The color-blind naturalist

(If you see a number in this circle, then you are not one of us.)

I am willing to come out of the closet and tell the world that I don't see things the same way most people do.  Along with 7% of American males and 0.4% of American females, I am color-blind.  The genetic basis of this condition and the myriad of details surrounding the types of color-blindness are too esoteric for this post, and their description would bore most of you to drink (even more than you currently do).

Color-blind people are apparently interesting and curious to normal-sighted people.  Holding up some item at hand, the perennial question is always: "What does this look like to you?"  Come on.  Think hard about that question for a minute.  You are asking someone who does not see objects as you do what the world looks like.  The color-blind person could only describe the world as he sees it, not the way you see it, so no matter what the answer is, it will be of no value to you at all.  It is a ridiculous question, but non-color blind people ALWAYS ask it.  Do you do it just so you can laugh behind our backs?  To make yourself feel superior? I'm really sick of the ignorance of the colored-sighted persons.  It is high time that color-blindees stand up and complain about the bigotry and ignorance that exists in the U.S. toward those of us who happen to have been born with a weird density or arrangement of cones in the retina of our eyes.  This "defect" is not our fault, and being grilled relentlessly by our children, and now grandchildren, who try to teach us the colors by holding up those stupid Crayola crayons is not helping.  What the hell is mauve, anyway?

And besides, how do we know that an object that you say is "red" is really that color?  That is just the way YOU see it.  I see it differently.  Maybe I am correct, and the majority of people are incorrect.  Is it correct to call it red because more than 50% of humans say that is what it is?  Or, to get even more complicated.  Because I have been told all my life that the color of the shirt you are holding up is called "red", I may have learned to call it that, even though I see something very different from what you see.

To publicize the plight of color-blind persons, I propose we initiate a Special Olympics of sorts.  The main event, which would actually constitute an extreme sport for color-blindees, involves a railroad crossing in an actual rural setting. The exciting spectator part of this is that the umpires wait until a train is coming at full speed.  The umps hold up a green flag when it is safe to cross and a red flag when it is not safe.  If the contestant gets it wrong, they lose, big time. 

Actually, this railroad crossing event simulates what real life is like for us all the time.  Years ago, my brothers (who are both also color-blind) and I went grouse hunting in southern Ohio.  As we crossed an intersection in a small town, cars screeched to a halt from two directions and started blasting their horns.  We pulled the car over to see what the heck was wrong.  After studying the situation for a few minutes, we realized that the traffic light had the green light on top and the red light on the bottom.  Go figure.  It was Ohio.  Our M.O. had always been to drive through any intersection when the bottom light was on and stop when the top light was lit.  This had worked for years.  The color never mattered to us.  Whoops!  It matters in southern Ohio.  Was this some kind of trick to kill off color-blind innocents like us?  (By the way, in Romania and Turkey, color-blind people are not given a driver's license.)

I went through life bearing this burden from primary school until I was 40 thinking I simply saw objects slightly differently from other people.  Then, when we were on sabbatic in Costa Rica in the mid-80s, I was taking a hike with my son Matt along a trail in the Monteverde cloud forest.  At one point in the walk he said: "Dad, look at those red flowers on that plant."  I said: "What red flowers?"  And he patiently pointed out to me that there were dozens of red flowers all over a patch of some herbaceous plants about two feet tall immediately next to the trail.  I realized then that not only did I see colors differently from normal people, but that I was not seeing some objects at all.  Only two weeks ago, my wife was exclaiming about the red apples all over our tree about 50 feet from where we were standing.  I could not see a single apple unless I stood right next to the damn thing.  I have been quasi-depressed about this startling revelation ever since that day in Monteverde.

In 1968, I thought I might turn this handicap to my advantage.  I had received my draft notice to report to Uncle Sam.  You know, that uncle who has 300 million nieces and nephews.  The Vietnam War was at its peak, and the military took every body they could find.  I heard a rumor that they even picked up a road-kill deer at one point, because the body was still warm.  They probably figured the deer could at least serve as a company clerk.  So I thought I might fail my physical if I was color-blind and, thereby, not have to go into this dangerous situation.  I took my physical in Columbus, Ohio and, immediately after the eye exam, I asked the technician if I was color-blind.  His response: "Yep. Next."  I spent the next three years in the U.S. Army.

So I am a nature lover, and I have been all of my life.  But think how much more beautiful it would seem to me and to color-blind people everywhere if we actually saw the world in all its incredible, colorful reality.  Brilliant flowers and ripe fruits and autumn leaves on trees that we hear everyone exclaiming about.  And rainbows.  And blushing girls.  And birds.  And Christmas lights.  And even traffic lights.  Damn those deficient cones!

Senescence sucks: The virtues of Versed (part 4)

(When you see this guy coming, just say "Versed please".

Last week, I had occasion to be given an "ultra short-acting benzodiazepine derivative, which has potent anxiolytic, amnestic, hypnotic, anticonvulsant, skeletal muscle relaxant, and sedative properties"?  Of course, this was done under medical supervision at the hospital.  Don't try this at home.  The occasion was a procedure called an upper GI endoscopy, and it was conducted by the same doc that does my colonoscopy every five years.  Hopefully, he uses different instruments for each procedure; no double-dipping, please.  This most recent procedure involves having the specialist thread a tube with a small camera attached down your throat into the esophagus and into your upper digestive system to reconnoiter, take pictures, or even repair some problems.  This was recommended because of that hiatal hernia that I wrote about earlier. 

The barium swallow that I took several weeks ago was a preliminary look inside the problem area but, as my doc explained, the endoscopy procedure is the "gold standard" for examining that area of the human body.  I may not invest in gold when I trade online, but you can be damn sure I want the gold standard applied to figure out what to do about this hernia.  The doc and I sat in his office as we discussed all this.  It took only five minutes to explain the endoscopy procedure, and we spent 20 minutes talking about cigars, wines, and scotch.  I really like this guy!

Part of the reason the medical discussion went so quickly is because as soon as I learned that the patient is sedated with a drug called Versed, I needed to hear little more.  This is the same drug they used for the colonoscopies, so I was an old pro at this one.  Understand that I have never done recreational drugs in my life (well, there was that one time at the Delta Chi house), but I now go around to cocktail parties, wedding receptions, and bar mitzvahs giving free testimonials about Versed.  What is sad is that my testimonials are more interesting than most conversations at these events, so I always have good attendance in my corner of the room.  There are a few jock-types standing around the hors d'oeuvre table discussing the Yankees, but there are really impressive numbers in my corner where I am discussing my favorite ultra short-acting benzodiazepine derivative.

In short, and I'm obviously being very non-technical, Versed works not only by relaxing and sedating the patient, but it results in total amnesia about the event that occurred while you were under the influence of the drug.  You are completely awake during the procedure, you can answer questions, and you are able to respond to the medical team's directives, but you remember absolutely none of the gagging and swallowing of the tube.  Think about that for a moment.  You realize they are putting 2-3 feet of tubing down your throat while they are doing it, not a very comfortable thought, but when you recover from the drug, you can not remember a single second of the experience from the time they injected the IV drug until you recover. 

Think of all the times in your life you wish you would have been under the influence of Versed.  Your boyfriend breaks up with you.  The next day you feel great, because you don't know you have no boyfriend.  Your boss fires you, the next day you feel great, but you don't know you are unemployed.  The stock market crashes as it did last year, but the next day you feel normal, even though you have no money for retirement.  Wow!

But there are two problems with this antidote for life's miseries.  First, you don't know when these adversities are going to occur, so you would have to be on Versed all the time to gain the benefit.  On your 50th birthday, you wouldn't have any memories until before your 20th, when you began the Versed regimen.  And second, eventually you will realize you don't have a boyfriend, and that you're unemployed and broke.  At that point, you would probably employ Plan B, which is to partake of a more common drug of choice, alcohol.  So Versed is not a long-term solution to life's problems.  But when it comes to someone in a white coat sticking a tube into one of your body's orifices, it is fantastic.  Who needs to remember the details about that?

Plus, I have always adopted the view that life is mostly about creating memories, which you can draw on later in life.  In fact, bad memories may be better than no memories at all.  Memories enrich life, help us realize that our time was not spent for nothing, give us something to discuss over and over, and entertain us when we are alone.  They represent material for sharing with others. But when you see the doc comin at ya with a tube and a camera attached, just say "a benzodiazepine derivative, thank you very much".

Everyone is selling something all the time

(Listen.  This is the honest truth.  I'm not selling anything.)

As a behavioral ecologist, I have long believed the literal truth of the title of today's post.  It benefits each individual to convince others that they are trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean, and reverent.  Of course, not everyone is a Boy Scout at heart, but it is to their advantage to try to get others to believe that they are.  If I trust you, then I might buy a car from you, loan you money, give you a job, let you date my daughter, invite you to my party, give you a ride downtown, or tell you an important secret; if I trust you, there are a plethora of ways I might help you materially or help you enhance your status in the community.  As we shall see in future posts, status is everything in a species as social as ours.

But being a regular participant and reader of social networks over the past year has brought home to me this lesson most vividly.  The posts on any social networking site are mostly a barrage of salesmanship, of one form or another.  On Facebook, for example, I have become "friends" with several celebrities: Joan Lunden, Billy Bush, Craig Crawford, Tom Bergeron, Peter Greenberg, Michael Wolff, Alexis Glick, and others.  Those people are on FB for only one reason--to sell their tv show, or their next interview of Kate Gosselin, or their next appearance on the Bill Maher show, or their next book.  And any of us who read what they write are their intended consumer. 

Many of these salespersons, mostly the females, take the tact of describing how they spent the weekend with their adorable kids at the beach, and then came home to cook mac and cheese for their family, and then washed the dirty dishes with their husband after they put the kids to bed.  That is, she is trying to sell the image that she is a regular working mom, just like you.  The difference, of course, is that she has a weekly tv show, which she would appreciate you watching on Wednesday night, and she makes $500,000 per year (and is hoping for a raise to $1M next season).  The men tend to be less devious in their approach: "Watch me tackle the health care reform bill on Sunday morning on Meet the Press".  It sounds like a football game, and that is what REAL men do.  They tackle things.

Those of us who are not famous or well-known are, more often than not, doing the same thing within our own milieu, in our own way.  We are trying to be humorous, clever, intelligent, sexy, provocative, useful, ludicrous, outrageous, or interesting.  We play to our strengths on or off FB to "win friends and influence people", as the famous Dale Carnegie course promised decades ago to entrepreneurs who aspired to be successful. All of this is perfectly normal human behavior, but once you view the world this way, nearly everything you hear or read seems trite and hollow.  In fact, if we were all perfectly honest all the time, society as we know it would probably collapse.  The lies we tell and the myths we believe keep us sane and moving forward.  My current favorite is the investment company that advertises on tv and tells us how much they care and worry about us, how they want our financial future to be bright, to be able to send our kids to college, and to retire in style.  Bullhonky!  They don't know any of us and they couldn't care less about us as individuals.  They simply want to sell us their product.  You all know what I mean.  For fun, watch a couple of hours of tv tonight, including the commercials, and turn on your crap detector.  You will find it more amusing than the content of the show you tuned in to watch.

All of this can take a serious turn as well.  Bernie Madoff pulled off the largest financial scam of all time by selling his friends and acquaintances on his investment scheme.  I know some people who invested with him.  He was, apparently, a hell of a nice guy and everyone thought he was perfectly honest.  Not!  He was, however, very good at playing his role.

What is the point of all this cynicism?  Not sure.  It is just that the older you get, the more practiced you become at seeing through the morass of lies and half-truths.  The most difficult to discern are those lies told that the teller truly believes.  By definition, I guess those are not really lies, just untruths.  Natural selection must have favored individuals who are good at telling these self-serving stories, and good at selecting individuals who are able to detect their merit.  Another example of an evolutionary arms race.  Human behavior is about as interesting and entertaining as it gets.  And it is free.  Now, I must get back to trying to entice FB readers to visit this blog.  I love each and every one of you!

Car Rider: the deer who liked to ride in cars

(Would you share a ride with this deer in your Volvo?)

We have had many different kinds of pets over the years. I use the term “pet” very loosely, because many of these critters remained with us for a very short time, and they were not pets in the normal sense of that word. I will write about some of them in the future, if all of you behave yourselves.  During the past 40 years, we have had hawks, owls, foxes, rabbits, kangaroo rats, deer mice, gray squirrels, various salamanders and snakes, a red-eyed vireo, a black bear cub, and a black-tailed deer. And it is the latter animal that is the subject of this brief anecdote.

When I was studying Columbian white-tailed deer in southwestern Washington during grad school, Fred Lindzey, a fellow grad student, called me up and asked me to come over to his study area on the Washington coast. Fred was studying black bears on an island just off the coast adjacent to Willipa National Wildlife Refuge. Apparently, someone had raised a black-tailed deer fawn to yearling age, and it had become too much for them. The deer was hanging around refuge headquarters, so the personnel there thought it would be a good idea to get rid of the animal somehow. Fred immediately thought of me. I was only an hour away, I was studying a closely related species of deer on a deer refuge, we lived on the refuge, and there was plenty of space to turn the deer loose. Plus, he thought I might learn something by watching a black-tailed deer amidst a population of white-tailed deer. Sounded reasonable.

So I drove over to Willipa to pick up this deer in my Dodge truck. Now, this deer thought it was a dog or something, because it tried repeatedly to get through the front door of any house and, most curious of all, it would jump into the front seat of a car or truck if the door was left open. It actually liked to ride in moving vehicles. Thus, it was given the name “Car Rider”. In this instance, we encouraged the deer to jump into the back of the pickup truck and I drove it back to my study area on the deer refuge.

When I arrived back at the refuge, I promptly put a neck collar on the young male, similar to the one I used on my study animals. After a few hours of entertaining ourselves with this weird deer, I decided it was time to introduce Car Rider to his new home. I put him in the back of the truck and drove down the gravel road to the center of the 2,000 acre deer refuge, and released him. I began driving back to my house and after about 100 yards, I looked in the rear view mirror only to see that Car Rider was chasing after the truck and was only a few yards behind me. I couldn’t drive fast enough on this rough road to distance myself from him, so I ended up back at the house with a winded deer. Introduction of black-tailed deer to white-tailed deer population = failure!

The next morning I received a call from the refuge manager who wanted to meet with me in his office, which was about 3 miles on the other side of the refuge. I got in the truck, and drove about 45 miles per hour to his office. The road made a bend about half way there where I needed to bear right to get to his office; another small road took off to the left at the bend, and this was the only other road that intersected the route I took. About 20 minutes into our meeting, we got a phone call from Hobie's grocery store in Skamokawa, the tiny town nearby, that they had a very hot and tired deer standing in their store with a white collar around its neck. Damn! Car Rider had apparently tried to follow my truck, unbeknown to me, but I had been able to drive fast enough to put enough distance between us so that when he got to the bend in the road, he went left instead of right and ended up at the store.

Needless to say, my cohabitation with this deer had already become an untenable situation. At this point I was cursing Fred Lindzey, because I had little time for all this. In the end, I found that research biologists with the Washington Department of Game needed a trainable deer for a food habits study, and that is where Car Rider was sent. What a dear.