Colorado

I have taken more than a few trips back to Colorado, where I spent my formative years.  Well, not all that numerous, a few volleyball trips and the once per decade high school reunion trips. 

I went back there again this past week for an IEEE site visit.  Since I am the general chair for the ECCE 2013 conference, I had to go to check out the venues and look at the hotels. It was a boondoggle to beat all boondoggles.  I was wined and dined and I got to stay at a very nice suite in the Hyatt.  It's good to be the king!

Being back in Denver aroused a lot of nostalgia and a mixed bag of feelings both good and bad.  I did not realize just ho wmuch I missed the rockies, until I see them again.  I did not realize just ho wmuch I missed the west, untilIi see the wide open prairies and the wide open ethos of the place.  I did not realize how much I missed the vibrancy of Denver, until I walked the streets of LoDo and Larmer Square.  I suppose I will feel the same way when I eventually make it out to the mountains and hike around the mountains. 

It was pretty amazing to be driven from the Denver International Airport to downtown Denver and I had The Eagles, Fleetwood Mac, Peter Frampton flowing through my brain: the soundtrack of my youth.  The fashion sense, actually the lack of fashion sense never made an appearance.  So, in my short ride to Denver I relived my seven short years in Denver in my head.  Recalling friends, family, neighbors, and classmates.  It was both emotional and melancholy, recalling those who have left this earth and those who have become lost through the unrelenting march of time. 

Values was a big operative word a few years ago.  Religious leaders pounded on the theme of values as the key to our daily existence.  While I agree with the fact that there needs to be a fundamental basis for one's actions, values seem to me the wrong word choice.  To me values are transient fads, based on base principles but subject to the on rush of trend, cultural expediency, and the direction of the wind.  I believe that principles, while seemingly identical to values, is the better and more permanent word.  It implies a dynamic and living yet also implies permanent personal philosophy.

The main difference is that principles are often and necessarily challenged by those who try to live by their principles.  Those that can withstand the test of time are principles, values are those that wanders with the onrush of time.  All too often, people will stand by their values as if they were principles, the key is that they will cling to the values and not challenge the premise or the underlying belief of the value.  This zealotry in homogeneous thought leads to dogmatism and has led the human civilization into intractable wars and ponderous institutions like organized religion and major political parties.  As history has shown, zealotry serves no one positively in the long term.  it may give some the justification short term for acting selfishly, but it serves humankind adversely in almost all instances. 

On the other hand, a nihilistic view of guiding structure and wisdom creates chaos and confusion.  Not believing in anything is believing in nothing.  While relativism serves a great role in philosophical thought experiemntation, and does reveal a certain amount of truth, a moral system based on constantly changing foundations mean inpermanence and volatility of the moral center.

So it seems that a firm walk down the middle of the extremes would be the wisest and safest route.  Yet the adherence to the middle also becomes zealotry and dogma in and of itself. 

Whoever said life was easy.