Cause and Effect

Dekyon waves have created a rift in the space-time continnum.

And HippieHusband I are stuck in a time loop -- it goes like this--> I realize I have a big bad brain tumor, have brain surgery, HippieHusband loses his job, we both start looking for a job, I find one, and then we move.

We're on iteration #2.   In iteration#2, however, instead of being able to stay in the country, HippieHusband has to leave tomorrow morning for TheGreatMapleLeaf.

And so I do what comes naturally, the most buddhist thing of all,  I *cling* to that dotted red line.

Whatever you do Remember #3.

Hill climbing

The dotted red line - - -

Today HippieHusband and I were talking with a very good old friend, MiddleC, who lives in TheHighlands. MiddleC is a thoughtful, kind, and sensitive scientist and father of two.  For about 1-2 years of my PhD, we shared an office in an aging portable.  During one of his week-long visits back home, I spent a furious few days trying to figure out where this really offensive smell in our office was coming from.  At the start, there was only the slight stank of day old garbage but by the end of the week it had grown to into the putrid smell of rotting flesh. Visits during the day from my grad school friends dropped off precipitously such that by the end of the week, no one would come within a foot of our office.   I was convinced that a raccoon had died below the portable and was ready to call plant operations to take a wreaking ball to the floor of our office until on the Friday morning I found the problem.  A rotting cabbage.  As a mentor to high school kids, he had used it for a science project, but then promptly forgot about it when he left for vacation.  Talking with MiddleC made me miss grad school because there all of us were comrades against a common enemy, TheBigBadSupervisor.  Whatever shit came our way, we had sympathizers all around.  Now in the real world, it's you and a pile of toilet paper.

So how does one handle a shitstorm (beside the requisite toilet paper)?

Last week HippieHusband told me how surreal it felt when, earlier this week his company laid him off,  and he was escorted with his bankers box of personal items to take the 'perp walk' to the front door .  He said that during the time his managers were giving him his termination notice, he was extremely aware and calm while the others were visibly distressed.

This is the dotted red line.  To maintain a state of quiet and stillness both inside and outside despite the amount of poo that you might be standing in.

Getting there, of course takes work.

The future is predictable.

As a Bayesian, I believe the future is a random variable and as such I can use the data/past to determine my probability models.  Of course I can also evaluate the fit of my probability models and the implications of the posterior distribution.  Here I've modeled the probability of a shitstorm as binomial (I could use a better model suggestions?) given my observation of the past 15 years of my life.

Not looking good I admit. 

This past year the brain tumor reared its ugly head again leading to a second brain surgery.  Then to top that, I found out that the surgeons can't remove it all because it's too close to a little thing called a carotid artery, which if they nicked could lead to me bleeding to death. And now the biotech company, which I mostly enjoyed working for, is sinking.   Finalement - yesterday HippieHusband was laid off.

So the future is predictable.  Shitstorms happen.  Over and over again.  And the longer you live the more you accumulate.

The good news is that there is a dotted red line.  

More on the dotted line later.