When I was in kindergarten, or perhaps it was the first grade, they took us on a trip to The Swan House. While there, they asked us if we could figure out why the clear crystals put out rainbow colors.
I said that you can see the light being split on the edges.
They were surprised. I was confused. People were always asking you questions that they thought you ought to know as if you didn’t know. And when I knew, it made me angry; as it did then. I did not like being talked to as if I were lesser or somehow expected NOT to know.
But I could see it happening, so I was also confused because it seemed I was the only one in the room that could.
Not even the almighty teacher, or the uber tour guide (the notions of order of authority have been fascinating to me for as long as I can recall).
And somehow, both the tour guide and teacher were annoyed with me for answering.
– the early memory and thoughts of my (then) young, autistic mind.
I have always been astonished at the dominance and subservience rules in our cultures and societies. The contradictions between them and the hypocrisies that live nestled alongside them wearing carefully constructed euphemisms that place blame and shame without ever attesting the name.
So long as I can recall, I have never felt that another human being was ‘better’ or ‘worse’ than myself. Only different. Just as I was different. It helped me greatly that this was my mindset, for not only was I very different, my life experiences were going to be as well.
For over a decade, I have casually contemplated documenting the story of my life as I recall it. Much remains; tenderly swaddled threads of a historically wide weft… remnants of the loosing of the looming of my life.
I did mention I love assonance, right?
I cannot decide if I want my life open to review. But at the same time, I seem to be able to speak from so many perspectives and experience positions that it may well serve a cautionary tale.
Probably just ego. People say I have a way with words. I say that it’s not a way, it’s a mind that taught itself how to make sense of a incessantly nonsensical world.
For example:
Everyone loves the ideal, but few are willing to strive after it.
Everyone loves the hero, but only until peace returns; few commit to works that could render heroes unnecessary.
Everyone loves to talk, but few are willing to risk action. Particularly in a world where those who took oaths to protect you are as likely to murder you first.
I’m part of everyone. Duh. Why is it that this is always the first mandate from the listener/reader? The difference is that I get why I’m a hypocrite and can explain it to others.
Using science and the power bestowed by my beautifully autistic mind.
But it’s completely anecdotal the moment I step beyond the realities introduced by epigenetics and neuroscience (both of which are quietly terrified by the ramifications, just ask them and see).
Just as at The Swan House, I can see it. Clearly. I can describe it. Clearly. But I know that if I do, the responses will be just like they were back then, too.
The one thing that hasn’t changed is our tethered, animal physiology… truly, our one and only evolutionary blockage. Dopamine reproductive machines, no different from any other but for a curiously self-destructive prefrontal cortex.
Naturally, most of humanity still lives in strident denial of the fact, let along any of the ramifications that immediately accost the moment denial retreats.
People gonna peep. Humans gonna hew. How does our species continue? I dunno, how bout you?
BUT!
If I’m going to do this, it is going to have to be without popular culture labels and terminology, because the labels now effective prevent communication rather than propagate it. (Thanks, “social” media.)
But I would probably start by compiling peer reviewed work demonstrating how interdisciplinary work is turning up all manner of amazing things (and validating me!). Look! Here’s an example!! This paper that posits a workable model of our brain as circuitry (a bit closer to the bone than most realize):
The Microcircuit Concept Applied to Cortical Evolution: from Three-Layer to Six-Layer Cortex – How exciting is this? Just look at this basic circuit model for the mammalian mid-brain:
This is just the beginning. They’re reverse-engineering behavior down to the organic chemistry level and, completely unsurprisingly, we match the patterns just like all the other living animals and beings.
(Aside: That page tells you something that is incorrect. It says:
.”..epigenetic changes are reversible and do not change your DNA sequence, but they can change how your body reads a DNA sequence.”
They can change IF and HOW your body reads a DNA sequence.
That “IF” is critical because IF they turn OFF a sequence, and a baby is conceived before it is turned on again, that baby will be born with that sequence OFF… which IS or CAN BE an irreversible change. But it’s an easy mistake to make in the name of “simplifying for public consumption”… only it’s incorrect.
As time and science have already experimentally revealed. The ramifications here, alone, are world-changing. Well, I hope.
I wish I could be alive to see it all manifest. I am hopeful for future generations to see it beginning in my lifetime. I wish I could have had a better life, one that allowed me to be more than an armchair spectator in the most important and imperative work of our or any future generation – understanding our reality as embedded, organic technology – so perhaps we are not doomed to the outcomes we seem to have at last brought upon ourselves.
Mark my words, they will one day be able to show you exactly how the literal biosphere updates and changes our genetic coding on a regular basis. (Yes, Virginia, the planet has root on your primary domain.) And how our food choices contribute. And our lifestyles. And our mutable culture and social environments.
Interesting times indeed. I rumination on writing, but I doubt I can take on something like this as non-fiction. So I’m thinking of picking up a former short and making it into a book.
(wanders off contemplating plot-lines)