Notes on My First Car

Getting my driver’s license was a huge deal. All of that freedom, all of that “I can just leave the house when I want?”-ness of it had pent up inside me for years. I remember distinctly the very first time I drove on my own: I borrowed my mom’s car and drove to the Best Buy in Downers Grove, Illinois, to pick up a special order of R.E.M. Succumbs on VHS. (That tells you a lot about me, right there.) I pleaded with my mom to take that 20+ mile drive and bring my best friend Greg along, and she somehow agreed.

But my first car was something my parents and I found in the local newspaper. An older person was selling a used 2-door 1988 Dodge Shadow. It claimed it was in good condition, and the price was right. I had saved up money for it, but my parents also were willing to chip in a good amount. I remember at that point just thinking, “So long as my dad thinks the car is in good shape, I’m getting that car.” Being able to drive was essential for me, and since my dad had been a mechanic in his teens and 20s, I trusted him fully.

The car got a pretty clean bill of health. The head had a small crack, so I was told not to really take it on the highway nor go over around 60 with it. The interior – red cloth! – was in good condition. The A/C was broken, likely out of refrigerant, so summers would be kind of awful. But it ran, it was cheap, and it was a great first car.

The first thing I purchased for the car was, naturally, a CD player. It had a stock radio – AM/FM only, no cassette even! – and in-car CD players were still relatively new and relatively crappy back then. I spent a day installing a Sony single-DIN, faceplate-removable stereo with my dad. I remember distinctly that when the car went over any bump, the player would skip – and scratch the disc. It was horrible and great.

My first trip in the car? The night after we bought it, I asked my parents if I could drive to Taco Bell. (Teenagers, right?) They reluctantly agreed. I remember the excitement of getting to drive in my car, to get food for myself, to enjoy myself – that independence was incredible. And so I drove the short mile or two to Taco Bell, seeing cars flashing their lights at me, not realizing I was driving without my headlights on at all. (I remember thinking, “Wow, night driving is really hard – it’s impossible to see anything!”)

I also remember the first time I drove my car to high school. Again, I felt amazing. I was coming up on my school’s parking lot, and signaled to make a right turn into the lot. A car from the other direction came up and gave me the wave to go ahead… and I gave him the wave at the same time. We misunderstood each other, and yes, we ended up going at the same time. He took out my front wheel completely. I was scared and worried and so disappointed. As I sat in the back of a police car, talking with them about the accident, I saw other students walk by, see me in the back seat, and laugh. Assholes.

—-

The Shadow died a sad death. Despite the warnings from my parents, I still drove the car on the highway. Once I took it out to Woodfield Mall in Schaumburg, and noticed a bit of smoke emanating from the hood while I was in a drive-thru. I didn’t think much of it. But when I started driving the car back home, the temperature gauge went all the way to “H” – and the smoke increased. I pulled off to a nearby Wal-Mart and, thankfully, had change to call my parents. They were more than a little annoyed, to say the least, but after I bought some antifreeze, I waited for them to arrive. That half hour was the longest half hour ever. My parents didn’t flip, not fully, but they were quite pissed. My dad looked at the car and sure enough, the entire head had cracked. We caravanned back home, with my Shadow not being able to go over 25.

Repairing the car would cost more than the car was worth, as you can imagine. After a short while, I traded it in – somehow – for a 95 Dodge Neon, which would become the first car I truly loved.

—-

I write this now, recalling stuff that happened over 25 years ago, without a car that I call my own. My wife and I still have a car, but due to the coronavirus it’s just not being used much. We sold my car just before all of the lockdowns, and are waiting to see what happens next.

Welcome to Mac

There's been a few things swirling around the web this week about Apple's designs and how maybe they're not the pinnacle of everything anymore; in those posts and thoughts are strands suggesting that Apple's stuff has lost its humanity.

I agree wholeheartedly. But I wanted to share a reason why.

I switched from the PC to the Mac in 2000. I've written endlessly about my reasons for switching but most importantly, I put them on phonezilla.net (the earlier version of this website). Over the course of the day I found my lil' "I bought a Mac, yay!" post was picked up by major Mac news sites like Macintouch, The Mac Observer, et cetera. Along with that I started getting emails. There were a few, "YOU BOUGHT A TOY!!!11!11!" types but the overwhelming majority were strangers congratulating me and welcoming me to the Mac community.

It was something I hadn't experienced since my C64 & C128 days.

However, one letter stuck with me. It was a long one. It opened with a hearty welcome, brief introduction, and so on. And then the author went into detail about how, with a Mac, I had an amazing amount of power: the ability to more directly tell stories. Not just my stories, but the stories of other people – people who needed to be heard. He equated the video editing/recording revolution of the early 2000s with the desktop publishing revolution of the 1980s (and, I think, was mostly right). The letter closed by asking, "With a Mac and a digital video camera, you've got this awesome power. What stories will you tell?"

I am sure I replied to him and thanked him. Pretty sure I got no reply. And worse, I no longer have the email (happens!) I also can't quite picture this happening today. Maybe. But it feels unlikely.

Computers and how we use them have changed. They'll continue to do so. But in the early-to-mid-2000s, I think we really closed the chapter on large-scale computer clubs, hobbyists, SIGs, and all of those other community markers from the prior couple of decades.

Hair

“Ma'am, I think you dropped something.”

The voice of one of my high school enemies punched through the air that was thick with laughter. I had just sat down in my sophomore year math class, my first class of the day. I had walked into the school a few minutes prior sporting a new haircut. At the time I felt really good about it; a rare thing I could feel even a little good about during a time of my life filled with relentless body- and self- hatred.

People were laughing. Loudly. At me. The class of 25 students, led by this bully, picked on me that day. Everyone was looking at me, everyone was judging me, and all I wanted to do was be small and shrink down to a size smaller than my textbook.

All it took were those words, that moment of intentional misgendering and being told at such a fragile time in my life, “You look like a woman”, to push me down a path where I never wanted that level of hurt to happen again. It built itself on a foundation of no self-confidence, naturally, but in that moment a completely hurt part of myself decided I never wanted anyone to judge me based on my haircut. I didn't want to be seen. I wanted to blend in, and I wanted to hide.

After that class I flew to the bathroom, embarrassed for anyone to see my now-clearly-hideous hair, and made a beeline for the sink. I grabbed as much water as I could and doused my head with it. I used my fingers to pull all of my hair back, all of it, in a somewhat-slicked back style that had no style at all. The rest of the day was hard.

The next day I got a giant can of styling mousse and gel and slicked my hair back. My hair was crispy on top. But, it was unquestionably masculine. I kept that hairstyle for a number of years. It was not me, no, but it was a helmet: something to protect me, something to keep me safe in a place where I did not feel safe in the least.

...

As seen on phonezilla.net (the forerunner of this site), around 1997. Sideburns were a thing.

For many years before that time in high school, I had a head full of light brown hair, parted on one side. There was a way I wanted the part to ride up from my forehead just so that it required a bit of work each morning. I dealt with a cowlick. The goal was for my hair to look effortless and bring me very little attention.

As I'm wont to do, however, I would make small changes and see if anyone noticed. One morning before school I parted my hair on the opposite side as usual; it took getting used to, but did work. Over time I moved the part to the middle, and kept everything a little shorter. When I got to college I opted for a Clooney-influenced Caesar cut, the last haircut before the style I've had now for many years. I felt slightly better experimenting with my hair and changing my appearance – but not too much.

...

On my 28th birthday.

I've had a complicated relationship with my hair. I've placed a lot of importance on it, probably more importance than others have, because it became a signifier of identity for me relatively early in my life. With my current cut I decided to opt-out of hair altogether. The pain I had received, the misgendering, the strange looks and stares... all of that was too much for me.

My buzzcut was a spontaneous decision. While I long talked about shaving my head when I went bald, that moment at the barber shop many years ago was one of clarity. Can I just not deal with this anymore? Why not just shave your head now? Just go for it. My Clooney cut was no more. I had no hair on my head and a goatee on my face. And outside of growing a full beard, I've kept that same cut for around 15 years.

...

I cut my own hair nowadays, just because I can. But I won't lie to you: there's a regret within a part of me that shows up every time I get out the clippers. It's a regret that I can not grow my hair out long easily (I've got some impressive balding happening, and a receding hairline). It's a regret that I can't dye my hair. It's a regret that there is still an identity and statement that goes with even my current haircut, and that I have very little control over it.

---

Epilogue

I rarely do epilogues on blog posts.

Around September of 2016, not long after the date of this post, I started to grow out my hair. It became quite awkward at times, and I largely reverted to the cut I'd had all those years ago with... naturally... a lot less hair and a lovely bald spot in the back.

But I stuck with it. I got haircuts again, which was a weird experience. ("How do you want it cut?" "I... don't know?") After going to a random place or two I found a stylist who was perfect for me and I truly felt amazing after getting my first cut from her back in May. Given my experience and feelings around hair this was a revelation. I felt unstoppable and really, really good about myself.

That's valuable. Genuinely, truly valuable.

A Little Water

I have to confess something to you. I'm not a fan of self-help books.

For the longest time, I was stubborn. I held those books in very high contempt. What could a book teach me? What could I possibly learn from a book that was seemingly designed to help me? I don't need help!

But I did. And I found the help I needed in not-quite self-help books. Not books that were categorized officially in that spot, but ones that had a profound impact on me nonetheless. And it wasn't always expected.

Many years ago my wife and I were at a bookstore and I found myself looking at books by the Dalai Lama. Live in a Better Way spoke to me, at least in title. And at the time I had had nothing more than a passing fascination with Buddhism. But I bought the book. And I devoured it. So many words in it gave me so much hope, so much care, that I actually felt like I was healed at the end of it.

It helped me consider things in a different light, in a different way: my life, love, death, and everything. It didn't prescribe how to do things, not intentionally. It simply presented its topic and gave the hardened soil of my soul a little water and sunlight.

That book pulled on things I already knew, long knew, about myself. And it started to encourage me to explore the world in this way. It didn't start my journey. But for a short time, it gave me the space I needed to begin to truly find myself.

Denver, the second time around

When I was very young, the idea of moving to Denver was planted in my noggin and stuck with me for a long, long time. Denver was the place I would live, I decided. I wasn't sure why; I hadn't been there, I hadn't known anyone from there. But I think the idea of living in a different place (but not too different) was appealing to young me.

In 2003, my wife and I moved to Denver. This was it. This was where I was going to be, and where I was going to live. But between my job (which was OK) and her job (which was pretty awful), I got myself stuck in a rut. Instead of looking around for possibilities and growth, I closed myself off and wanted to get back to Chicago as soon as possible. It happened. We were there for just a year.

But over the past few years, there's been enough change in my life to warrant a reexamination of it. And as I mentioned in my post, The Last Everything, there were a lot of factors that went into deciding to move to Denver this time. I said:

The only time I've lived outside of Chicago was, in fact, in Denver over 10 years ago. It was a very different time, and I was a very different person.

I can't ignore where I am in my life now when examining this. 12 years ago, I was young and green. I hadn't traveled all that much and thought cities (at least in the US) were all the same. I was expecting a Chicago-like experience in Denver. And when that failed to materialize, I became small and hardened. I didn't try to plant roots. I didn't try to make too many new friends. I simply shut myself off, and pined for the familiar things back in Chicago.

It was a change and I handled it poorly.

This time around, things are altogether different. I have a wife and a son. I have a larger family support group in Colorado. I am walking in with an open mind. I have a new job with smart people. I can feel the potential and the opportunity growing. It will not be easy. Parts of me will want it to be easy. But it will be different and, this time, I will make it better.

The little kid who wanted to live in Denver is delighted.

Time is Tight

Let's talk about time travel. From my post on writing:

“I really took a knack to writing when I was in grammar school. I wrote a book for a Scholastic Book Fair contest called What Year is This? Of course it involved time travel. The lead character went back in time, met her own mother, and then the space-time continuum went kablooey. Happens!”

In reflecting on it, one of the reasons I liked time travel so much – and still do! – is that it lets us change something that people created as a concept but do not control. When I was younger, I wanted to travel into the future so I could skip parts of my life that seemed boring, uninteresting, or even painful. It would let me fast forward and savor the moments I have; it would give me that precious illusion of control, the idea that I'm in charge.

Naturally, as I've gotten older I've had to process the idea of limited time and death, and what it means to me. As I first began to confront it, I was overwhelmed. There's no telling when we'll die? And... I have no control? And... what's next is a mystery? That really bothered the parts of me that plan stuff out. Then, that swung back the other way for me. I only have so much time. I need to do everything. How can I do everything? Time isn't unlimited. When will I ever open that cookie shop? When will I skydive? When will I do all of these things I want to do? When will I....

It got overwhelming. Ultimately I chose to get to a place where I plan some things in my life, but not all. I can't say that I live each day like it's my last. I feel that's a little clichéd because if I knew this was my last day, I would be really selfish. But there's even something to take away from that silly statement: the selfishness. When do I take care of myself? When do I express myself? When do I spend quality time with my family, and my friends? When do I make those scary decisions?

Time is one of the few resources that we, as life designers, can't change. It's the most constraining constraint. But we mustn't live our lives in fear that we don't have enough (that's an assumption). Instead, we need to look at what we can do right now, in this moment.

And yes, there's no control. Achieving a state of mind where one accepts there is no control is not fatalist, at least not to me; it's honest and true.

From the 2005 Steve Jobs Stanford speech:

“Remembering that I’ll be dead soon is the most important tool I’ve ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure - these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.”

Thus, we are in charge. And we don't need time travel to show it to us.

(Still love time travel stories, though.)

Growing Up Digital: Raising Tech-Savvy Kids

My son first used an iPad about 2 years ago, when he was 2 1/2. He was fascinated by the thing but, more impressively, he figured out the interface within a matter of days. Soon he scaled that knowledge up to apps, calling people (via phone and FaceTime), sending texts, and playing Angry Birds. He enjoyed using the camera and timer apps almost more than anything else, though: these acted as a view into his world and understanding what was happening around him.

Last year I met Elysse Zarek via Twitter, and we finally had the chance to meet (and enjoy tacos together!) earlier this year at SXSW. Elysse is the project manager and producer at Bloom Digital, a Toronto-based startup that promotes healthy childhoods. Their first app, Long Story, is an episodic game targeted at teens. It explores dating, gender, bullying, and all of the incredibly complicated stuff of growing up. It is a great game.

I got to talking with Elysse and her coworkers about technology and kids and how different it is for us, as parents, than it was for our parents. Most importantly we yearned for something beyond the whole, "How much screen time is 'too much'?" debate. It was frustrating, because there are bigger issues to explore around how this aspect of parenting changes you, too. For example: if you set up your kid with a Twitter account, when do you hand it over to them? Can she delete all of your "cute" tweets about things she said at the age of 3, or 4, or 5? How do you introduce the positive aspects of tech? In essence, how do you design your life to support a healthy relationship with technology for you and your children?

Elysse and I are proud to share our SXSW proposal with you. Our talk, Growing Up Digital: Raising Tech-Savvy Kids, will explore these topics in depth. Here's our SlideShare about it.

Growing Up Digital: Raising Tech-Savvy Kids from Paul McAleer

You'll be hearing more about this talk during the SXSW 2015 voting period, which ends on September 6.

But most importantly, if you'd like to see us at SXSW 2015, then you should vote for this talk right now. We hope to see you in Austin!

Me & Music

This summer I chose to try out Beats Music and Spotify in lieu of rdio, my streaming service of choice. I'm brewing up a massive, 495-page comparison post that you all will love to pour over. But in the interim, I thought it was worth noting how I feel about music without taking up 494 of those pages.

The first song I truly remember loving in my life was "Copacabana" by Barry Manilow, because my mom was a huge Fanilow. (Yep.) Another song from the far reaches of my memory that I really loved was "Steppin' Out" by Joe Jackson, and of course, its video. For most of my childhood, my music consumption was a steady stream of the oldies station from my mom's car radio. 

Once 6th grade rolled around, though, I started to shift over to contemporary pop music - and, simultaneously, really fell in love with The Monkees. My mainstay was Chicago's B96, and I taped songs off of the radio incessantly. Sometimes, as was the case with "Ice Ice Baby", I recorded the song multiple times on multiple tapes from the radio. (That song landed hard.)

The Door Opens

I drifted and stayed in the whole contemporary pop and classic rock world until I found R.E.M. in 1991. "Man on the Moon" was the hook. It surely wasn't the first R.E.M. song I had ever heard, but it was the one I played over and over until I wore out the CD. It was the first music I chose to really love: I was deep into R.E.M., and rec.music.rem was my online home at the time.

The important thing about my exposure to R.E.M. was that it got me really interested in music in general: I started to explore other artists, aided by the booming alternative music scene at the time. I went to my first concert: James, at the Vic. I broke bread with Tim Booth, the band's singer (really!) 

At this time my high school pals and I started playing music together. I picked up a guitar and taught myself how to play. I borrowed books from the library and studied them, but mostly grabbed tabs off of USENET and Gopher (YES) and started to learn chord formations. I distinctly remember trying to play "So. Central Rain" and being overwhelmed instantly. "Oh, he changes chords that quickly?"

I kept practicing, though, and became competent with open chords. I started writing my own songs, but rarely played them for anyone else. I kept them in a big Word file called "Original Songs and Lyrics". I hope I still have that file on a floppy somewhere, but there's one song - "Mistaken" - that I wrote 22 years ago and have memorized.

It's also worth noting that Loadstar, the fabled disk magazine, exposed me to lots of new genres of music I would have never have heard otherwise - like ragtime. Totally got into Sousa for a long time.

Back to the Mc

Over time, though, I started to rediscover the songs I had enjoyed in my childhood, or those that had seeped into my head through repeated listenings. Some of them I loved, some I hated, but the mix of oldies and early MTV and other random sources ended up being more influential than I had thought. It forms a basis for the stuff I like now.

I really like catchy songs, but my tolerance for mainstream pop is limited; power pop is a favorite genre of mine. I don't believe in guilty pleasures - everyone likes what they like. I will defend most of The Monkees' music as solid, well-constructed pop songs. I'm excited to find new music, and since I primarily use streaming services that's mostly where I look for new music. I generally don't like country music (but can appreciate it) and electronica wears thin on me. I find that I really, really love 70s funk. I can listen to "One Night in Bangkok" and "Simple Song" anytime.

Today, I still play guitar with my son, and I sing pretty regularly too. I listen to music every day. And I admit, I'm still blown away by the fact that I can pretty much think of a song, type it into my phone, and listen to it on demand. That's amazing.

The people in the header image, by the way, are the great Sara Watkins, Luke Bulla, and Glen Phillips from their 2007 Various & Sundry tour. Front row seats. Fucking amazing.

Found out

On Friday my friends Amy Silvers and Lori Widelitz-Cavallucci spoke at Madison+ UX on Imposter Syndrome. (This was also the talk they presented at IA Summit, and you can see the summary here.) Watching and listening to their talk over the web kicked up my own feelings on this matter.

In short, for years I waited for the other shoe to drop and to be found out as a fraud. Years. Even when I was a young, good programmer, a part of me held on to a fear that one day someone would basically shoot holes in whatever I was doing, and as a result I would feel incredibly humiliated and embarrassed.

During that time, there was a direct impact on the way I worked. It might not have been so noticeable in the darkroom or in the code, but the part of me that was a vocal critic and on alert for being called out was always present. It was always there. As a result of this, I rarely spoke about my work - and promoted it even less. That's because there were enough parts of me saying, "This isn't all that good." It might have truly been good stuff, and to be honest, probably was! But I had a hard time recognizing that and an even harder time taking a compliment. (I mean, people were complimenting me on my work? My internal barometer on that was just way off!) This is also part of the reason I preferred to work by myself for so very long.

But I've had to adjust

Good design work is people-focused, whether it's research or life design or aesthetic design. And that means it's far more open to criticism - but it's also far more open to connection and appreciation, as well. The risk is higher and the reward is higher too.

The biggest things that I've had to account for are my own self-confidence (which is only emerging due to intense work on the self) and my experience.

My experience is something I can now count on, and it appeals mostly to my brain and not so much to my heart. It's relatively easy for me to justify design decisions based on decades of work, including what works well and what doesn't. I say this not to brag (my ego will chime in momentarily!) but I say this as a point of fact: when you work in a field for a very long time, you simply start to see the broad patterns and gain that understanding. I considered it to be table stakes when it came to myself, instead of giving it the true honor it deserves. (It was hard work!)

But the self-confidence is the much, much harder piece. It has required sustained, intense focus on my self, identifying who I am, and being able to even get to a place where I see my work having value and being worthwhile - even to myself.

For instance, it is only within the past 6 months that I have been able to hear a compliment from someone about my work, take a moment, absorb it, and thank them instead of doing the knee-jerk "thanks!" response. I would do the latter because it was polite (brain-focused, other person-focused, society-focused) and not really do what I needed to do to truly hear the other person and take that in (me-focused).

In addition, working on Designing Yourself has given me ample opportunity to promote this great thing I'm doing. On the one hand, it may look easy to post a tweet saying that the show is great. On the other hand, it stirred up a lot of conflict in me. I was overly concerned about appearing too self-promotional, too selfish, too... lots of things that I saw as negative. That, in turn, would make me more vulnerable.

But as my work has continued to get closer and closer to me (less of an abstract), this vulnerability goes part and parcel with it. I can't hide behind code when I'm on stage talking about my experiences. It leaves me totally open. And that's where I want to be because that's where I need to be. Even if someone in the audience, or someone online, thinks I'm a total fraud.

Redesign

I redesigned my website last month. Did you notice it? I'm hoping you did, because I tweeted about it and made a big deal about it. That's great!

What about the redesign I did a week ago? That's the one I didn't write about. Was that one noticeable?

The poorly-kept secret is that we're always redesigning. We make changes along the way, try things out, and if they don't work we may go back to the way we used to be. Or, those changes may stick and bring forth new changes.

Change is always happening. Redesigns are always happening. Do we want to call attention to that change, or not?