Adding Value to Your Home

A long, long time ago we all started with no possessions. As a powerless child in the realm of the Middle Class, each of us possessed no means of income and no political power over anyone. The austerity of lifestyle in those early days approached desolation. Obtaining food, clothing and shelter was simply a matter of patience. It all arrived without permission, consent or authorization. That is why today, it is a matter of perceived amusement when someone asks, "Who dressed you?" because this is a reference to those early days when influence was absent.

As we age and acquire possessions, we add value to our home and improve our lifestyle. Such items include rare and valuable collectibles such as Dinky Toys, comic books (Silver Surfer), antique radios (Sparton Nocturne), artwork by nieces, nephews and grandchildren and component stereos. In the kitchen we acquire vessels to hold favourite liquids and fluids in addition to equipment for processing edible materials. The sum of all these valuable assets and properties can be perceived as truly priceless, because they represent a compilation unique to each individual.

The fact that visitors or outsiders have no appreciation for your valuables only reinforces the exclusive nature of your possessions. They may have their own ridiculous collections of absurd objects including furniture, cars, swimming pools, high ceilings, golf clubs and jewellery, but they have obviously missed the point. 

How can you put a price on a favourite book? Why would you want to convince anyone that your favourite movie is better than someone else's? What is the point of arguing about a favourite beverage. Establishing a preference takes time and effort. It is no simple matter to arrive at a choice and then maintain it through loyalty, fidelity, conscientousness and faith. Such high principles are acquired through experience and maturity. Early explorers of the world understood this concept. When one of them found a "new world" it was like finding the most delicious new dish in a restaurant. I had this extraordinary experience recently and will never forget it (the restaruant - not the new world). 

Preferences & Principles

As I visit people and places, I’m asked sometimes where I got my boots. I’ve had dental surgeons and physicists tell me they used to wear them, but I can't imagine a reason why they would have stopped. Once you wear cowboy boots regularly, it's really hard to go back to "normal" shoes. I've always loved horses and riding (western style). That's how pointed toe boots came about in the first place - on account of the stirrups. Meanwhile, good boots can get really expensive - costing as much as a car - but any good pair that fit properly will spoil your feet. In the past, I also got into the fancy dress stuff with yoked shirts, domed pearl snaps, carved leather belts and big shiny buckles, but I'm more conservative today. I don't want to look like Roy Rogers although I still really admire him. He and Dale were truly wonderful people. He came to town many years ago to open one of his restaurants. It was on the north side of Dundas just west of Dixie. He was called “King of the Cowboys” and he was the best rider in the movies on his golden palomino "Trigger." I got to shake Roy's hand and he gave me an autographed picture. I'll never forget it. There aren't very many saddle shops around anymore, but by ooincidence, there is a particularly good one right here in Cooksville, Ontario: Trdak’s Western Wilderness & Workwear Outfitters. You can find great shirts and boots there. They’re on the north side of Dundas - just down a spell, west of Hurontario (right next to the bus stop at 5 & 10). All kinds of people from miles around go to Trdak’s, because it’s the only place that stocks the specialized apparel. It’s like stepping through a time portal when you walk through that front door. I also really like visiting Joe (the owner). He has the best stories! I never owned any Charlie Pride records or Patsy Cline, although I did like The Flying Burrito Brothers. Those guys (including Chirs Hillman and Gram Parsons) were a mixed up bunch of talented guys trying to play a rebellious kind of country, but they sure didn’t live up to Roy Rogers’ extraordinary wholesomeness. My interest was about the down home honesty, integrity and traditional, hard-working characters associated with the western lifestyle. There are hints of it in films like The Electric Horseman (with Robert Redford) and even No Country For Old Men (with Josh Brolin). The celebration of ethics and virtue are incorporated in those films even if there are negaive aspects within the context. Well, Roy Rogers himself always said you need the valleys of sadness to appreciate the sunshine on the mountain top. While at University, I may have looked a little out of place like Llewelyn Moss at a boat show, but what are you supposed to look like when you are studying Restoration Poetry or 18th Century novels? I certainly didn't want to dress like Dr. Samuel Johnson. That would have been crazy. My favourite music ranges from Stravinsky to Miles Davis. My favourite artists range from Jan Van Eyck to William Holman Hunt (and a bunch of modern digital illustrators). My favourite authors include William Gaddis and Malcolm Lowry. My favourite footwear is cowboy boots. That's all.  Do your preferences indicate what sort of person you are? Perhaps. Do they influence your actions and their consequences - not so much. Such philosophy is more about what you stand for - not what you stand on.

Comparative Accelerated Chronology

In our immediate present we have an extraordinary sense of history, particularly in this age of accelerated temporal chronology. The term “ancient” used to refer to really old stuff like prehistoric civilizations such as Mesopotamia or Sumeria where they bartered in order to procure commodities, but in these days of encrypted e-commerce, the classical period might now be considered the previous few decades of the last century.

The great watershed of computing saw the introduction of DOS in the early 1980s. Originally authored by Seattle Computer Products, it was called QDOS which stood for quick and dirty operating system. The chief architect and author was a young guy named Tim Paterson. We could call this period the Neo-Aechulean (as in "stone") age of personal computing. Computers were soldered together by nerdy high school students, programmed by college geeks who didn't attend class and bought by independently wealthy enthusiasts who could afford to pay for hardware that cost more than a car.

Back then, the "Two Steves" started Apple Computers in a garage, Atari released Asteroids, and in 1982, Disney released TRON. That film is the one John Lasseter says got him interested in computer animation. John, of course, went on to run Pixar and is now at the helm of Disney.

That year was also the time Adobe Systems was founded by John Warnock and Charles Geschke. They introduced PostScript, which basically put a printer in every home. Adobe, of course, went on to acquire and distribute popular application programs such as Photoshop. The application program that has become a verb in everyday language was created by Thomas Knoll, while he was at college along with his brother John, who worked at ILM (Industrial Light and Magic). Years later, John was nominated for Academy Awards for his special effects work on movies such as Star Wars and Star Trek. He won an Oscar for his work on Pirates of the Caribbean.

This brings us to the “temporal” equivalent of the Neo-Industrial Revolution by which we compress approximately 4,000 years into 20. That’s what I mean when I say “accelerated” chronology. In this, our fourth decade of the  electronic interface, the ‘80s have become truly ancient. Contemporary generations have no idea what a rotary phone is or vector display. They have never heard of Silicon Graphics or Netscape or Mag Tape Data Storage. A lot of people don’t buy CD-ROM games anymore either. They are just a quaint storage system that has dropped out of mainstream usage.

During the CD revolution, I was at the roll-out of Spaceship Warlock in San Francisco in 1991. Two years later, MYST came out. Both games were originally authored for Apple computers only and were “ported” to the Windows platform. This produced radical compatibility problems, because the PC environment was far more open to developers and authors, which is also the reason why it is far more open to hackers, crackers and thieves who send out viruses, steal credit card information and identities. The recent "Heartbleed" security flaw for service providers is just another example.

This brings us to our contemporary age where cash is no longer preferred in commerce. Virtually untraceable, cash contributes to the underground economy. It is considered “underground,” because it is possible for transactions to go institutionally unreported. 

If you try to buy a product at a high tech outlet, do not attempt to use cash. You will be relegated to the ignominious fringe of shame and humiliation. Perhaps the concept of cash should go away so we can return to bartering for commodities instead of using electronic equivalents of accumulated wealth. I would gladly pay you a 12 inch sub for a unique internet domain. 

Attainable Perfection

I suppose it all began at my grandmother's house when I was a small boy and asked for a pencil and a piece of paper. I guess it just wasn't that high a priority at that particular location. Relatives started going through drawers in the kitchen and branched out into the living room and down to the bedrooms. They eventually came up with a blunt stub of a pencil that required some sharpening and a crumpled piece of paper torn out of a notebook. It served my requirements, but it was the shock that my request was not as fundamental as a spoon or a slice of bread or a torque wrench. Those were easy. The paper and pencil was almost an epic challenge.

I still love pencils and graphite and erasers and quality paper. I still sketch and draw all the time, but the idea of writing and drawing over the years has expanded to include rare and exotic pens. No, I'm not a collector of Montblanc pens, although I wouldn't turn one down. I wouldn't turn down a Cartier either, but expensive or valuable is not the point. It is more about how it performs and feels than how it looks. Of course, appearance is important, but so is weight and colour and texture. There's nothing like a sleek, slim silver shaft of a pen made of cool, smooth metal with a slick "roller ball" contact point so the ink can flow like a river through a generating station. That is all about power and control.

Then there's the quill (tiny metal nib) and the technical pens with pigment ink and let's not forget sable brushes dipped into Speedball Super Black India Ink or Dr. Ph. Martin's Black Star waterproof India Ink. There's nothing more beautiful than brushing that black magic onto artboard or good paper and combining it with perfect lines with great design. There's also the added thrill of anxiety and pressure from knowing how truly permanent that ink is and what it can do to an article of clothing or wall to wall carpet. Spills just add to the excitement.

Every pen has it's own unique purpose, and I'm not including the prosaic and mundane. I don't retain common stick pens or fine points that skip or globby devices that leak or ones that gush unexpectedly. I've learned how to avoid those. This is a serious passion requiring years of experience and expertise. It's kind of like being a connoisseur, but it really develops out of necessity. The pleasure of perfect control is just another part of writing along with perfect word selection and turn of phrase. It's all part of the creative process. Can you imagine a carpenter building a house with only a pen knife? Can you imagine an auto mechanic tuning a car with just a hammer? Can you imagine a plumber trying to work with just cellulose-based adhesive tape? Of course not. The pen has become an object of extreme desire, but not for mere value, but because perfection has finally become attainable. We're talking about the pen here. The trouble is, I seem to have an unquenchable thirst for the attainable. 

Reading States Defined

Readers know there's different kinds of reading. There's a hierarchy of cognitive function established by location, time and task priority (LTT). It's kind of a formula that underlies all of our activity and it results in emotional states such as guilt, happiness and procrastination.  If you have the luxury of complete freedom and you are either sitting by a pool on a warm, sunny day or on vacation on a beach near the Equator, you can relax and read each page slowly and deliberately. It doesn't even have to be a good book or good prose. It doesn't matter. The pleasure of the location plus the availability of time and the absence of task priority make this the preferred state known as "Alpha" reading.  Sometimes, when the book is really, really good and you lose the sense of LTT (location, time and task), you might consider wearing a portable alarm device so you know when to get off the bus or the train. Otherwise, you might end up arriving at an unintentional destination. This also occurs on a regular basis on the last trains of the day leaving Grand Central Station after the bars have closed. I'm not saying passengers are reading. I'm just saying they are not paying attention to LTT. The "Beta" state of reading is also a pleasure state. This often takes place when reading while anticipating the transitional mode preceding dream state. It may occur in bed, but what defines it is the variable of task priority has been taken out of the equation (Location and Time are still significant and essential). The "Beta" state does not take place in medical waiting rooms. This is a much lower state known as "Epsilon" reading - otherwise known as "killing time." "Gamma" reading is the highly focused state when information is being recorded into mnemonic memory registers. It is information you require or really, really want to remember. It is useful for storing critical data regarding your job or for when you are contributing to conversation in restaruants or institutions of refreshment. If you don't get your facts right, you will be contradicted. Even so, you may be required to either furnish physical proof or become more concvincing in your delivery than the person who is challenging you. This should not be confused with "Delta" reading which is known as studying. In this state, the equation has a very heavy value in the Task variable while the location and time elements only add pressure and anxiety. There is also "Kappa" reading, which is known as "speed reading," but that is only useful for getting through periodicals or books you have no intention of actually absorbing or retaining for whatever reasons. Some of the other kinds of reading have names such as Zeta, Eta, Theta, Iota and Lambda, but the LTT equation tends to grow more and more irrelevant in those progressive states. Some of them have to do with if you have your glasses with you or if you are trying to read while you are driving or if you are trying to multi-task (such as walking or eating). One of those succeeding states known as "Theta" refers to reading "sequential art" (otherwise known as graphic novels and comic books), although one can argue, depending on the location and time and task priority equation, you might be able to enter the "Alpha" state from there - depending on your VPI (Visual Propensity Index).