Whither Good Enough?

(graphic from - & explained - here)

When I first decided - it's been well over a decade now, maybe a decade & a half - to start a blog to explain why exactly I chose the themes I covered for the show - & believe me, some people really want an explanation as to why this is the theme right now - I honestly thought it would be more interesting than it has become. Because - sorry to bore you - but mostly the themes come at me randomly because of music I am listening to. Or so it seems.

Sometimes I pretend it's serendipity, or "the universe talking to me," but really it's kind of lazy. "Oh hey, several songs I've recently listened to mention the phrase good enough! I wonder if there's enough for a radio show!" One reason I think some people prefer The Dickenbock Report is because its themes are because there's a national day for it, or it's some artist's birthday, things like that. It makes sense sort of. It's not arbitrary. A Self Help Radio episode with the theme "good enough" is happening because - I thought it might be a good theme & I found enough songs. That's not exciting or interesting in any way.

How will it turn out? You will need to listen. Tonight! Midnight to 2am. On 90.7fm in Portland & online everywhere at kboo dot fm. Like most of my shows it might not be all that good, but for tonight at least it'll be good enough.

Preface To Good Enough: How Good Is Enough

(image from here)

In 1986, in my first year of college, I took an Introduction To Philosophy course. I thought I was supposed to be interested in philosophy, but found it hard to read the texts & - though I didn't want to admit it - realized my mind was mostly bored but otherwise confused by philosophy as it was taught. What I remember most about the class was sitting next to a cute woman with whom I talked about the Smiths - who were my obsession at the time - & who, after I made her a Smiths tape, offered to give me a book she had made - with her boyfriend - which consisted of a bunch of images from pornographic magazines - mainly close-ups of genitals - as a thank you. I'm not sure what sort of reaction she expected from me, but I was a bit horrified. I gave her the book back & said I wasn't interested in it.

How I wish I knew the name of the professor of that class so I could tell him - it was a man, an exhausted but smug man - that I remember nothing about his class except that strange interaction with a lovely punk rock girl. I should also tell you, she & her boyfriend made me a tape of American punk from the mid-1980s & I discovered I didn't enjoy that as much as British punk from the late 1970s.

This is just to say that early on in my life I wearied of questions like "Is this good enough?" or "Am I good enough?" Which is to say, questions one asks in philosophy classes. I know too many people who really, really, really, really want to finish sentences like, "Good is..." or "Enough is..." They would love to dispense wisdom in the same way they see/hear/read it dispensed in books, from religious texts to opinion pieces. As I get older - & I know this makes me absolutely irrelevant in our culture - I refuse to express my opinions as absolutes. I am certainly not a relativist but I find it tiring that everyone not only needs to have an opinion about everything but that they need that opinion to be right. Correct. True.

Here's an example from someone who doesn't talk to me anymore. I posted something on the Facebook by a current comedian. This former friend responded, "That person isn't as funny as he thinks he is."

Imagine the inflated ego of someone who would write that! Not - "I don't think that person is funny" - but reaching out to judge the humor of someone they really don't know.

Must I add that the person whose comedy I posted on Facebook is successful, does stand-up, has a podcast, is well-known, while my former friend is... someone you'll never hear anything from?

You might surmise I titled this post "How good is enough" as a reason to stumble through this clumsy explication of my lack of interest in being someone who speaks "truths." It's not. I titled it before I knew what I would write. I sometimes wish I could be the critic that writes snarky shit as if it were fact. That stuff amuses me greatly, even when - especially when - I disagree with it.

But I confess I feel sad for those folks who think they know the Truth. If you follow them long enough, read what they write, you realize they themselves find their own idea of Truth malleable. Not that they're hypocrites - just that they don't realize their opinions are just opinions. They want them to be facts so they act like they're facts. But they're not facts, so they end up as slightly puffed-up opinions.

Which is probably a disservice. The average opinion is just glad to be heard, it doesn't need to be turned into a Holy Fact.

Oh shit look what I did that. I turned my (obviously dumb) opinion into a fact. Fuck me. I want to tell you this has something to do with this week's show but - nope!