Hacker News Reader

Comment by nikatwork | Hacker News Reader

> young, self-absorbed, ignorant, but believing I was clever and knowledgeable.

Well, don't beat yourself up too much. It is existentially wrenching to think about the missed opportunity but such is the folly of youth. Equally Preston could have shared more. Like tears in rain and all that.

Though I look at that statue of Turing and I really want to shake his hand and thank him. Sometimes life is terribly unfair.

View on HN

  > Equally Preston could have shared more.

Now that I am actively seeking out people and deliberately spending time with them, the one thing I consistently find is that they are very reluctant to initiate conversations about these things. I've now spent time with Charlie Duke, Alan Bean, and TK Mattingly, and without exception it takes time to get them to open up and talk about these things.

I used to wonder why, but I had an in-depth conversation with someone a while ago who was similarly reluctant. She said:

    People ask, but usually they don't really care.
    And if they do care, they usually won't make
        the effort to understand.
    And if they do make the effort to understand,
        they usually don't have the background or
        experience to understand.
    And if they do understand, I don't need to have
        explained.

Taking the time, making the effort, explicitly acknowledging that you'll never fully understand and yet being willing to make the effort to appreciate their experience, then you can get people to tell their stories.

Otherwise they won't, and you'll miss out.

I understand why, and I know how most of us are. But it does make me sad that these harrowing experiences get smothered by polite conversation. FWIW my grandparents escaped the Soviet gulags and were likewise reluctant to discuss it. So the stories and lessons are lost.

I remember sitting chatting for a day with Ivan Moscovich. his story[0] is compelling and horrifying in equal measure. I am privileged to count him as a friend, and to have had him open up and talk quietly about some of his experiences.

[0] http://yoz.com/wired/2.09/features/moscovich.html

>Now that I am actively seeking out people and deliberately spending time with them, the one thing I consistently find is that they are very reluctant to initiate conversations about these things. I've now spent time with Charlie Duke, Alan Bean, and TK Mattingly, and without exception it takes time to get them to open up and talk about these things.

It also depends on the person asking and how he goes about it.

I have a couple of friends who people will tell them absolutely anything, their whole life drama, 10-20 minutes after meeting them.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com