Lees meerIt’s a restless hungry feeling
That don’t mean no one no good
When everything I’m a-saying
You can say it just as goodYou are right from your side
I am right from mine
We’re both just one too many mornings
And a thousand miles behind
Lees meerSam: That’s the thing. The internet is not the larger conversation, the internet is the smaller conversation. I, like, had this realization. I was checking into a hotel room Sunday night in Dallas, and this woman asked me what I’m doing, what I’m in town for, and I’m like, “Oh, I’m a journalist,” and she’s like, “Oh, what are you doing?” And I – I said, “I work for NPR, I’m covering this shooting.” And she’s like, “Oh, my god.” So we start talking about the shooting and her interactions with police and – we have a long conversation – and finally she says to me, “You know, I see both sides. I see Black Lives Matter point, I see the police officer’s point. I see both sides, but whenever you say that you see one side, everyone thinks that you hate the other side, so I just stay quiet.”
PJ: That’s it. That’s what he saw. And I know how small that is. I know how … meagre it is to find hope in the fact that people are quietly thinking about something. But I think Sam’s right. Like, even though we know that we’re ruder and louder and more argumentative on the internet, I think that we forget that the other thing the internet doesn’t show us is quiet. The moments that we’re all having where we’re sitting there turning this stuff over, trying to make sense of it. It can feel like nobody else is doing that.
Lees meerNobody tells people who are beginners — and I really wish someone had told this to me – that all of us who do creative work, we get into it because we have good taste. But there is this gap. For the first couple years you’re making stuff, it’s just not that great. It’s trying to be good, it has potential to be good, but it’s not. But your taste, the thing that got you into the game, that’s still killer. And your taste is why your work disappoints you. A lot of people never get past this phase. They quit. Most people I know who do interesting, creative work went through years of this. We know our work doesn’t have this special thing that we want it to have. We all go through this. And if you are just starting out or you are still in this phase, you gotta know it’s normal and the most important thing you can do, is do a lot of work. Put yourself on a deadline so that every week you will finish one story. It is only by going through a volume of work that you will close that gap, and your work will be as good as your ambitions.
Lees meerGeorge: Well, you got no place to go. I’ll tell you what your problem is, you brought your queen out too fast. What do you think? She’s one of these feminists looking to get out of the house? No, the queen is old fashioned. Likes to stay home. Cook. Take care of her man. Make sure he feels good.
Liz: Checkmate.
George: I don’t think we should see each other any more.
Lees meerRob: You could have a costume drama here, couldn’t you?
Steve: I would just love to do a costume drama in these hills, leaping, vaulting over dry stone walls with a scabbard, with that dead look in my eyes, ‘cause I’ve seen so many horrors that I’m sort of immune to them, and they always say something like, “Gentlemen, to bed! For we leave at first light. Tomorrow we battle, and we may lose our lives. But remember: death is but a moment. Cowardice is a lifetime of affliction.”
Rob: Nice.
Steve: To bed, for we rise at daybreak!
Rob: Very good. Very impressive.
Steve: But they always leave at daybreak. They never leave at, you know, nine-thirty. “Gentlemen to bed, for we leave at nine-thirty!”
Rob: Ish.
Steve: Ish. “Gentlemen to bed, for we rise at… What time is the battle? About, oh, twelve o’clock? Twelve o’clock. How is it on horseback, about three hours? So we leave about eight, eight-thirty?”
Rob: Eight-thirty for nine.
Steve: “Gentlemen, to bed! For we leave at eight-thirty for nine. And we rise at just after day- seven-thirty, so just after daybreak. Gentlemen to bed, for we leave at nine-thirty on the dot. On the dot.”
Lees meer“I will,” I say. I stand there wanting to say something else. But I don’t know what. We keep looking at each other, trying to smile and reassure each other. Then something comes into her eyes, and I believe she is thinking about the highway and how far she is going to have to drive that day. She takes her eyes off me and looks down the road. Then she rolls her window up, puts the car into gear, and drives to the intersection, where she has to wait for the light to change. When I see she’s made it into traffic and headed towards the highway, I go back in the house and drink some coffee. I feel sad for a while, and then the sadness goes away and I start thinking about other things.