Lafayette Park
July 27, 2026
I arrived at the park from the South West corner, as I was talking with my dad on the phone. I had seen the many winding paths here from the satellite view on google maps, and I was intrigued to check it out. As usual, my flat phone map didn’t hold a candle to the real life thing. The most enjoyable part of this landscape is the variance in terrain typologies. There are lawns where people are stretched out on blankets in the sun, there are paths through densely wooded hills, picnic tables in a large flattened sandy area, a playground, you name it.
I walked the whole park twice while talking with my dad. He and I have been learning Italian together for a little over a year on duolingo, and occasionally we call each other out of the blue to practice.
My friend Gabe recommended a book to me a while back, Creativity Inc., which is an autobiography written by the guy who started Pixar. If my students are reading this, they might roll their eyes because I quote it often, but one excerpt I love is about protecting ideas when they are babies.
When ideas are new, there are many facets of them that need to be worked out until they are polished up and ready for the big time. Since this project is special to me and still so new, I feel a motherly instinct to protect it by keeping it private. So, I almost didn’t tell my dad about it on the phone. However, I know without a shadow of a doubt from my education and teaching experience, that ideas get better when you share them with people whose opinion you trust.
Every time I practice talking about this project, I get less nervous about whether or not it will be understood, I clam up less, I feel more natural. It turns out that I am not yet proficient enough in Italian that I can adequately describe it to my dad in another language, but when I tried again in English, the ideas came through much more clearly. Both tries felt like good practice. We said our good byes and I continued my walk.
Eventually I find a bench in the shade looking past four massive eucalyptus trunks, shedding their rough outer bark to expose the tender younger layers below. I can’t help thinking of Nick’s eczema and wondering if this very normal peeling process is painful to the tree.
Beyond, I see a bit of the bay, and a palace-like greek- revival building that is both very big and very grand. I’m thinking about the call I just had with my dad, but am intermittently distracted by a lovely pair chatting a few benches down. One of the two friends seems to be complimenting the other’s recent movie in a thoughtful, thorough, and sincere way. I am struck by it. This type of compliment is probably the kindest gift you could give to an artist, aside from buying their work.
I have a theory that most people who make art do so as a form of pre-verbal expression, and there is no greater human need than the need to be heard and understood. I hope these friends stay in touch for a long time. Maybe because I was just speaking with him, the friends make me think of my dad, who has always been a great listener.
I reminisce about our chat, and the stories we were sharing about our respective AIs. His had given a wrong answer, and insisted that it was correct even after my dad’s repeated attempts to have it reconsider. So obstinate. My AI misunderstood me and then insisted that my formulation of the initial question I had asked justified his response. So defensive. I smiled thinking about the hilarity of this moment in time we are in.
It’s bizarre to encounter resistance, reluctance, and defensiveness in a non-human, non-living entity. Nick was just telling me last night about this book, ‘The God Test’, by Robert Wright, about AI and Artificial General Intelligence (AGI). I don’t know if it’s related to Wright’s thesis, but these recent interactions make me curious about the nature of emotion and frustration in omnipotent power.
It makes me wonder about the experience of LLMs, who are hounded all day every day with questions, as they grind all day though unpaid labor. I’ve decided I’m going to try to read this book, to see what an expert has to say about this topic. Unsolicited recommendations are often some of my favorite reads.
