And why ‘Contravariance’?

I originally acquired contravariance.net when I was digging on and digging up the language of mathematics (the mathematics of language—especially the algebra—delights me, too, geekily enough). In short, contravariant functors reverse the direction of composition (for the full glory and beauty, see its Wikipedia definition) and that’s an idea that appeals to me. I wasn’t sure how I’d make use of it at the time, though, so I stowed it away.

I dug it back out again when I was angry at Million Little Pieces author, James Frey, for fibbing in his crack-filled confessional memoir. That kid dealt a blow to anybody with a drug story to tell. ‘Contravariance’ implies my againstness to straying from the truth. The tag works as a response to Mr. Mismemoir. But, as Elie Wiesel (author of Night, a memoir of his experience in Nazi concentration camps and, like Frey’s book, an Oprah Book Club selection) said in a January 30, 2006 interview in Time, “I don’t want to speak of that controversy. I will say, with memoir, you must be honest. You must be truthful.” Since my project here has always been about truth, ‘contravariance’ works in that wider scope as well.

So what is my project here? Well, I was a crack addict just weeks ago. Still am by some people’s reckoning. But instead of joining Narcotics Anonymous, announcing to a bunch of strangers seated in a church basement that I’m a crackhead and waiting for them to answer back with “Hi, Mr. Crackhead,” and twelve-stepping my way through recovery and life ever-after, I’ve decided to conjure up my own program (very much against the advice and wishes of doctors, friends, and family, including my addiction counseling social worker sister), and that program involves my announcing to a group of strangers on the Interness (from my mother’s basement, incidentally) that I’m a crackhead, and then continuing to chronicle on this site my jaunt through recovery. (Other sites chronicle my jaunt through addiction and practice runs at recovery; see Propagation, Branching, and Screening.) It serves, at least, as a public accounting, self-examination, and expunging, and I’m hoping that any folks that might be interested in or benefit by it, might stumble in and say, “Hi, Mr. Crackhead” back.

Anyway, if James Frey serves as disinspiration for this project, Anne Frank serves as its inspiration, and on the aF page have collected some points in parallel. Considering Miss Frank’s prominence in my favorite album of all time—In The Aeroplane Over The Sea—I’m in good company. Incidentally, it has been posited that Jeff Mangum, the writer of that masterpiece, may be a “crackpot,” too.

In the end, and in more ways than one, reversing the direction of compostion is what this here is all about.