Month: April 2017

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Re-Re-Re-Invention

Growth is painful. Growth is change. Growth is…what now?

I’m in my early forties, which means, by modern standards, I’m in my decade of re-invention. Only change is growth. Whether it be ordained from a higher power above (“Thanks, Shiva, I was doing just fine!”) or fellow bloggers/thinkers/therapists (everyone not named Justin Edison) my once-stable image of myself and my tasks (and there are many) are up for review. Just when I thought I’d figured a few things out, too.

Autumn leaves all over the yard and sidewalk

Now, it’s late April, halfway into the season of growth, so I should be including a picture of budding flowers, birds chirping from sun-drenched tree branches, Camellias dropping pink litter. But I picked the above image because it’s a bit how this whole concept–of constant change–makes me feel. Growl. Grown. Enough already! Right?

Apparently not.

To wit, my marriage: Evolving, lately to accommodate the stunning realization that my wife and I have two completely opposite brain types. No wonder we have to schedule things like talking along with when to run the laundry and pick up groceries. That we keep different hours (her night-owl versus my morning person) doesn’t leave a lot of time for two ships to pass in the calm water of “free” time.

My self-image: Too plump, needs adjustment. Low-carb diet good, liberally boosted intake of fat bad (I go bananas with Kind bars and steaks). Too much fuel in the tank, time to own up.

My parenting: Pretty solid, but reviewing assessment of dad-to-son skills. We talk quite a bit. Time to talk more, apparently, so we butt heads less. Our afternoons are spent in the kitchen, with him “doing” homework as I cook, sort bills, wrangle those homework aspirations (with thrice daily explanations of why it’s important) and try to keep my younger, less-tasked daughter occupido.

And I just learned–from whichever sage source I can’t even name at the moment–that allowance for chores is not ideal. Okay. It wasn’t working too well, anyway. So, the kids will get a weekly allowance–not tied to emptying the dishwasher or picking up their laundry. And I, as the resident ogre/bad cop (that’s always been my job) will try to instill a work ethic and cajole them into these tasks without playing ogre/bad cop. Swell.

Career: Constantly in a state of flux. I’m moving toward project-based work, which means I’m technically in-between projects in one regard while I wait for an already-slotted project to begin. Sorta. This is what it means to be under-employed, rather than unemployed. It sucks.

My writing: Going well, learning, adapting, all that jazz. The ideas and material flow like gold-flecked syrup. (Now, if I could simply do something about my time and energy producing a hilariously small amount of revenue, I’d be set.) Oh, and I’m also taking up marketing (I suck at it) and book-cover work (for one small job, which I assume I’ll suck at). All in the name of re-invention.

Mine are all first-world problems, I realize. Still, it would be nice to be able to sit down and believe, for an hour, that all this constant flux/re-branding/re-assessment/re-anything isn’t so crucial to my life.

Yeah, right, pal. Try that when you’re 50.

Justin Edison in a silly pose.

Sigh.

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Am I One or Thirteen?

Come on, haven’t you felt like this before?

(The title is, of course, a quote from Voices by Alice In Chains. As some of the best rock lyricists ever, AIC is always a quotable band–and great for inspiration. “Who am I? Is this me? Am I one or thirteen?”)

The song, about a sort of identity crisis, begs a simple question that really isn’t so simple at all. Who are you, when it comes down to it?

Myself? Piece of cake (sort of): Writer. Dad. Husband. Cook. Coach. Driver. Educator. Editor (for income, or colleagues, or paid work). Errand runner. Soccer player. Website designer (aspiring). SEO marketer (also aspiring). UX/UI man (okay, maybe a stretch until I get more years’ experience under my belt). Book marketer (my own, others’ when possible). Dreamer. Wishful thinker (kind of painful, put that way). Trip organizer. House captain (admittedly poor at it sometimes). Projects person (a role which needs to become more prominent, based on my scatterbrained thinking). Reader. Listener. Viewer. Complainer (yup, that too). Progressive activist (at least, in my mind and to my friends). The list goes on and on. In fact, it has no practical end.

I’m a runner, for example, but I don’t list that as an identity (though I used to do it frequently and have one marathon and several half-marathons under my belt). Maybe I didn’t list “runner” above because it’s not something I prefer to be and do (unless it’s on a soccer field).

Add in “hiker” though. I don’t do much now, because of the kids, but will do more as they get older. At some future point, we’ll haul our tired and sweaty selves (with other kids and parents) to the top of Mt. Dickerman, take in the panorama, and I can say, “I told you so.” I know what beauty is. Climbing 3,800 feet for that view will quality as a beautiful thing.

Okay, I got off track. Who am I foremost? When I clamber out of bed (typically, still dark, only the cat awake) what is my first non-coffee thought? I get up to write. It’s my thing, it’s a worthwhile pursuit. There’s no money in it, so far. My conservative estimate puts my balance a few thousand bucks in the red (if you count all the paper, ink, coffee, dedicated hours drafting and editing and researching, plus a few writing weekends away). It could be downright depressing. But people tell me they love the stories. To keep going. Author Terry Persun encouraged me to keep producing–that being prolific counts for something. (I can only hope this applies to me in more than the “moral victory” sense.) So I do. More work on its way, trumpets and drums being readied. And if the book doesn’t meet hopes (readers, reviews, revenue) will I still be foolish enough to think of myself as a writer?

Yes. I have to. It’s what I do. Is that foolish?

Red pen and coffee mug with Edison's draft work.

So what about the painter who spends hours and hours trying to get a watercolor tree correct? Or the cartoonist who can’t perfect her chubby cat’s expression? Or the drummer who, with all of his skill and paid studio work, may not feel right about calling himself a musician when he hits that ‘snooze’ button? He should, though. He is what he is, despite all the other hats he wears (which don’t pay a dime, as if revenue is the only worthy motive in the world).

My point is, we all wear a lot of hats. Sometimes the hat or label or face doesn’t fit, and we make the call to take it off, to quit. But we each have to decide for ourselves (and not let anyone else decide for us) which hats fit the best. You are what you are. Perhaps William Ernest Henley said it best in Invictus. “I am the master of my fate. I am the captain of my soul.”

Tomorrow, like yourself, I will get up in the morning and, regardless of today’s successes or shortcomings, I will have to decide who I want to be–or who I am. And I’ll wear those thirteen or thirty-one hats because they are my job. And, with a grumble or a cringe or a eureka moment, I’ll know which hat fits best.

What about you?

 

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“Rogue One”‘s Moral Dilemma

I’m not a skilled film critic–let’s start with that caveat. Those who are paid to do it have been viewing and reviewing movies far longer than I have. Usually, I’m just one of the billions who views, takes in and mulls what he’s seen.

For those who haven’t seen it, I would definitely recommend “Rogue One: A Star Wars Story.” But with precautions (for one, it’s quite dark). Star Wars fans (come on, who isn’t?) will love this bridge story which is more precursor to Episode 4 than anything. It tells a ton of story (somewhat erratically) and hints at much more. There’s no mind-blowing a-ha moment for the central quest (the rebels’ theft of the all-important Death Star plans) but it’s still very enjoyable to see how it’s done.

Those who aren’t fans and haven’t seen Episode 4 will be hopelessly lost. There’s a million enjoyable characters and ships flying at you, and you won’t know why troubled-punk-next-door Jyn is after something so badly (the Death Star plans, via her father) and why they’re so damned important. Until the Death Star shows up to do its thing.

I will say, of all the Star Wars films (and virtually any science-fiction movie) “Rogue One” does the best at actually presenting the true scale of these machines. It starts with the sinister image of a Star Destroyer (2 miles long?) dwarfing a mountain-plateau city below. Director Gareth Edwards and company must’ve intended for the film’s “different” style–the Star Destroyer, when called, lumbers off at a realistic, ominous pace (instead of just zipping into hyperspace). When the Texas-sized (?) Death Star moves into position (in footage eerily reminiscent of a NASA satellite over one of our own celestial bodies) it helps us remember just how big planets really are. In the climax, a so-called Hammerhead Corvette cruiser plows into a colossal Star Destroyer. For me, the visuals alone will be worth watching again and again.

The Death Star coming to pay a visit in "Rogue One"

But, back to that Death Star and the central plot of the movie. I recently read a thriller that was filled with so many twists and turns, you weren’t sure where the seed of the whole dark adventure actually started–or who the chief villain was. Stories (and their villains) often boil down to one-sentence summaries. A lot of times, these are the best kinds of tales. There’s no overly-complicated amorphous blob of evil making the story unnecessarily contrived. In the fourth “Pirates of the Caribbean” movie, Blackbeard sublimely confronts the clergyman who’s trying to convert him. “I’m just a bad man,” he says. It’s simple and direct, and doesn’t make you despise him any less.

I bring this up because “Rogue One” presents audiences with a quiet but crucial moral dilemma. The plot revolves around securing the Death Star plans, via the heroine’s father, Galen Erso. The film opens with Erso, a scientist/engineer, being re-acquired by the evil Director Crennick in order to complete the battle station. Key to the station is the super laser which is powered by Khyber (sp?) crystals. Erso, obviously, completes his work. A cool sequence in the film shows the finishing dish put on the super laser, and then its awesome destructive power is demonstrated.

From the story, we don’t know much about Galen Erso, except that he hates the Empire and, after losing his wife, hopes his daughter (heroine Jyn Erso) can eventually complete his work: The destruction of the Death Star. As chief designer/engineer (at least of critical systems like the reactor core and super laser) it is Erso’s “fatal flaw” which leads to the station’s ka-blammo via Luke Skywalker in Episode 4. So it seems a bit dodgy, since he built the thing in the first place.

And here’s the moral dilemma: Would you, in his shoes, carry on with the work at all?

Now, he works for the Galactic Empire, mind you. This is not some DARPA project developing a new sonar system. We have to assume that Erso knew exactly what the super-laser was for (a ginormous plate of enchiladas, obviously) and that the motivations behind creating such a thing were not benevolent. Also, we know the Empire could’ve threatened him (torture and death, the usual). Since they’re not above gunning down wives or innocent planet-wide populations, Erso must’ve figured things wouldn’t end with a gold watch and a nice pension plan. And the whole idea of tracking down and executing lots of un-involved people…really not much of coercive tactic since that what Crennick and company planned to do anyway.

On the flip side, there’s Erso’s argument (compelling as it is, on the screen) that he only finished the work so that the weakness could be built in. What now?

The Death Star–without getting into nittie-gritties–is essentially an armed space station built around a massive reactor. Pretty much the way any vehicle or floating installation works these days. Our modern aircraft carriers and submarines (and other naval vessels) rely on nuclear reactors for juice. Kind of hard to move 10 million tons of metal with oars and a whip, I guess.

We know from various mishaps (both natural and via human error) that these reactors are touchy pieces of machinery. They don’t like foreign objects at all. That whole sabotage thing actually works (and that was originally carried out against relatively simple gears and cogs of centuries past). So no reactor in the world is going to tolerate a couple proton torpedoes introduced at high velocity. Boom, chain reaction, no more fancy reactor. The fatal flaw in Erso’s design–a la Episode 4’s heroics–is a small thermal exhaust port. For J.R.R. Tolkien’s Smaug the dragon, it was a natural problem–one scale missing from his soft side. For the real life Titanic, it was a combination of human arrogance and the system of water-tight doors. Dare I say that no human-made machine or vehicle is indestructible. But while we, the audience, buy into Erso’s motivation, it does beg the question: If someone somehow could find another way to destroy the Death Star (or merely put it out of commission for a while) was his noble plan really that necessary?

The closest equivalent we have is the Manhattan Project, which gave us nuclear weapons (undeniably evil) in the latter stages of a desperate worldwide armed conflict. The scientists behind it knew their creation wasn’t going to feed the homeless or cure leukemia. It was a bomb (capable of far worse than anyone truly understood). However, it was wartime. Easy for us in “peacetime” to debate the merits of such acts.

In “Endgame” and its sequels, heroine June Vereeth is a sharpshooter. It is wartime (albeit under different circumstances and in alien environs). Though she doesn’t enjoy her job, per se, she also doesn’t have the “luxury” of questioning it. From what I’ve ready, everything a sniper does comes down to the decision to pull that trigger. That pesky kill-or-be-killed quandary.

For fellow writers, here’s the question: Your hero has a gun to his/her head and is threatened (with all kinds of penalties). Do they still choose to abet evil?

 

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