Field Notes from a Life

In February, Mrinank Sharma, an AI researcher who had been deeply involved in the development and safety evaluation of advanced artificial intelligence systems, resigned from his position. In his resignation letter, Sharma expressed concern that the rapid pace of technological progress was outstripping our collective ability to cultivate the wisdom needed to manage such power responsibly. He warned that society risks falling behind on the moral and philosophical challenges that come with new technologies. That concern is not unreasonable. Many people working close to advanced technology have reached a similar conclusion. What was striking about Sharma’s departure, however, was not the diagnosis but the tone. His statement moved quickly away from the language of engineering, governance, or policy and toward poetry and spiritual reflection, quoting writers such as Rainer Maria Rilke and Mary Oliver. The implication seemed to be that the solution to our technological moment lies not prim...

Yesterday morning, in the wee hours, my neighbor Gloria died. In the late afternoon, J bought a beautiful arrangement of flowers, and we went next door to sit with the family, a Mexican custom. I left before the recitation of the rosary began. In keeping with Mexican tradition, firecrackers went off now and then to announce the death. For a moment, it felt like New Year’s Eve, that strange overlap when something ends and something else is just beginning. One of Gloria’s grown children, my neighbor Victor, sat with a downcast expression. He’s a hard worker, providing for Gloria, his wife, and their three kids. On top of that, he’s building another floor onto the family house. In the midst of growing, building, and expanding, there was a death. Gloria had been ailing for some time and had been bedridden for a few months. I’m sure that, along with the sadness of losing her, there was some relief that she was no longer suffering or in pain. The growing family will put the additional space ...

Sunday afternoon, during the Virgin de Guadalupe celebration on my street, a small brown dog followed us on our walk with our five dogs. We chased him away, and he retreated, but when we returned home at the end of our walk, he was still running and scared. Indigenous tribal dancers pounded on loud drums; a truck with huge speakers blared music for the loco dancers, and fireworks. The little dog was shivering and running on adrenaline. I couldn’t just leave him like that in the street, so I crouched down and picked him up. At home, I lifted him into a spare crate in the garage, away from my own pack of dogs, the cat, and the parakeets. The moment the blanket fell over the crate, creating a little den, the little dog, whom I named Koni (Czech for “grasshopper”), let out a long sigh and fell asleep. A scared dog doesn’t want wide-open freedom. He wants containment and a feeling of being held. Later, I tried to let him roam freely in the garage, but he panicked and began scratching at the...

Dulci is a complex and challenging dog. She’s probably a mix of Basenji, Husky, and Podenco. Each of these breeds was shaped by landscapes that demanded self-reliance, intensity, and vigilance. From the Basenji, Dulci has inherited a quick-reactive temperament and an almost feline sensitivity to space, touch, and sudden changes. Basenjis are clever and independent, dogs who feel things acutely and express those feelings in fast, clear bursts. They are not built for long fuses. From the Husky, she has the athleticism, the high energy, the instinct to chase, and the strong-willed streak that made northern dogs capable of pulling sleds through storms. Huskies are social but excitable, and once their adrenaline rises, it’s difficult for them to shift back into calm. Dulci’s tendency to get swept up in play — and then overwhelmed by it — echoes this lineage. And then there’s the Podenco element, common in this part of the world: desert runners bred for speed, alertness, and stamina. Podenco...

One of the headlines in today’s Guardian was the announcement that the search for Malaysia Airlines Flight MH370 will resume after eleven years, which resonated with me for some reason that I couldn’t immediately name. But with reflection, I figured it out. A missing plane is not only a tragedy and a mystery, but also a disruption in the narrative flow. When a flight takes off, the arc of the story is supposed to be simple: departure, journey, arrival. It’s a story with such a predictable shape that we hardly think of it as a story at all. But when that arc suddenly ends in midair, what’s left for the families is a kind of suspended grief — a narrative suspense that lasts for years, even decades. They cannot finish the story of the people they loved.   And so they wait for the ending, the last page, the missing line that will let them breathe. I felt the same resonance last week when I finished Dead Mountain, the account of the Dyatlov Pass Incident of 1959. Nine young hikers died ...

We celebrated Thanksgiving a bit differently this year. J’s work schedule on Thursday made it difficult to prepare a traditional meal in one day. I also wanted to enjoy cooking without rushing, so we spread the meal over two days. On Thanksgiving Day, we had what I called “the appetizer course” — small, comforting dishes that didn’t require hours in the kitchen. The rest of the feast was saved for Friday, when I was more relaxed and could cook at my own pace. When dinner was ready, I set the table with dishes my ancestors used. I placed the roasted chicken, bright orange squash, and gravy in bowls and platters that once belonged to my maternal grandmother, Geri Schmieman. Our dinner plates came from my maternal great-grandmother, Margaret Wayer. They were shipped to me last year by a cousin, who carefully wrapped them for shipping. They had sat in her attic for decades. We used them for the first time tonight. As far as anyone knows, they haven’t been used in over fifty years. That’s a...