It is 2021, or so they say

It has  been a rough year.  There were good things, but the world got crazy.

I don't know how to post here anymore.  I need to re-read "she calls me daddy" and "letters from dad".  I need to find this "dad" person again.

-dad

End of March, 2020

Hello Math-girlies,

It has been a busy year.  The mind forgets, doesn't it.  If you wrote down all we did, it would be a year of good adventure.  Kelleys Island.  Dad's new Job.  New baby.  Kings Island.  Christmas.

I'm in the basement writing a letter because the world is nearly shutdown. There is a virus, "covid", a coronavirus SARS-2, that has been overwhelming medical resources of 1st world countries like Italy, and Spain.  It came from Wuhan China, a product of their "wet market" where they kill, cook, and eat near where the animals are stored.  Very unsanitary.  Only in the 3rd world can things like that still exist.

I have a new cough.  It's really weak, but its unlike coughs that I have had before: its really dry.  I worked from here all last week, and I don't get out much.  Allergies?  Flue?  or Covid?  Time will tell.  The dry cough has been around since Saturday the 21st of March 2020.  We will see how this goes.

We have started playing through "Storm Kings Thunder".  I want to tell you how to think of goblins with AC15 and your first level characters.  Neither hit so well. How do you stack the numbers so the individual goblins become a non-issue?  You don't know it but the same approach works for the college application process, the job application process, and other game-theoretic situations.

I have to get working.  Cognitive models, and optimal computing beckons, and it also pays our bills.

I love you dearly.  You are all four my favorite girlies.  

-MathDad

End of May, 2019

You both went through cross-over.

Math-mini, you were the first girl to earn "arrow of light" for Pack 365.  We did it together, but you had to do a lot of the legwork.  In one year you earned both your Webelos and your Arrow of Light.  I am very proud of you.

Math-micro, you completed your tiger and you are now a wolf-cub.  You two worked very very hard.  I can't tell you how proud I am of you both.

First they gave the pins (mathmini) or belt-clips (mathmicro) that each scout in the pack had earned.  Some had earned few, you both had earned many.  We do a lot of activities.  Mom doesn't know how very much of a scout she is.

Afterwards, they had each den starting with the youngest (lions) and ending with the oldest (Webelos) cross over the bridge. 

Before you crossed the bridge they painted your faces and said (I think):
- black stripes on the tiger trail mean happiness
- yellow on the chin is sunlight along the wolf trail
- red on the forhead is for bravery

These show you are ready to move along the trail of scouting.

 Mathmini, you were the first girl ever to go through your pack.  You were the first Webelos girl.  You earned your Webelos and Arrow of Light in one year.  Words fail me when I try to say how very proud of you I am.

Mathmicro, you are a brave and friendly wolf-scout.  I am delighted in your character (don't tell folks but I am also delighted in some of your quirks) and I love your kind soul. 

On the saturday afterwards, we went and put flags on the graves of veterans.  When someone has died, giving their life, so you can have a life of peace and freedom, then you have to say thank you, and take a moment.  There are thousands, tens of thousands, of graves of veterans there.  It took hours to put down all those flags, but there were Scouts BSA, Girl Scouts, American Heritage girls, and several other organizations with lots of folks to make the job a lot easier. 

You said it right, mathmicro, when you said just thinking of it is scary and sad.  It is scary and sad.  It is a holy thing.  No person with a soul should disregard the high cost it took to get here.  Fools throw it away as worthless because they haven't taken the time to look at the value. 

I am delighted with and deeply proud of my Scouts.  I love you girlies deeply.

I also love our math-nano.  Too young to be in scouting.  I don't have a picture to put here yet. 

You are why I do so very much of what I do, because it is good for you, because you need it.

-mathdad

March 1, 2019

Girlies,

I accepted an offer of a new position at another company.  It is south by southeast of here.  It is a big, scary, change.  I'm afraid of change, but I also know there is no life with change.  There is no growth.  Things can get worse, yes, but the only way for things to be better is change.

I should have more time with you girls.  This should be a good thing.  We will see.

-Mathdad

Feb 2019

Hello girlies.  Hello oldest, middlest, and littlest.  (whisper: hello peanut)

Biggest math girl, you were my first mathbaby. 
Middlest math girl, you are an artist, and a force of nature.  I love your wonderful heart.
Littlest math girl, you are brave, and engaging. 

I love you all.  I love you dearly.  You are my favorite people in the whole wide world.

I don't think you heard that.  You might think you did, but I don't think you did.
Classes that I have been in say that when I am self-controlling and think to myself "I'm being a good example", I am in fact kidding myself, because on the outside you have no visibility to what happened.  Those classes say I should narrate, so you can get clues, and see what you are missing.

And now... I return to work. I wish to get the right kind of free time to build this in a suitable and properly noble enough way to be valuable and meaningfully empowering to you when you eventually get to read it.

I should narrate what "I love you means" when the thought traverses my heart.

-Mathdad.

January 2019

Hello girlies.  All three of you.  It is January.  My letters are less frequent, not more.  I don't like that.  My interactions, face-to-face with you are more, not less, and i do like that.  I don't like the zero-sumishness of that.

I love Liz Ryan.  She has a heart, a soul, and a humanity that make me feel valued.  Her approach is very pro-human.  It is the antonym of tyrannical, a more win-win and proactive.  I like it.

Here are some of her webpages:

• (Forbes) 
• (Linked IN) I read this one a lot
• (her page) 
• (Inc)  
• (Glassdoor) 

 So I would like to share some game theory with you girlies.  I read this article (link).  Here is the text of it:

Q. You are very quick to tell people to start job hunting. Sometimes you have to stay and fight.‬ ‪

A. In any other industrialized country I would agree with you, but in the US we have a curious thing called employment at will. You can be fired for any reason, or no reason at all.‬ So staying and fighting can mean getting fired and losing your income before you have a new job. Interestingly, launching a stealth job search and speaking your truth at work both require the same ability:‬ the ability to step through fear. It’s scary to launch a stealth job search, and scary to speak your truth to your boss. Whichever path you choose, you will grow muscles. There is no wrong answer. Do what your gut tells you to do.‬

I would like to tell you about "Game theory" which is better called "Decision Theory" and is the math of making good decisions.

Let's say your boss is a bit of a punk.  Let's say he is verbally denigrating, but not in such a way that there are recordables for HR.  Let's say that he takes things you initiated, things you and only you could make, things that you pushed into being - your children - and claims that they were his, and he alone should get rewarded for them.  (This is not my current boss, Jan 2019, just so you know.)  So you don't like that, and you want to be able to pay rent and buy food while not suffering these moral injustices, so you want to look for a job elsewhere.

Here is a single person, single action, decision matrix.  The rows are actions on your part.  The columns are fundamentally distinct ways the universe responds, they are what reality is. It isn't about the boss, but about whether a husband (or hub) should buy flowers for his wife (or sweetie) if he is unsure that it is his anniversary.  A guy might say getting it right is a win, missing it is a loss, but buying flowers on a non-anniversary is a slight loss, and not buying flowers on an anniversary is a wash.  Wins are +10.  Washes are 0.  Losses are -10's.  small losses can be -5.

+--------+------------+-------------------+---------+---------+
|        |            | Anniversary       | Row Sum |         |
+--------+------------+-------------------+         +---------+
|        |            | Today | Not Today |         |         |
+--------+------------+-------+-----------+---------+---------+
| Action | Buy flower |  +10  |     -5    |    5    | <-- -10="" 0="" code="" flowers="" no="" this="">

 The row (action) with the highest sum is the one where you have the best result no matter the outcome.  A high tech big-brother weights the scores by their estimated probability of occurrence.  If you forget every day of the year, then the weight for getting flowers on the anniversary is 1/365 and the weight for buying flowers but today not being the anniversary is (365-1)/365.




So let's think about the boss.  If you do a normal job search, he can (and likely will) fire you for it.  If you do a stealth job search, then he is less likely to find out until you have a better place to go, and you can have a better work environment.  If you tough it out he might change, find another target/victim, or he might get worse.  Here is a plausible matrix.  If he suddenly becomes less of a jerk during the stealth search, there is no harm and no foul, though I would say leave, because he can just as suddenly change back.




+--------+----------------+----------------+---------+----------+
|        |                | Current        | Row Sum |          |
|        |                | Situation      |         |          |
+--------+----------------+----------------+---------+----------+
|        |                | Better | Worse |         |          |
+--------+----------------+--------+-------+---------+----------+
| Action | Stick it out   |   +10  |  -10  |    0    |          |
+        +----------------+--------+-------+---------+----------+
|        | Stealth Search |   +10  | +10   |    20   | <-- code="" this="">

So people who rob, who have gotten away with it, are much more likely to do it again.  Recidivism rates for all types of crimes are something like 43% over 5 years; that is with prison time, not without.  Petty tyrants with no expectation of punishment do not stop, they only escalate.  This would give a probability weighting to the cells, substantially lowering the "better" column.




You might have different numbers.  Your stuff might look different.  You could get different results.  As long as the values that you place in the cells are realistic for you, and are the best you can get, then you can make better decisions.




Make good decisions, kiddos.  I love you.

-MathDad

Mid-November 2018

It has been some time since I wrote.  I should write monthly, not quarterly.  I am sorry.

One of the challenges is to find both energy and unimpeded opportunity in the presence of a host of competing urgent things.  You are the important, whether or not you are urgent. 

I feel like, in the past week or so, my mind and heart have gone from being a single core processor to a dual (or quad) core operating at higher rate.  I am thinking better, and also feeling in color (without injections of testosterone).  I have been thinking about how Jordan Peterson engages the bible as myth, in the sense of epic and deeply meaningful symbolic, and started processing through the question "what are the myths that made me".  It feels like I am speaking the true name of myself, and each time I do it, I gain power and life. 

Should I tell you about me?  Should I tell you about you?  I am doing something, intentionally, that Jordan said was a miracle some several thousand years ago: I am speaking to the future, trying to make a deal with the future.  This future, unlike his example with the farmer and the grain, is outside my lifetime, but in yours.  The question behind the question becomes, how can I give you a great gift that you can receive outside my lifetime, that you can realize?  It is a game of catch, but what to throw?

The myths that made me are terrible.  They are crushing. 

My mother ran away from home as a pregnant teen in the early 1970's so that my grandfather could not drive/enforce her to abort me.  She started running then and has been running since.  I think it both made and broke her.  She ran from her ex, moving every 3 months for years and years, because he had promised to kill us all, so there was a dangerous and damaging several decades there.  For me I had to ask "did I destroy her life", "do I owe her a huge debt now".  It set up a reliance when I was young that became much more of a codependency as a teen.  It was healthy for me to move out of her home.  It was healthy for me to walk, and stumble, and struggle under my own sometimes heavy burdens without her as the context.  I have been, and will be, pro-life because it is too easy to put a crushing pressure on a teenage girl, to pressure her to abort the child.  I think that pro-choice folks would get a lot less aggressive opposition if they could make sure it is the girls choice, and not someone forcing her to do it, like they force her to do other stuff.  It feels like they have bought into their own binary narrative, when the world is more than "either-or".  There are cases where the availability of abortion on demand enables more, much more, oppression than it eliminates. 

I asked my grandfather, when I was in 6th grade, if he did that, if he pressured her to abort me, and if he really wanted me dead.  He said his baby girl was in a scary and dangerous place, and he just wanted to help her.  I saw in his face, that in my asking the question, he looked in some reverential fear at that moment toward the holy ground that he had transgressed when my mom was pregnant with me.  He saw a piece of the terribleness, of the just consequences of his actions.  He wished she had a different trajectory in life, but he had taken a presumptuous hand, he had committed the sin of hubris against something great, in what he had done.

If I write here, in this public forum, one that is searched and analyzed by many robots, by many actors, some of my other myths, then I will set myself up for harm.  There are things that most folks simply cannot process.  They have no capacity for thought in the domain, and only a pre-programmed response, and I can see that response from here.  I would tell you some of the others, as I figure them out, but not the government(s), not the business entities (A,G), not the employers or potential employee analytics firms, have any right to know or use abuses that happened against me as a child as weapons against me or against you.  They can't help themselves.  I see the clusters and chains in how the algorithms candidate youtube videos, or feed posts at either facebook or linked in.  The humans view through the broken lens of the machinery.  That eye doesn't capably measure itself, so it can't self-diagnose, or self-improve. 

Your lives are rich, and busy, and sometimes hard.  There is, thank God, so far, very little in the way of terrible.  The bears that mauled me, and your mom, you have not yet even seen them with your own eyes.  I like to think that is protection, but not over-protection.

I am going to have to re-read "Letters from Dad" and try this again.  I think that I have "departed from the way", though I didn't know it.  I sincerely hope to try again at this, and get it right.

I love you.  I delight in you.  I admire you.  You are the best of me.  You make me delight to work hard, and try and enable and empower you in life.  May you have a good and healthy life.  May God make you great, and make your life meaningful.  May your hearts be full of integrity, and may you do the best things.  You are blessings to me. Thank you.