Come (definition)/ kəm
verb
move or travel toward or into a place thought of as near or familiar to the speaker.
arrive at a specified place. travel in order to be with a specified person, to do a specified thing, or to be present at an event.
join someone in participating in a specified activity or course of action.
occur; happen; take place. be heard, perceived, or experienced.
take or occupy a specified position in space, order, or priority. achieve a specified place in a race or contest.
pass into a specified state, especially one of separation or disunion
Thálatta, thálatta! (And a review of Dawn of Planet of the Apes)
I was asked a casual, and given recent fortunate circumstances, reasonable question recently from someone whom I greatly respect and appreciate their wisdom. It’s the same question I have asked others but, sadly, mostly without the genuineness of interest with which I was asked. It is my vague recollection that whenever I inquired it of others, it was without the absence of a preconceived notion of my own response.
But, as to that same question pointed at me, I declined an immediate answer and filed it in the free app that I downloaded to my mind. In the lengthy pause I have been mostly on a boat sailing the Lesser Antilles and surviving nautical calamities.
“what’s next?”
Several big goals have been completed and paint by numbers pictures are rarely a challenge or enjoyable the second time around. I feel like I have exhausted that color palette.
I refer to the enormous quantity of people within history and contemporary times that I admire and keep as an aspirational reference, George Washington (his adherence to a role), Lincoln (Leadership), a Few Caesars (administration conquest), Socrates (discipline)  and several antique philosophers, smattering of artists of various output. All distribute themselves over an assortment of interests.
So I think my best response is not a tactical one, it is rather blunt, honest and mark to market.
Over the years I have made promises to myself. But, these obligations seem to have been reneged and put aside while I have kept my dues paid with others.
So then, my answer is this: I will enjoy, for just a bit, a release from obsession, its anxiety and striving, its effort and attention to details. Muscles fatigued in the gym are rebuilt at rest.
I have, even as a peculiar child meticulously plotted to an ‘optimal’ with the management of my own life and its intricacies. But, like excessive luggage on a Jet Blue flight, it has its cost.
It is a behavior that I have reinforced and somehow I became both the scientist and the subject monkey. With perseverance I banged on levers, found my way through a variety of mazes and collected many grapes and banana chips. A loop like the one I constructed neglected conditions to terminate and, because it was productive, I lacked any desire to halt it. There was no neighbor banging on my door telling me to stop playing that same Whiney Houston riff over and over, and it continued.
Then, what was intended to be a quick vacation to St John’s and I was coaxed onto the sea. No phone or laptop, no social media and no stock ticker. Just friends and the water, stars and brief jaunts to land and a few quick flights in a turbo prop. I returned to NYC last month and then my summer home in July, wonderfully disoriented.
A review of Dawn of the Planet of the Apes:
As of this writing Dawn of the Planet of the Apes has grossed over 700 million dollars. Everyone seems to love the movie and no counter opinions so I offer this as solace to others who, like myself, hated it and must reconcile some pittance from 3 lost hours.
In little order, these random outraged rants against:
I knew this movie was going to be (very) bad when it opened up with thousands of apes hunting deer. This is a very inefficient mechanism for sustaining a large population. After a tremendous coordinated military effort they caught +1.
During this sequence the apes are communicating using a sign language accompanied by small grunts. So the viewer can comprehend we are given subtitles. What is this, a French movie?
You would think as the apes display an intelligence they would have developed some primitive agriculture and thought to pen livestock. It’s a kind of Game of Thrones stunted growth. Large concentrations of population that are intelligent will innovate and the first issue is sustaining in the hard times.
Too many stars. You know Keri Russell, et al will not permit their character to be killed off and miss the next move in the cycle and the big paycheck.
The apes are portrayed as the mythological ‘noble savage’ with only a silly plot device to foster political and nonsensical intrigue.
Boring and simplistic. The beauty of an absurd premise is that it doesn’t need a back story. Creating a rationale fills it with too many holes.
If the (or some) apes can speak why don’t they do so more frequently? Is it that English is the language of the oppressor so they refuse to speak it unless compelled or is this some Mr Ed inside joke? And, why does it sound like they can only speak mono syllabically and its painful to the speaker. Either they can speak or they can’t.