FAQ-ING HELL…

Q) What’s ‘Life 3.0’?
A) Life 3.0 is the sum of 1) reality as it is, and 2) our alternate realities. It takes the best of both, and indeed, all worlds. Sounds too good to be true? You are quite right – it doesn’t exist. Or, an other way to look at this, which is the same side of the same pence, is to say that Life 3.0 is right there. I mean, right HERE. EVERYWHERE. NOWHERE, and NOW, HERE. It is IN BETWEEN, in the gaps and interstices, without which everything collapses. It is that which holds the whole together, the dark matter. So, try. Try harder. Harder. Getting there? YOU ARE NOT TRYING HARD ENOUGH!

Q) Why ‘rough guide’?
A) This is a travel guide, to help us navigate this or any lives. It’s a rough, rather than a ‘refined’ (?) one, since it’s updatable, changeable, open, unfinished and unstable (NO THANKS TO YOU, MY DEAR READER!). Rather than a monolithic opaque mass of absolutes, the rough guide is fragmented, tattered, shredded into pieces, rather like the dislocated Kaidie herself really.

Q) What do you mean by ‘dislocate’?
A) Kaidie lives Life 3.0, but since Life 3.0 does not quite exist, we can’t quite locate her, can we. Also, by extrapolation, Kaidie does not exist. Or, inversely, if we say that Life 3.0 is everywhere, Kaidie is everywhere as well. Rather than a sugar-coated lovey-dovey balance and harmony, Life 3.0 is positioned in-between Life 1.0 and Life 2.0 in a dynamic and violent space-time brimming with tension that accommodates and pushes hot/cold, right/wrong, black/white, happiness/pathos all at the same time. Following this, Kaidie, a 3rd Lifer, is also necessarily equally violently ruptured/torn/split/dismembered/dis-located – and thoroughly knowing it  – AND enjoying it.

Q) Why this timeframe?
A) Kaidie is born 12.12.2009 and dies 09.09.2012, which resembles a palindrome, which suits Kaidie perfectly, being a sucker for artificial and/or superficial symmetries. Kaidie, who has absolute control over her birth and death,  handpicked these dates. Regardless of Kaidie’s success in fulfilling her quest, she will expire 09.09.2012, and she will refuse aid to sustain her life, and she will donate her organs on e-bay. Any takers? What’s your starting bid?

Q) Where is Nondon?
A) Nondon is a subjective version of London. So, Nondon is in London. Or, London is in Nondon. Nondon is a variation of London. Or, London is a variation of Nondon. Try a few variations of venn diagrammes, shall we? Recall that Godard says that all documentary films are a form of fiction. Or the other way around? Both make sense: so-called non-fiction (sic) as a subset of fiction, and fiction as a subset of non-fiction. Try a few variations of venn diagrammes, shall we?

Q) I live in London, Ontario. Is this of any relevance to me?
A) Yes, for you can have your own ‘Nondon’ as well (if you don’t already)!

Q) I live in Croydon. Is this of any relevance to me?
A) Yes, for you can have your own ‘Mroydon’ (or ‘Droydon’) as well (if you don’t already)!

Q) Why ‘a rough guide’ instead of ‘the’ ? Why ‘a Life 3.0’ ? Maybe you don’t understand how articles are used?
A) Thank you Mr/Ms Grammar Cop. I do. Maybe you need some re-education yourself in manners.

Q) Why ‘a rough guide’ instead of ‘the’? Why ‘a Life 3.0’
A) Kaidie points to a possibility; she is but one out of many possible versions out there – but she’s not even possibly the ‘best’ of the lot! Hence, instead of THE rough guide, what we are proposing here is one out of many possible variation. You can have your own version of rough guide, and Life 3.0 as well, for that matter.

Q) What constitutes a ‘meaningful’ life?
A) That’s for me / us to find out… Well, that which is not meaningless, or is less meaningless.

Q) So, what on googleearth does Kaidie want?
A: Thanks for asking. I would like: 3-year supply of Waterstones book vouchers, Garmin GPS Forerunner (or a GPS system to strap to my forehead), miniscule portable High Definition camera-cum-video camera that I can carry while running (or have one made for me to strap onto my large forehead, which still has space), new trainers, sweat-proof winter running gear, 3-year membership at Olympic-sized pool, champagne, rose wine, warm fresh bread, salmon, cod fish, sashimi, companionship, advice, etc. I am a very open person, so I would entertain anything you may wish to offer. Also, I am still open to receiving gifts for my baby shower, as well as Xmas(es), and New Year(s).

Q) Who are you?
A) I am Kaidie. Next question.

Q) What does Kaidie do for a living?
A) Kaidie is a full-time (re-)searcher of the meaning of  Life 3.0.

Q) What does Kaidie do when she is not working?
A) Currently Kaidie is so busy with work that she has no life. I mean, Kaidie’s work is to live Life 3.0. So, what I mean is, Kaidie is so busy with work that she is also busy with life. So, when she is working, she is living Life 3.0.  When she is living Life 3.0, she is working. When she is not working, she is not living Life 3.0 and will not be talking to you, since you wouldn’t know her, since she does not exist as far as you are concerned.

Q) Your life looks boring. Why should I care?
A) Well, help me make my life interesting, then! Write in, give me advice about how to make mine a meaningful life!

Q: Why should I be involved? Why should I care!?
A: Life 3.0 is a worldview/position/positionality/stance/philosophy that anyone can adapt. No, Kaidie is NOT so heroic as to be doing this to do all of us a grand favour  – selfish prat that she is, she’s doing this for herself, really – but she is keen to test her theory/hypothesis, and she genuinely wishes to make this life work. For real. And EVERYONE, ANYONE can use this  template-insofar as this can be called a ‘template’ at all, being highly patchy, inconsistent and self-contradictory – and apply it to their life, any of their lives, in any city. Like Dryden’s Life 3.0  in Droyden, or Fanny’s Life 4.6 in Feijing, or Frederic’s Life 13.0 in Faris, and so on.  That the template is changeable, adaptable and highly customisable is its strength and beauty. Get it?

Q: Are you sure you have gotten your Math sorted out? Is it not Life 1.5, since it’s in between Life 1.0 and Life 2.0?
A) YOU should get YOUR Math sorted out. Life 3.0 take the best of BOTH worlds. Like Eisenstien’s synthesis, the sum is greater than the parts. Life 1.5 is the average of the 2 – a half-baked compromise. If it were a compromise we hadn’t needed to invent this. Kaidie is uninterested in compromise, but excited by how she has to negotiate the tension between Life 1.0 and Life 2.0 – Kaidie precisely acknowledges and respects the push-pull, the struggle, the battle – and positions herself right in the thick of action! Now THAT is Life 3.0.

Q) You seem nice. Can we be friends?
A) Why thank you. You seem not too bad yourself, since you make such nice comments. Add ‘Kaidie Nondon’ as your Facebook friend!

Q) You seem bad-tempered and impatient. I thought you are living a nice life and all that?
A) Well, do I have a choice?! I have not much time. Unlike you, who can have the luxury of 30 or 60 or 90 years to look for the meaning of your life, or not, I have only 3 years! In fact, I have so little time that I was born an adult from day one, so that I don’t have to go through all that growing up pangs, and become a professional Lifer straight away.

Q) You have hardly answered any questions properly. Are you having a laugh?
A) Well, if I’d known so much I wouldn’t need to do this experiment, would I?

Q) You have hardly answered any questions properly. Are you having a laugh?
A) Look at the title of this page. I didn’t say I could answer these questions. Also, if one cannot answer something in the positive (what something is, which is, wow, very grand indeed), it is always helpful, or at least interesting, to say it in the negative (what something is not – which sounds like an exercise in  semantics but I assure you it is not). And if I  / you / anyone could answer everything it would be all too easy, too boring, and we wouldn’t need to do it in the first place. Now I don’t want to sound preachy (or peachy, for that matter), but Life is all about challenges – Life 3.0 is one hell of a challenge it self (isn’t that obvious!) Raising questions is the point – and rather than claiming to ‘answer’ questions, it’s a lot more exhilarating for us to open things up, open things up further, refine the question, come up with more questions, ask why we are asking these questions in the first place, ask why we are asking why we are asking these questions in the second place, and then…

Q) You have hardly answered any questions properly. Are you having a laugh?
A) Why should I? This is a matter of life-&-death. Particularly MY life-&-death! I’m devoting not one day, but ONE THOUSAND days to do this search / research!! Can/ do YOU have that sort of commitment and passion and stamina? Well, I don’t either, so come on the road with me so we give each other some amoral support.

Q) You have hardly answered any questions properly. Are you having a laugh?
A) Yes. Why not. Life is short. And you?