings went as many outs as the batting team desired? If the pitcher could throw at the batters without consequence? If plays could be settled by swinging a bat at other players? Would it still be baseball?

The rules aren't just a part of baseball, they are baseball. Executing those rules under those supervision of the umpires is what it means to play the game.

Functional capitalism has always required the same thing: rules and people to enforce those rules. Regulation isn't external to the system. The government's role in capitalism isn't one of an outsider placing restrictions on the market. The government makes the market. It shapes it and enables it, allows the market to function. A good government controls the market so that the market serves the citizens. It uses that market to set the price of goods, provide capital for new industry, and offer opportunities for investment. When the market doesn't handle those tasks well, government adjusts the regulations so that it can. When someone finds a loophole, government sews it shut. The regulations aren't an imposition on the market, they are the market, they define it, just as the rules define baseball.

It's just as ridiculous to expect the market to police itself as it would be to expect a baserunner to walk off the field if no one is calling outs. Games, and markets, are made to work through rules. Rules only work if they are enforced. If the game no longer serves the fans, or the market no longer serves the citizens, then the rules need to change.

When we look back over the last half century, we see a market that increasingly veers away from its role of serving the citizenry. Especially in the last three decades, the market has moved form being a vehicle designed to allow investment in companies that create goods and services, and become the target of its own interest. It's turned into a banquet of fiscal self-cannibalism. It does not serve the citizens, and in fact represents perhaps as great a risk as any enemy extant.

Without engaging in a lot of what if and if only, is it still possible to see where we went wrong and understand how we might set things back on course? How did we lose the market as a tool of the government, and instead turn the government into a servant of the market?

One way was in an increasing push for deregulation. Broad calls for weakening the government's role in policing the market—closely tied to the idea that markets were somehow more effective in the absence of government—has been the harbinger of downfall again and again. In particular the destruction of the Glass–Steagall Act, was directly responsible for eroding the boundaries that allowed the most recent fiscal collapse to become more massive. Deregulation was the first strike.

Another way in which markets ceased to serve the nation was in becoming engines of wealth concentration rather than means of wealth creation. There are several factors involved, including the creation of unregulated instruments that allowed trading in complex derivatives. However, even more important in this change was the reduction of top income tax rates and capital gains taxes. With no bounds at the top and no penalty for accuring more and more wealth, the system lost all incentives for creating investments and rewarding workers. Effects as diverse as sending jobs overseas and draining pension funds are directly attributable to massive reductions in taxes that allowed this wealth to pass into much fewer hands. Wealth concentration was the second strike.

This final way in which this market has turned against the public, is in declaring that it is the public; that corporations are not just citizens, but super-citizens privileged to levels of leverage and political favoritism well beyond that enjoyed by flesh-and-blood citizens. Corporate citizenship has such powerful implications in both the short and long term, that unless it is swiftly addressed, the whole idea of market and state will be perverted. It's the third strike, and it's a big one.

If we hadn't deregulated banks and markets, we wouldn't be facing the kind of disaster that we've seen over the last three years. If we hadn't drastically reduced tax rates for the wealthy, we wouldn't have seen pension funds dry up and middle class wages stagnate. If we hadn't given corporations more and more political clout, we wouldn't be where we are—in a broken system that serves them, not us.

But what if is a game for suckers. The question isn't where we went wrong, it's what we do about it.

The occupy movement is a withdrawal of consent. It's not a war on capitalism. It's an acknowledgement that we are doing capitalism badly, and in a way that does not serve to help real people in their real lives. To repair the system will require government to step up and take action.

A good first step might be remembering that the market belongs to them, and not the other way around.

Posted at 10:56 AM
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bullet October 15, 2011

I'm relieved to have had my migraine tone down from the intensity of last week, but I'd still much prefer it to tone down enough that the migraine pills would mostly mask what is there. Having a constant migraine is very tiring, and with all I have to do getting more tired than usual is quite horrible.

Pain, pain, go away - and don't come again some other day.

Posted at 10:44 AM
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bullet October 14, 2011

My friend John showed up yesterday as I was running around like crazy trying to get a bunch of things done in the last twenty minutes before my grandma would be brought back from day care. My first reaction to seeing him at the door was surprise quickly followed by laughter - John has an almost perfect knack for calling or showing up at the just the moment I'm getting my grandma into a car to go to an appointment or cleaning up poop from an accident she had or even just getting her ready for bed. It's uncanny that John can call at the wrong time almost every time I hear from him ... and it's a shame because he's a truly nice guy that I like talking to.

I've known John since high school. He was one year ahead of me in school, but my friend Doug was friends with John as well and we hung out together often enough to become friends ourselves. John and I have never had the opportunity to get very close or have a particularly strong friendship over the years, but our friendship has lasted thirty years when others have failed or just slowly disappeared. That says a lot.

John has come into an early retirement and he has repeatedly offered to help me, partly because that's just his generous nature and partly because he's "bored out of his mind" (which doesn't surprise me; this is Sandusky, Ohio after all). So John calls or stops by, hoping to chat and offering help, and more times than not I have to turn him away because I just can't get away for even a minute at just that point.

Yesterday John brought me a Salmon Rushdie book and a Subway sub just because he's that kind of guy - generous. I feel like a heel not being able to give him more time, but heck - I don't even have time for himself! And while I appreciate his offers of help there's only so much I could ask. Just about everything with my grandma right now requires picking her up and doing so in a quick and comforting way so she doesn't panicky. Even getting her to eat has certain sorts of finesse needed to keep her going or she just gives up. I've learned these things over time - what works and what doesn't - but you can't just pass this stuff on to someone simply. Sure, I have plenty of stuff that doesn't involve my grandma that honestly has gotten away from me because of the excessive time it now takes to directly care for my grandma, but how fair would it be to call John and say, "Hey, could you come over and rake the leaves out of the yard?" "Hey, could you come shovel the snow from the driveway?" "Hey, could you borrow or rent a ladder, climb up it, and put a cover over the in-wall air conditioner?" There are plenty of tasks like that which need to be done, but I can't just ask John to do them, even if he offers. They're big jobs, and they're neverending jobs. There's no end to those kinds of jobs, and just because John is retired but bored isn't a good reason to make him a slave - even if a willing one.

So I appreciate John's offers - and I hope he fully realizes that I truly do - but I just don't see what I can ask of him that would be a help but not be too much. At least he's made the offer to be there. At some time or another I'm sure to need that, and it's good to know there's at least someone in this city I can turn to if I have to.

Posted at 11:44 AM
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bullet October 13, 2011

Don't you hate it when the battery in your alarm clock dies before it's supposed to go off?

Posted at 9:26 AM
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bullet October 12, 2011

I can admit that my head isn't as bad as it was yesterday, but when you have this much pain it doesn't really matter if it's somewhat less than the day before - it's still unbearably painful regardless.

Having this crushing force trying to break open my skull and having to care for my more-than-normally-vapid grandmother is no fun at all, but there isn't really any choice. There are no sick days in this job (or vacation days or holidays or days off or breaks ...)so I just have to keep at it - even when I'm in so much pain I can barely keep balance myself.

Ah the fun of my life. And people wonder why I'd rather be dead.

Posted at 11:07 AM
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bullet October 11, 2011

A whole bunch of things for me to do today and my brain decides it wants to bust out of my skull. Seriously, the pressure is killing me, and no amount of over-the-counter migraine aspirin is going to make this stop (although in fairness I'd probably be lying on the floor writhing in pain without the effects of the pills I've taken dulling the pain).

My head is outrageously painful, like someone is trying to overfill a tire with air. I feel like I'm minutes away from a blowout.

PAIN! It's the new black ...

This can stop any time. Really. No, really.

Posted at 11:03 AM
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bullet October 10, 2011

My sister, niece, and dog-in-law left for home this morning, and it was back to the routine for me - along with a bit of extra clean-up and organ zing after the visit. I'm still washing laundry and cleaning and organizing, but I feel like I'm finally on top of things and not just struggling to keep up. Hopefully I can get this stuff done today and then tomorrow be able t move on to other tasks that need to get done.

But of course we know how that goes ...

Posted at 3:11 PM
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bullet October 9, 2011

... and the migraine amps up again. Joy!

Posted at 11:10 AM
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bullet October 8, 2011

My sister arrived last night with my niece and their dog Spot. It's a very brief visit to celebrate a belated birthday with my grandma, and it's a wonderful, thoughtful gesture, but my grandma has been more out of things than normal so I hope she can enjoy the company while it lasts. They're only here today and tomorrow and will leave early Monday, so there's not much time.

I hope my grandma sleeps better so she can have a fresher mind and get something from all of this.

Posted at 1:34 PM
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bullet October 7, 2011

The problems with my grandmother standing have grown gradually worse, leading up to today where I can't get her to stand on her own for even a second (and that's with pulling her up and moving her into position. Mostly this seems to be a matter of not trying, and other than that it's anxiety. Physically she's fully capable of standing, but without her will to do so we're screwed.

Of course she doesn't stand often of for very long, but I need her to do so at those times. Pulling down pants and adult diapers is impossible sitting down and needs standing - just for a few seconds - every time you go to the bathroom (and the reverse when finished in the bathroom. I also need to wash my grandma's behind and put on some powder - every day - because she regularly wets the diapers and bed at night. Again, this doesn't take long, but it's impossible to do with her sitting down.

So today I had to move her back and forth from the bed to the toilet and back and forth between the two in the process of lowering and raising clothing and cleaning here and there. She didn't like it at all, and I can't say I was any more enthusiastic about it than she was. Still, it's the only avenue I see left if I can't get her to stand. It sucks because it makes things much less comfortable and more drawn out for both of us, but I simply can't see any other manner of getting what needs to be accomplished done.

Isn't that the story of this whole endeavor.

Posted at 11:03 AM
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bullet October 6, 2011

Steve Jobs died yesterday, far too soon for his age but having truly lived a full, rich, and fulfilled life. I have never made any secret of my love for all things Apple, and I have similarly always been a supporter of all things Steve. He was a man with a magic touch, a brilliance for melding forma nd function beautifully, and a willingness to break from standards and expectations.

Unlike Freddie Mercury and Gary Gygax, whom I have loved and revered for not just what they gave me but also - and specifically - how they changed my life for the better; unlike those and other idols of mine, Steve Jobs gave me great Apple products but rather than offer things that changed my life, Steve became a symbol of what I wanted to be: the dreamer fulfilled.

Steve Jobs was a dreamer, visualizing a better future for himself, for his co-workers, and for the world - and bringing those dreams and visualizations to life. He didn't hold back when a wonderful dream challenged conventional thought, when bad reviews were put forth, or even when his own company stood against him. He stayed true to himself but most importantly he stayed true to his dreams. He never let go of them; he never watered them down; and he never accepted that he couldn't bring them into being.

Thank you, Steve, for being a dreamer. Thank you for showing it can be done - and with great style.

The following is the commencement speech that Steve Jobs gave in 2005 to the graduates of Stanford. It is very telling not only in showing how he was a dreamer but also shows how in many ways he was prepared for death, untimely though it was.

I am honored to be with you today at your commencement from one of the finest universities in the world. I never graduated from college. Truth be told, this is the closest I've ever gotten to a college graduation. Today I want to tell you three stories from my life. That's it. No big deal. Just three stories.

The first story is about connecting the dots.

I dropped out of Reed College after the first 6 months, but then stayed around as a drop-in for another 18 months or so before I really quit. So why did I drop out?

It started before I was born. My biological mother was a young, unwed college graduate student, and she decided to put me up for adoption. She felt very strongly that I should be adopted by college graduates, so everything was all set for me to be adopted at birth by a lawyer and his wife. Except that when I popped out they decided at the last minute that they really wanted a girl. So my parents, who were on a waiting list, got a call in the middle of the night asking: "We have an unexpected baby boy; do you want him?" They said: "Of course." My biological mother later found out that my mother had never graduated from college and that my father had never graduated from high school. She refused to sign the final adoption papers. She only relented a few months later when my parents promised that I would someday go to college.

And 17 years later I did go to college. But I naively chose a college that was almost as expensive as Stanford, and all of my working-class parents' savings were being spent on my college tuition. After six months, I couldn't see the value in it. I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and no idea how college was going to help me figure it out. And here I was spending all of the money my parents had saved their entire life. So I decided to drop out and trust that it would all work out OK. It was pretty scary at the time, but looking back it was one of the best decisions I ever made. The minute I dropped out I could stop taking the required classes that didn't interest me, and begin dropping in on the ones that looked interesting.

It wasn't all romantic. I didn't have a dorm room, so I slept on the floor in friends' rooms, I returned coke bottles for the 5¢ deposits to buy food with, and I would walk the 7 miles across town every Sunday night to get one good meal a week at the Hare Krishna temple. I loved it. And much of what I stumbled into by following my curiosity and intuition turned out to be priceless later on. Let me give you one example:

Reed College at that time offered perhaps the best calligraphy instruction in the country. Throughout the campus every poster, every label on every drawer, was beautifully hand calligraphed. Because I had dropped out and didn't have to take the normal classes, I decided to take a calligraphy class to learn how to do this. I learned about serif and san serif typefaces, about varying the amount of space between different letter combinations, about what makes great typography great. It was beautiful, historical, artistically subtle in a way that science can't capture, and I found it fascinating.

None of this had even a hope of any practical application in my life. But ten years later, when we were designing the first Macintosh computer, it all came back to me. And we designed it all into the Mac. It was the first computer with beautiful typography. If I had never dropped in on that single course in college, the Mac would have never had multiple typefaces or proportionally spaced fonts. And since Windows just copied the Mac, it's likely that no personal computer would have them. If I had never dropped out, I would have never dropped in on this calligraphy class, and personal computers might not have the wonderful typography that they do. Of course it was impossible to connect the dots looking forward when I was in college. But it was very, very clear looking backwards ten years later.

Again, you can't connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future. You have to trust in something — your gut, destiny, life, karma, whatever. This approach has never let me down, and it has made all the difference in my life.

My second story is about love and loss.

I was lucky — I found what I loved to do early in life. Woz and I started Apple in my parents garage when I was 20. We worked hard, and in 10 years Apple had grown from just the two of us in a garage into a $2 billion company with over 4000 employees. We had just released our finest creation — the Macintosh — a year earlier, and I had just turned 30. And then I got fired. How can you get fired from a company you started? Well, as Apple grew we hired someone who I thought was very talented to run the company with me, and for the first year or so things went well. But then our visions of the future began to diverge and eventually we had a falling out. When we did, our Board of Directors sided with him. So at 30 I was out. And very publicly out. What had been the focus of my entire adult life was gone, and it was devastating.

I really didn't know what to do for a few months. I felt that I had let the previous generation of entrepreneurs down - that I had dropped the baton as it was being passed to me. I met with David Packard and Bob Noyce and tried to apologize for screwing up so badly. I was a very public failure, and I even thought about running away from the valley. But something slowly began to dawn on me — I still loved what I did. The turn of events at Apple had not changed that one bit. I had been rejected, but I was still in love. And so I decided to start over.

I didn't see it then, but it turned out that getting fired from Apple was the best thing that could have ever happened to me. The heaviness of being successful was replaced by the lightness of being a beginner again, less sure about everything. It freed me to enter one of the most creative periods of my life.

During the next five years, I started a company named NeXT, another company named Pixar, and fell in love with an amazing woman who would become my wife. Pixar went on to create the worlds first computer animated feature film, Toy Story, and is now the most successful animation studio in the world. In a remarkable turn of events, Apple bought NeXT, I returned to Apple, and the technology we developed at NeXT is at the heart of Apple's current renaissance. And Laurene and I have a wonderful family together.

I'm pretty sure none of this would have happened if I hadn't been fired from Apple. It was awful tasting medicine, but I guess the patient needed it. Sometimes life hits you in the head with a brick. Don't lose faith. I'm convinced that the only thing that kept me going was that I loved what I did. You've got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven't found it yet, keep looking. Don't settle. As with all matters of the heart, you'll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don't settle.

My third story is about death.

When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.

Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:

No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.

Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.

When I was young, there was an amazing publication called The Whole Earth Catalog, which was one of the bibles of my generation. It was created by a fellow named Stewart Brand not far from here in Menlo Park, and he brought it to life with his poetic touch. This was in the late 1960's, before personal computers and desktop publishing, so it was all made with typewriters, scissors, and polaroid cameras. It was sort of like Google in paperback form, 35 years before Google came along: it was idealistic, and overflowing with neat tools and great notions.

Stewart and his team put out several issues of The Whole Earth Catalog, and then when it had run its course, they put out a final issue. It was the mid-1970s, and I was your age. On the back cover of their final issue was a photograph of an early morning country road, the kind you might find yourself hitchhiking on if you were so adventurous. Beneath it were the words: "Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish." It was their farewell message as they signed off. Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish. And I have always wished that for myself. And now, as you graduate to begin anew, I wish that for you.

Stay Hungry. Stay Foolish.

Thank you all very much.

Posted at 12:05 PM
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bullet October 5, 2011

TOO MUCH SHIT TO DO!!!

Posted at 11:39 AM
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bullet October 4, 2011

Today, while my grandma is at adult day care (she just left and will be back just after 4 PM), I have to:

- Go to two banks
- Get gas and air for my tires
- Go to the post office
- Grab lunch
- Be at the house in time for Meals-on-Wheels
- Mow the lawn
- Work on the yard (HA! Unlikely ...)
- Spray the house inside and out with pesticide for the Fall
- Set up an appointment to check the furnace
- Fully clean all of my floor of the house
- Clean the basement
- Test drive two cars at a dealership in a city 20 miles away
- Wash and wax and detail my car
- Wash laundry

All of this in just over six hours. Possible? No. Necessary? Yes. But as usual all I can do is get as much done a possible and then piss and moan about all of the stuff still left to do.

Posted at 9:45 AM
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bullet October 3, 2011

How crazy can someone get with senility? I may soon find out. We're certainly at the extremes now - although fortunately not constantly.

I suppose I should be happy that things are still as good as they are with her being ninety-seven and all, but it's upsetting, frustrating, and stressful nonetheless, and considering that it could be worse does nothing to make me feel better.

Posted at 10:58 AM
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bullet October 2, 2011

The crazy lady woke me up before dawn calling out, "Help! Help me!" I went down to check on her right away only to find out that she was upset that she was wearing socks (which she thought were shoes and which she thought were too tight (but were in fact quite loose) and which she thought were surely somebody else's and that they'd put them on her while she was asleep. As usual she wouldn't listen to reason so I just took the socks off nd covered her up again and went back to bed.

Much as I wish I could have, I couldn't get back to sleep, and when I went back down to get my grandma up she was clearly awake the whole time and hadn't made any attempt to get more sleep.

The rest of the day already has been one act of crazy to the next, and while I hope getting some food and coffee into her along with a little activity will bring her back a little closer to humanity, I fear this may be a day full of the crazy.

Why was she so good during the whole week my mom was here and now she's a disaster every day since my mom left? Is this intentional, just a cycle, or a result of built-up exhaustion from constant activity while my mother was here? We'll probably never know, but I've had more than my share already ...

Posted at 9:55 AM
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bullet October 1, 2011

Yesterday was outrageously exhausting. Today has started better - at least up to this point.

Here's to hoping for a simpler, ideally less stressful and less taxing day.

Posted at 9:59 AM

 


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Journal, by Paul Cales, © October 2011