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The mapmakers were so good they created a paper map of the world that matched it exactly in one-to-one scale. They duplicated the world, covering it up. So it goes in “Of Exactitude in Science,” a little story written by the Argentinean author Jorge Luis Borges in 1946. And so it goes with life today. Two worlds exist on top of each other — one where we interact physically, actually, and one were we do so digitally.
Something similar happens in Charlie Kauffman’s 2008 film “Synecdoche, New York.” Here, a death-fearing theater director creates a play much like Borges’s map in an impossibly enormous warehouse. His endless show — with sets and actors and even actors playing the actors — is created to scale with his real life. By doing this, he’s trying to make multiple versions of his life as a way to create more life. He isn’t content with multitasking. He’s multiliving.
That’s what goes on with Second Life — an interactive, massively multiplayer virtual world created to replicate our real one (complete with jobs, stores and relationships). And, when you think about it, multiliving is one of the main functions of all the user-generated-content sites on the Web.
You only live twice
Seeing things with our eyes isn’t enough. We take a picture with our phones and upload it to Flickr for all to see. Thinking things with our brains isn’t enough. We tell our friends on Facebook what’s on our mind right now. Living life isn’t enough. We Tweet so everybody knows exactly what we just did.
Alternative realities aren’t new to the modern world. As soon as we had the time and inclination to stop simply surviving and tell stories, read books, view photographs, talk on the telephone, watch movies or play Super Nintendo, we were stepping away from the real and into a place where people can be little gods.
But, until recently, most of us had no part in shaping these realities. We were passively part of a one-way flow of entertainment. We couldn’t socialize with the regulars at Cheers. We simply tried to forget about our real lives for half an hour and watch these people in their pretend lives — complete with a laugh track and commercial breaks.
It’s time that you love
I sympathize with Caden Cotard, the main character in “Synecdoche, New York.” I like to multilive. And I’m fully aware that I do it as a vain attempt to try to fend off my own mortality, to hang onto time, precious time, in whatever virtual or actual ways I can. I’m not old, but I’m getting there. We all are.
So, between everything else I do, I multilive by documenting life — creating another version of it that goes out to whoever happens to see it. Most of what I do is “cover” a trip to the Saraga International Market or The Big Donut with updates and pictures uploaded to Facebook.
It’s all really addictive. I rarely stop fiddling with my phone when I’m out — taking and uploading pictures on Facebook and Flickr, checking in on Foursquare, scanning my nine email accounts or messing with GPS tracker programs that map my every move.
I remember answering machines
All of this multiliving sort of snuck up on me. Fifteen years ago I didn’t have a cell phone or Internet access at home. Fifteen years ago, I mostly lived in the real world and interacted with people in real life. I was far less popular when being a friend meant that you had to actually be around me and I had to be around you. Instead of the 600 Facebook friends have now, I had a handful of friends who I would really do stuff with.
With no cell phone, people who wanted to let me know something would call and leave me a message on my answering machine. It had a cassette tape in it and it would pile message after message on top of each other — erasing and recording, erasing and recording. Usually, when I got home, I would go straight for the answering machine to see who had called. Maybe the red light would be blinking. Somebody called me in the last eight hours and had something to say!
Now we don’t even have a home phone, let alone an answering machine. And the red light is a tiny number in my email inbox or on the Facebook homepage. It is a voicemail or missed call blinking on my cell phone. It is the dozens of Tweets from people I know and don’t know telling me what they ate for lunch (I had carrots on my salad!) or a play-by-play account of “The Bachelor.”
A dose of actual reality
I recently left my laptop and phone at home before setting out with my wife and kids to stay a few days in Golconda — a fading, little city along the Ohio River in Southern Illinois. This was a getaway trip. And what I got away from most was multiliving.
When we first arrived and decided to take a little time to do nothing, I felt like I’d just stepped off a treadmill after running all day. My body was still. But my multiliving brain was still moving and moving.
I wanted to tell everyone about the really cool historic cottage we were staying in right on the river. I wanted to upload pictures of the giant barges floating past into the sunset. But I couldn’t. So only we knew what was happening in our lives at that moment. Only we sat there, sipping hot tea and talking to each other. Later, only we played cards with the kids and listened to the birds and went hiking in the hills and explored the other little towns.
Sure, we got lost in the country without having the option of using my phone’s GPS and had to drive around until we found a town. Sure we saw and experienced lots of things that would have been nice to preserve with pictures. But, we lived a little actually. We lived one life at a time, if only for a while. And it was good.
In the end of Borges’s “Of Exactitude in Science,” people get bored with the enormous and cumbersome map and leave it to be destroyed by the elements. Soon, only fragments remain here and there flapping in the desert breeze. Will the same thing happen to Twitter someday? Will we leave Facebook behind like a pile of virtual junk?
Only time will tell.
10 ways to live a more actually
1. Buy a watch and use it instead of looking constantly at your cell phone. This will keep you from obsessing about checking your text messages, email, Facebook mobile or voicemail messages. Plus you’ll be doing the watch-making industry a favor. Watch sales are in the tank.
2. Search for the quietest place you can find to sit there for a bit each day. You might call it meditation or you might just call it stopping.
3. Do something really fun and don’t document it at all. Let those moments belong only to the people who were actually there.
4. Choose to turn off the computer and phone at a certain time on certain nights. Don’t put it in sleep mode. Shut it down. I’ve found that this helps me get to sleep at a reasonable hour.
5. Read books that make you think. Read the newspaper in print form.
6. Write your thoughts in a little notebook and keep them to yourself.
7. Write notes on paper and leave them for somebody you really like or love to find in person.
8. Send a friend a postcard in the mail for no reason.
9. Walk instead of driving. Nothing makes life more real than actually touching the earth with your feet.
10. Really pay attention to the world. Smell it. Taste it. Look at it. Listen to it.
By Jenny Walton
Second Story Intern
While driving last Saturday, I was listening to NPR which usually only happens when every other radio station is simultaneously playing “I Gotta Feeling,” another Black Eyed Pea lyrical conundrum that inexplicably incorporates mozoltov into the other two lines of the song: “I gotta feeling that tonight’s gonna be a good night” and “let’s do it.”
Anyway, back to NPR, I found myself listening to man read a ghost story that takes place in India and is about faceless people in the woods. As it turns out, the librarian I was listening to, David Wright, is a librarian at the central library in Seattle where he hosts a regular event called Thrilling Tales: A Storytime for
Grown Ups where adults come and eat their lunch while David reads. And I wondered why this sort of event isn’t more common. Or, if it is, why nobody’s told me about it.
A little different from Wright’s tales and a personal favorite of mine is Mark Twain’s essay on How to Tell a Story http://www.timsheppard.co.uk/story/dir/twain.html. Twain tackles the art of humor especially as it relates to the telling of a story.
There’s plenty of research explaining why parents should read to their children. And we all at least know about the importance of continuing to read, but maybe we should reconsider the importance of reading to each other beyond childhood even if Dr. Seuss or Bill Peet remain the authors of choice. “Cause I gotta feeling . . .”
Can’t be sure if I’m alone in this dilemma or not, but I really don’t like watching hours of TV. Don’t get me wrong I like TV. It’s just that I can’t really sit down and watch The Biggest Loser for two hours and walk away feeling like it was time well spent, especially because you can’t really walk away. For the last hour the station’s been playing clips of what’s next and the news sounds like it’ll be interesting tonight.
I guess I just like having something to show for my time. If I put off work or cleaning the bathroom for three or four hours, I want it to be because I did something besides look through all 748 Facebook pictures of that kid I haven’t talked to in three years. But it can be hard to find something that’s fun with a product and doesn’t cost $10 for the plain mug and $15 for the glaze and firing.
This week though, while observing a 7th grade English class at the Center of Inquiry (Indianapolis Public School No. 2), I was introduced to Storybirds, the answer to my indoor free time predicament. This website provides for hours of engaging and creative entertainment for anyone who enjoys writing or art, or especially those who enjoy both.
It’s a site where you select an artist, and then you create a story using the work of your chosen artist to illustrate your online book—and the artwork you can choose from is good, I promise. Then when you’re satisfied with your book, you publish it, which means other Storybirders can read it and make comments on it.
You can do it with your family or your friends, too. Make a game out of it. Take turns writing each page. Or have one person select the picture and have someone else write the material.
All you do is go to storybird.com, set up an account (which by the way is free! and doesn’t require you to download so many programs that you have to delete the pictures from grandma’s birthday party), and you’re ready to go. There’s a tutorial video for those who feel a little shaky on their internet-feet, but the site is relatively easy to navigate. Did I mention it’s free? So, do yourself a favor and at least check it out. If nothing else, it’s a really good reason not to do the dishes.
Visit storybird.com here.
October Second Story News:
1. New Fall Programs Seek Kids and Volunteers
2. Fundraiser Event this Saturday, Oct. 10 at Radio Radio
3. In-School Program at CFI Gets Started
4. Check Out Our New Website
1. Volunteers, Young Writers Needed for 2 After-School Programs
Join Us for Drop-In Writing help for kids:
After School Mondays in Fountain Square
Second Story is hosting a unique and free after-school program on Mondays this fall for students in the grades 3-6 located at the Wheeler Arts Community at 1035 Sanders St. in Fountain Square. Programming starts October 12 and runs through December 10, for a total of ten Mondays from 3:30-5:30 p.m.
The first half of each session will be dedicated help with writing or reading related homework. The second half will be set aside for creative writing games and writing prompts that are meant to be both accessible and fun for the students. Some of the work produced during this time will be published online and in a semester anthology. All young people in grades 3-6 from anywhere in the city are welcome to attend this free program. Parents will need to arrange for transportation for children participating in the program.
We are currently seeking 20-plus volunteers to help with this program. You don’t have to be a professional writer or teacher to help (though writers and teachers are more than welcome!). We’re looking for volunteers who are interested in creative expression and helping kids succeed. We’d also like volunteers to make a regular commitment to being there each week, but we could also use others who can fill in on occasion. You will receive training and support as a volunteer instructor.
For more information, reply to this email, visit http://www.secondstoryindy.org or contact Jim Walker (317) 408-1366.
Volunteer on Thursdays at MLK Center
Our second fall after-school program happens at the Martin Luther King Multi Service Center at 40 W. 40th Street by Tarkington Park. This program starts on October 29 and runs for seven weeks this fall. It is linked with existing programs at the center for kids from the neighborhood, so we are mainly seeking volunteers. Our programming will happen on Thursdays from 5-6:30 p.m. and will work in pretty much the same way described above. Please let us know if you’d like to participate.
2. Support Second Story at our Corporate Rock Off Fundraiser
Six bands featuring co-workers from Indianapolis companies and organizations will compete this coming Saturday, Oct. 10 to see who has the most mojo in Corporate Rock Off, a fundraising event for Second Story — a local nonprofit organization offering free writing workshops and tutoring for inner-city kids.
The bands in the event presented by Well Done Marketing include Vibe Dial, sponsored by rippleFX; The Raidiators sponsored by Raidious Digital Content Services; The Long Dong Bomb Poonan from Hong Kong sponsored by Bradley and Montgomery; Sea Krowns, sponsored by Big Car; Accordions, sponsored by Nogginwerk; and Indianapolis Monthly’s team, Misprintz, winners of this year’s local battle of the media bands.
Each band will play a 20-minute set in a one-round battle. Winners will be chosen through a combination of audience vote and selections by expert judges. The winning team will be announced that night and will conclude the event with an encore set. Teams or their sponsors chipped in $500 as a donation to Second Story, and 75-percent of ticket sales also go to the organization. As a prize, 25 percent of those proceeds go to the winning team’s charity of choice in the name of their company. The winning band also gets an opening slot at this year’s Tonic Ball.
Big thanks to board member Matt Mays for taking the lead on making this new and awesome event possible. And thanks to Radio Radio and all of the companies and organizations sponsoring teams. Thanks also to Well Done Marketing, HiDef Pictures and Mays Entertainment for their donations.
Also, we’ll have Second Story t-shirts for adults available for purchase at the event!
Calendar Information
What: Corporate Rock Off
When: 8 p.m. on Saturday, Oct.10
Where: Radio Radio, 1119 E. Prospect St.
Cost: $10, $5 with college ID. 21 and over.
Info: (317) 408-1366; http://www.secondstoryindy.org
3. Second Story Partners with Butler, IMCPL and IPS School No. 2
We’re very excited to have just started last week with our first middle school program, working with all of the 7th graders at IPS School No. 2, Center for Inquiry on Fridays at Central Library. This partnership with Butler University and the Indianapolis-Marion County Library’s Learning Curve brings graduate and undergraduate students from a for-credit course at Butler to the library to work in two-person teaching teams with workshops of five or six students. The class, taught by Second Story managing director Jim Walker, includes six very skilled, talented and creative students. The program will culminate in print and online materials and a public reading event in December the students and teachers. Thanks to everybody at Butler, IMCPL and CFI for helping make this exciting partnership possible.
Please visit our website http://www.secondstoryindy.org for more info or to make an online donation. And please forward this update to anybody you know who might be interested… Thanks!
Jim Walker
Managing Director
Second Story
1014 Prospect St.
Indianapolis, IN 46203
(317) 408-1366
Second Story is a nonprofit creative writing project for young writers in Greater Indianapolis. Through classroom exercises, after-school tutoring, and other special programs and events, Second Story helps kids 6 to 18 find joy in writing as they discover their voices, explore their world, and embrace a life of curiosity and self-expression. Learn more at http://www.secondstoryindy.org.
You’re here, so you know it is live. After working with a blog site for our first couple of years, Second Story’s new website—designed by our friends at MediumLarge—is up and running. We have lots left to do. But we didn’t want to wait any longer to make the switch. All of the gaps will begin filling in as we finish up the site in the next few weeks. Our goal is to create a site that does a great job sharing Second Story’s mission while working as a great resource for students, parents and teachers. Please let me know your thoughts on our new site and any suggestions you have for additions and improvements. Thanks!
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