You never when it's going to be too late until it's too... late

The window of opportunity for understanding my origins is forever narrowing.

I started this blog entry well over a year ago. It was an idea I had, I guess. But I stopped. It was undoubtedly during a broad window of writer's block.

When I was in high school, or perhaps younger, I did a project for either school or some personal reason, where I interviewed my grandmother - my mother's mother. I don't remember what I asked her. But I do remember that she didn't remember as much as I would have hoped she'd remember about her past. And I probably didn't ask very well-formulated questions.

I never got a chance to ask any of my other grandparents those questions. With the exception of my father's father, they were all born in Europe around the turn of the century. That was a different time and place. There was no electricity. There was no internet. There were no refrigerators. There were no cars. It's weird to me to think that just that gap of two generations holds such immense changes in how life was lived.

I talked with my mother a lot, about a lot of things. But I wish, now, that I had conducted lengthy formal interviews, extracting every bit of knowledge I could, and taking good notes. I wish I knew about her childhood more than I do. I remember her relating tidbits such as when I asked her about what it was like growing up and she said "We all [her sisters] believed that we were our father's favorite, and that our mother hated us." I remember stories about my mother's father. I knew he'd lost his leg because he was hit by a fire engine. I knew that he had a temper and he was good at playing cards. I knew that people had only a vague sense about what he did for a living. As a child, I recall stories about how he either worked for the circus or was in the Jewish Mafia. I don't know what the truth was. And I don't know why it was so opaque.

I used to ask her questions about how she and my father met, and she would always tell me crazy stories about how my father supposedly wouldn't tell her what he did for work for the first few months they dated. I know that my father's mother didn't care very much for my mother. That she wasn't good enough. Just all these little snippets. But it's not a movie. It's like notes inside fortune cookies. I didn't get to ask her everything I wanted to ask her. And I have forgotten the details of many things I did ask. It seems ironic to me that I used to get so upset when my father would tell me he didn't remember things from the past, but I am now forgetting things from the past. Though, I think I remember my past better than that of the stories that have been related to me.

I want to know more about my father's time as a child. I want to know more about his father. Even though my mother's father died thirteen years before I was born, I know more about him, because of the few stories, than I ever have known about my father's father, who was alive when I was a small child. I only remember visiting him in a hospital bed. I know that he was part of a business with partners, something like a hat store, and that his partners "screwed him out of the business" (that's how someone related the story), and that they lost their home in the depression and never owned a home again for over forty years. But that's all. I don't know what they were like.

The only ones left in my family from whom the stories may be told of the past are my brother and my aunt. There is probably much they can share of their respective generations. And they both are great storytellers.

I learned much from my brother about how different my parents were when they were younger, with him being eighteen years older than me. But again, the stories don't feel like I'm really there. I don't know what it is. It's like I'm wanting something deeper than a story can provide. And nobody's memory is sufficient to quench my desire to feel what these people were like.

I would love to know more about my father's time in the Navy. Or in college. To know what he wished for when he was young. What did life look like?

I loved it when my mother would tell me little memories... she told me what it was like the day that JFK died, and I could feel the emotion. I want that reality, that intensity, for the entire movie of the entire history.

But she's gone.

And people are aging.

And I am aging.

And memories are fading.

And at some point, in the not too distant future, it's going to be too...

Home sweet home sweet (bittersweet) home

The truth is, you can have two homes.

I've struggled for years now as to "What is home?" When I moved to Seattle, there was a long time where I spent my time pointing out all the ways in which Seattle was lacking. Inferior infrastructure. Inferior pizza. Lack of anything really "old." There was a long list. It went like that for a few years. And then, at some point, for a variety of reasons, Seattle became home. And suddenly, I dreaded Boston. For completely different reasons, however. It was not that I changed my preferences about pizza. Or mass transit.

I developed an aversion to the pressure of visiting family. Of having to stay in the uncomfortable, tiny bed of childhood. The deep immersion into family which I had told myself I was happy to be away from. The weather. Hot or cold. The feeling that a family visit was not really a vacation, and there's only so much vacation time. So, for many reasons, Boston became a dreaded trip, and a place I could never imagine myself living again. Each trip was short, and rushed, and felt frantic and tiring. And when my mother died, it felt like Boston had become repellent to me. I did not want to return. Ever.

Then, my situation at work became such that there was an opportunity to travel to Boston periodically. And suddenly, my attitude began to change. Visiting Boston meant visiting Boston - the city. Working in the city. Staying in the city. And visiting family and friends as a part of the trip. Now, Boston became a trip to a really cool place I used to know, without being too deeply immersed in the things that made me uneasy. And that made me develop a new fondness that may have even exceeded that which I had when I left.

In the course of about a year, I think I visited Boston four times. It was a period of transformation for me. I started to feel more connected with family. I started to feel more connected to my history. I felt connected to my roots.

And then I left the job where I was afforded that opportunity to visit home on a company dime, and stay in fancy hotels, and eat on a per diem budget.

And I haven't visited since. Instantly, my aversion to visiting has ratcheted back up again. I don't even know when the last time was that I visited, but I believe it may have been about a year ago. And, as before, the longer I go without visiting, the more I don't want to go. And the longer I go without visiting, the more it becomes imperative that I visit sooner rather than later. And that, again, makes me want to move to Irkutsk.

So where is home?

23andMe and the prospect of eugenics

Though not quite as elaborate as the eugenics of Gattaca, 23andMe is a service that, for $200, will tell you quite a bit about your genetic traits, disease risks, and family heritage. I decided it would be a fun thing to do. Actually, I decided it would be a fun thing to purchase as a gift for a friend who is a biologist. And the friend, in turn (and independently), decided it would be a good gift for me.

There's a lot of information in the results they provide. Some of it is not at all surprising, such as validating your risks of diseases that you already know are in your family (though, it's a reassuring "positive control" to see this appear in the data). There's also a lot of muddier information, where they tell you that you've got potentially elevated risk for something, based on some of the markers in your genome, but potentially decreased risk based on other markers. Of course, that's completely to be expected, but leaves you with not a whole lot of certainty as to whether you actually are at risk.

I suppose there are only a small number of cases where one learns something extremely significant about one's genetic risks. 

One of the neat things about 23andMe is that they have a large number of surveys where they ask you about your own traits, history, and drug sensitivities. The answers to these survey questions, combined with the genetic data that they have collected from a large number of participants, enables them to occasionally identify new associations between markers and traits. So this is a two-way service. They tell us something. But we also tell them something that is used to fuel further scientific discovery.

So what did I learn?

I learned that I have almost double the average risk for prostate cancer, which was interesting to me, because there are no known cases of it in my family (to my knowledge, though my family is so poor at communicating, that perhaps I wouldn't have heard about it anyway).

I learned that I have dramatically lower risk for any type of colon disorders such as cancer, irritable bowel, Crohn's Disease, etc. That's good to know.

I learned that I have much greater than average risk of heart disease, which is consistent with the fact that heart attacks, angina, and arteriosclerosis are widespread on my mother's side of the family.

I learned that I have significantly lower-than-average risk for developing Alzheimer's Disease.

And I also learned that, on my maternal grandmother's side of the family, my heritage at some point traces back to one of the most common European ancestries; not a purely Jewish heritage like I would automatically have suspected.

There are a bunch of other things, but these were the ones that stood out as particularly interesting.

Moving back to the Gattaca topic... how will this data be used in the future? Will insurance companies be allowed to genetically screen people? Should they be allowed to do so? Why is it okay for life insurance companies to charge higher premiums for people who smoke, but it's not okay for health insurance companies to assign higher premiums to patients who carry higher risk for developing diseases?

The quick answer is that lifestyle choices are something we can control, but genetics is not. And we have actually seen health insurance moving in the direction of more privacy, rather than less, in my lifetime. I recall being denied health insurance because of something that was seen in a physical examination when I was in my twenties. It turned out to be a mistake. But the fact is, it happened. Today, we don't see that happening. And even preexisting conditions seem to be covered. Should they be?

Should a health insurance company need to be forced to take on a high-risk patient, and lose massive amounts of money? Or, at the least, should they be allowed to say "Your genetics indicate you have double the risk of cardiovascular disease of general public. Thus, if you want us to insure you, we're going to charge you such-and-such a premium. And if you smoke, the premium will go up by this much. And if you do not maintain your weight below such-and-such a level, your premium will go up by this much."

It sounds brutal, but it is also completely logical for health insurance companies to want to do this. Of course, the resultant litigation would be a nightmare, as would the attempts to falsify data that the health insurance companies can maintain.

The Gattaca scenario of carefully selecting the best possible genetic material, so as to avoid these expensive outcomes seems like a more viable solution than the approach of prorating healthcare.

But can you imagine the battles there would be if the government tried to mandate in vitro fertilization for the purpose of eugenics? There would be huge opposition from the religious right, and from the personal freedoms supporters of both the liberal and libertarian groups. Who would support such a thing? What ideology? It would be easy to envision it in the context of some horrible ethnic cleansing. But what does it mean to cleanse, not by ethnicity, but by genetic "fitness"? Is that any better or worse? And who decides? In a purely capitalistic sense, one could set the goals at eliminating those diseases and disorders that carry the largest price tag. 

It's a scary thought. I cannot really envision us going to it. But it is also (in my opinion) nearly equally odd that individuals who are born with zero, or virtually zero chance of normal lives are provided millions of dollars of medical support, while we don't have the healthcare resources available in this country, or in other parts of the world, to provide basic healthcare to everyone.

The argument is political, philosophical, ethical, and economical. Of all those "-ical" arguments, I suspect, in the long run, economical will be the trump card.

One final angle to consider is the impact that such data could have on relationships and marital choices. If you knew that your partner was a carrier for a trait or a disease, how would that impact your decision to start a family? The implications here are slightly more favorable, in that eugenics could offer couples the opportunity to screen to avoid genetic diseases. This already happens today. But a more widespread availability of such data, and the stigmas and propaganda that could evolve along with that availability, could lead to a new type of relationship conflict. Ultimately, it could give rise to new approaches to "mate selection." One could even envision dating sites where, instead of using a special formula to find your best matches based on preferences and personality, you would be given your best matches for genetic compatibility. The possibilities, again, are endless.

Precious things lost forever

When in doubt, don't get rid of it.

That is truly a motto to live by. Because you never know what you'll be sorry to lose. And sometimes, you do know what you'll be sorry to lose, but you let it go anyway. One might point out that this could be taken to an extreme, in the case of pack rats, hoarders, etc. But for the average, balanced person, I would say that if you have one moment's hesitation, keep it. Find a place to put it. Give it to someone for safekeeping, even.

I wrote those first few lines over a year ago. And interestingly, almost exactly a year later, the topic came up again today. Today, I put a little spin on it though. If it has any sentimental value whatsoever, keep it. If it's a stack of random papers that mean nothing to you, that you haven't looked at for 6 years, toss it.

I've lost a few precious things.

A dollar bill. Hand-made greeting cards. Guitars. And in every case, I could have and should have known at the time that I parted with them that I would long regret the decision. In one case, it was brief brainwashing that led to the relinquishment. In another case, it was fear. When it came to guitars, it was the illusion that I needed the paltry amount of money from a sale in order to justify the purchase of some other piece of gear.

Even today, with my countless guitars, I am still heeding my own advice to part with none because I don't need the cash, and well, you just never know when you're gonna wish you still had that guitar. Of course, the guitars are replaceable. The greeting cards were not. And neither was the dollar bill that belonged with the cow.

Don't lose your precious things.

Seeing the objective truth... so hard

I jump to conclusions. So often. And it's mood dependent. I get a thesis statement going in my head about what reality is, and then I start "seeing" all the data that supports my theory, and "not seeing" all the data that refutes it. That's a bit ironic for a researcher to take such an approach to life. I certainly hope that is not the way that I conduct my research.

And I am so convinced. So sure. I have tried to be more open than I used to be. I have tried to see all sides of a situation. Of course, I think I have always portrayed myself as someone who sees all sides of a situation. But I think that perception is probably distorted, because I continually come to the realization that I am not doing it.

It's just a forever continuing work in progress.

I have a hard time walking the line of recognizing that I lack the compassion and openness that is possible, without immediately devolving into the self-flagellation of what a bad person I am for lacking it. What it comes back to is the place where it all needs to start, which is compassion and openness with myself.

I started off talking about objective truth, and there's an interesting paradox of "objectivity" when talking about one's own inner states. Because you'd think that "about self" is fundamentally "subjectivity" but there's an objective truth about ourselves as well.

The other day, I was listening to someone give their sales pitch about the Landmark program. Of course, I am not a subscriber to cult philosophies, not so much because there's no value in them, but because I am very careful about assigning myself to any sort of community -- even my participation at my yoga studio is starting to feel a bit cultish, but that's another blog.

In his sales pitch, he talked about how there are "facts" and there are "interpretations" or something like that. In our day to day lives, there are things that occur that actually occur and then there is the layer upon layer of filtering or interpretation that we place on top of it. The result is that we often do not even see "the facts" because our brains have created this compelling story on top of it - and that story is based on what he referred to as our "point of view". These are self-limiting approaches. And to really see, we need to remove the interpretation layer.

Now, I don't need to join a cult or self-help program, or read a thousand books to heed that common sense. It is just common sense, right?

But I don't heed it.

And it's all mood dependent. In my best moments, I have the openness, and try my best to experience life as a series of moments. But in my darker moments, which are sometimes many, I spiral every "fact" into a web of worst-case scenarios. And that makes me feel worse.

Here's an example.

I send you a message. You reply immediately. I send you another message, asking you a question. You don't reply immediately.

This happens all the time, with everyone in my life. But the interpretation is mood-dependent. If I am in a good mood, I just wait for the reply. Or if it's urgent, I call. But if I am in a bad mood, then that lack of immediate response immediately becomes "they don't want to answer my question" or "i am not important to them" or "why are they avoiding communicating with me". Then, reality turns out to be any of a series of natural causes: driving, text took a long time to go through, got a phone call, was eating dinner, fell asleep, etc.

The sad part about this is that I rake myself over emotional coals running with the worst-case scenarios. And for some reason, my brain is particularly adept at spinning worst-case scenarios for even the smallest of scenarios. The paranoia kicks in, and everyone's motives are questionable.

I know this about myself, and it still happens. I also know that the first step toward self-improvement is self-awareness. But unfortunately, self-awareness is a little bit more uncomfortable that selfish oblivion, particularly in the short-term.

A cow, a dollar bill, and a memory of the past

A red wooden pedestal, measures approximately 2.5" x 1.25" x 0.5". Rising up from the pedestal is a thin red post, about an eighth of an inch in diameter, and 3" tall. Atop the post, a quarter-inch thick wooden cow, white with brown spots, black eyes and hooves, and a black nose. Skewered by the red wooden post, a single dollar bill. It's upside-down, so I cannot see the vintage. But if I lift it up, and examine the other side, it reads L-series (meaning it is from the San Francisco Mint), serial number L86314752M. Series 1995. Robert Rubin was the U.S. Treasurer at the time. But this is not the first dollar bill to grace this ornamental and sentimental object that I have had in my possession for 25 years, and about 5 months. The first dollar bill to grace the cow remained in its throne from 1986 until sometime, I would estimate, in early-1998. The one that is presently in its place has likely been there since. And there's a story behind that, but I'll come back to it.

The "Cow and a Dollar Bill" (as I have always referred to it) came into my hands from my sister, when I was in the hospital, recovering from minor surgery that had been the result of a car accident. It was just a silly gift. That's the kind of person my sister was. Funny, random, clever, sarcastic. It was not something that necessarily needed to have any significant meaning, but it ended up having very significant meaning because I attached the meaning to it. I am not sure if the cow traveled with me to college, or if it remained in my bedroom at home. It's been too long for me to remember. But the cow traveled with me to Seattle, where it now sits in front of me.

So why did it have so much meaning? Well, the events that wound me up in the hospital, which I will not share here because they're not really relevant to the story at hand, led me to do some existential and philosophical pondering about truth, honesty, life, and the importance of many things. Somehow, because the cow and its dollar bill showed up in this time window, I ended up making a proclamation: The day I need to use that dollar bill is the day that I know that things have become really bad. Or, the flip side, I'm never going to use that dollar bill, but I'm going to keep it right there on this cow, as a reminder of what it is like to not be in need, and to keep the entire ornament with me everywhere I go, as a reminder of the same.

Yet, you might ask, "What happened to the dollar bill that was on it originally?" (which I might note, was tattered, and very fantastically antiquated, even though the currently positioned crisp bill has actually been "in office" for a longer period of time; I guess the original must have started off in a more worn-out state)

That, too, is a different story and, as it turns out, the bill was not spent in a moment of need. Rather, it was something I chose to release, in a moment of what I had believed to be personal growth and "letting go" of the past. It was donated, in a sense, to a cause that I briefly believed in, but ultimately to which I did not cling. In fact, one of my slight regrets in life is that I parted with that dollar bill when I did.

Sadly, the cow and the dollar bill have come to take on a new symbolism. And the loss of the original dollar bill feels eerily poignant. See, my sister who gave this to me is not the same person she was, just as the dollar bill is not the same dollar bill. She's had a neurological condition for most of her life which, until recently, did not have any noticeable cognitive effects. But in the last 5 years or so, she's unfortunately undergone a gradual decline in her cognitive abilities, particularly when it comes to memory and analytic reasoning. It's been significant enough that she is now really not the same person she was for most of her life. She doesn't really engage with people anymore, and is uncomfortable in situations where it is necessary. Her long-term memory seems to be well-preserved, but she has difficulty forming new memories. She's withdrawn, and sad. She's somewhat aware of the loss that she's suffering, and that probably makes it even worse for her.

When I look at the cow and the dollar bill, much as when I look at my sister, I am reminded of the person who gave it to me, and everything that she represented in my life. But when I see this imposter dollar bill, not the one that my sister gave me, I feel like something is lost, and I know that it can never be regained.

One thing that troubles me is that, while there's no way I can ever imagine myself parting with the inanimate reminder that I keep, I have already distanced myself from the person of whom I am reminded because, while it's possible for me to look at the cow and the dollar bill, and have everything it has ever been and ever meant evoked in my mind, the same is not true for my sister. Communicating with my sister now reminds me only of what is lost, and what she is no longer, and will never be again. I feel like she's gone, but she is still here. And I have a hard time with that. I suspect I should probably be trying to make what connection I still can, while she is still here at all, rather than lament what is not. I am a little bit afraid of that. I think it betrays a problem I have with mortality. I'm trying to deny it. But as I come of the age that more and more of those dear to me will become frail, ill, or die, it's going to become increasingly unavoidable. I need to face it.

Perhaps I should see if she remembers the cow and the dollar bill.

Why everyone should keep a journal

Last night, I spent almost two hours rereading journal entries from 2008. I'm speaking of a "diary" that happens to be online, as opposed to this blog. From time to time, I go back and start rereading what I've written. And it's never easy to be reminded of where I was before. I don't often write about fluffy topics in the journal. It usually is about self-exploration, or venting the struggles I'm having with various situations happening in my life.

The hardest thing for me is when I see huge sections of my emotional history that have repeated themselves. I can find a page from 2008 that could just as easily be written today. New situation, different year, different people involved, but the same me. And, consequently, the same struggles and same questions. Sometimes, reading those excerpts leads me to question whether I'm growing at all. Am I truly repeating the exact same mistakes as I was three years ago? But there's a tendency to latch on to the negatives, the similarities in plight, without recognizing the small, but significant differences.

In 2008, I had written a little "vision statement" for where I wanted to see myself heading in the future. It was originally intended for this blog, but I'd moved it to the journal instead, because I was worried it would be a little too sensitive for people who may have felt "involved" in the birth of that vision. I think enough time has passed that I can post it here:

There are ways in which I wish I were more capable.

I wish I had the discipline and motivation to drive my career toward productive ends.
I wish I had the wisdom and restraint to not engage in commitments that I cannot keep.
I wish I could be a hero.
I wish I would realize that being a hero is a commitment I cannot keep.
I wish I could decide to focus on exercise, and it would last longer than a week.
I wish I could learn to keep promises to myself.
I wish I would never cause anyone pain ever again, myself included.
I wish I would set for myself more realistic wishes.


When I look at this now, I realize that I've grown a lot more than I thought. Certainly, I experience many of the same feelings and fears as I did three years ago. And certainly I have made some of the same mistakes. But when I look at the list above, I realize that, by and large, I have achieved every one of these goals. But the unrealistic wishes that I had then, to some extent, still persist as an Achilles' heel for me. I still battle with wanting to be a hero. I still labor over the fear of being hurt, or hurting, in such fashion so as to render me rather risk-averse.

It's a good thing to see that I set these goals for myself three years ago. Going back and reading it in a journal is a helpful way to realize who I was, who I am, what's changed. And it serves as a reminder of the direction I've set for myself. Definitely something I would recommend to everyone.

I've got a ways to go. But it's getting better.

How surfing is like dating

I was sitting on lava rocks, in Kona, at a beach named "Magic Sands," watching the surfers on the water in front of me. I was on my cell phone having a conversation about relationships. And suddenly, the combination of the conversation and the visuals in front of me, brought about the following metaphor:

Surfing is a lot like (online) dating.

I add the term "online" in parentheses because I think it is probably a nearly obligatory modifier.

So, how does it work?

Simple. Let me explain. You sign up for an online dating site, and you've essentially grabbed your surfboard and decided to enter the water. Easy enough, right? And then, you watch and wait. For something with potential to come along. Sometimes there's nothing. Sometimes there's plenty. Finally, a wave comes along that looks like a good one, so you decide you're gonna have a go at it. Of course, one of the most critical things, no matter how good the wave is, is that you need to time it right, and use the proper technique for picking up the wave. Sound familiar? Much the same as online dating, where you need to read that wave, and start off with the right kind of communication, or else you never even get a date.

So, getting a date is sort of like standing up on your board and starting to ride the wave.

What happens next, of course, is completely unpredictable. Sometimes the wave disintegrates immediately, and you fall right off your board. Sometimes the wave gets too big too fast, and swallows you. That's like when you discover on the first date, or shortly thereafter, that it's not what you had hoped, and you either abort, or get tossed. Or sometimes people come on too strong, and it's necessary to run away.

Occasionally, you get off to a good start, and you're on that wave, reading the changes in it, and feeling like everything's completely under control. That would be "steady dating." Even then, sudden twists and turns, or missteps, or interference from other currents in the water throw you off sooner than you might have expected. The failed relationship.

Rarely, almost never, you ride that perfect wave, handling every nuance of it, and eventually find yourself still standing, well clear of the surge, and coasting gently to shore. Ah, commitment.

Much like surfing, you usually take on plenty of waves of highly-varying quality and duration before finding that one that takes you home. The metaphor breaks down for me a little bit when I think about the fact that there are various ways to leave the game of surfing. You could get injured. You could have so many bad waves that you finally decide to leave the water on a less-than-optimal note. Conversely, one could be so obsessed with the novelty and rush of every unique wave that comes along, that you never want to leave the water.

Do we have the capacity to know when we're on the most awesome wave we're ever going to see? Or is it only in hindsight that we look back and think about an amazing wave, perhaps idealizing it to have been bigger, and more perfect than perhaps it actually was?

I do not know.

THE GAP in quality... the price of fleeting fashion

Let me start with a disclaimer. I have not done everything according to "the books" in the story I am about to relate. Nonetheless, I feel that the experience I had does not reflect exemplary customer service. In the end, I have decided that the keyboard may not be mightier than any figurative sword, but it's about all I've got left.

For Christmas, I received a very nice blue and black flannel from THE GAP. The shirt was a medium, and it barely fit before washing. After a few weeks' delay (due to my schedule), I managed to make it into the Downtown Seattle location of THE GAP to try to exchange the shirt for a large. They did not have a large in stock there, but said they'd be happy to have the shirt held at another location. Just to be sure, I tried on a large of a very similar (but not the same) flannel that they had in stock, and it seemed to be a perfect fit.

A few days later, I went to the Redmond location of THE GAP and picked up the large shirt they had held for me. MISTAKE #1 that I made was that I did not try on the shirt before taking it home. I was in a hurry and, since I had already tried a large of a similar flannel, assumed it would be perfect. When I got home, sure enough, the shirt did not fit. It was absolutely huge, and it also had a weird variation in how the top button was latched, which differed from the medium of the same exact product code. Odd.

MISTAKE #2 is that my schedule resulted in me not managing to make it back to THE GAP to exchange this oversized shirt until the first week of March. MISTAKE #3 is that I did not have a gift receipt. Thus, when I went to the Downtown Seattle store to exchange, they informed me that they no longer were stocking this shirt, because it had gone out of season. As a result, in the absence of receipts, they could only credit me the old-stock price of $29 (the original price of the shirt was $54). Grudgingly, I purchased another shirt from THE GAP, that was currently in style, for $54. At this point, I am now down $29, but such is life, and such is the penalty for making a few mistakes, and taking too long to handle an exchange.

The new shirt is a gray, Western-style shirt with metal snaps that have white overlays affixed to the metal snaps. Very cool looking shirt. I wear it once, and one of the white overlays falls off in the washing machine.This surprised me a bit. There was nothing that said the shirt was dry-clean only. Nonetheless, I grabbed my Super Glue, and reattached the overlay. I wear the shirt a second time and, while wearing it, a different button falls off the shirt while I'm just sitting doing nothing. At this point, I decide that I should really return this shirt.

MISTAKE #4 is that I probably waited a month from the time that the second button falls off the shirt before I get around to going back the Downtown Seattle location of THE GAP. When I go to my closet to grab the shirt, I notice that yet another button has fallen off the shirt, and the overlay piece is just sitting on the floor of my closet! It fell off the shirt while I wasn't even wearing it! I bring the shirt and the two missing buttons into THE GAP. They ask me if I have a receipt, which I do not. They tell me that I can only exchange the shirt for the old-stock value of $29 because it is now out of season (it's summer by this time). At this point, I am not happy, but I very politely explain my lengthy story, and they call the manager over to speak with me. The manager tries to make it right. She agrees that this is messed up. The solution is that she will order a replacement of the shirt from the warehouse, at no charge, and she will also give me a gift card for $20, which brings me almost back to Even Steven on the entire amount that I am into clothing from THE GAP (including the original loss of $29 from the first round, minus $9 difference).

I feel like this is a victory.

But alas, it's not that easy...

A week or so later, I receive a package from THE GAP. I leave it on the kitchen table for a few days because, at this point, I am not particularly excited anymore about anything from THE GAP, and I've learned to expect the worst.

Finally, I open the package.

The replacement shirt is missing two button overlays. And they're not even in the damn bag! They actually sent me a shirt that was missing buttons straight from the factory!

Back to THE GAP. This time, it's September, and I'm at the University Village location. I tell the manager my story. She tells me that it has really been too long, and they've really done all they can do. She understands my frustration. The solution this time, which is not entirely satisfactory, is that she refunds me another $6 (a discount on the defective shirt), and suggests that I try gluing the two buttons (from the original version of this shirt) onto the missing spots on the replacement shirt. I agree, because I realize I'm not going to get a better solution than this. And, fool that I am, I spent another $60 dollars on more clothing! I'm a glutton for punishment, right? Or a devoted customer... you be the judge.

I am pretty sure that it won't be long before more buttons fall off the shirt, and then I'm probably going to have to just suck it up and realize that clothing from THE GAP is not meant to last more than a few wearings. Further case in point, which is one that I have not even bothered to raise during my visits, is the fact that I have a quarter-sized hole in the back pocket of a pair of 1969 jeans that are less than 2 years old, and have probably only been washed 15 or 20 times. Contrast that with Levi's that I've had for a decade and have no rips, and I just have to believe THE GAP clothing is made to not last.

The staff at THE GAP have been nice. They've never been rude to me. They agree the quality should be better than it is. But I don't feel particularly satisfied with my Christmas Gift Experience... it ended up requiring multiple visits to multiple store locations, only to end up nearly even, but with a slightly defective shirt.

Here's to finding out if THE GAP searches the blogs for customer stories...

Moments: Red Truck (1/30/2006)

Forty days and forty nights.

Looking out the window again. The red pickup truck is still there. The rain is still falling. Did Seattle deserve a great flood, or what? I wonder, will the red truck move before tomorrow? The view being the same, it's sort of like reliving yesterday. Steel-gray sky. Whatever. Maybe should think about better words to describe the sky. The red truck (again) catches my eye, as it's the only - well, almost the only - bright-colored object in view. And, as red trucks go, it's pretty drab, at that. Rusted-out near the wheel wells, paint faded. Almost an orangey-red. Could be a Ford. Or a Dodge, or a Chevy. But that's not my specialty so, without further investigation, I'm just guessing.

So, I lied about the brilliant colors. The building behind the red truck has a reasonably bright-blue roof. That's something, right? The neighbors have a bright-yellow milk crate in their backyard, amidst an otherwise brownish-grayish yardscape.

I don't know what I'm expecting to see out there. Perhaps this is just a realization that urban-world or, for that matter, any-world, is not particularly colorful. I mean, this isn't the tropics. Yet, I am still focused on the lack of color.

An orangey-brown flower pot is near the yellow crate. Large pot. Didn't see it until I moved closer to the window. Green barbecue cover, too. Saw that, but didn't think it warranted mentioning.

What am I looking for? I don't know. Maybe I should stop looking. But probably it's better to keep examining this landscape until it looks like home, instead of a holding pen.