This is your typical bitchy rant. No getting around it, I am still pissed off, almost a week later. I felt the need to write something about it because... I'm pretty passive aggressive and, to be honest, the subject of my annoyance likely won't listen to me in person anyway. Also, I'm hoping this will help me get over my feelings of violent rage.
In keeping with this aesthetic, the format of this will most certainly be a "Shitty First Draft" a la Anne Lamotte. I will not stop, it will be in the second person, and there is NO obligation to read it. Seriously, just cuz you feel the need to support my creative efforts, does not mean you have to read this raving rant about someone you probably don't know.
That said, let me set the scene.
There are, admittedly, extenuating circumstances that made last week particularly frustrating. I will acknowledge that things possibly wouldn't have come to a head last week were these circumstances not present. But they were. And everyone but you knew it. One of those things that gets around because people talk and look at each other and pay attention to their surroundings and their friends. But you weren't looking, didn't want to, and instead drowned yourself once again in more drink than could down a cow. Not a rare occurrence, and I admit to not expecting much more from you. Most days, it's entertaining enough. Loveydovey drunk that you are, I can usually write off the bullshit you say to the obscene amount of alcohol in your system.
This time, however, your head-up-your-ass attitude was just the last straw on a heap of obnoxious bullshit I've been having to deal with from you for weeks now.
Now, I could deal with the whole "Oh, I love you, I want you to be my future ex wife, you're just sunshine and rainbows!" shit normally because it usually stops there. I mean, it annoys me for various reasons, but there's a lot I can simply ignore. It's when you start talking about sex with me (strap-ons and otherwise) and touching me and stuff, that's when we have a serious problem. Of the "Oh HELL NO!" variety.
First problem: I have known you for approximately ten years. TEN YEARS. Means I met you when I was about SIXTEEN. Now, a lot's changed since then, but that's still seriously weird. I remember you when I was sixteen and bright-eyed bushy tailed all dorky kid at a dorky school super into The Rocky Horror Picture Show, of which you were a member. All of you guys were so brotherly type taking in young strays and teaching them to be crazy and comfy. It was a nice environment back then. But I was sixteen. I was the kid. THE kid. Like a tiny protege of the cast. Now that was a long time ago, but... still... thinking about that makes this new dynamic super fucking creepy.
Next problem: I've known you for all that fucking time and you didn't notice that I'm not all sunshine and rainbows? Did I have to send out a memo? Are you seriously that shallow? "Hi, umm... I know you still think of me as this girl who eats sunshine and shits rainbows but... I'm really a fucking violent smartass piece of work and I'd appreciate it if all previous versions of me be stricken from the record. THANKS!" Who have you been speaking to these last few years at the club that you think I'm some happy-go-lucky girly girl? Are you fucking blind? Not only am I smarter than that image makes me out to be, I'm not nearly that smiley. I am not a member of the Power Puff Girls. I haven't even watched the Power Puff Girls in at least eight years. A lot of shit happens in ten years that changes a person. I was barely that smiley girl then. Now if you think that's all I am, you're just fucking shallow. I realize that this is, actually, a common misconception of me. Most guys I am around think of me as this pigtailed bouncy rainbow girl. But if a guy gets to know me a little better, they notice that 70% of that is an act. Mostly an ironic comment on that image. I promise, I'm fuckin smarter than that and don't you forget it.
Another problem: Touching me like that is inappropriate. Period. Get your fucking hands off me, I don't care how drunk you are. Next time, I won't try to quell the urge for violence, I'll just elbow you in the throat. And yes, THIS is the girl I expect someone who's known me for ten years to at least have an inkling of. Some idea that I am capable of anger, violence and more rational thought than a fucking cartoon character. Did you need this memo? Should I have sent that? Oops, I had that on my calendar for next week.
And Another: This all went down a week after I ran into you at a different bar and you totally ignored me, chasing some OTHER TAIL. So don't you talk to me about love and whatever, cuz you were not about to give up on that other girl to chat with me about anything. Was it cuz I was with a couple of dudes? Never stopped you from talking to me before. Means you only talk to me when you're hyperdrunk and wanting to get some ass. Thanks, yo. Fuck off.
Last on my list: And we've come to the straw that killed the camel. I didn't think I had to update my facebook status that I was WITH HIM for that last week he was in town. You know, I didn't think it was necessary and, really, I didn't care. Everyone with two eyes was fully aware that he and I had been hooking up all week. But not you. You didn't notice the week before when I let him kinda claim me and yeah, guess who I chose above you? Him. Why? Because he knows I'm not some sunshine-chewing pigtailed Bubbles wannabe. Oh yeah, and you just kinda piss me off.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Thursday, December 2, 2010
coulda, shoulda, woulda
You know those moments where you had an opportunity to say something or do something but you didnt take it? And you think about it later and continually kick yourself for keeping quiet? Those moments plague me. Probably because i'm too cautious to ever take those opportunities when they come.
This blog could be called Coulda Shoulda Woulda and i could post one such moment every week, and what i would have done, and never run out. Stretching as far back as i can remember and with a wide range of topics, reasons for keeping quiet, and reactions i should have had.
One surprisingly rich source of such moments is a Philosophy of Religion course that i took in the winter of 2007 (i think).
On the very first day the professor (yes, the dude was actually faculty) was only trying to explain why we were only going to be studying judeo-christian philosophy in the class. I had no problem with that. There's rich philosophies there and well worth a quarter of study. Though i was disappointed, i had been expecting it so i didnt mind. All the professor had to do was state the mission of the class and be done with it.
Instead, the professor starts talking about Aztec and Mayan sun gods and blood sacrifices. Of couse, having been several years since that class, i've forgotten the specific words he used, but he said something like "well that isnt logical, so we're not studying it" and made the practice of worshipping the sun, as well as blood sacrifices, sound downright silly.
Now, though i would have pointed out how racist that was, that wasnt even what i would have argued against.
The logic of worshipping the sun versus worshipping the judeo-christian god would have been my specific concern.
How isnt it logical to worship the sun? The sun actually gives life. Scientifically proven to feed plants and provide humans and animals with food and a warm enough planet for survival, the sun is The Source. In fact, Aton got it right. Dude, all things, all creation, all life (and thus all ideas, all thought, and thereby all gods) on Earth exist because of the Sun. So, exactly how isnt that a logical candidate for worship?
Alternately, you want to worship a god you cant see or feel or scientifically prove the effects of? Why? What exactly is the logic in that? There's nothing there. Its a mere figment. An idea. A concept. Worshipping the concept of god is like worshipping the concept of zero. Actually very much so. Just as philosophers play with the concept of god, see it move and transform observational realities, mathmaticians and scientists play with zero, and see it transform observational realities. Try dividing by zero and the universe explodes. Try rationalizing god and you'll end up in some kind of horrifying death circle of madness forever looping logic around your pinky finger until your intestines explode. I know this. I took the class. Got an A- i think.
So either trap yourself in infinite madness, or worship a physical entity that you can feel and see its effects all around you and inside you. Im eating a clementine right now that wouldnt exist were it not for the sun. So i figure worshipping the sun is pretty damn logical.
Then we come to the logic of providing a blood sacrifice to the sun in order to ensure that the sun does not stop providing us with pretty much everything. Just doesnt seem that far fetched to me. Think about if you saw the earth die every year without the sun in the winter, only to be reborn in the spring when it comes back. The rebirth can only happen after the death. So i figure it makes sense that someone's got to give their life, to die, in order for the sun to return. And it would be an honor. Give yourself for the greater good of the crops and the town and the civilization. And to return the Sun's favor, which it has bestowed so generously. It was a hard time to live in then (being any pre-industrial agricultural society) and so much depended on the sun, that anyone would probably do anything they could to ensure healthy crops. Now, i dont know those religions well enough to say whether that was the actual reason they made blood sacrifices or not, but thats just what the professor was arguing wasnt logical.
It just seems more logical to me to give something back to a god, in whatever form it takes, than to continually request from them. It makes sense to me that gods often take human attributes, so what happens when you constantly beg and request from a human and give nothing in return? They get pissed off and probably yell at you. When the sun gets pissed off, i'd imagine you'd get pretty hungry, as would your friends and your animals and all the plants around you.
It just shocked me how blatantly ridiculous these accusations were. And they were throwaway comments, as if it was widely accepted truth and we should move on to more important (read western and white) ideas. The professor went on to say more ridiculous things in effort to illustrate simple points (including one about the Jabberwocky which made it very clear he'd never bothered to actually read the poem. I should have spoken up about that one too) throughout the quarter. I gave up complaining because it was so obvious no one else in the class cared at all. So now i have a blog topic. Lucky you.
This blog could be called Coulda Shoulda Woulda and i could post one such moment every week, and what i would have done, and never run out. Stretching as far back as i can remember and with a wide range of topics, reasons for keeping quiet, and reactions i should have had.
One surprisingly rich source of such moments is a Philosophy of Religion course that i took in the winter of 2007 (i think).
On the very first day the professor (yes, the dude was actually faculty) was only trying to explain why we were only going to be studying judeo-christian philosophy in the class. I had no problem with that. There's rich philosophies there and well worth a quarter of study. Though i was disappointed, i had been expecting it so i didnt mind. All the professor had to do was state the mission of the class and be done with it.
Instead, the professor starts talking about Aztec and Mayan sun gods and blood sacrifices. Of couse, having been several years since that class, i've forgotten the specific words he used, but he said something like "well that isnt logical, so we're not studying it" and made the practice of worshipping the sun, as well as blood sacrifices, sound downright silly.
Now, though i would have pointed out how racist that was, that wasnt even what i would have argued against.
The logic of worshipping the sun versus worshipping the judeo-christian god would have been my specific concern.
How isnt it logical to worship the sun? The sun actually gives life. Scientifically proven to feed plants and provide humans and animals with food and a warm enough planet for survival, the sun is The Source. In fact, Aton got it right. Dude, all things, all creation, all life (and thus all ideas, all thought, and thereby all gods) on Earth exist because of the Sun. So, exactly how isnt that a logical candidate for worship?
Alternately, you want to worship a god you cant see or feel or scientifically prove the effects of? Why? What exactly is the logic in that? There's nothing there. Its a mere figment. An idea. A concept. Worshipping the concept of god is like worshipping the concept of zero. Actually very much so. Just as philosophers play with the concept of god, see it move and transform observational realities, mathmaticians and scientists play with zero, and see it transform observational realities. Try dividing by zero and the universe explodes. Try rationalizing god and you'll end up in some kind of horrifying death circle of madness forever looping logic around your pinky finger until your intestines explode. I know this. I took the class. Got an A- i think.
So either trap yourself in infinite madness, or worship a physical entity that you can feel and see its effects all around you and inside you. Im eating a clementine right now that wouldnt exist were it not for the sun. So i figure worshipping the sun is pretty damn logical.
Then we come to the logic of providing a blood sacrifice to the sun in order to ensure that the sun does not stop providing us with pretty much everything. Just doesnt seem that far fetched to me. Think about if you saw the earth die every year without the sun in the winter, only to be reborn in the spring when it comes back. The rebirth can only happen after the death. So i figure it makes sense that someone's got to give their life, to die, in order for the sun to return. And it would be an honor. Give yourself for the greater good of the crops and the town and the civilization. And to return the Sun's favor, which it has bestowed so generously. It was a hard time to live in then (being any pre-industrial agricultural society) and so much depended on the sun, that anyone would probably do anything they could to ensure healthy crops. Now, i dont know those religions well enough to say whether that was the actual reason they made blood sacrifices or not, but thats just what the professor was arguing wasnt logical.
It just seems more logical to me to give something back to a god, in whatever form it takes, than to continually request from them. It makes sense to me that gods often take human attributes, so what happens when you constantly beg and request from a human and give nothing in return? They get pissed off and probably yell at you. When the sun gets pissed off, i'd imagine you'd get pretty hungry, as would your friends and your animals and all the plants around you.
It just shocked me how blatantly ridiculous these accusations were. And they were throwaway comments, as if it was widely accepted truth and we should move on to more important (read western and white) ideas. The professor went on to say more ridiculous things in effort to illustrate simple points (including one about the Jabberwocky which made it very clear he'd never bothered to actually read the poem. I should have spoken up about that one too) throughout the quarter. I gave up complaining because it was so obvious no one else in the class cared at all. So now i have a blog topic. Lucky you.
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Wednesday, November 17, 2010
Earlham and Ulysses
Sometimes i miss Earlham so thoroughly that it aches. This time, just a rocking chair, fit for the meetinghouse, set it off. Other times its a smell or a taste. Something i could only get there. Sometimes its just a feeling.
Earlham is its own smell. Maybe the air is different inside the bubble. Its in the atmosphere there. Im not talking about monkey chow either, its like... coziness in a smell. Just like how Ben's car smells like independence, Earlham smells like that feeling you get when you're under blankets and you're safe and warm. The sun on your face while napping in OA 3rd floor. The walk through the Heart to Lobill. Third floor of Carpenter or the basement of Runyan. It all smells like that. Maybe smell is the wrong word, but its in the molecules and you breathe it in when you're there and like nicotine or childhood you crave it when it's gone. At least i do.
A part of me will always live there. I forgot her there like my pretend friend Penny got left at the mall when i was six. The ghost of EarlhamBlanche lives in the mosaic in the mailroom. She lives in Hoerner, in OA. She lives on the swing, in the chem labs. That part of me lives on but separated and maybe all of this, this blog, this reading Ulysses, this half-assed nod to furthering my education is an attempt to bring her back. Welcome EarlhamBlanche back to her natural home somewhere in my left ventrical or my occipital lobe, wherever my capacity for being multiple people at once lives.
Its funny how different EarlhamBlanche is too. Reading Ulysses i realize Stephen Dedalus is an annoyingly broody Hamletesque adolescent that i can nonetheless relate to, which is somewhat embarassing. I mean look at this whiny introspection. EarlhamBlanche would love that part best(and the part of me that came back from Earlham did kinda fall for him. Residual affection remembered from Portait? Maybe) Maybe im not relating my life or the people i see on the street to mythology... oh, wait I totally do that.... anyway, Leopold Bloom is much more adult. He quit worrying about existentialism and resolving his aspirations with his existence. He's actually more interesting to read because of it. ColumbusBlanche sees the difference and appreciates Bloom more, despite my affections, despite my ability to relate. I guess that shows what value i place on my introspection.
So what does that say about my whiny, Hamletesque angst and my inability to resolve my aspirations with my reality? Put up or shut up, i guess. Maybe im just a Telemachus waiting for my Odysseus, walking along my shore in anxious contemplation. Maybe i make too many metaphors already and i dont need more. Maybe its something as quotidian as a smoothie with whipped cream and a black and white muffin from the jazzman cafe in the coffee shop.
Whatever i am subcosciously searching for, i doubt Stephen or Bloom can help me. Stephen needs a serious dose of reality and Bloom is... preoccupied with the oppressiveness of reality. And i wont ever get that EarlhamBlanche back, which i should have learned from the loss of CAHSBlanche (same scars like the separation of conjoined twins- CAHSBlanche lives in the theatre, the humanities room, the courtyard, laughing and dancing, languishing in the depths of education and youth). I never learn lessons like that. Life should quit trying to teach them.
Earlham is its own smell. Maybe the air is different inside the bubble. Its in the atmosphere there. Im not talking about monkey chow either, its like... coziness in a smell. Just like how Ben's car smells like independence, Earlham smells like that feeling you get when you're under blankets and you're safe and warm. The sun on your face while napping in OA 3rd floor. The walk through the Heart to Lobill. Third floor of Carpenter or the basement of Runyan. It all smells like that. Maybe smell is the wrong word, but its in the molecules and you breathe it in when you're there and like nicotine or childhood you crave it when it's gone. At least i do.
A part of me will always live there. I forgot her there like my pretend friend Penny got left at the mall when i was six. The ghost of EarlhamBlanche lives in the mosaic in the mailroom. She lives in Hoerner, in OA. She lives on the swing, in the chem labs. That part of me lives on but separated and maybe all of this, this blog, this reading Ulysses, this half-assed nod to furthering my education is an attempt to bring her back. Welcome EarlhamBlanche back to her natural home somewhere in my left ventrical or my occipital lobe, wherever my capacity for being multiple people at once lives.
Its funny how different EarlhamBlanche is too. Reading Ulysses i realize Stephen Dedalus is an annoyingly broody Hamletesque adolescent that i can nonetheless relate to, which is somewhat embarassing. I mean look at this whiny introspection. EarlhamBlanche would love that part best(and the part of me that came back from Earlham did kinda fall for him. Residual affection remembered from Portait? Maybe) Maybe im not relating my life or the people i see on the street to mythology... oh, wait I totally do that.... anyway, Leopold Bloom is much more adult. He quit worrying about existentialism and resolving his aspirations with his existence. He's actually more interesting to read because of it. ColumbusBlanche sees the difference and appreciates Bloom more, despite my affections, despite my ability to relate. I guess that shows what value i place on my introspection.
So what does that say about my whiny, Hamletesque angst and my inability to resolve my aspirations with my reality? Put up or shut up, i guess. Maybe im just a Telemachus waiting for my Odysseus, walking along my shore in anxious contemplation. Maybe i make too many metaphors already and i dont need more. Maybe its something as quotidian as a smoothie with whipped cream and a black and white muffin from the jazzman cafe in the coffee shop.
Whatever i am subcosciously searching for, i doubt Stephen or Bloom can help me. Stephen needs a serious dose of reality and Bloom is... preoccupied with the oppressiveness of reality. And i wont ever get that EarlhamBlanche back, which i should have learned from the loss of CAHSBlanche (same scars like the separation of conjoined twins- CAHSBlanche lives in the theatre, the humanities room, the courtyard, laughing and dancing, languishing in the depths of education and youth). I never learn lessons like that. Life should quit trying to teach them.
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Thursday, October 28, 2010
Winter
There have been very few moment where i have ever enjoyed winter for winter's sake. i come from people (specifically my mother) who cannot abide coldness of any degree. Any temberature under 70 degrees fahrenheit and she needs a sweater. While i am not of such an extreme, i do not enjoy cold, slow-moving winter molecules, which tempers my view of the whole season, really.
But there are some moments where winter's cold can be a sensational ecstasy.
Basketball in middle school was a horrifying torture. A hideous montage of humilation and shame as Jhonen would say. In any reasonable school with a normal number of students, i never would have been allowed on that team. Had they not needed bodies so desperately, i might have been spared the endless basketballs to the face and hurt fingers. As it was, at least three nights a week in the winter, i had basketball practice.
The best thing about it was definitely when we got to go home. No more dropped balls and Ms. Sue's exasperated looks. No more hesitations in my defense and running away from the ball on offense. When Mother finally came in to get me, i got a few hours of freedom.
But above all of the emotional relief was the pleasure of walking outside in my uniform, still sweaty from the suicides, into the prickly quiet cold. Sweat chilled my skin, goosebumps erupted and my hair stood on end. i wanted to stay outside forever, or at least until the sweat cooled and my lips turned purple. Mother would try to get me to put my coat on, but i knew she'd had the heat turned up in the car and i'd been so hot for so long it was hard to give up one of the few bodily pleasures i had at that age. The cold air clensed my lungs and i felt finally free of my torture, of the body that hated me, of my inability to play a simple sport. Just for that moment, when the air first hits and blows everything else away. Before mother starts yelling at me about my coat, before i remember i have to do it all again tomorrow, before i remember all the fresh embarrassment from today's practice and all those before it. That brief moment, when you're an awkward and tired twelve-year-old girl covered in sweat and you walk out in the superwinter cold and take a deep breath. Mmmm.
But there are some moments where winter's cold can be a sensational ecstasy.
Basketball in middle school was a horrifying torture. A hideous montage of humilation and shame as Jhonen would say. In any reasonable school with a normal number of students, i never would have been allowed on that team. Had they not needed bodies so desperately, i might have been spared the endless basketballs to the face and hurt fingers. As it was, at least three nights a week in the winter, i had basketball practice.
The best thing about it was definitely when we got to go home. No more dropped balls and Ms. Sue's exasperated looks. No more hesitations in my defense and running away from the ball on offense. When Mother finally came in to get me, i got a few hours of freedom.
But above all of the emotional relief was the pleasure of walking outside in my uniform, still sweaty from the suicides, into the prickly quiet cold. Sweat chilled my skin, goosebumps erupted and my hair stood on end. i wanted to stay outside forever, or at least until the sweat cooled and my lips turned purple. Mother would try to get me to put my coat on, but i knew she'd had the heat turned up in the car and i'd been so hot for so long it was hard to give up one of the few bodily pleasures i had at that age. The cold air clensed my lungs and i felt finally free of my torture, of the body that hated me, of my inability to play a simple sport. Just for that moment, when the air first hits and blows everything else away. Before mother starts yelling at me about my coat, before i remember i have to do it all again tomorrow, before i remember all the fresh embarrassment from today's practice and all those before it. That brief moment, when you're an awkward and tired twelve-year-old girl covered in sweat and you walk out in the superwinter cold and take a deep breath. Mmmm.
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Monday, September 13, 2010
is this adulthood?
Retracing my steps to the first place i felt young in a good way. Listening to songs i danced to in the womb. Drinking way too much nostalgic hounddog's coffee and wanting to drive and listen to 90s metal all night. Parking in the same spot my cousin took me to for driving practice in the later-christened Millenium Falcon when i was 16. Singing karaoke but still too afraid to do it alone(and go all out). Still being too afraid to go to a new place cuz im not cool enough. Still feeling self-conscious with the cool kids (though i fully acknowledge that they dont think they're cool, and none of us have ever felt like the cool kids) because i don't look hot or tough or really much of anything other than vaguely quirky. Shit! that was totally a cop car just now and i have no idea why they blew me off!
Seriously, is this what adulthood is about? Cuz i still feel like a kid. Like it's taken me five years to be 21. Is this how my whole life will be? Will it take me another five years to feel 22 and emotionally prepared to make life-decisions other 22-year-olds make (like grad school, for instance)? Am i emotionally slow or overly cautious? Is it my lack of adventuring spirit holding me back or my lack of self-confidence? Or must this phenomenon be considered "holding me back"? Is this even a fault of mine? Could my refusal to enter adulthood be a good thing? It's not like i'm not having fun.
In conclusion:
1. I love The Clash and "Lost in the Supermarket" just makes me happy.
2. Though it's changed a lot, Hounddog's remains awesome and the source of many nostalgic warm fuzziness.
3. Cheap 3am coffee is the scent-memory of countless endless nights of laughter and love and infinity. Of "young in a good way" and "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" on the brain. Of past life memories of Jack and Allen in New York.
4. Prince is universal.
5. In the end, maybe adulthood is about the freedom and contentment of being alone in your car listening to music at quarter-till 5am. Yes, i'm listening to "The Bad Touch" again tonight, but this time LOUDER!
Happy Birthday to me. ^_^
Seriously, is this what adulthood is about? Cuz i still feel like a kid. Like it's taken me five years to be 21. Is this how my whole life will be? Will it take me another five years to feel 22 and emotionally prepared to make life-decisions other 22-year-olds make (like grad school, for instance)? Am i emotionally slow or overly cautious? Is it my lack of adventuring spirit holding me back or my lack of self-confidence? Or must this phenomenon be considered "holding me back"? Is this even a fault of mine? Could my refusal to enter adulthood be a good thing? It's not like i'm not having fun.
In conclusion:
1. I love The Clash and "Lost in the Supermarket" just makes me happy.
2. Though it's changed a lot, Hounddog's remains awesome and the source of many nostalgic warm fuzziness.
3. Cheap 3am coffee is the scent-memory of countless endless nights of laughter and love and infinity. Of "young in a good way" and "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" on the brain. Of past life memories of Jack and Allen in New York.
4. Prince is universal.
5. In the end, maybe adulthood is about the freedom and contentment of being alone in your car listening to music at quarter-till 5am. Yes, i'm listening to "The Bad Touch" again tonight, but this time LOUDER!
Happy Birthday to me. ^_^
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Thursday, August 26, 2010
Soft Liquid Joy
Next time i try to read Ulysses, i need to remember to keep a pencil and highlighter handy so as to take copious notes. i think thats where i went wrong, where i screwed up this post-college independence thing. I quit taking notes all the time and thus stopped thinking as much about books, about movies, about life. Thinking too much about what is noteworthy rather than just taking the damn notes. Don't stop but to clarify the vision in your mind's eye (or something to that effect, thanks Jack).
All this will happen when i magically get my shit together. As if "getting my shit together" is like getting a cheeseburger or wall-shelves or a raise. I'm starting to understand, or face up to the fact that i will never be one of those people who has their shit together, (at least not my perception of those people). i will never know what i'm doing, never know where everything goes and what to do with it or whom. I envision myself all slick and adult with a leather bag and lots of writing utensils (in this fantasy, i'm also tall, thin, and look completely different. oh, and feel comfortable enough to wear girly things without puking) and the leisure to waltz into a coffee shop and sit for hours reading some supersmart author and writing notes in the margins. Learning all sorts of things about writing style, writing movements and symbolism on my own because my education prepared me to do so. This magical, fantasy leisure time comes from having a magical, fantasy writing job where i have the freedom to write from anywhere and the knowledge and experience to use all those things i learn in my supersmart books by Joyce and Pynchon and hell, throw in some Spencer for nostalgia.
Maybe part of growing up is understanding that you will never be the fantasy, and being ok with that. I won't ever write like those guys. I will never be as calculating as Pynchon, as flowing as Joyce or as metaphoric as Spencer. I am ok with that. It's incongruous with my CAHSmic fantasy of myself, but i can't write like that.
I'll probably never own a slick leather bag like for scholars either. Not because i'm cheap, cuz yeah, i am, but because i like military bags and bags from gama-go and bags with other stuff on them more than i like those scholar-bags.
Nor will i ever magically get the confidence to wear girlier clothes. I'll always feel like it needs balancing, like yin/yang or something. I'll always feel like it's over-the-top, whatever it is.
In fact, that woman in the coffee shop reading Joyce is so deeply un-me that once i get down to it, i really don't want to be her much. She's way more mature than i want to be. She'd never fill a room with playpen balls for the hell of it. She'd accept her adulthood as a given, not rage against the dying of the light as i do (though she'd get the reference and lecture me about how it's about DEATH not growing up, to which i'd repond "so?" and go back to playing Fable). Maybe my fantasy is more about the feeling of comfort and accomplishment she has. The feeling of knowledge as a tangible thing, not a vague remembrance as it is now. Her ability to use her education, rather than allow it to get moldy under the desk. The magical job, the togetherness, the height, those are all extras. I guess i need to start trying to see me now in that coffee shop fantasy future.
Eww, sorry, i think this got really cheesy and now i'm talking such fuzzy topics as self-confidence. I promise, this started as a rant about active reading... i think... Eww, yeah, fuck this.
All this will happen when i magically get my shit together. As if "getting my shit together" is like getting a cheeseburger or wall-shelves or a raise. I'm starting to understand, or face up to the fact that i will never be one of those people who has their shit together, (at least not my perception of those people). i will never know what i'm doing, never know where everything goes and what to do with it or whom. I envision myself all slick and adult with a leather bag and lots of writing utensils (in this fantasy, i'm also tall, thin, and look completely different. oh, and feel comfortable enough to wear girly things without puking) and the leisure to waltz into a coffee shop and sit for hours reading some supersmart author and writing notes in the margins. Learning all sorts of things about writing style, writing movements and symbolism on my own because my education prepared me to do so. This magical, fantasy leisure time comes from having a magical, fantasy writing job where i have the freedom to write from anywhere and the knowledge and experience to use all those things i learn in my supersmart books by Joyce and Pynchon and hell, throw in some Spencer for nostalgia.
Maybe part of growing up is understanding that you will never be the fantasy, and being ok with that. I won't ever write like those guys. I will never be as calculating as Pynchon, as flowing as Joyce or as metaphoric as Spencer. I am ok with that. It's incongruous with my CAHSmic fantasy of myself, but i can't write like that.
I'll probably never own a slick leather bag like for scholars either. Not because i'm cheap, cuz yeah, i am, but because i like military bags and bags from gama-go and bags with other stuff on them more than i like those scholar-bags.
Nor will i ever magically get the confidence to wear girlier clothes. I'll always feel like it needs balancing, like yin/yang or something. I'll always feel like it's over-the-top, whatever it is.
In fact, that woman in the coffee shop reading Joyce is so deeply un-me that once i get down to it, i really don't want to be her much. She's way more mature than i want to be. She'd never fill a room with playpen balls for the hell of it. She'd accept her adulthood as a given, not rage against the dying of the light as i do (though she'd get the reference and lecture me about how it's about DEATH not growing up, to which i'd repond "so?" and go back to playing Fable). Maybe my fantasy is more about the feeling of comfort and accomplishment she has. The feeling of knowledge as a tangible thing, not a vague remembrance as it is now. Her ability to use her education, rather than allow it to get moldy under the desk. The magical job, the togetherness, the height, those are all extras. I guess i need to start trying to see me now in that coffee shop fantasy future.
Eww, sorry, i think this got really cheesy and now i'm talking such fuzzy topics as self-confidence. I promise, this started as a rant about active reading... i think... Eww, yeah, fuck this.
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Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Atheism - episode 1
There are a lot of reasons why I'm an atheist. They include things like belief in chance, and the random movement of molecules. A strong belief in democracy and a reluctance to think in moral absolutes. A sense of privacy and the knowledge that very little actually matters to normal people, much less a god.
But one argument that baffles me is evolution. How can anyone look at the totally random way some life has evolved and tell me that was a coscious decision on anyone's part? A consciousness would be smarter.
Think of all the dumbest looking animals you can. Platypus. What the fuck? They're wobbly, egg-laying, poisonous, swimming mammals that can detect electric fields generated by muscle movement (wait, what?). Think about why they look goofy. See how they walk, with their belly hanging down, like they ate too much. They'd make more sense with normal teeth like an otter but no, they've got a bill like a duck, so as to dig in river sand and eat things there (i guess). So basically, they could have been a nice water-loving, cold-blooded bird thing, but they had to ride the tree all the way to mammals before they decided, "Hey those birds might have the right idea of things"...
Anyone could see that the poor platypus would be happier if it's legs were longer or if it had bigger teeth so as to maybe hunt fish and frogs. It could avoid attack without poison. Get away or maybe attack back. That would make the platypus a happier animal. A better self-defense system.
Now look at the human reproductive system. This cannot have been a conscious invention. Its too dumb. Your vital reproductive organ rips itself to shreds periodically in order to function properly. How does that make sense? You'd think that lining would be important to have in order for an egg to latch on and grow. A seed needs plenty of dirt, right? Nope. You have to periodically purge the lining in order for there to be little enough to satisfy an egg. But every egg doesnt always latch on. They dont tell you in bio or in sex ed that fertilized eggs sometimes, actually often, never find a place to settle and so never grow. Maybe thats cuz your body's so damn busy purging all that nice spongy egg-growing stuff! This system is moronic. Anyone with half a brain could come up with a more efficient way to reproduce. And dont tell me there's some sort of moral lesson to this because thats just stupid. There's no morality in irony.
Every funcional aspect of an animal is actually an extremely roundabout and inefficient way to function. When something works well, it's a marvel (cockroaches: efficient, strong, resourceful,adaptive and still alive). When humans invent things, usually we think of the most efficient way to achieve our goal before we set out. Evolution's only measure of what works is what creatures aren't dead before reproduction. Any random mutation that works will continue, but you have to wait for the lottery to get it. And then, when the mutation reproduces, you still have a chance of losing it! If there were a consciousness present at any point, it wouldnt be quite so outlandishly absurd, inefficient, and pointless.
I guess unlike most people, the idea that life is pointless is actually a comfort to me. Means if i dont get it, there's nothing to get, and no reason to sweat it. Another reason i'm an atheist.
But one argument that baffles me is evolution. How can anyone look at the totally random way some life has evolved and tell me that was a coscious decision on anyone's part? A consciousness would be smarter.
Think of all the dumbest looking animals you can. Platypus. What the fuck? They're wobbly, egg-laying, poisonous, swimming mammals that can detect electric fields generated by muscle movement (wait, what?). Think about why they look goofy. See how they walk, with their belly hanging down, like they ate too much. They'd make more sense with normal teeth like an otter but no, they've got a bill like a duck, so as to dig in river sand and eat things there (i guess). So basically, they could have been a nice water-loving, cold-blooded bird thing, but they had to ride the tree all the way to mammals before they decided, "Hey those birds might have the right idea of things"...
Anyone could see that the poor platypus would be happier if it's legs were longer or if it had bigger teeth so as to maybe hunt fish and frogs. It could avoid attack without poison. Get away or maybe attack back. That would make the platypus a happier animal. A better self-defense system.
Now look at the human reproductive system. This cannot have been a conscious invention. Its too dumb. Your vital reproductive organ rips itself to shreds periodically in order to function properly. How does that make sense? You'd think that lining would be important to have in order for an egg to latch on and grow. A seed needs plenty of dirt, right? Nope. You have to periodically purge the lining in order for there to be little enough to satisfy an egg. But every egg doesnt always latch on. They dont tell you in bio or in sex ed that fertilized eggs sometimes, actually often, never find a place to settle and so never grow. Maybe thats cuz your body's so damn busy purging all that nice spongy egg-growing stuff! This system is moronic. Anyone with half a brain could come up with a more efficient way to reproduce. And dont tell me there's some sort of moral lesson to this because thats just stupid. There's no morality in irony.
Every funcional aspect of an animal is actually an extremely roundabout and inefficient way to function. When something works well, it's a marvel (cockroaches: efficient, strong, resourceful,adaptive and still alive). When humans invent things, usually we think of the most efficient way to achieve our goal before we set out. Evolution's only measure of what works is what creatures aren't dead before reproduction. Any random mutation that works will continue, but you have to wait for the lottery to get it. And then, when the mutation reproduces, you still have a chance of losing it! If there were a consciousness present at any point, it wouldnt be quite so outlandishly absurd, inefficient, and pointless.
I guess unlike most people, the idea that life is pointless is actually a comfort to me. Means if i dont get it, there's nothing to get, and no reason to sweat it. Another reason i'm an atheist.
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