So for me, hope is not like some abstract consideration. It's sort of a prerequisite for my survival, but I do understand it's kind of a funny fuzzy word. Like the word “hope” just has a slight, like, live laugh love connotation, not that there's anything wrong with living and laughing and loving. I-I'm just trying to understand what we actually talk about when we talk about hope. Anyway good morning Hank, it's Tuesday. Let's get a check of the weather. 

Even a grizzled melancholic weatherperson like myself has to acknowledge that it is absolutely glorious. Oh, also, I understand we have some breaking news. A couple weeks ago, a major work of art called a leaf emerged from the branches of this tree, and then over the next couple weeks several million more major works of art emerged, so that's nice. I think by hope I mean that I need to believe that consciousness is worth it. That, like, biological awareness, which of course comes with much misery and consternation and pain, is nonetheless valuable. It's valuable to learn about leaves, it's valuable to look up at the stars and try to figure out how and why and when and where they are. Even if that knowledge won't last forever because nothing lasts forever, I still think it's valuable. I think it's valuable to read Beloved and Othello. Or watching iCarly with your daughter. Yes, or watch iCarly with my daughter. Actually, I completely agree with you.

So when I talk about hope I guess I mean that I need to believe that love and connection and art and collaboration are, for lack of a better term, worth it? But I also mean I live and hope that the human story will go on, if not forever, a-and also that it will get better, if never anywhere close to perfect. Like, over the weekend I saw an elderly man receive a hat, and it was a very fancy hat. It was encrusted with all kinds of minerals and stuff, and the only thing all those minerals had in common is that they were from every corner of the Earth except the corner of the Earth where the elderly man in question lives. It was a very curious event, but it reminded me of how much can change because just a few centuries ago, we would have given that elderly gentleman not just the fancy hat, but also, like, absolute power over an entire kingdom. Making the hatman into a ceremonial position seems to me like real progress, albeit insufficient progress. There's still much injustice in how power and resources are distributed in our world, but still that doesn't negate the reality of progress.

These used to be pepper seeds in my bathtub, but now they're full-fledged pepper plants in my bathtub. almost ready to be planted in the garden. Margaret Atwood once wrote that very little in history is inevitable and I believe that. Uh-oh. [John sneezes] Oh no, sneezing isn't normal, I never sneeze. But right, so Margaret Atwood once wrote very little in history is inevitable, and I believe that. I-I I don't just think we can change the world together, I think we will and I believe in hope that we will change it for the better. And that's the kind of hope that, for me, holds up to scrutiny. The kind that sings the tune without the words and never stops at all.

So that's why I am, despite everything, like broadly in favor of humans. I look at what we can do together and I am awed. I am also horrified of course, but I need to make space for both of those realities like there needn't have been a hospital here. That's happening because tens of thousands of people from around the world and across every imaginable barrier have made it happen. But it is equally true that there should have been a hospital here many decades ago. Believe me, I understand the urge to simplify experience, and nothing is simpler than despair. But I don't think any simple story tells the whole story. So all hail complexity. 

Hank, I'll see you on Friday.