Being the Music

Being the Music
January 22, 2002
By Peter Stair

From dreaming, I wake up. The sun touches me. I feel energized. I breathe the trees. I feel at home. I drink some cool water. From dry and stale, I become lubricated and refreshed.

I pace myself. Not too much movement. Not ready to breathe heavily yet. Not too much sound. Still listening to silent dreams. Too much of almost anything and I will become grumpy.

So: slow, please, I’m tuning up. I’m going to make music today.

I pace myself. I walk. Stretching out, loosening up. From dream to ground. To left from right. I’m finding the rhythm. I find it . . .

. . . and I begin gliding. From discrete steps to a continuous flow.

I notice more rhythms around me. The rocking of the trees. The zig-zag of an insect. The rapid hum of a machine. The whish of a car. The bouncing of molecules against my skin (a slow beat means “cold”) The frequencies of the sky. These are the vibrations that comprise the world of my perception. Today I find a harmonic collection. This part of the country makes some beautiful music!

Class. My professor speaks, emphasizing and pausing in clarifying ways. He is singing. I temporarily don’t understand his harmony. I sing my own version of what he’s saying, but I end with an up-note, as if I’m waiting completion. I am a question mark: raised shoulders, raised eyebrows, leaning forward. I’m waiting for him to bring us back down from my up note and eventually back to the tonic home note. When he does, I get a subtle rush of relief, and I nod with a rhythm and depth that says, “Thank you. I understand.” He ends the lecture on a concluding down note. We close our notebooks in applause.

I walk through a briar patch of other people walking and biking, each at different angles, speeds and awarenesses. If one person were to direct all of our movements, many of us would crash, or not move as quickly. But, when we feel each other, the most effective thing is anarchy. If we expect the other person to change their direction and speed too much, or if we change our own rhythm too unpredictably, we struggle with each other, and we become trapped in the briar patch. Today, we don’t dodge. We harmonize.

I stop to talk with a friend. She is beautiful. We make music. I say something brief. She says something longer, in her higher octave. I say something brief again. She says something brief. I listen to her, I see her, I smell her. I feel the melody of our conversation. Another friend gracefully enters and pipes in. We more than look at each others’ eyes.

I walk back to my home — returning my music to a tonic note. I eat. One bite at a time. I chew, one chomp after another. I drink, one sip, then another. I become a rhythm.

I am a permanent flow. Within a couple weeks, I will have entirely rebuilt my skin. Within about two months I will remake my red blood cells. A few years from now, I will finish completely reconstituting my bones. Within a few more years, I will have replaced the molecules that make up my DNA. I will eventually breathe, sweat, poop and pee the contents of my body.

I am simply the information that directs this flow. I am the score.

Between the “in” and the “out” is the energy that is me. Thinking, talking, smelling, smiling. In between are the movements that comprise my day. These movements are the dance of my life.

The day is getting warmer, and my pace is getting faster. I decide to rush to class because I want to finish composing an e-mail, and I think I will enjoy the rushing of wind in my face and of blood in my muscles and gliding on my bike and humming fast music . . . and then sliding, panting, into the classroom.

I do this, and I enjoy it. There’s something profound about myself that I don’t really understand, but it’s also something I’m willing to accept without thinking much: being alive feels good.

Today I will learn to be more alive. I read, and I learn. I talk with other people, and I learn. I watch other people interact, and I learn. I feel my body, my little sorenesses and sadnesses, and I learn what I can avoid doing again. I will learn to be less stagnant, more alive.

The discussion section I attend is an opportunity to improvise. I have the ability to speak at any moment, but I choose to speak when certain cues are right. I can let my TA finish, or if it makes better music, I can interrupt her when I don’t understand. I can walk out anytime, but I leave to go to the bathroom at a certain moment, and with a certain, more harmonious body language.

Every moment is another opportunity for me to improvise. More than other organisms or natural processes, I have the ability to change my melody rapidly. Like a vocalist or a soloist in an orchestra, I have leeway. The sun, the plants, the insects create the beat and underscore that allows me to do some interesting things on top. I can do a hand-stand right now. I can stop breathing for a few moments. I can sit over there instead of here. It’s not all instinct.

It’s especially interesting how I play music with other humans. How well do we support each other? We spontaneously create a soccer game before dinner. We talk sporadically, harmonizing our desires to listen, speak and move.

But! I fail to pass the soccer ball where I wanted it to go — I’m off-pitch. I interrupt someone in a disruptive way — I’m off-pace. I continue to eat more chocolate chips than I feel good eating — I’m a broken record. I can easily make bad music.

So, feeling sluggish, I clean out my filters by exercising. I rush blood, sweat, air and heat through my pipes. I stretch, loosen and become a clearer vessel. Now I feel more like smiling to the stranger I pass.

I shower off my exterior, feeling far from stagnant.

I reorder my room, reducing the dissonance of the pathway across it.

I prepare sleep. But I play slow music on my computer before I get into bed.

Sleep is the long, deep tonic note that I must always, and will ultimately, return to. From movement to rest. Tension and release is the repeating story of the universe. What a day I’ve had!

I dream, as usual, of a double helix. From what angle do I see it tonight? It is a circular / linear, unified / binary, yin / yang universe I live in.

From dreaming, I wake up.

The sun’s excess touches me. I feel energized. I breathe the trees’ extras. I feel at home.

Peter Stair is a junior studying human ecology. If you read his column last week (available at The Daily’s Web site) you would understand what he means when he says he’s schizophrenic. He’s never written a column, or anything, quite like this. Will it sound “on” or “off” pitch to others? E-mail him at pstair@stanford.edu.

Time, Life, Acceling

Time, Life, Acceling
January 15, 2002
By Peter Stair

I wake up this morning and have only five minutes to get where I’m going, so I don’t want to be where I am.

I throw off the covers of my nicely warmed bed and throw my notebooks into my bag, which I toss over my shoulder, and then jump onto my bike and race to class. I sit down in class just after the professor starts and settle down from my momentary frenzy. I slept only six hours last night.

So my head nods as the teacher drones about some new set of observations and connections humans made not long ago. He’s pretty excited about all the stuff we’re learning so quickly in his field these days. He makes a joke about an ignorant conception of the world that people used to have, and I’m temporarily jolted out of my daze. I don’t get the joke, because I haven’t been paying attention, and I didn’t have time to drink my coffee this morning, so I’m too slow for him. I’m not going to understand much today, so I just want to get through this class. So, when I hear the professor wrapping up, I start packing up, and the professor is like, “one more minute,” but I’ve already decided that he’s finished, and when he does stop speaking I’m the third person out of the room. “Hi,” I nod to someone I know from my freshman dorm. We haven’t actually stopped to talk all quarter.

So I’m on my bike again and I’m going to my next class, which is far away and was scheduled so that I have only seven minutes to get there, and I don’t recognize anyone I know until it’s too late to say, “hi.” I get upset with the slow walkers spread out in front of me and at the guy who’s recklessly weaving around people on his bike. And I just don’t understand why other people have to be such a problem.

So I get to my next class, and I snatch a seat. It’s another class that’s only mildly interesting. This is one of those classes where I really respect the professor, but I don’t have time to do all the reading. I think I miss a lot.

I sometimes think about living on campus without all the deadlines and pressures. I could just learn what I want to learn, hang out with friends, go skiing and visit all the other interesting places in this area. But I really shouldn’t be upset by my life. This is the best time of my life, after all. I think I like it here. I like it. Actually, I know I like it. A lot.

The professor finishes, and I jump back on my bike and go back to my dorm, but I forget to stop by the Bookstore to buy new batteries for my alarm clock, and so I rush back to get them. But I can’t stand lines, even though I have to.

I know that I’m going to be late to lunch with an old friend I haven’t seen in a while. Luckily I know she will be late also. We grab food and talk to each other. I’m so impressed by how busy she’s been.

But she has to rush off to a meeting, and I have to go to another class. So we agree to meet again sometime.

After class, I bike back to my room. I haven’t checked e-mail all day! But it’s just announcements for events I don’t have time to go to. I start catching up on my reading, but I realize that I need to exercise. The gym is crowded, and my favorite machine is broken, so I try out a new and unfamiliar machine. It feels strange, but, hey, change is good. Then I notice that I have only 45 minutes before dinner, so I try to work extra hard, even on my strange machine.

I make it back to dinner in time to get some of the good food! But I don’t stay for long, because I need to do some reading. But it’s hard to stick with, even though it’s about dinosaurs and a meteor and the scramble to survive. I’m not understanding it.

So I check e-mail again and get a really long and thoughtful e-mail from a friend on the East Coast. But it’s too good: I don’t have the time to respond properly right now. I really like this friend.

So my attention wanders, and I pick up my stuffed dinosaur. Here’s one that didn’t go extinct, I think cleverly. But he doesn’t look like a survivor at all. He’s goofy-looking and soft, and he looks like he’d be really slow. And, though I’ve only had him for a little while, I’ve used him enough that he’s already old and I should get a new one. But — ahhh — what am I doing? I don’t have time for this.

I do the reading for another class, but I don’t do as much as I need to. I start responding to my friend’s e-mail, but I don’t want to send him a 20 page e-mail, so I have to think about what I want to say. I’ll finish it later.

I continue my reading. I’m catching up. I think this is progress!

I decide I’m going to go to bed a little bit earlier than usual today. So I move some piles around in my room, and get into bed. Another day over. But I start thinking about all the things I still have to do, like that application, and solidifying my plans for spring break, and deciding what I’m going to do this summer, and getting my brother a birthday present, and I’m still way behind on reading. Damn! I didn’t do anything today.

I’m sick and tired of doing so much, I think. But it’s not that bad. I like being busy. I think I might be getting a little sick. Hopefully just a little, though, because I don’t have the time to be sick. I’m sick of being sick.

Peter Stair is a junior studying human ecology. He wants to pay tribute to Jorge Luis Borges for his brief profundity, and likes the movie “Koyanisquatsi” (“out of balance”). “Make Haste or you will become Waste,” his grandfather always told him, or something like that. He likes when people take the time to send him comments at pstair@stanford.edu.

True or false? The world in which we live

True or false? The world in which we live
January 8, 2002
By Peter Stair

Over break I tried my first fat free potato chips. They were tasty. They were cooked with a chemically engineered lipid, called olestra, which our taste buds recognize but our enzymes cannot properly digest. They are emblematic of our time: The Age of Illusions.

On my way home I took my first pilgrimage to Las Vegas, the mecca of the Age of Illusion.

It is a place of smoke and mirrors, flashing lights and seductive smiles. It is a place of windowless casinos, where the realities of night and day are lifted. Human companionship is offered as if it could be bought and hapless gamblers are made invisible. It is a place where Believers are encouraged to believe the illusion that there are short-cuts to personal and financial success. It is a desert which nonetheless gives the appearance of plentitude, where fountains gush, wastes are whisked away to some seemingly infinite dump and, if you gamble, drinks are ostensibly “cheap.”

Mirages.

Extravagant as Las Vegas can be, it is a brilliant satire of our culture.

At Stanford and elsewhere, we increasingly live in a world of 90 degree angles, concrete ground, cultivated gardens and fake flowers. Fruits have brand names, as if they were manufactured. Toilets and garbage trucks flush away our excrement, as if it simply disappeared. And, as we build our cities into the clouds, entertainment is our most common source of information. Living in illusion, we’re buffered, detached, ignorant of the vital feedback we need from our environmental support systems.

Socially, also, we’ve become more sheltered from each other. Computers and mobility separate us from the people we live with, just as cement and sewers separate us from the ground we live on. Instead of interacting with the people around us, we can use our cell phones to interact with people more distant. Instead of talking personally to someone, we can e-mail them. And when we feel sexy, we can have “virtual sex.” Less grounded and intimate in many relationships, we increase the likelihood that we’re living in delusion.

We’re inundated with opportunities to live in unreal, virtual worlds. We spend an increasing amount of our time playing on our computers and watching our televisions, meaning we spend more of our days interacting with neither the non-human world, nor humans themselves. In this world, we often actually prefer information that is specifically unrepresentative of reality. Our journalists tell us more often about unusual events than about broad trends. Our entertainers give us special effects and melodramas. Magazine covers are mostly digitally altered, airbrushed photos. We can pretend we’re video game characters who perform physically impossible feats.

Now, when we do interact with other humans, we increasingly talk about this virtual world we’ve created. We talk about our gizmos and games. We gossip about people we don’t even know, and who probably don’t really exist: personas with permanent stage names, like P. diddy and Kramer. Even when deciding whom to be our leaders, we talk about candidates with “image problems,” people without the “media savvy” to “perform” the role properly. A memorable slogan of our times is “image is everything.”

So what happens to us, as we construct the illusions of our age? As our world slowly becomes un-moored from reality, we risk a painful crash down to reality. Speculative bubbles burst. Enron goes out of business. The Titantic crashes. Liars get trapped. Terrorists follow through on threats we’d ignored. Illusions are dangerous.

But, more than that, it’s just not as much fun to live in fantasy. Picture someone at a dance party who’s flailing around, moving far too quickly and out of sync. That’s you and I. We can become so deaf to the music of the natural world that we lose our ability to dance to it, and, since we don’t hear the same beat, we have a harder time dancing with each other.

Sheltered in our cities, we can more easily believe we’re prospering, because it is easier to dismiss problems like global climate instability, nuclear waste, species extinction, soil erosion, collapsing fisheries and falling water tables.

“What environmental problem?” We can say, “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

Sheltered by our computers and our televisions, we more often take our social cues from non-reality. My father, an emergency room doctor, tells me that more people, confronted with unusual circumstances, are emulating the actors they see on TV. More fly into rages, threaten lawsuits, or command dramatically, “do everything, doctor!” They are making their world a TV world.

When we take too many cues from non-reality, we have difficulty interacting with reality. Alejandro Martinez, director of Stanford’s Counseling and Psychological Services, told me last year that she’d seen an “unprecedented number” of room-mates and dorm-mates having trouble getting along. She theorized that students who grew up with computers might incorrectly expect other humans to be just as pliable. Are we more often becoming social misfits?

Yet, despite the dangers of illusion, many of us at Stanford are working to further virtualize our world. Every time we work primarily for a credential or grade, we de-emphasize our value for actual growth and cast a vote for the world of appearances. How often do we plan or describe our life as if it were a resume?

We are programmers who will design the most exciting new video games. We are journalists or marketers who will work in an enormous and growing public relations industry, an industry that serves primarily to distort our information. We are teachers who will teach illusions. We are engineers or product designers who will further shelter people from the “discomforts” of reality. We are artists who will devote our talents not to elucidating deep truths but to the art form of the Age of Illusions: advertising, an art-form that seduces us into believing that buying something is always the solution.

We are illusionists.

But why feel bad about who we are when we can also work to spread clarity. Aware that cities are not the world, and that movie characters are not actual people, we can receive information more skeptically. We can practice trusting our own experiences more often, and words less often. We can become more experimental. Then we can become more creative in how we go about our daily lives. Psychologists call this awakening process “self-actualization.”

There is a difference between authentically connecting with our natural world and being safe from natural perils. There is a difference between being honest with other people and being rude. But I’m not so concerned about demarcating the boundary.

Because I think we know true connection and honesty when we feel it. And they feel so good ! I know the dissatisfaction of an entirely false smile, or a day spent in an office building, or a day writing e-mails. But I also know the feeling of looking into someone’s eyes and truly connecting with them. I know the feeling of communing with a tree, understanding its slower pace of living. We know how authentic, fresh and right these experiences are.

The real world is a beautiful place to live.

Peter Stair is a junior studying human ecology, honestly. He’s not sure what he thinks about currencies and the gold standard. To be frank, he struggled to find an authentic tone in writing this column. For those interested in shedding illusions, he recommends a visit to a nearby organization called Magic, Inc. He is sincere in wanting to hear your feedback at pstair@stanford.edu.