Hit the road, Jack.

My life is renewed when tires meet the road.

It's always been that way, for as far back as I can remember. When I feel pressed down, or stressed, or worried, I hit the road and I'm made whole. Maybe it's the self-induced isolation, or maybe it's giving myself time to think and unwind and enjoy the scenery. I don't know enough to explain it, but I know that it works.

So it was this weekend, when I left town to see my good college friends Andrea and Keith. On the way to see Andrea in Harrisburg, PA, I took a small section of the old Lincoln Highway - what is now US-30. I've been to Pennsylvania twice, and driven through it twice, and have never seen much of the state because it was always dark when I drove through. It's a beautiful Commonwealth, full of hills and trees and old American farms, and traveling down an old highway reminded me of the Route 66 trip, if only briefly.

My visit to Keith's was an exploration in the truly unknown. Nobody thinks of Columbus, OH when they think of big American cities, but I do now. It's a fine town, complete with a fully-operational Apple Store and a (ahem) major American university. Keith made an excellent host and tour guide, and gave me a whole-day's respite from the road. I like driving, but I also like not moving for a while.

Monday, my birthday, had me hitting the road once again, knowing that when I got back home things would go back to normal. Sure, it's nice to return home from a long trip, but I dread the part of me that feels like I never left in the first place. The road's romance is short-lived, it seems, and I only get the benefit in the doing. And maybe the remembering, days and weeks and years later.

I drive to escape, mostly. To get out of town, to Go Somewhere, and leave the everyday behind. I surely can't drink and eat like I do when I'm on vacation. And I can't suspend life's rules like I do when I'm on the road. All I can do is take a little piece of the road home with me. See this big, beautiful country we live in. Perhaps take some pictures, too.

America 2.0

Someone, sometime soon is going to start describing the climb out of this impressive hole we’ve dug for ourselves, and they’re going to call it “America 2.0”. Clever, yes. We need a new version of ourselves and that’s going to involve bright, unexpected ideas from those we least expect them from, and they’re going to strike you as impossible. All you need to do to understand these terrifyingly ambitious ideas is to look back at what we’ve already done to understand what we can do.

From Rands In Repose, called "The Makers of Things," on how the building of the Brooklyn Bridge applies to the troubles America faces today.

None of the malaise we face these days compares, historically, to what came before (see: Civil War, Great Depression, 9/11). The blogger's point is that from all those catastrophic woes sprang creativity.

[Via Daring Fireball.]

Something to digest

A true test of any fitness level is the paczki, a Polish doughnut usually eaten in America on Fat Tuesday. They're a big hit around Michigan, Toledo, and areas of high Polish-population density. And they're delicious.

My test came after I devoured my paczki on Tuesday. Because I'm diabetic, I have to be careful about eating carbohydrates. My body doesn't produce insulin on its own, so if I eat more than my insulin injection can handle, my bloodsugar spikes drastically. Tuesday, post-paczki, this didn't happen.

To top it off, I also had a sizable breakfast at Rotary: eggs, bacon, and a few pancakes with strawberry jam, plus the usual orange juice and coffee combo.

By all accounts, my insulin shot should have only covered my egg-and-pancake meal. After the paczki hit my stomach, my body would have searched for any leftover insulin to cover the pastry bomb. Finding none, it should have spiked my bloodsugar, turning my plasma into a system-wide poison.

Again, this didn't happen. When I check my bloodsugar levels before lunch, my machine read "108." Normal bloodsugar for diabetics is anywhere from 80-120. Mine was perfect.

I can explain this in two ways. First, on my own, I've started to adjust my insulin medication to fit the meals I eat. If I eat less carbs for breakfast, I take less insulin after breakfast. If I eat a lunch full of carbs, I take a bit of extra insulin. My bloodsugar level also gets factored in: high bloodsugar equals a bit of extra insulin to take care of it. There's some math involved, but it's not too complicated.

Except now, through trial and error, I've figured out how much insulin I need when I eat, say, a salad-and-fruit dinner. My bloodsugar has dipped a few times when I took too much insulin after such a meal, but I've learned from those experiences. Now my adjustments are much more accurate, and my bloodsugar remains stable.

Before, I would have to eat enough carbs to cover the insulin I took after my meal. I had a set level of insulin I would take after every meal, so if I didn't eat enough my bloodsugar would crash. Now, I don't have that problem. I can eat what I want, and adjust the insulin - not the other way around.

That's number one. Number two is, with my gym membership, I've had to adjust my insulin around my meals. Since my metabolism is running pretty steadily these days, any insulin I took would have a bigger affect. When your body is more efficient at burning calories, you need less insulin to make up the difference. This is why healthy people don't become Type 2 diabetics.

Which makes something really obvious: the body is a wonderful, remarkable machine. This plus this equals that. Excercise plus insulin equals flexibility.

And flexibility is something I haven't had with my diet in a long, long time.

So when that paczki was finished digesting, I had enough insulin and enough metabolism to cover the beast. Instead of taking more insulin at lunch to cover lunch and the paczki, I only had to worry about lunch. And since I had chili and an apple for lunch, I had even less carbs in my system.

This, friends, is progress. It's a system that has helped me prevent a lot of the high-and-low swings that are epidemic among Type 1 diabetics. Because my bloodsugar doesn't crash after I take my insulin, I don't eat as much - and because I don't eat as much, I can take less insulin. In fact, if I could subsist on plain vegetables, I might not need to take insulin at all.

But let's not get crazy, here. I love paczki and fruit and bread too much to let that go. So I'll work with the system.

And, these days, the system is working great.

Humility in this day and age

Humility is in plentiful supply these days. And why not, since people are losing their jobs, losing their homes, and losing their sense of purpose and dignity. Us Michiganders have felt it for years now, of course, and now we stand to lose names like "Pontiac" and "Chrysler" down the giant economic drain hole.

That's humility. Now it's being felt all over.

But no matter what we learn during these hard time, it will all be forgotten in a generation. Maybe sooner, judging from the snap back to The Way Things Were after September 11. For a while there, we felt like we learned a lesson. Things were going to change. Then Things went back to normal. And here we are.

Ronald Reagan taught us to think we were special, remember, no matter how many hits to the chin we suffer. All you need is a short memory, an intollerance for intelligence or debate, and lots and lots of TV. Stir, add a little pepper, and you have that wonderful dish: Exceptionalism.

Exceptionalism, Jon Carroll says, is the excuse of dying dinosaurs:

Empires think they have beaten the rule of change. They haven't. Empires think size will protect them. It won't. Empires think military might will protect them. It won't. Empires think charismatic leaders will protect them. They won't. Nothing will. The old makes way for the new.

What's the new? Is the new America made of debt and not much else? That's all we've known since Reagan, and despite a few years during the '90s when our financial house seemed to be in order, we're right back where the Gipper put us: leveraged.

Now, to kick start the economy, our new president is forced to put us even more in debt. And if that doesn't scare each and every one of you, you're taking better pills than I am.

Have you looked through the stimulus bill? The kind of money our goverment is throwing around is staggering. For eight years we starved our national programs, and now we're replacing what was lost - but how will we pay for it all?

Democrats should fear these deficit numbers because, after all, it was their own Bill Clinton who balanced the budget. Democrats attached "fiscally responsible" to their brand, even though the GOP liked to think different. When Bush ran up the national tab, Democrats raised a hew and cry. Now Dems are spending money like it's going out of style.

Republicans should be even more ashamed: the largest tax cut in history, and the party that favors tax cuts can't complain enough. At least they pretend to worry about deficits now, instead of during the past eight years when they had access to the national MasterCard and humped it like a whore. It's enough to make you puke.

Those of us using our heads and stashing away a bit of money are made to feel bad for being frugal. "You fools," they tell us, "you'll hurt the economy if you don't spend more."

Edward Glaeser, writing for the New York Times, says so outright:

Within the private sector, as well, some should save and some should spend. Those Americans who borrowed too much, or are near their financial limits, should certainly cut back. The nation needs no more bankruptcies. Yet there are many Americans who spent the last eight years living within their means, and have plenty of resources left. For those Americans, the ones with cash in their bank accounts, this is the time to spend.

Right. So those who were responsible with their money, now is the time to go hog-wild. That, friends, isn't humility - it's the same horseshit that got us into this mess in the first place.

Is this what our grandparents faced in the 1930s - a call to spend? Did we respond to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor by going shopping? Now that whole generation is dying off, and with them the common sense that helped weather some of the greatest storms in our country's history.

I hope for some Grand Realignment of our economy, one which values production and saving energy and building things, instead of just moving money around. I hope for an America that doesn't base its self worth on people buying crap they don't need on credit. I hope for a country where a bit of humility, foresight, and grit win the day.

If things turn around, I'm worried that we'll go back to our old ways and repeat this cycle, every 10 years or so, and learn nothing. Or we'll find new ways to screw shit up.

But what if things don't turn around? What will we do then? Can we get any more humble?

Will it do us any good?

Winning the fucking Newbery

Author Neil Gaiman, after finding out (via speakerphone at 5:45 a.m.) that his book won the Newbery Award:

You are on a speakerphone with at least 14 teachers and librarians and suchlike great, wise and good people, I thought. Do not start swearing like you did when you got the Hugo. This was a wise thing to think because otherwise huge, mighty and fourletter swears were gathering. I mean, that's what they're for. I think I said, You mean it's Monday?

I like his Twitter response even better.

I got to know Gaiman for his work on the Sandman comic books, and got turned on to books like American Gods and Neverwhere. Now he's got a new movie coming out, and his The Graveyard Book won the Newbery. Thing about Gaiman is, he writes really creepy kids books. And they gave him an award for it.

Couldn't have happened to a better bloke.

On answering the call to serve.

During his campaign for president, Barack Obama asked the American people to give of themselves to help steer us out of this national funk we're in. Service, he said, helps us help our fellow citizens, lifts our spirits, benefits the economy, and fosters a sense of responsibility in America's destiny.

I didn't need to be told that by President Obama. The benefits of service and altruism, to me, are self-evident. But that's not the case with a lot of Americans. Many are complacent enough to let others do the serving, while they reap the benefits of a prosperous country.

What happens, then, when your country isn't so prosperous? Is it then time to get off your duff and do something worthwhile?

It's a shame it's come to this, but if an economic downturn, and a "sapping of confidence across our land," are what's needed to get Americans mobilized, then so be it. Let them take a share in country's future - as they should have all along.

Obama used Martin Luther King, Jr. Day as a call to arms for all Americans: do something above and beyond yourself. Use Dr. King's legacy to serve the underserved. A lot of Americans answered the call.

But I imagine more didn't. And no matter how many times the president asks us to serve, there will be those who seek excuses for not serving. I'll bet some won't even be shy about it.

During the last administration, the most Bush asked us to do was to grab our credit cards, start shopping, and shut the damn up about Constitutional abuses. We were asked to give nothing up in response to the Afghanistan and Iraq War, except the lives of our young people and our standing in the world. We sacrificed little. Maybe that's why the cries for the war to end have been relatively quiet. Why cry when you have little to cry about?

Now a lot of people are hurting, and perhaps Obama's message - that we're in this together, that it will take a collective effort to get us out of this mess - will be respected. There's plenty of blame to go around, but a heart attack patient doesn't weep long over the pizza and beer of a previous life. Instead, he gets busy shaping up. That's what America needs.

One of my online/Mac/humor heroes, Merlin Mann, said it well:

Maybe what we really need is somebody to tell us it’s time to grow up, to think about how the rest of the world operates, and to accept that being a country of adults means doing a ton of insanely hard work and making sacrifices where not everybody wins.

So what to do? How can each of us assist in beating the "general malaise," as President Carter once understood it, and fight the "crisis in confidence?"

The options are endless, really, and it depends on where your heart find the most joy. Marketer Seth Godin has a few ideas, and some ideas are very difficult at all. You could do as the Coudal Partners suggest and simply put your hard-earned money where your mouth is. Do you seek confidence in the strength of the American market? Fine. Pay up or shut up.

Chances are, however, that your efforts can do the most good not too far from where you're sitting right now. Time and time again, I talk to local non-profits and businesses and hear the need in their voices: shop here, give here, help us out.

My advice? Go where your talents can do the most good. Or, go and do something that you've never done before. Just do something. Not all of us can be Ben Franklin, who gave so much of his time, talent, and attention that we put him - a guy who never became president - on our currency. But you don't need to be Ben Franklin to make a different somewhere. Try this: one night a week, for an hour or two, give your time to a cause you care about. Just one night a week, turn off the TV, set your video game down, get out of your living room, and put yourself to work - for free - on a project.

If you do this already, great. Your country thanks you. Keep doing it, and do a bit more if you can afford to.

But if you don't usually do this kind of thing, and even if you didn't vote for or support President Obama, answer his call to service. If you don't, nothing will happen. No one will hate you. America will carry on as before.

And that's exactly what I'm afraid of.

Standing at the waterline.

"Civilization ends at the waterline. Beyond that, we all enter the food chain, and not always right at the top." - Hunter S. Thompson, 1986


* * * * *

As General Motors and Chrysler crumble and teeter like a top-heavy Jenga game, I can't help but feel apathetic. These are the people who inspire the need for a new car. In fact, their whole business (or lack of) depends on Americans buying vehicles that lose their value the minute they leave the dealership lot.

How strange, I think. But maybe not. Our whole economic system, after all, depends on the new, the shiny, the weird. Maybe it plays to the Grand Ego of our country - the one that says we're the best, so we need the best.

I'll probably never buy a new car, so my economic decisions won't ever help to save an ailing auto company. GM will survive or die without me. There's comfort in that thought; I have no individual responsibility for saving a company that was once the symbol and thermometer of American progress. I've checked out of the system. No fault of mine.

Used vehicles are the lifeblood of my place of employment, and there's dignity in that thought. When all the banks are dying or being bought up like on-sale antiques, credit unions stand apart thanks to their not-for-profit status, their democratic decision-making, and their responsbility to serve the underserved. I didn't know a lot of this when I got the job, but as the years have gone on, I take pride in my industry's philosophy - probably because it matches my own.

Used cars. Used Macs. Used CDs on eBay. Even used clothing, when it smells decent. Perhaps I should have been born in the Depression. Lord knows I'm still lucky enough to have a job in the current one.

Our generation may have a wake-up call coming. America's ego has been made flesh in every generation since the Baby Boomers, and while our generation is politically active and commercially cynical, it still thinks a lot of itself.

Republicans, and a lot of Democrats, see nothing wrong with this. They've been selling the idea of America as a Place That Does No Wrong for a long, long time. It's only lately that our giant national id has been laid low. Being humble is not an American trait that comes naturally, but lately we've had no choice.

I know this personally. 2008 was a stupid, stressful, bumble-headed year for me. It taught me a lot about my limits and faults, and I've thought a lot about them this winter. It's been good for me.

Which is why I can only wish the same for all of us, as a country and a people. The world is too nasty and too chaotic to keep our national credit card on an over-the-limit status. We're now at the waterline, as Dr. Thompson mentioned, and the sharks are circling nearby.

That adrenaline rush we feel in our gut is evolution at its most basic: fight or flight. Which way do we go? Do we strive for a more meaningful and fulfilling life? Or do we seek meaning in a life looking for a bailout?

We've been at the top of the food chain for a long time now. But the sharks have been around a lot longer, and they have no ego to keep in check.