Fiery fury tears down old systems to clear the way for spiritual and creative renewal.
If you follow the side of my life in which I put out writing, drawings, photography, etc., you already know what a fan I am of all things William Blake. His influence on me seeps into pretty much everything I do. I consumed his works in college and taught some parts of his writing for over twenty years.
In William Blake’s complex personal mythology, Rintrah represents righteous wrath and holy anger. He is a fiery prophet-like figure who rages against hypocrisy, social injustice, and the cold, oppressive rationalism of his era. His roaring and shaking of fires in the poem signal a time of massive spiritual and political upheaval—a storm preceding a revolutionary shift in human consciousness.
Wait, I thought this was about Dots and not a literature lesson.
Hang on, I’m getting to it. Eventually. I’ll be all over the place in this one.
It’s a fiery fury that drives me. It kept me working with challenging student populations trying to make systems work better for them. It drove me to run for school board once even though I knew my chances were slim. It’s what continues to motivate me to push for change.
These last few years have been a challenge. I’m constantly hearing about some new AI application or offering from one of the big three, and my initial reaction is: no thanks. I don’t want to know about your GPTs, Gems, Artifacts, Skills, Plugins… I don’t want to know what Model Context Protocol (MCP) is. Why would I use an LLM in my terminal? The list seems to go on. And then within a few weeks, I end up going and learning about those things. Some are ridiculous and are rightly shelved, and others end up becoming an integral part of my workflow. Terminal and MCP have brought me some pretty big advancements and have changed how I use those services. As I write this, I’m building an accessibility tool in the background that will be a massive leap forward over a typical review/fix session.
That brings me (finally) to my Dot. I was in a bit of a mood last night when I spun it up and it asked me if I wanted to give it a name. Sure, why not. I like customizing things to suit my preferences. My Dot’s name is Rintrah.
According to said Dot, A Dot is a personal AI assistant powered by OpenAI that keeps track of your ongoing work, learns your preferences, and flags things that may need your attention. With access you choose to give it, it can use connected apps and computers to research, prepare work, and carry out tasks, asking for approval when needed.
It seemed dumb until it wasn’t. I closed it and didn’t think any more of it. I’d look into how people were using them later and then decide how deep I wanted to go with it. Then within a few minutes I got a phone notification…
“One timing issue worth checking…”
Uh oh.
Side note: I have trouble with time. For context, I’ve never been great with it and since my motorcycle accident nine years ago it has gotten way worse. It’s a mystery to me. I can’t seem to wrap my head around my schedule and calendar, and I will occasionally miss meetings even though I’d just checked my calendar. It can be a real problem and I’m grateful to the people who help me with that. Every time I book a flight or a hotel I require additional confirmation from a trusted human in my life (usually my wife) to make sure I booked things for the right times and days. Often, I end up going back to modify my reservations to make sure things align. Anyway, stay tuned for information about my upcoming novel that is a time travel story! (Seriously.)
My newborn Dot, Rintrah, was warning me that the thing I’d just agreed to was going to cut things pretty close with a flight I have booked shortly after. We went back and forth on whether I should alter my hotel reservation (turns out I needed to do that anyway) and book a flight for the next day. Ultimately, we are going to keep things close and I’ll stress about it for the next couple of weeks and see what happens. Maybe things will work out. Maybe they won’t, but I’ll have a story to tell about it. I’m prepared for the consequences and have a plan now, thanks to my new Dot that I had given up on moments after starting it. It has already flagged upcoming things in my calendar that I need to prepare for and 24 hours in, I am welcoming the notifications that come from it because chances are, it’s going to save me from a mistake.
Should you use a Dot? I can’t say for sure yet, but it’s been an interesting start for me. I’ll keep you posted.
Anyway, if you want more, and I can’t imagine you don’t:
The Marriage of Heaven and Hell: The Argument
By William Blake
Rintrah roars and shakes his fires in the burdened air;
Hungry clouds swag on the deep.
Once meek, and in a perilous path,
The just man kept his course along
The vale of death.
Roses are planted where thorns grow,
And on the barren heath
Sing the honey bees.
Then the perilous path was planted:
And a river and a spring
On every cliff and tomb;
And on the bleached bones
Red clay brought forth.
Till the villain left the paths of ease,
To walk in perilous paths, and drive
The just man into barren climes.
Now the sneaking serpent walks
In mild humility,
And the just man rages in the wilds
Where lions roam.
Rintrah roars and shakes his fires in the burdened air;
Hungry clouds swag on the deep.