Everything but Wilson
My dad worked for a computer company when I was a kid, and I don’t really remember a time when we didn’t have a computer in the house. So finding out about the Johnny Castaway screensaver in my 30s feels like a tragedy.
For those who (like me one day ago) don’t know, Johnny Castaway is considered the “world’s first storytelling screensaver.” Instead of a digital fish tank or a bouncing icon that teases you into believing it might one day perfectly hit the corner, Johnny Castaway would do all kinds of things on his little island. Here’s a casual ten-hour recording of it if you have some time.
Was it a good story? Well, if you Google Johnny Castaway, one of the top results is “Did Johnny Castaway ever get rescued?” Seems like people were invested.
Floating Narratives
I recently read a story on the Come Follow Me Daily Substack that illustrates why filling in narrative gaps can be a problem.
I was in a science class and my teacher told us to write down everything that he did.
He got a ladder. He climbed up the ladder. He got a balloon. He went under the table. We heard a pop.
He asked me to read my writing on the events that occurred.
Easy—“You climbed the ladder, got the red balloon, went under the table, and popped the balloon.”
He then proceeded to blow middle school Mary’s mind by pulling out the red balloon, not popped. Then, he pulled out a popped blue balloon, which was under the table the whole time.
We as human beings naturally want to make sense of the world. We fill in blanks with narratives that make sense to us.
This reminds me of a plot line in an episode of Malcolm in the Middle. Lois, the mom of the family, works at a grocery store. On the drive home, she is pulled over by a police officer whom she had recently refused to give a free drink at the store. He tells her she cut someone off, but she insists he is just making up a story to get revenge for not giving him a free drink.
Watching the show, you can’t help but be firmly in Lois’ camp because you have been in the car with her the whole time. However, at the end of the episode, you see security footage from a different perspective. Just as the officer said, she had cut off a car without realizing it.
Side note: I just want to point out that it’s a little ridiculous for Lois to assume she couldn’t be guilty of bad driving.
To Infinity, but Not Beyond
The thing about stories is that they are finite. They are usually packaged into a nice little box. They give us closure. They orient us. And we love them for that.
We inherently make sense of the world through stories. But that means we unconsciously float narratives over story gaps to manufacture closure. We hate open endings. We like things to …
We should all do ourselves a solid by questioning the narratives that we assume are correct based on our worldview, experiences, or limited information.
Sentence of the Week
This week’s sentence comes from one of my favorite authors. Just be careful. It might introduce a thought that gets stuck in your head for a bit. Maybe you’ll ruminate on it in the shower or as you fall asleep.
I began thinking about my skeleton, this solid, beautiful thing inside me that I would never see.
― Mary Roach, Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers
Thanks for reading,
Braden