Good morning, John.
Going Pizza John Classic today.

So we're all in agreement that speed is relative, and you say that you ran those 17 miles slowly, but just so you know, to me, and probably many of the people watching this, any speed at all, after running 16 miles, is effectively infinite. I have not, in my entire life of 41 years, run more that 1 mile at a time. Like, if you add all of my running up, I bet you get above 17. 

John, the fact that you 've put together some system of willpower great enough to somehow keep you exercising and gaining all of the physical and mental benefits that come along with that, honestly, it's kind of inspirational. Like, that's not something that I've been able to do, but I feel like you make me feel like I could do it. And honestly, bro, you are a pretty inspirational guy, a thing I was reminded of when I listened to the most recent episode of "Heavyweight", a podcast. It was titled, "John"--you are the "John" in question, which is a little weird.

I can't believe that after 15 years of telling stories on the internet, you still had that story. It made me think a lot about how big our world is and how no one has the capacity to care about everything, and that's ok.

Everything is a lot of things. And you can quote me on that.

John, I have a friend who just got sick with covid, and she's fine, she's vaccinated, she's young, she's going to be okay. But of course she feels like absolute garbage and also, she told me that she feels really frustrated. Like, all of the last 2 years of being careful were for nothing, because she still got covid! A frustration that I understand. But (and I didn't say this to her, it's just a thing that it made me think, along with the podcast episode), we haven't spent the last 2 years wearing masks and enduring lock-downs and being careful in order to eliminate the possibility of getting covid as an individual. Like, maybe at one point that's what we thought we were doing, but we can't eliminate the possibility completely; it's always going to be there. We are lowering the probability that any individual person will get it, because that slows down the spread overall.

Everyone's got lower odds, but some people are going to get unlucky. And it is probably true that if she hadn't done any of this stuff, she would have got covid the same number of times. But even leaving behind the fact that 1) She's vaccinated now and so it's going to be less severe, and 2) Like, maybe she would have gotten covid multiple times, because that can happen. The real point is that we think of ourselves as individuals, but the world acts on us as a collective.

Think of it like voting in a big election. Like, I am under no illusions that my 1 vote in a red state with 3 electoral votes was going to have an impact on the presidential election. But I still did it. Because everybody thinks, "Well my 1 vote won't matter", then no one votes, and that's not a very good democracy.

So why this anecdote in the middle of this video? Well, because, you've been caring about a person for years; who you would have had no connection with if not for a very peculiar, specific moment in your life. And there are so many other people like that, but it's not on any individual to care about everything; to do everything. To never get covid, to launch a space telescope, to decrease maternal mortality in Sierre Leone, to teach every student, or plumb every house, treat every patient, deliver every package, plant every tree, or cook every meal. We do all of these things in a web of care. And if all of us extend our care out a little bit more, yeah, that does make the web catch more things.

But we don't need to care about everything, because everything is too many things. And I don't need to care about everything because that's actually a kind of selfish thought. That's what other people are for.

Like, regardless of your wonderful, lovely depth of care for the person in your story-- whether that was there or not, he was cared for. And that seems wrong to me, but it is not wrong. Like, don't people need my care specifically? But no, usually they don't. Even saying the words, as I have done several times, "I don't need to care about everything" makes me feel gross. Like, it sound callous.

But I'm not saying that the things I don't focus on in my everyday practice aren't worthy of care. I'm saying that they don't need my care. I can, and need to, trust my fellow members of the web to do their care. I have to, because it is a good thing that we don't have to care about everything; not least because we can't.

John, I'll see you tomorrow.