I'm on the top floor of a beautiful brick library that overlooks the confluence of the Maumee and Auglaize Rivers and I just finished reading this article (in Reader Mode, on my laptop) and I am completely, utterly, losing my shit right now. I have so much to say - and so much to think about - and I'm probably going to read this at least three or four more times in the next few days, but first I'll just try to bang out a semi-coherent comment to capture some small part of what's currently exploding inside of me.
First: Readup works. It doesn't "kinda" work. It's not circling around a problem, or redefining a problem, or inventing a problem, or providing some vague form of pseudo-value like so many startups and web products. It takes the biggest, most obvious problem with the internet and it drops a fucking nuke on it. It's absurd how proud I am to be half of the two-person team that invented and built this thing. It's by far the best achievement of my life. Life with Readup is so much better than life without Readup. Specifically, I'm wrapping my head around the fact that Readup works ON ME. It used to be that I had to feed articles into this thing, by reading a bunch, but now we have enough users that the machine is feeding articles back to me! At least as far as article selection goes, it's downright surreal to get out of the driver's seat and let Readup take the wheel. Frankenstein is alive! He got up from the operating table and now he's talking to me!! I still can't believe it. The internet is this massive noise box of absolute shit (99.99% of it not worth anybody's time), but now there is this thing that knows how to find the .001% of articles - like this one (!!) - that are really, legitimately, WORTH your time. I'm talking about stuff of such outrageous quality that it has the power to change your life. Holy. Fuck. How completely nuts is that?! And, even better, the platform straps you down, glues you to your seat. By the time I was one or two paragraphs into this piece, I realized that Readup had already put me in the harness and the roller-coaster ride had begun.
Second: Having nothing to do with Readup, I just want to say that this article is SUCH a perfect 10. The line, "Like Don Quixote, I was propelled on my quest by books," gave me goosebumps, and it was only the very beginning. Like a flower in bloom, it just kept opening and opening and opening. I followed the narrators journey so closely, so carefully, I really felt each bump in the road. The motorcycle road-trip was almost too much; I felt like I was getting pranked, like this was written for me. That's what great writing does. It creates a legitimate, emotional relationship between writer and reader. The writing is smart, but not intellectual. It doesn't shy away from complex language and the overall structure is nuanced. But it's perfectly readable. Not at all punishing. (Sidenote: I want, so badly, to be able to write like this!) The wisdom of age permeates the piece. Yet the story itself isn't about the destination, it's an exploration of the journey, the many ups and downs of a life. If you're 20, you need to read this. If you're 30, you need to read this. If you're 40 or 50 or 60, I think you need to read this even though I'm not that age yet. It's just so full of life.
A few weeks ago, I was moved to tears by a corny bookmark at a corny bookstore. It wasn't drops-down-my-face crying, but more just like, I could feel that shit was starting to happen in my sinuses and I knew that I needed to go outside to take some deep breaths of fresh air or a full breakdown could actually happen. (For the record, I have cried in private and public recently, in pretty awesomely strange ways, and maybe one day if I'm brave enough I'll share those stories.) The bookmark had a picture of Barbara McClintock and a quote of hers: "Stumbling blocks never occurred to me. Not that I had the answer, but I had the joy of going at it. When you have that joy, you do the right experiments. You let the material tell you where to go and it tells you at every step." Nothing gets me more fired up than reading about people who toil in obscurity, who believe in what they're doing, even when nobody else believes in them. Even though I know that Readup is going to get absolutely humongous, I feel like it's actually as fun as it's every going to be RIGHT NOW.
OK, now I need to share this article with everyone I love.
I LOVED this. Makes me want to go to grad school for literature or creative writing.
It breaks my heart that he lost sight of this: "Finally I’d figured out who I was and where I belonged. Finally. I held back tears."
Of course this piece made me question the last time I felt, "There is nowhere I’d rather be, and nothing I’d rather be doing." It's been a while.
“Have you ever been happy?” Asked the girlfriend. “You can do whatever you want,” said the NYPD detective father. And so begins the fabulous story of Bob Henderson and his Physics teacher/mentor Sarada Rajeev. I love this on so many levels. As a human, I love this man’s heart, his quest, his doubts, his honesty, his willingness to live with roaches on a dirty mattress to follow his dream of discovering a new frontier in the world of Physics. As an artist, I love his words, the pictures he paints, the details that make me feel like I’m sitting next to him in the library or walking the steam tunnels that crisscross the campus underground. As an energy worker, I love Quantum Physics. It has brought science and spirituality together and that excites me to my core. We are now getting a chance to peak behind the Veil, to begin to understand how the Universe works. The book I’m currently reading is The Everything Answer Book. How Quantum Science Explains Love, Death And The Meaning Of Life. This is a heavy read but glimpsing The Great Mystery is worth the effort. I also watched a docudrama series on Einstein and it was thrilling. I get Bob Henderson’s passion. And even though he went into finance, I’m so thrilled he is writing! By the way, finance is money, money is energy - so the answer to Bob’s question posed in this title is everything has everything to do with physics! And I think the answer to Bob’s girlfriend’s question is a resounding yes!
Yeah this article felt so familiar to me. I need time to process this but absolutely wonderful writing.
Just broke into #5 spot on the Hall of Fame!! :D
OH MY GOD FUCK YES SO SO SO GOOD.
This is it. This is everything.
I'm on the top floor of a beautiful brick library that overlooks the confluence of the Maumee and Auglaize Rivers and I just finished reading this article (in Reader Mode, on my laptop) and I am completely, utterly, losing my shit right now. I have so much to say - and so much to think about - and I'm probably going to read this at least three or four more times in the next few days, but first I'll just try to bang out a semi-coherent comment to capture some small part of what's currently exploding inside of me.
First: Readup works. It doesn't "kinda" work. It's not circling around a problem, or redefining a problem, or inventing a problem, or providing some vague form of pseudo-value like so many startups and web products. It takes the biggest, most obvious problem with the internet and it drops a fucking nuke on it. It's absurd how proud I am to be half of the two-person team that invented and built this thing. It's by far the best achievement of my life. Life with Readup is so much better than life without Readup. Specifically, I'm wrapping my head around the fact that Readup works ON ME. It used to be that I had to feed articles into this thing, by reading a bunch, but now we have enough users that the machine is feeding articles back to me! At least as far as article selection goes, it's downright surreal to get out of the driver's seat and let Readup take the wheel. Frankenstein is alive! He got up from the operating table and now he's talking to me!! I still can't believe it. The internet is this massive noise box of absolute shit (99.99% of it not worth anybody's time), but now there is this thing that knows how to find the .001% of articles - like this one (!!) - that are really, legitimately, WORTH your time. I'm talking about stuff of such outrageous quality that it has the power to change your life. Holy. Fuck. How completely nuts is that?! And, even better, the platform straps you down, glues you to your seat. By the time I was one or two paragraphs into this piece, I realized that Readup had already put me in the harness and the roller-coaster ride had begun.
Second: Having nothing to do with Readup, I just want to say that this article is SUCH a perfect 10. The line, "Like Don Quixote, I was propelled on my quest by books," gave me goosebumps, and it was only the very beginning. Like a flower in bloom, it just kept opening and opening and opening. I followed the narrators journey so closely, so carefully, I really felt each bump in the road. The motorcycle road-trip was almost too much; I felt like I was getting pranked, like this was written for me. That's what great writing does. It creates a legitimate, emotional relationship between writer and reader. The writing is smart, but not intellectual. It doesn't shy away from complex language and the overall structure is nuanced. But it's perfectly readable. Not at all punishing. (Sidenote: I want, so badly, to be able to write like this!) The wisdom of age permeates the piece. Yet the story itself isn't about the destination, it's an exploration of the journey, the many ups and downs of a life. If you're 20, you need to read this. If you're 30, you need to read this. If you're 40 or 50 or 60, I think you need to read this even though I'm not that age yet. It's just so full of life.
A few weeks ago, I was moved to tears by a corny bookmark at a corny bookstore. It wasn't drops-down-my-face crying, but more just like, I could feel that shit was starting to happen in my sinuses and I knew that I needed to go outside to take some deep breaths of fresh air or a full breakdown could actually happen. (For the record, I have cried in private and public recently, in pretty awesomely strange ways, and maybe one day if I'm brave enough I'll share those stories.) The bookmark had a picture of Barbara McClintock and a quote of hers: "Stumbling blocks never occurred to me. Not that I had the answer, but I had the joy of going at it. When you have that joy, you do the right experiments. You let the material tell you where to go and it tells you at every step." Nothing gets me more fired up than reading about people who toil in obscurity, who believe in what they're doing, even when nobody else believes in them. Even though I know that Readup is going to get absolutely humongous, I feel like it's actually as fun as it's every going to be RIGHT NOW.
OK, now I need to share this article with everyone I love.
I LOVED this. Makes me want to go to grad school for literature or creative writing. It breaks my heart that he lost sight of this: "Finally I’d figured out who I was and where I belonged. Finally. I held back tears." Of course this piece made me question the last time I felt, "There is nowhere I’d rather be, and nothing I’d rather be doing." It's been a while.
“Have you ever been happy?” Asked the girlfriend. “You can do whatever you want,” said the NYPD detective father. And so begins the fabulous story of Bob Henderson and his Physics teacher/mentor Sarada Rajeev. I love this on so many levels. As a human, I love this man’s heart, his quest, his doubts, his honesty, his willingness to live with roaches on a dirty mattress to follow his dream of discovering a new frontier in the world of Physics. As an artist, I love his words, the pictures he paints, the details that make me feel like I’m sitting next to him in the library or walking the steam tunnels that crisscross the campus underground. As an energy worker, I love Quantum Physics. It has brought science and spirituality together and that excites me to my core. We are now getting a chance to peak behind the Veil, to begin to understand how the Universe works. The book I’m currently reading is The Everything Answer Book. How Quantum Science Explains Love, Death And The Meaning Of Life. This is a heavy read but glimpsing The Great Mystery is worth the effort. I also watched a docudrama series on Einstein and it was thrilling. I get Bob Henderson’s passion. And even though he went into finance, I’m so thrilled he is writing! By the way, finance is money, money is energy - so the answer to Bob’s question posed in this title is everything has everything to do with physics! And I think the answer to Bob’s girlfriend’s question is a resounding yes!
UPVOTE. Awesome comment.