Bucky spoke at my high school graduation.
Nobody understood a word that he said, but we all had a really, really good time.
That is - until the food poisoning from the strawberries hit my sister and myself and we found ourselves fighting over hugging rights to the one commode in our shared hotel bathroom.
Think of it as the sport of competitive lunging.
I'd win for awhile - then she'd come at it again.
Father helped solve that problem with an injection to Sis' ample rear end. It looked painful - I declined. She proceeded to sleep it off.
Phenergan?
Not sure.
My sister will always remember my graduation.
A few other notes about Bucky:
(1) Bucky's Geodesic Domes.
They leak when it rains. Really. It is a core problem.
That's one thing that doesn't show on the drawing board.
And, no matter how convincing you speak or write, you can't talk yourself out of it.
They leak.
I knew an ecology-oriented counter-culture sort that built one as his home. You were supposed to be able to put one up in a few days - remember Mother Earth News and all that? Like a barn-raising.
He believed what he read.
It took him five years to complete his dome. Even then it wasn't completely completed - but at least he and his wife could live in it.
He was still married then. Dunno if it lasted.
Building codes were a bit of a problem. Building codes did not recognize many aspects of the dome design. What part of a dome is the roof? What part is the wall? You have to deal with both of these concepts distinctly to fit into the building codes - if the glass is in the wall it is a window. If it is on the roof it is a skylight. Different requirements. Walls and ceilings have different insulation requirements. Etc. Etc. Etc.
All sorts of building approvals were thereby delayed.
Not for days. For years.
Because of the thin shell, the building codes forced him unnecessarily to use some sort of a super-duper petroleum based rubbery insulation that turns into cyanide gas if there is a fire. It outgassed considerably with normal use. Not exactly the first choice of an ecologically-oriented counter culture type.
At the housewarming party he was proudly showing us through the place, as any owner-builder does. And we were the properly admiring audience.
That sort of enthusiasm is infectious.
I did notice that he had some hanging plants in the two-story living room suspended from the curved ceiling with the suspension system way over-engineered for the weight of the plants. Heavy chains that allowed the plants to be raised and lowered for watering. It was clear with a quick glance that the system was designed for lifting and lowering weights far heavier than the hanging plants - you coulda lifted a boat with that rig. I considered the matter. Hmmm . . . no boat in site.
Perhaps I should not have mentioned my thoughts in front of the full touring group - I have grown slightly more tactful with age.
My conjecture was met with some giggles - and telling silence from our hosts.
They were honest people. They would not deny an obvious truth.
I thought it best not to ask about acoustics.
We continued the tour of their home.
Listening to the story of the house's constructon 'minded me of the story of Moses' li'l stroll through the wilderness. Still, seeing the builder's pride in his wonderful house, I considered that I might want to build a geodesic dome, myself, one day. I found myself asking the following question:
"If you had it to do all over again, knowing what you know now, would you do it again?"
The look between my host and his wife was long and classic. My question was not answered. Only silence once more.
I suddenly found that there were other places on the grounds that I had to be right then.
I can still see that look between them, even now.
Yes - that was the party where people pulled out "Silence of the Lambs" to watch on the VCR. An odd thing to do at a party, but people were insistent, so I went along. Hey - Momma didn't raise no spoilsport.
I had not previously seen "Silence," anyway. Someone handed me a drink and the show began.
Then I noticed that I was the only one who was watching the movie.
Everyone else was watching me.
You know that odd feeling you get when you are at a party and people are looking at you like you are food?
I considered possible escape routes, my capacity for quick and effective violence - pre-empt in such situations, always pre-empt - and the whereabouts of my car. And the odds.
The odds looked fair-to-middlin'.
Only then did I request an explanation.
The explanation given was that there was wide agreement from those that had already seen the movie that a major character in the movie distinctly reminded them of myself. Not a mild impression. No. A "that's Epaminondas!" kind of epiphany. A bunch of them apparently suffered this same experience independently. They were now, as a group, proceeding with the next logical step in dealing with this issue.
I felt relieved. It looked like I would survive the evening, after all.
But, upon reflection - the explanation given was almost as spooky.
I've thought about that one long since in the long dark hours of the night . . .
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Thesis: Bucky Fuller's Geodesic Domes make for memorable parties.
Corollary: Don't actually try to make sense out of what Bucky says and you will still have a time to remember.
Conclusion: Do not actually act on Bucky's theories unless you wish to experience, full force, the Law of Unintended Consequences.
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(2) Other dome builders note that American carpenters have great difficulty in framing internal walls that are not square.
They build their wonderful domes but the internal rooms do not work out.
Thinking back the Geodesic dome that I toured, above - the interior was not so much a house as it was a round aircraft hanger with several square-framed rooms scattered throughout. And a very, very, very open floor plan (married couple, no children).
Considering that a house's shell typically costs only about 20% of the cost of the house, building a wonderful shell may not be so great an idea if the other 80% of your housing effort thereby goes awry.
My own modification to Bucky's geodesic dome idea: the Square Dome.
I.e., the cube house with a conventional roof. Maximum building efficiency without the building code and internal framing problems of Bucky's dome.
And the roof doesn't leak.
Y'all stay warm -
Epaminondas
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The Geodesic Dome:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geodesic_domeAnd who can ever forget:
The Dymaxion Car:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_CarThe Dymaxion House:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dymaxion_house
