Pamper

I will continue to assert that once the baby is asleep, you can make all the noise you want; if it wakes up, that means it doesn’t want to miss the fun; you have to respect it as an autonomous rational agent at that point, age be damned.

Which is just another way of noticing that the reason we have rules is to, as Thomas Hobbes pointed out, make us more free, not less so, and that in order to live a life that is not solitary, nasty, brutish, and short, we agree to give up some of our liberties, so that culture, among other benefits, becomes possible.

But none of this is meant to suggest that all the fun is forsaken; on the contrary, the whole point is to create conditions where as much nonsense as is possible is possible.

Case in point: the 2012 Fucking Hills Race, an event so perfectly pushed up against the edge of the permissible that we’re constantly reminded of what’s possible, as individuals, small group members, citizens, and human beings fully engaged in the activity of being fully human.

So many delightful snapshots: our tandem running the ferry toll booth since, after all, we did buy the Kaskadian bib; miscreants assembled on the poop deck, eventual winner Rayford Junior in his formalwear jersey holding court accidentally; and then there was the thrilling start to the contest, Derrick stating simply “Why don’t you just go?” as one after another two-wheeler bobbed into the sea of day-glo riders.

Mimi and I spent much of the time formulating alternative responses to the never-ending parade of middle-aged men who asked us what “FHR” stands for. “French Ham Rally,” “Fantastically Hip Riders,” “Free Henry Rose!” were some of the alternatives that shut people up.

And then, there we all were, in the park, on a sunny afternoon, picking prizes from a pile: that’s some Fabulously Happy Results that any baby should be glad to wake up for.