I had a very interesting weekend. I've been in Nottingham for the wonderfully fannish SF convention, Novacon. I've loved this convention since the very second time I attended. This year Sally came with us. I wasn't sure how much fun it would be for her given that, other than the next generation of fans in the approaching pubescent age and younger, the youngest person is probably in their thirties and the average age looks to be late fifties. As far as I can tell, though, there was enough amusement and book purchasing opportunities to make it a weekend well spent for her.
There were two stand out moments for me. Not Ken MacLeod interviewing Iain Banks though that was an amusing glimpse into a firm friendship and Iain's way of thinking. Not Julian's occasionally immoderate moderating of Iain Banks, Geoff Ryman and Charlie Stross's discussions about hard and mundane SF, fascinating though that was. Not even James Bacon with his endearing rendition of one of Bob Shaw's serious scientific talks although that was very wonderful. No, my moments were less comfortable though more enlightening than any of those.
The first moment came as I arrived at Tarn Thai on Friday evening, decanted from the taxi I had shared with Julia, Doug and Julian. Ian and Sally were waiting outside the restaurant although the rest of the party had gone in. 'There's a problem,' understated Ian.
I looked at Sally who was hardly breathing in an effort not to cry. 'What's wrong?' I asked and the tight control dissolved into wild sobs. Horribly, I couldn't understand a word she said. Eventually I fathomed it. Her much loved science teacher from school, Mr Friedeberg, had died suddenly. He had been one of those teachers who hadn't lapsed into cynicism or despair but had continued to give huge amounts of time and effort to his pupils. Sally had benefitted from a great deal of extra help from him and her grade B in chemistry was a result of his enthusiasm and selfless dedication as well as her hard work and willpower. He made his subjects interesting and comprehensible, passing his enthusiasm on to the kids who responded by working hard to achieve, and by loving him. Apparently his funeral was so packed that there was no space left.
Once the first powerful torrent of grief had abated somewhat I called a taxi and the two of us went back to the hotel and sat in my room. She talked about the man and what had happened. Mr Friedeberg hasn't been the first important person in Sally's life to die. Both my father and Paul, her Dad's mother, have died but both deaths followed a long period of worsening health and increasing pain, both as a result of brain tumors. The deaths were slow and awful and ultimately a relief. There was plenty of time to say goodbye. Mr Friedeberg died unexpectedly. One of the things that bothered her when she was finally able to drink a mug of tea and reflect on the shock was that she had missed the funeral. When I spoke to her father the next day he said he had known about the death and the funeral but didn't think Sally would be interested and was reluctant to mention it. Augh!!!
OK, so that was my first stand out moment. The next evening we went out to Pappa's for a really substantial Greek meal; enough vegetarian meze for six served to Sally, June and me whilst the remaining five ate enough meat for many more people. We staggered back and Ian, Sally and I subsided on the sofas in the dimly lit back of the bar. We girls had made a bit of an effort with makeup so Ian snapped us with his new iPhone. They're interesting pictures, despite Sally's strange otherworldly silver eyes. Later in the evening Ian showed the pictures to Liam Proven who seemed more concerned than a technical problem might indicate. He suggested to Sally that she should get her eyes looked at, probably not a problem, but really. Do it! When Sally backed away he came and spoke to me. Initially he didn't want to explain but I pressed him. Apparently there had recently been a story about a toddler who, in her birthday photographs had one redeye reflection and one eye that reflected white. The white reflection was a result of cancer of the retina which displaced the capillaries that cause redeye. Very gently, after repeating that it was extremely unlikely, he told me that that type of cancer had a very good chance of cure if caught early enough, but the eyes would have to be removed. I looked across at Sally who was chatting to Julia. She was animated, happy and very beautiful. I can't begin to describe the dread and grief I felt. Liam repeated that it was very unlikely, that it usually happens to much younger children but that, really, to be on the safe side, I should make sure she got it checked. He wandered off leaving me ashen.
Five minutes later I'd explained Liam's warning to Ian and he'd immediately devised a scientific experiment. He dashed upstairs for his usual camera. Photographs of Sally with this displayed wonderful, lovely redeye. Photos of Julia with the iPhone had scary silver eyes. Somehow it must be function of how the flash works on an iPhone. My relief was almost as devastating as the fear. I didn't know what to do with myself.
I would like to note here that Ian's reaction is one of the reasons why I love him so much. In a crisis he is calm, clear thinking and wonderfully practical. Laura Wheatly and Julia Daly, also practical and terrifically sensible, helped me calm down from my adrenaline high.
So. It was a false alarm. I was utterly terrified for, as it turns out, no reason. Should Liam have kept quiet because the information would upset me? Good God no! I never want to have another trauma like that but half an hour of deep terror is trifling compared to losing my child.
My final point is that information can often cause pain but without it we may make false choices with results that might range from mildly embarrassing to disastrous. Failing to pass information either shows a lack of respect for a person or cowardice. I never think it is better not to know. We can't be in control of our own destinies if we have no conception of reality. We can only gauge that by obtaining all the information and testing it. And then maybe seeking the support of understanding friends.
As a science fiction fan of many years standing I've been aware of the idea that your ability to deal with certain concepts is constrained by the language you speak. Apparently this is the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis which comes in a strong and weak version. The strong version posits that you cannot think things for which your language has no words.
One of my favourite books in my teenage years was Babel 17 by Samuel R Delany, based on the strong version of the hypothesis. This is a wonderful book in many ways whose central conceit was that your mind and intentions could be completely subverted by speaking and thinking in the constructed language, Babel 17, to the extent that you would betray your country and be unaware of it.
The Languages of Pao by Jack Vance has a similar central idea where societies are manipulated by the languages they are taught to speak. When I wiki'd Babel 17 the piece cited Native Tongue by Suzette Haden Elgin and The Dispossessed by Ursula K LeGuin along with The Languages of Pao as similar books. I don't quite agree with this.
Native Tongue and the follow up, The Judas Rose, are books written by a linguist with language as a central theme but although the women's language, Laadan, is transformational, it does not seem to make the ability to think about concepts impossible. Indeed, Suzette's language is designed to give words to things that are common experiences for women but which cannot be easily expresses in English and so necessitate endless words being used to try to approach the concept, in some ways the opposite of strong Sapir-Whorf as it is plain that the concepts can be approached but not with any grace or economy. I've just taken the book off the shelf to remind myself of some of the words given in the appendix. I particularly like to words beginning with 'ra', words about not doing or being something, and the words ending with lh which seem to imply intention for wrongness. Examples that I like:
ramime: to refrain from asking, out of courtesy or kindness
ramimelh: to refrain from asking, with evil intent; especially when it is clear that someone badly wants the other to ask
Another that I think very useful:
raheena: non-heart sibling, one so entirely incompatible with another that there is no hope of ever achieving any kind of understanding or anything more than a truce, and no hope of ever making such a one understand why ... does no mean enemy.
This last gives a flavour of how I felt about my ex-husband, David. We could talk and talk and he would rarely understand what I was talking about.
So what got me started on this? I came across an article, via Ran Prieur's site, about language and how it affects thinking that is quite fascinating. It's called, 'Does Language Shape How You Think?' and it's well worth reading the whole piece. It gives a history of the Sapir-Whorf Hypothesis and gives some very interesting examples of the weak SWH, that colour perception is influenced by words, e.g. if your do not have separate words for blue and green you will see them as essentially shades of the same colour, and in languages where objects are allocated sexes, this will subtly affect how you perceive the object. Examples are given of words allocated opposite sexes in German and Spanish. The really intriguing example is the difference in perceptions in languages who view direction as person centred (front, right, behind, left) and those that are geographic (north, east, south, west). The implications of this to the way we use our minds are huge.
I wonder how many similar language based differences may eventually be discovered. Because our thinking is enveloped in our language I imagine it is difficult to see outside it. We all sort of assume everyone else perceives things the way we do.
I used to publish a fanzine. A science fiction fanzine. My original fanzine was called Barmaid and I loved doing it whilst I was at home with my kids. I even had a semi-regular publishing schedule. Then I went back to work and I didn't have a lot of spare time to lovingly craft bijou sentences about interesting topics so the zines came out less and less often.
After a time I realised I wasn't publishing a series of coherent fanzines, more occasional, stand alone zines without much relationship to each other. For a while I published one off zines including 'Talking Shit' when I worked in the sewage industry, 'Adverse Camber' when life was all uphill and trying to throw me off the road, and so on.
I missed the regular zines, and the Nova Awards, so some years ago I tried to get my act together to write more regularly and called the supposedly new regular zine Joie de Vivre, more in hope of a bit of joy than actual experience. I achieved four zines in this series over about four years and gave up again.
Ever hopeful, once my masters was complete, and I had more time on my hands (hah!) I introduced iShoes, a sparkly new fanzine with covers featuring my fabulous shoe collection and an intention of writing about some of the environmental issues that were giving me cause for concern.
My biggest problem with producing a consistent zine is a complete lack of organisational ability. I once bought a book called something like 'How can you save the world if you can't find your car keys.' I can't tell you the exact title of the book because I've misplaced it. And that was what I did with my pieces of writing. Scattered around my house I have envelopes with half baked ideas scrawled on them, note books with introductions and excuses, buried on my laptop I have similar out-of-date scribbles. There were very few coherent fanzines produced. iShoes, in paper form, came out three times.
Friends have suggested that I get a Live Journal, or Facebook or any other new fangled IT fad that comes along and I have resisted but, some little time ago now I started producing a blog for the company I work for, ECUS. This has been fun, if intermittent (there is no pattern here, move along now), but it was the face of my company and could not be frivolous, extreme or rude. Which leaves my writing urge somewhat unsatisfied. Therefore the iShoes Blog. I envisage this as both a place to indulge my writing cravings and somewhere to store my writing that is accessible so that I can maybe think about flinging the best bits into a paper fanzine. Maybe.
So lets see how it goes.
I'm sort of thinking that this may be a series.
I live in Sheffield. It is a hilly place. A very hilly place. And I live at the top of a hill like the great north face of the Eiger. Well not really but it is steep enough for Ian to refuse to ever attempt to walk up it. Last winter in the ice it was more dangerous than the fastest skeleton bobsleigh run. Yes, I chose to live here. One of the reasons was the 3 and 4. Unlike the 80 family of buses that drop me at Hunter's Bar, the foot of the horrid hill, the 3 and 4 trundle gently along Psalter lane and end up at the top of my road. When I had to get to work in the ice I slithered up my mildly sloping road and bused into town on the 3 then out to work on the 40.
The service has never been very frequent. At best the buses were only every half hour, once an hour in the evenings and Sunday, but it has been reliable and, importantly, ends up at the Intersection, near to the rail station, and is therefore great for visitors and for me when I conscientiously travel by public transport for work.
On Monday, without any obvious notification, the service changed. Sally and her friends waited for an hour in town at the usual bus stop. When the second bus didn't turn up they went to the Intersection to ask and found that the 3 had been cancelled and the 4 had been relocated to Arundel Gate (up a hill).
My neighbour comments, 'I got caught out on Monday morning (which is apparently when the new service came into effect). I saw no signs on the buses or bus stops to warn us! I was very unimpressed when I nearly missed my 8.20am train on Monday
morning because I didn't know the bus times had changed and had to catch another bus and run at full speed across town to get to the train station. I caught the train by the skin of my teeth - not impressed with First Buses at all!'
I am signed up with Travel South Yorkshire to receive notification of changes to the timetables of the 3 and 4 but I can't find any record of a notification and I didn't see any signs at the bus stops either.
Having discovered this unannounced* downgrading of our service I looked on the South Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive website to find where to comment. Apparently their 'job is to encourage you to use public transport'. It's not clear on the website how they do this or how to comment but after trawling around for a good while I found their customer charter. I will be contacting this organisation today to see why my lifeline bus has been cancelled and why I didn't know about it.
*I'm sure it wasn't unannounced. See The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy to see how bad changes are usually communicated. Further investigation reveals that there is a link at the bottom of the Travel South Yorkshire page called 'July Bus Service Changes' but how would I know to go looking for it? Especially when I am signed up to be notified of changes to my service.
