Recording for the departed

A bit more about why this podcast exists and reflections on the passing of a friend. Giving myself the same space and grace that friends and partners have and that you can extend to yourself.  Next time, Part 1 (chapters 1-3) of There Is No Antimemetics Division and related media.

Transcript

Null 0:01

Well, hello again, internet people. Here we are again in this space called Null by Design. I'm coming at you again here much sooner than I probably usually will, sooner than I expected to. But I wanted to chop up some more word salad and see what audio jazz we could put together to better describe why we're here. Why does this little space exist? And unfortunately, the very specific reason for why this space has come to exist when and how it has is because of tragedy. Not too long ago, a good and dear friend of mine, a friend of more than twenty years, passed away. It was unfortunately a sudden and unexpected death, and one that we don't really know a lot about. There's no immediately specific reason or cause for his passing. It's one of those things that stood out as we're given whatever time we get. We don't necessarily know when that time will end, and so if there are things that we've been thinking about doing, if we've wanted to put something out into the world to harness and express our creativity in some sense, we should do that. We should make sure that we're doing the things that we want to do. In some ways it leaves footsteps in the sand that give a definite and public evidence of our passing through this world. And so here I am, putting my feet in the sand, walking along this shore of this life that we have in whatever time that I'll be given, and am making sure that those steps make it to where I want them to go. This is one of those projects that's lived in the back of my mind for quite some time. I've always enjoyed recording. I was one of those kids that wandered around with a microphone and a tape recorder and incessantly asked people questions. There was some sense that maybe through an interrogation of everything around me I might come to a better understanding of myself. And so here I am in this space, which is very much a continuous interview and interrogation of myself, with the hope that I'll come to some answer, or, if not an answer, find some further mystery to keep asking more questions about. It's an important thing to keep doing. It's something that, in that introduction to a liminal space, I was trying to put as directly as I could in my own thoughts and mind. But we spend so much time trying to escape our own thoughts, escape our own questions about ourselves through any number of things that we can find around us, that it's important for me to reserve and keep a place where I can be here in some deeper and more objective let's not call it objective, some just extended interrogation of my own mind. And not an interrogation to come to any definite conclusion, not something that needs to arrive anywhere, but time to question, to think through, and to give order and coherence to wherever my mind wants to wander. It's about carving out a space with love and kindness, with space and grace, for those thoughts and feelings that wander on through, because that's one of those things that my now dearly departed friend did with a group of us. Although the friendship lasted for more than twenty years, the last six years have been particularly special for a group of us, because back when COVID and the whole pandemic started, and we were going through all the different series of lockdowns and understanding how to navigate very new and different levels of social isolation, we formed a gaming group, and we've been playing games since 2020, a full six years of weekly sessions. We've played through a number of games and really, although the games themselves are fun, it was that social space that really gave us all a chance to maintain our sanity. Because I think we all remember there were some times there where it was very hard to maintain some sense of ourself while navigating social isolation. And I'm someone who lives in quite a bit of social isolation. I am not someone who naturally builds large networks of friends or keeps an extended community of people around me. I am already a very isolated, very introverted person who keeps a very small number of people close in my life. And so having a group of people who on a weekly basis managed to keep getting together and maintained space for each other, well past there was any direct and dire need for it, is something that really, really is going to stick with me everywhere I carry my mind. Because it's that solid group of folks, and we're still gaming, even with the loss of our friend, we are maintaining that space, if not just because no matter what we enjoy it and are going to continue it, but in that tribute to our friend, we're not going to let that go. No matter how much, sometimes it may hurt to just keep the routine going. It is the routine that, even though there may be some thorn that now sticks into our side when we have to confront that there's a space in our group that's no longer occupied, and that a very meaningful part of that group has disappeared, we're maintaining it. We're keeping in communion and community with each other. Again, it's something that's kept all of us sane for a long time. It's something that's outside of our regular families and partners that we can rely on, and especially a space where if we need to, we can find an escape from those responsibilities that certainly give our lives meaning, but which are also a very different kind of relationship to maintain. Instead, we're able to chat with each other with the very real crutch of a video game to help guide any moments of silence into something that has its own constructive narrative to help guide us forward no matter what's going on in our lives. We can be going through the loss of a job, the loss of a friend, the loss of a relationship, the loss of a favorite shoe. Who knows? Loss takes up a lot of different forms in our lives. And it's something which has been one of the most consistent social routines in my entire life. And that comes with a very deep amount of meaning. Again, especially as someone who persists in quite a bit of isolation and who requires quite a lot of social space to keep functioning as a normal human being. Having a touchstone and a routine with a group of friends has really been something that has contributed to my life and which I will never be able to forget no matter what occurs. And if you've been staring at the cover art for this at all, it may stand out that this is a podcast for divergent minds, and that may stand out as having some particular meaning right there. The neurodivergent community is full of people who aren't necessarily super great at maintaining community, and instead exist in very different and atypical levels of isolation from what might be the more neurotypical world. And that's fine. And I hope that everyone finds their own chosen community to be a part of. I hope that everybody has some level of regular, routine connection to others, no matter how small that group is, no matter how frequently it meets or doesn't. But it has been the constant and regular social connection to that group of friends, the tolerance and continuing presence of my partner, and the not wonderfully regular connection that I have to my family. Because for me in a lot of cases, out of sight is out of mind. I am just really regrettably terrible at maintaining connections with people over time, and so lots of different friendships have slipped away over time. The friend that I'm speaking of who passed and who this is largely dedicated to, a friendship which, as I mentioned, lasted more than two decades, wasn't a friendship that was continuous in its contact. We drifted in and out of each other's lives for sometimes years at a time, when we moved to different locations, and neither of us had any real talent at picking up the phone and calling another person to maintain some of that regular contact that comes so naturally and normally to others. But the thing that matters is we kept picking it up just like it had left off moments ago whenever that friendship reconnected. And it's been the last six years of this regular gaming group and routine that has come as a reminder that it's those folks who are around us, our sort of picked family, our chosen family, regardless of whether we're related to them by blood in any way, shape, or form, that means so much to our lives. And no matter how much isolation we exist in, it's those bright connections that can pick up and leave off in any variety of ways that keep us moving forward. And so here I am again, in many ways, a child with a microphone, still in interrogation of himself. But as I keep hacking away one syllable at a time, interrogating myself, as I hope I put as plainly as possible in the introduction to a liminal space, I hope that I'm doing so with space and grace for myself. It's our connections and our friendships that give us that space to express ourselves as freely as possible. And it's our own self-critique, our own ability to engage in automatic negative thoughts that can really require us to have those friends. Because sometimes the most hostile place we can find is in our own mind. And so spending time, again, just allowing thoughts to flow through, to let the questions that come to mind, to let the little idiosyncratic thoughts wander and cleave their way through the stone until they leave some permanent channel, is something that isn't just important, but develops, I think, a practice and a self-protective quality within our minds when we allow ourselves to get comfortable with it. Our thoughts may not be what we want to have. They may not give us a great deal of comfort in the moment, and if we try to escape them, we won't find that place where we can have stillness and acceptance with ourselves. It's that acceptance that we often find in our chosen families. It's those people who, in their presence, we're able to get lost in a conversation. They are what gives us a solid ground to be ourselves on when we do find them. And I have been very fortunate in my life to, on a number of occasions through my life, find those groups of people with whom I've really been able to be myself. That was some great friends through college. It was some amazing people in high school. We rolled a lot of dice together because it turns out being nerdy together is a wonderful way for everyone to give each other space to be weird. Be it tabletop role-playing, be it video gaming. You can be a little weird with each other when you've got some crutch of a narrative to really hold you up. But we don't always have that. Again, I'm someone who often exists in a lot of isolation. I have a wonderful partner who gives me a lot of space and tolerance. But I'm left a lot of the time with just myself and my own mind. And that's not a wonderfully comfortable place from time to time. I've struggled with many different things through a lot of different years, be that depression, anxiety, the completely unrecognized neurodivergence that I persisted in for years, thinking, wow, I'm really not doing good at all of this. Uh-oh, what am I gonna do? Because there were a lot of times where it felt like living a normal life was burning a candle at both ends, and soon I was just going to be a puddle of wax dripping off the side of a table, quite possibly about to start a terrifying home fire that would take me out of this world and into a darkness far earlier than it ever should. And it's been the tolerance and friendship of the people around me that's kept me on a course that I can be sane in. And it's also been those friends, friendships, partnerships, that in giving space for me to be just kind of a weird dude, has given me back that ability to be weird just with myself. Again, to be that kid with a microphone, wandering around incessantly asking questions, even if really it's only my own mind being questioned. Because if I don't have that space in which I can maintain some peace with myself, I can't be at peace with anybody else either. I grind against the edges. Much like a mortar and pestle grinding anything in its path down to fine dust. And that doesn't always feel wonderful. It's not wonderful to watch as you grind down the people around you as the rough edges butt up against the sides. But it's something that exists, it's something I recognize in myself, and it's something that, again, through the space and tolerance that people have given me, and it's taken a lot out of a lot of people in their lives to be sure that they've given me the space and grace that they have. I recognize that I am often not the easiest person to be around. I'm not the easiest person to be around just for myself. And so, this is that space in which I want to provide kindness to myself, the same kindness that I've received from others. This is a space that I hope everyone can join in on and realize you can just mumble on and interrogate yourself. You can be comfortable in it and with it. Because you've got to have yourself all the way to the end. There's nothing else and no one else that's going to be there the whole time except you in your own mind. I have to be with myself every hour of the day. And that's okay. And sometimes it's genuinely fine. Sometimes it's even fun. And that is what this space gives, a chance to be frustrated, to be fine, and to be fun. Because any of us only has the time that we're given. And then we may be gone. And others will have to work with and process the space that we've left behind. And I hope that the space that I leave behind, I hope the space that you leave behind is the same as what my friend left behind. Something where I still have a deep sense of sadness that he's gone, and it's going to take a very long time to process that he is truly gone. But it's a space which I already feel fondness filling, because he was a good and kind person to all of those of us around him, even if he wasn't always the easiest person to be around in the same sort of way that I'm not always the easiest person to be around. But you don't have to be a perfect person, none of us is. And instead, the more genuine you are, and the more you let yourself be genuine with others, the more what will fill that space is love. And so look around at the people around you. Look to those people who you care about and who have cared for you. Spend some time really appreciating what that means. Look to yourself. Look at the space that you've given yourself and that you've made for yourself in your life and have some appreciation for it. Have appreciation for what's in your mind and what you want to create with it. You could also pull out a microphone and force others to listen to it. Maybe you have any other creative pursuit that you want to chase after. Do it. Create the thing. Only you can do it, and the world will be better for it. You as a person are never filling a much needed space. Remember that. You are never filling a much needed space. You have to maintain space for yourself, and others who are around you and who care about you are also maintaining that space to be filled by you, to be filled by your presence, to be filled by the caring that you also give to them, because they aren't filling a much needed space either. Every person around you is someone who you are letting be there. Let them be there and let them fill those spaces. Alright, well that's probably enough sentimentality for this one. I've already probably droned on longer than I ought to. So let's finish off with what my intentions are for the next little bit. I said in the introduction, I have the desire to do a a book club to review my thoughts on things that I'm reading, and that the intention was, first of all, to approach there is no anti-mimetics division. And I've started reading it. I've made it through the first part, and it is a wonderful book. So the intention for the next episode is to review that first part of the book and to just kind of cover my thoughts on what it's brought up in me, what questions I have from it, what feelings have coursed through me because of what I've read through, and to kind of go through other things that it has made me think of from other media. Ah, so again, it's going to be as as spoiler-filled a conversation as possible. So, ahead of time, what I am going to be covering is part one or chapters one through three of There Is No Anti-Mimetics Division by Quantum. And I'll also be discussing the Southern Reach and probably not a lot of the narrative within those books, but at least some of the thoughts and feelings around how it discusses contending with the unknowable and different levels of mental control in. Manipulation, uh, because I think that bears a lot on viral ideas and viral anti-ideas. Uh it it certainly discusses anti-memetic qualities in certain ways in how it approaches its characters in their minds. I think that it has a lot of overlap and interesting qualities that are common in the TV show Severance. So I'll definitely be discussing at least portions of that show. Uh, if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it. It is a wonderful investigation of how a literal split between work and life in order to maintain the work-life balance that you may have heard of, plays out when you can actually sever those two halves of oneself. And it is an incredible interrogation of modern society and how we exist within it. I'll also be discussing Control, uh, the video game, which takes its lineage from the Alan Wake games from that same studio, and also No Man's Sky and its concept of both memory and iteration. So, until we come back here and we discuss that book later on, have a wonderful, wonderful evening, internet people. Keep caring for yourself, keep caring for others. And I'll see you next time in this space between the platforms.