Kernville

I had a brief conversation in the cafeteria of my coworking space with a student blabbing about his token burn while solving math problems. We, the tech bozos, recognize each other.

I’m liking the small-town dynamic here. It breaks through the usual nerd shyness. It’s perfectly acceptable to crash someone’s solo lunch to talk about AI, or software, or whatever adjacent nonsense got you there. It rarely ends on software, which is the best part. At some point the conversation drifts and you end up talking about something real (often bike related).

I’ve noticed this tangential dynamic in person quite a bit. Talking about work outside of work seems mildly frowned upon in SLO County. Especially tech. I respect that.

Mister Math today mostly felt like gushing about how much he likes it here. He’s from Kernville, a place he described as “basically a suburb of Bakersfield.”

I’m not from around here, but I’ve heard plenty about Bakersfield. The heat, the dust, ag, lowriders, neck tattoos... A collection of mostly unflattering images that I more or less confirmed during my only passage through town. So I can sympathize with his enthusiasm. Being able to breathe properly and be outside all year round is lovely.

His parents are apparently big fans of off-roading and camping, which makes it so cliché that they somehow engendered an AI math student. They have to come pick him up for the holidays because they don’t want him taking the bus. From what little I know of the area, this illustrates the situation quite well. I’m a supporter of public transportation, but taking the bus through Kern County ranks fairly high on my list of things I’d rather avoid.

Oddly enough, I think I had heard about Kernville the day before. Lisa was considering it for a chill weekend away from home. I’d wager Lisa is not a huge fan of off-roading or Bakersfield-style camping.

Lisa wants a nice hot tub.

Somehow all of this connected in my head with a line from Wendell Berry, something along the lines of: when we don’t know where to go, we have begun our real journey; the mind that is not baffled is unemployed.

I always have opinions, or I absorb someone else’s opinions, which leaves me baffled, in a judgmental way.

Who in their right mind would want to go there?

And yet, of course, it makes just as much sense as anywhere else.