New Orleans Storytelling

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The last few days I have been in New Orleans taking a mini-vacation. It was much needed after the last few months. As much as I was hoping to completely disconnect, I did bring my computer with me so I could continue to work on some code. I was able to get some things done….but not as much as I had hoped. That will be my goal over the next few days. Nevertheless, the trip was totally worth it cause I got the much needed chance to just relax.

Once I was officially away and in this new city my mind had a chance to recalibrate. I, as usual, am way more preoccupied on my next steps. But while in Nola I had the chance to think about some of my past steps, such as my work in anthropology, and consider where that has taken me.

New Orleans is a great city for that, for relaxed reflection. It’s motto in my head is laissez les bon temps roulez (cajun for let the good times roll). Not just because you can walk through the french quarter sipping on drinks in one hand and buying more with the next (why can’t we do this in Texas?), but cause this part of the world feels just as old as it does new. There are so many spirits walking around there, you can’t help but to feel a bit more open in how you see the world.

It makes me think about not only what are my next steps, but what am I stepping towards. What is my ultimate contribution going to be? I thought my next goal would be to contribute to a ruby gem or make an amazing web app from scratch that takes the world by storm. But I realized that I want to use all these skills to help tell better stories. Stories about who we really are, and create ways to interact more with the reality of all of us in the world. For a time when we are all so connected, sometimes it feels as if we have never been further apart.

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I spent some time talking to a man that I met in a bar (I know what it sounds like, but its not like that). We talked about New Orleans history, Haiti, Voodoo, Catholicism, religion and the spiritual world. I could have talked to this guy for hours. Now….how can we use technology to help foster those kinds of interactions? I am not convinced that social networks alone are the answer. Sometimes it can feel more lonely on a social network than it does being the home by yourself. Its one thing to be alone, its another to be surrounded (even digitally) and still feel alone.

And yet, here I am in another city having a great conversation with someone off the cuff. I would say that what got me that far in the conversation was my anthropological training. What I wonder is how can technology help keep me there. Isn’t that the next hurdle? What I wish was that I could have more interactions like that. Where I connect with someone, learn something, and enticed to learn more in just a few minutes. This is what I mean by being a better storyteller. It feels like we live in a time when knowledge is running in concurrent silos. Shouldn’t we do something to change that? What is the point in having all this technology, and not using it to push ourselves further as a species?

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I don’t know how I am going to do it, or what I am going to go with this. What I know is that storytelling is important to history, culture and society. It is how we know who we are. I want to somehow bridge that with my growing technological skills. I don’t even know how to do it, but I feel that it is important to try. New Orleans gave me that. I always love going to that city. So even when I am resting, I am still working. That’s ok…as long as in the end I contribute to something great. That is the goal at least.

 
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