Log: The Comma Directory

I've meant to write (and I always mean to write) about our arrival to Bath—which has been truly revitalizing and has offered some harmonious continuity to our time in Devon and Selgars Mill.

However, I have been occupied in the pruning and clipping of previous Comma Directory entries that, over time, seem to have grown unwieldy, outgrowing the categories and sub-categories we have plotted them into. It has taken me some time, and it has got me thinking.

Curatorship is a topic that has long interested me, and it has become more and more pertinent in navigating the complexities we encounter—growing complexities—many would say, as the world grows more and more complex with AI, a changing climate, the threat of war. But I would say, instead, that complexity was already here all along. It could been found in the simplicity of a leaf that photosynthesizes or the star that twinkles in the night sky.

Hence, there is a "primal" need to curate, or categorize, or simplify. These actions are not strictly synonymous, but tightly bound to each other. I think, at least.

The issue with trying to place an infinitely complex experience of existence into neat categories has long been discussed within science, philosophy, technology, art. Our representations of the world are limited, and that is precisely why they are meaningful. By placing limits, which is to say prioritizing some facets of existence over others, we voice a point of view. This is why diversity of representations is so important—but it doesn't mean that limits themselves are "bad." Without limits, without the brain's ability to curate the complexity of each passing moment, decision-making, survival, meaningful and directed action would all perhaps be impossible. It is known, after all, that the "infinite" choice of streaming platforms, food delivery, and dating apps can often be debilitating and paralyzing. As can be the "infinite" flow of news and social media posts.

And these choice-laden systems do not even begin to approach the true complexity of how our planetary systems operate, not to say the universe.

All of this to say, I have been toying around with The Comma Directory's Concepts, Media, and Travel pages. I have been questioning whether having a "Design" category is too broad, and what the difference between design and other creative practices is. And, should sub-categories be included into multiple categories or restricted to a single one? It might not help that lately Marc has been reading the book, What Design Can’t Do: Essays on Design and Disillusion.

Ultimately, what are these categories for? Which in the end is the same as asking: what is The Comma Directory for? Developing a system for categorizing main ideas and themes is at the heart of our founding concept. It is a work in progress, and in a sense, it always will be. The categories will always overlap in some ways that are perhaps uncomfortable, and maybe there will also be some gaps that are hard to fill. Imprecisions.

I can imagine that many may consider that AI is particularly well-suited for this task, with its powered up pattern-recognition. Feed it the texts and have it spit out a systematization that, with the right prompting, could be "better" than anything that we can produce manually. Less time consuming, too. Why not? Maybe, while it is at it, it can also generate the entries and the images.

If making "sense" of the everyday complexities that bombard us is one of the most important functions of our brains, if our ability to make purposeful decisions has to do with our brain's ability to curate, to pick and choose, to categorize and, therefore, judge—then the work we do manually at The Comma Directory is profoundly rooted in what it means to think. In our vibes-bent era peopled with all sorts of energies and traumas, "feeling" feels much more fashionable than "thinking." And while I find modern, postmodern, and contemporary critiques of rationality to be very important, I echo Camus in saying that, while I acknowledge the many limitations of "reasoning", I do not deny "reasoning" in it of itself. And I do not want to automate away the very mental processes that constitute reasoning, and which I perceive to be very closely linked to my own agency and liberty. Not to say that intuition and feeling do not play an essential role, a role that is perhaps more closely tied to reasoning than traditional dualist conceptions of thought allow.

Ultimately, when I sit down to edit, reorganize, redefine, and recategorize, it is almost like I can feel changes starting to blossom from within, in real time, as I focus and tinker with our little website. I feel new questions begin to emerge, ideas begin to form, old ideas begin to transform. Maybe that is also why this entry is growing so much more longer than I anticipated.

There is a pleasure too that comes with all this thinking, of feeling yourself being transformed by interacting with a challenge and all the difficult questions it brings with, even when you do not fully succeed (which is often the case). The pleasure I derive from the curation and restructuring of The Comma Directory is also akin to the pleasure of moving to a new home, finding the nooks and crannies in which different little aspects of life can fit into. Here, the washing, there, the books. It is as much the art of adjusting the space to our lives as our lives to the space. Which is why it has been very fitting to work on The Comma Directory's categorization system at the same time as we have been settling into Bath and creating our short-term home here.

So, what's changed on here? New sub-categories have appeared, emerging from nearly a year's worth of writing and living, which is exactly what we hoped for from the start. I have also re-arranged some major categories within Concepts. For example, "Writing" has become "Creation", to cover a broader range of creative acts that we engage with. Thanks to Marc, each entry has its own page now, and can be accessed via the little square next to the location. Within media, there is some restructuring ongoing related to each "media" type. While we started with just "Books" and "Film", now we have "Articles & Essays", "Lectures", and "Websites". I am working on new ways of displaying a growing list of favorites, and hopefully implement a Reading Journal and a Film Journal. The new "Reviews" sections will include scattered thoughts on the different media types, rather than reviews in the strict sense of the word. I feel joyful about what The Comma Directory has grown into so far, and what it can grow to be with some continued care and attention.

- Andrea

Today is our first full day back in Bogotá and this is my first log entry for Comma Directory. Today, I want to reflect a bit on how I got here, both literally and metaphorically.

We had a rough trip back from Sasaima, Cundinamarca. Two buses with aggressive drivers, getting dropped off in an unfamiliar part of the city, and then a taxi driver who fell asleep at the stop light (wishing him safety and rest). These are the realities of traveling and living in Colombia, and even more so for most Colombians living day to day, struggling to survive.

For years, my family undertook this pilgrimage from Bogotá to Sasaima, and under much rougher conditions than we did. And despite of it all, visiting my great-grandparents’ farm was one of the familiy's happiest moments of the year, for as long as it lasted.

I had never been to Sasaima before, by the time I was born the voyages had ceased, my great-grandfather had already passed away.

Being able to finally go to a place that meant so much to everyone and that I have heard about since childhood was very special. Eating almojabanas at the town square, going to the plaza (market) for lunch, hiking through the surrounding mountains, eating fresh mandarinas on the trail, and meeting kind people who love their town and are proud of the land—it was a wonderful parenthesis, a welcomed contrast from the grittiness of Bogotá.

But even with all its pollution, the crime, the poverty, and the painful memories embedded into these mountains, coming back to Bogotá is coming back home. This month, I’ll leave Bogotá again and I am not sure exactly when I’ll be back—like so many of the other times I've departed, but it never stops being painful. I am excited about what is to come, it is beyond my wildest dreams, life that is. It has been that way during the past ten years. Full of new beginnings, new opportunities, but those beginnings always come paired with goodbyes and (hopefully) see you laters. A "see you later" is always an act of faith, and I am by nature faithless.

I see logging as more than a recollection of important events or thoughts, but as a way to digest and accept that duality, so integral to life. Whether one travels or not, we are all constantly starting and ending. Moments, books, trips, meals, tasks, conversations.

Before Comma Directory I have been logging in journals, the analog way. However, I rarely keep my journals around and I almost never have wanted to re-read my entries. Too self-conscious of my own writing, unfettered and unedited. However, recently I have made the effort to keep and complete the same journal, and also keep two additional analog logs on books and films. These logs are from the Rey Naranjo Editorial House, which is part of Bogotá’s very vibrant artistic scene. Their design is quite nice, they are compact and portable, and there’s a bit of humor and character infused into them. I’ve also managed to keep an agenda for the first time, which I bought at the beginning of the year in Oaxaca, that has also served as a nice writing space. More on writing next time.

- Andrea

Today, Andrea and I designed the Concepts page. Looking around at other personal wikis, our shared sentiment was that there is a lot of amazing content, but that it can be hard to navigate because of the overwhelming amount of information served in a rather flat layout.

By using a hierarchical structure, we are able to better break it down into sub-categories that are easier to navigate. The top has:

• Concepts
• Media
• Travel

And under them there is a subcategory and finally the topic. Each log entry uses a tag underneath, so we are still able to display the same log entry in multiple topics, if necessary.

To design the layout, Andrea and I started to look for inspiration. I am rather infatuated by the old lisp machines, and especially the Genera Symbolics lisp.

I love the portrait aspect ratio and the black and white look. So, I wanted the design to make an homage to its beauty.

Searching for its design elements, we came across this.

Andrea and I both find it beautiful. If you head over to the Concepts section, you can see how that served as inspiration for the design. We are very happy with the result.

- Marc

Comma Directory tries to set up a way to separate "the facts" from the interpretation of the facts. The idea is to build up a set of log entries that over time can be projected to display a unique interpretation of a given concept.

Originally inspired by event-sourced programming, this idea also has a certain resemblance to the zettelkasten method. In zettelkasten, you build up a set of atomic notes, that you then piece together to construct a novel idea.

This process allows us to improve our understanding of our own thoughts and make sure that important ideas are grounded in a solid foundation. And if we get it wrong, we are able to reinterpret the information, without losing the raw source.

- Marc

Comma.directory will be built over time by composing together many small log entries. Each log entry contains observations, events, and thoughts that we label.These log entries will be the building blocks for a directory of concepts, which we will categorize for easier navigation.

When entering the page of a concept through the directory, the log entries that led up to the idea would show up and and, if the idea feels more fully explored, it might also contain a summary or conclusion.

- Marc