so many connections . . .THE LAST LECTURE

Alice Storytelling was the turning point.

Kimberly tried to talk about Randy Pausch's inspirational celebration of life just a few weeks ago . . . We looked at each other--my thyroid-cancer-survivor child-heroine and I, daughter of another brave man who lost his battle with Randy's nemesis when he was Randy's age. We looked at each other. . . and moved on to safer thoughts, thoughts that would not drown us in memories old and not yet old enough.

I have run away from death and dying since losing Daddy, losing him the day Kimberly, his first grandchild, celebrated the six-month anniversary of her arrival in our lives.

But the connections were much too powerful this time. The Carnegie-Mellon connection--Kimberly's and Albrecht's alma mater. And Alice Storytelling, reminders of my own brief, unintentional-yet-intense love affair with artifical intelligence, the LISP parser, Kimberly's following that whimsical lead of mine into her own cognitive science major at CMU. Not that either of us continued down that particular road. But technology--the technology of storytelling--courses through our veins even now.

And the rocket on the cover of Randy's book? Man first stepped on the moon Daddy's last summer on our Earth. Jamie, his grandson and namesake, majored in aerospace engineering. His greatgrandsons are growing up even now with stars in their eyes, solar systems on their ceilings. Astronauts have signed books on our shelves, pictures on our walls. . .

I've downloaded Alice Storytelling--to unzip and explore another day perhaps. I smiled when I read it came with no support, to use at my own risk. Sentence-combining software memories, the stuff of which a PhD was crafted all those years ago on that whimsical path of mine. I'm not afraid of Alice, not at all. Maybe not even of dying, so much . . .

I've ordered Randy's book, two days in print and already backordered at Amazon.com.

I will read his book. I will celebrate his life. I will hope, when my turn comes to let go of the light, to make the most of that experience too. . .