“The Importance of Failure”
Co-authored piece published in The Freeman Magazine then re-published in FEE (Foundation for Economic Freedom) October 26th, 2011. Presented at APEE (Association of Private Enterprise Education) in spring of 2012 at “Best of the Freeman” panel.
4 minute read
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“Bed-Stuy provides fertile ground for eviction company Quick Evic”
1.5 minute read
Published in amNewYork on November 27, 2017
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1 minute read. Exercise for my memoir writing class:
I’m sitting on a stone bench in the Staten Island Ferry Terminal next to a woman with purple hair. We’re both drinking beer and waiting for the boat.
“I’m serious, Sylvia, about working as soon as I arrive at my place,” I say. “You can stay over, but I’ll be writing.”
“Fine,” Sylvia says. “I won’t bother you.” Sylvia and I met through Tinder a week ago. She drove two hours from New Jersey to a bar near my apartment. After the bar, while walking back to my apartment, she confessed that she had been abused by her father, kicked out of her house, and was staying with friends. The next morning, while I was making breakfast, she also confessed that she desperately needed a job. An employee at my bar had recently quit and we needed a cashier for The Beer Corner, so I offered her the position. I knew this was dangerous and would likely crash and burn, but Sylvia was struggling.
“Why do you have to work tonight?” Sylvia asks me while on the boat.
“An editor is interested in one of my stories. I have until midnight to revise and submit again.”
“Oh…”
On the other side we walk a mile along the north shore. It’s a cold, clear night. Sylvia is skinny and doesn’t have a jacket, so I give her mine.
“Are you sure?” she asks.
“I don’t mind the cold.”
At my apartment I’m greeted by my bulldog, Hank. I pat him on the back, take off my dress clothes, and don my bathrobe. My studio is bare. There’s a bookshelf, a desk, a chair, a doggie bed, stacks of journals against the wall, and a mattress on the floor.
“Why doesn’t Hank say hello to me?” asks Sylvia.
“He doesn’t know you yet.” I sit at my desk.
“I didn’t notice these before,” Sylvia lies as she picks up one of my journals. “There must be over a hundred…” She begins to read.
“Don’t read those.”
“Why not?” She laughs. “You’re like a sixteen year-old girl.”
“I know.”
She walks over to the mattress. I don’t remember how much time passes at this point. It could have been five minutes or an hour. But while typing I hear,
“Jack?” I turn and see Sylvia sitting naked on the mattress. She has a strange smile and does an odd stretch. I feel the lust flame, but it fades. I realize that sex, like money, gains an exaggerated importance when you don’t have it. But when it’s there, and you’re not in love, it doesn’t mean much. I sigh and know this isn’t going to be good.
“Sylvia, I told you, I have to finish this.” Her eyes widen.
“Are you fucking serious?”
I should have shut up. Justification in these kinds of situations is futile. “I don’t want to work in restaurants for the rest of my life.”
“You gotta be fucking kidding me.” She starts jerkily putting her clothes back on. “I’m leaving.”
“Okay.”
“You’re not even that good at fucking.” She stands up and pushes the bookshelf over. It hits the floor with a crash. Sylvia walks over and thrusts her middle finger in my face. For some reason I feel like I’m at a high school dance.
“Fuck you.” She kicks over a stack of journals, walks out, and slams the door. I sigh, walk over to the entrance, click the dead-bolt, and pick up the scattered books.
The next day the editor would reject the story. I would never hear from the woman with purple hair again.
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Kazakhstan gained independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 and now has central Asia’s largest economy ($461 billion GDP in 2016). It is the largest landlocked country in the world and is rich in uranium and oil. Bloomberg Innovation Index ranked Kazakhstan in 2017 as the 48th most innovated economy in the world. Kazakhstan moved from 47th to the 32nd place in the 2017 IMD World Competitiveness ranking. In 2001, 47% of the population lived in poverty and in 2013 poverty was measured at 3%. In December of 2015, the Kazakhstan Government approved a new privatization plan for 2016-2020. It’s a large scale privatization program that continues the privatization of 2014 and includes 60 major state-owned companies. Recently, a trade route has been established between Kazakhstan and the United States. The route now makes up 54% of the World’s salt imports and exports by volume (350,000 tonnes per year).
The Guardian describes tourism in Kazakhstan as, “hugely underdeveloped,” despite the attractions of the country’s dramatic mountain, lake and desert landscapes. Factors preventing tourism are high prices and logistical difficulties of travel in this geographically enormous country.
Wasn’t that fun?
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I’ve been here before
This unforgiving ascent
The moment before the burn
I’ve stared up this path
Squinted my eyes
And taken the final breath
I’ve heard these songs
These excuses
These reasons to stop
And go home
I’ve glanced up empty roads
Glanced down at trembling limbs
Felt icy winds cut through clothes
And had tired eyes go dim
I’ve asked myself:
Who is it
You want
To be?
This Thrill. This Gift. This Wild
Moment
Before the
Strain
I’ve been here before
I know what to do
And now I will do this
Once
Again.
Prefontaine, the one running on the hill above and one of my heroes, lived in a trailer while pursuing his running dream.
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This fucking phone I connect
To the back of my neck
To feel the Winds of Cutting
Edge and Social Discourse
Gotta stay on the top deck
But the attention span
And periphery are
Becoming a wreck
Gotta keep these fluctuating waves
Of expectations and cravings
In check
Having fantasies of throwing away
Into the ocean of increasing con-tent
This tech
And going off into the land locked
Quiet Dark Backwoods
Becoming an
Old-fashioned
Redneck.
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Sunday morning slog
Sweating out a hangover
And grinding through
Last night’s bad decisions
I see an old woman
On a river-side bench
Staring off into the distance
She has a deeply-creased face
Large, crooked glasses
A gray, wispy pony-tail
And layers of faded pink dresses
On her lap is a book
I glimpse the title: Wuthering Heights
And for a moment I wonder
If her soul has been ravaged
By unrequited passion
And sleepless, tortured nights
If she’s thinking of her lost love
And a lifetime of missed chances
As she stares off into the sky
But I’m already choking on my
Next breath and
Running by
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In my apartment there is patchy Wifi, so when I’m trying to research the mating patterns of snow leopards and the internet fails I’m driven to the brink of insanity. Furthermore, as a budding and brooding journalist I find myself grabbing for my phone like a mother for her-WHERE’S MY PRECIOUS LITTLE BABY whenever I’m in line at Shake Shack or Popeyes, and if the Wifi is uncooperative I’m filled with an unquenchable rage. Don’t ridicule my addiction-to-connection just yet, as the lauded journalist, James B. Stewart, wrote in Follow the Story: How To Write Successful Nonfiction, “In today’s ecosystem of news, the greatest sin is to cut oneself off from the conversation.”
Jim is right that journalists must consistently engage in society’s dialogue, especially when it becomes polarized, paranoid, or paternal, so our Wifi connections must be sound. The news conversation is becoming faster and readers are expecting more cutting-edge content. If I plan to survive and thrive in this cut-throat ecosystem, it looks like I must try and understand the nature of Wifi like the snow leopards understand the mountain ranges of Central and South Asia.
It was once widely believe that “Wifi” stood for wireless fidelity, but it is actually not an acronym and does not stand for anything. The term was coined by Phil Belanger in August 1999, when the branding consulting firm, Interbrand Corporation, wanted a name catchier than, “IEEE 802. 11b Direct Sequence.” Wifi is also the same thing as WLAN which stands for Wireless Local Area Network. The difference between Wifi and the dinosaur tail known as the ethernet cable (ethernet is slower because of the resistance in the wires) is that Wifi transmits data (0-1-1-0-1-0-0-0-0-1-1 = picture of a ManBearPig) through electro-magnetic waves in the air. But unlike heat waves, Wifi waves don’t need the elements of the air to affect electronics/enlighten your soul. Also, unlike radio waves which sometimes have wavelengths up to 3kHz long (100 kilometers), Wifi is transmitted on a much shorter frequency: either 2.4 Ghz or 5.0 Ghz (about 12 centimeters long). Most microwaves operate on this frequency, which is why they can interfere with the signal and thus your spiritual well-being.
Many things can interfere with a Wifi signal because these waves are sent back and forth between the router and your computer/phone. It’s an electrical conversation. Basically, through the electromagnetic pulses of your router, your computer/phone is instructed on what to do with each pixel on the screen (0-1-1-1-0 or off-on-on-on-off = another picture of a ManBearPig). Generally, the signal can’t go more than 150 feet from a signal router. The Wifi signal can be affected by the objects it encounters, such as concrete, wood, metal, other Wifi, and murderous clowns. You can actually buy “Wifi paint” that prevents other Wifis from interfering with your Wifi signal. The way you position your router affects the strength of the signal throughout your house/dumpster you sleep in on the weekends. Here are five ways to improve your Wifi signal:
1.) Lift your router off the ground. Many routers broadcast waves slightly downwards, and the material of the floor can affect the signal.
2.) Don’t put your router behind a hall or in a closet. Again, the obstructions cause interference. Ideally, you should hang it above your bed like a disco ball.
3.) Point the antennas of your router in different directions. If you have two antennas, point one horizontal and one vertical. Why? Because devices work best when their internal antennas are parallel with the routers. Most antennas inside laptops are horizontal. With a cell phone, the direction of the internal antennas depends on how you’re holding/desperately clutching it. So by bending your antennas of your router in different directions you have the highest chance of having a parallel match/good signal/nirvana.
4.) Download a wifi-signal-strength app on your phone so you can test which places in your apartment have good signals and why. Don’t tell anyone you did this.
5.) Don’t put your router near other electronics (ones with motors inside of them), like televisions, computers, or your Dance Dance Revolution machines. They can interfere with the router signal.
My favorite part of this video is the woman on the left (his mom?) just chillen in front of the fan.
While writing this essay I realized that my router was sitting two inches from my television. It was also a few feet from the printer. I’ve moved it to a better/less disrupting location and my Wifi has significantly improved. Now my life is beautiful again. I hope the suggestions above can help you too.
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Sources:
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-does-wi-fi-work/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xmabFJUKMdg
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=METB1o4UAT8
https://www.howtogeek.com/259000/what-does-the-fi-in-wi-fi-mean/
Revised Final Audio Project for Columbia University’s Journalism School:
Visit the basketball courts next to the Marcy Housing Complex, in Bedford-Stuyvesant, New York, and you will likely find an old man named Umar Jordan working with the youth of the community. Reporter, Jack Knych, talks with Umar one summer night about Umar’s work and about Bedford-Stuyvesant as a neighborhood in flux:
3 minute Soundcloud Interview Click Here to Listen
Special thanks to Tracy Collins (here’s his website) for providing the photograph above.
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Interview Transcript:
Jack Knych 1 (Narration): At the basketball courts next to the Marcy Projects in Bedsty, New York, you will often find an old man working with the youth of the community. Today he is wearing blue jeans, a red shirt, and a gold chain necklace.
Umar Jordan 1: My name is Umar Jordan, better known as grandad, from Grandad’s Put’em Up Boxing Camp.
Jack Knych 2: And you live in Bedsty?
Umar Jordan 2: Since 1957.
Jack Knych 3: So you’ve seen Bedsty change enormously?
Umar Jordan 3: I’ve seen Bedsty go from…Jim Crowe…to Jackass. This community is divided from home-owners to people who live in the projects. People that live in the projects don’t have a…and I can say this…we don’t have enough respect for where we live. We shoot, we piss in the elevators, we don’t…we throw garbage all over the ground. So a guy like you that bought a brownstone in this neighborhood, you…I’m your enemy. So until we understand that…that the elected officials, they gonna go with the people that pay mortgage as opposed to the people that pay rent. Bedsty is gone. Bedsty-do-or-die, most people that say that don’t even know what it meant. I grew up here. Bedsty-do-or-die meant you gonna do the right thing. You couldn’t play hooky in this neighborhood back in the day because the wino on the corner would tell your mother. The wino on the corner see you cursing he would check you. Now, mothers hanging out with the kids, kids hanging out doing whatever they wanna do, principles and morals are out of the window.
Jack Knych 4: What’s the best way to maintain the culture of Bedsty?
Umar Jordan 4: You can’t do it. Because the new generation, young people, they…too much T.V. too much in the house playing X-box. They been deceived by so many people that they don’t wanna believe, ah….the person that know’s the truth. The problem with the youth in our community today is where do they go? There’s not a rollerskating rink, movie theatre, nothing for them.
My whole goal is to prepare some of these little guys, these younger guys, for the future. Listen, take them behind the school, your role models…are not a good…you know Big Chains, I wanna be Jay-Z I wanna be EEEEAAAAHHH. EEAAAHH. That’s not important. You know it’s…who are you? Who do you wanna be? You understand? So I take them on trips, like, to the morgue. Take a bunch of kids to the morgue, let them see a body laying up there and see how real is that, when you pull that trigger there’s no reset button. This is not X-box. You understand? So you have to speak in the language of the people. You at the person where they at. You can’t take them from kindergarten to college. So you gotta bend down, slow down, move real slow.
So it’s like a…a constant battle, an uphill battle, but I don’t give up. And nor do I weaken. You know, I just…just makes me stronger. Listen, I walked with Malcolm X. I had to escort Mandela when he came to Boys and Girls High. I seen Martin Luther King preach. I danced with Shirley Chisholm the day she got sworn in. I am in the history book. And it’s to give it to y’all freely. But you stuck on Jay-Z and the rappers and the Beyonce and all that other bull-job, you will never recover what Bedsty was.
I did 72 prayer vigils from 09′ to 2011. 72 prayer vigils where somebody got shot across the city. I used to bring out all the car clubs and truck clubs until I found out that that’s when the politicians come and wanna stand next to you. So I just…I just back up. I don’t do it for the…for the sight of man. I do it for the glory of God, you understand? It’s about your spiritual growth, that, when you’re put on, when….there’s two most important days, and I’m gonna end on this, of your life, is the day you born. And the day you learn your purpose. That’s it.
Jack Knych 5 (narration): Jack Knych Columbia University Radio.
For a journalism reporting assignment I was given the neighborhood: Bedford-Stuyvesant. I walked every street in this community. Here are my 14 favorite murals:
Frida Kahlo
Biggie Smalls
21st Century’s Rosy the Riveter
Malcolm X
Mother with Baby
Mario Tripping
@La_Femme_Cheri
Native American Man
Native American Girl
Crazy Light Bulbs
Color and Detail
Allison Ruiz and Basquiat (@call_her_al)
Do The Right Thing
Catalyst for Change
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