I think a lot about "psychic weather." The ebb and flow of ideas, thoughts and moods that blow through a population. I mean, I think there are prosaic explanations for the moods and memetic ideas and how they move through the population of a very social species. For instance, the way panic moves through a crowd does not require a supernatural or paranormal psychic explanation. Primate social dynamics likely suffice. Still, if we're just talking about the felt experience of the world, I think about psychic weather because it feels like such terrible storms are forming everywhere.
Maybe weather is the wrong metaphor. Maybe it's memetic beasts run rampant, inspiring smug rationalizations for cruelty and and a terrible, hateful animosity for the other in every host they find. Maybe there are vast fields of space with energy gradients we can't yet measure that affect the whole species and we just drifted into the Hateful Asshole nebula. Maybe it's a particularly pernicious set of ideas that have developed a life of their own.
I don't really know. All I know is there is an ugly, spiteful spirit loose in the world and I don't like it. Further, I can see who the bad actors are. Assholes aren't subtle and you can tell who is wallowing in the worst version of themselves and who is egging them on. And what I really don't like is how few concrete and organized responses in favor of kindness, community, aiding the needy and loving the other exist. I don't know who I would point to as leading the counter-charge against the truly malignant forces currently challenging the post world-war democratic order. Everyone else either seems asleep, or outraged but helpless, or so deeply up their own ass they have yet to find their way back to daylight. And that I REALLY don't like. The ideas we value matter and they are not an inevitable force of the universe and we have to fight for them. I wish we understood that half as well as the "pain and suffering for you is corrective and incredibly convenient for me" and "we need a pure ethnostate that only likes ketchup" crowd does.
Tuesday, July 24, 2018
Saturday, July 14, 2018
*the sound of a fighter plane crashing*
Ugh, I'm super bummed about another potentially exciting relationship down the drain. I keep telling myself that it's just that the timing is wrong, but the timing will always be wrong as long as I am this stupid, tragic version of myself who's barely functional and not in any shape to share my life with someone. Cannot wait to finally be past my bullahit.
Friday, July 13, 2018
Look to Windward
Look to Windward by Iain M. BanksMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
Extremely satisfying, as his books tend to be. Extended mediations on culture and mortality in truly fantastic and fascinating environments. I could read a whole series of books on the airspheres and giant floating creatures that essentially function as biological, if completely alien, versions of the Culture ships. The crescendo of tension as all the players came together in this one was particularly page-turning. Recommended.
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Tuesday, July 10, 2018
Inversions
Inversions by Iain M. BanksMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
While I generally like the Minds And Drones and ships and things, I liked this more subtle take on the series. Those things are there, they are just only obliquely mentioned and interpreted through the eyes of someone who could not possibly understand them. A good book on its own merits unrelated to the Culture, although I'm still struggling to unpack what the moral of the story was. It feels more like a snapshot of a Special Circumstances mission to a developing planet. However, it remains unclear what the culture intends to accomplish here, other than a general push away from barbarism. I guess part of the lesson was monarchies are not necessarily evil and populist revolts not necessarily good.
In any case, I liked it and recommend it and look forward to reading the rest of the books in the series.
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Friday, July 06, 2018
Excession
Excession by Iain M. BanksMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
I'm reading through the culture books in order, and this is one of my favorite so far. I'm not sure what I think of the Culture in general, but I find the universe interesting and compelling and I like hanging out there. While there is a lot going on here story-wise it largely feels like an extended contemplation of morality and mortality.
Sometimes it feels in these novels like the Minds are more people than the spoiled hedonists they coexist with, and sometimes it feels like they are scary, if generally benevolent, gods for all intents and purposes. That said, some of my favorite moments in this book were long conversations between ship Minds and how they differ from and relate to each other and bicker in ways that made me laugh out loud.
Good book. Good premise. Interesting Universe. Highly Recommended.
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Friday, June 29, 2018
ch-ch-ch-changes
I had a minor visit to the ER last weekend that while not life-threatening was extremely uncomfortable and more than a little embarrassing. But it put a fine point on the ways I have not been taking care of myself.
I also had a minor and partially caffeine-induced panic attack last night looking at my budget last night, but the ultimate message was the same as the ER visit: things cannot continue this way indefinitely. Also, it's incredibly frustrating to have 350k sitting in a retirement account with no access to it. Although now that I'm hourly instead of full-time I may have more than I thought. I will need to call them first thing next week to confirm. A one-time raid of my retirement account would help me a great deal.
I mean, first of all, thank god. I cannot remember a more hopeless or isolated time in my life. Largely the result of personal choices yes, but still. I have no idea what my purpose is or where I belong and it is maddening. I want to be useful I've just lost sight of how to be. A decade of anti-networking as some kind of massive self-own isn't helping either.
I am thinking seriously about what next steps are. I still want to write, but how to make words into money is still some time and practice away. I think I would to get into hospice grief counseling, as it seems important to me and I like the idea of bringing comfort to people according to their particular beliefs without needing to impose my particular beliefs on them. Death and dying is the one time your beliefs get to be your own without challenge and I find that comforting and refreshing.
In the meantime, I am looking for other work and have no idea what I'm doing. Still polishing up my resume, basically using some templates I found online. Kind of hesitant to keep going in data visualization, even though I really like it at times. Leery of corporate environments I guess. I like academia and might just try to stay there, even by going back to school, as little as I like the thought of more debt. Although applying to a tech company in Montreal has some appeal. Honestly, I am wide open to opportunities at this point, I just need to look for them.
In the nested meantime of the first meantime, I don't know what's going on with my cat. Some days she's great, other days less so. Her kidneys are clearly failing but it seems to be a slower process than with my dearly departed boy. I feel like I'm holding my breath waiting for that to play out as well. Also, working from home is a misery with that cat. I love her, but she is anti-productivity or self-improvement as a general rule and it drives me nuts. Difficult all around.
But clearly things are changing. And have been changing. And I have wasted a lot of time and money with my head in the sand. And things cannot continue as they have indefinitely.
I also had a minor and partially caffeine-induced panic attack last night looking at my budget last night, but the ultimate message was the same as the ER visit: things cannot continue this way indefinitely. Also, it's incredibly frustrating to have 350k sitting in a retirement account with no access to it. Although now that I'm hourly instead of full-time I may have more than I thought. I will need to call them first thing next week to confirm. A one-time raid of my retirement account would help me a great deal.
I mean, first of all, thank god. I cannot remember a more hopeless or isolated time in my life. Largely the result of personal choices yes, but still. I have no idea what my purpose is or where I belong and it is maddening. I want to be useful I've just lost sight of how to be. A decade of anti-networking as some kind of massive self-own isn't helping either.
I am thinking seriously about what next steps are. I still want to write, but how to make words into money is still some time and practice away. I think I would to get into hospice grief counseling, as it seems important to me and I like the idea of bringing comfort to people according to their particular beliefs without needing to impose my particular beliefs on them. Death and dying is the one time your beliefs get to be your own without challenge and I find that comforting and refreshing.
In the meantime, I am looking for other work and have no idea what I'm doing. Still polishing up my resume, basically using some templates I found online. Kind of hesitant to keep going in data visualization, even though I really like it at times. Leery of corporate environments I guess. I like academia and might just try to stay there, even by going back to school, as little as I like the thought of more debt. Although applying to a tech company in Montreal has some appeal. Honestly, I am wide open to opportunities at this point, I just need to look for them.
In the nested meantime of the first meantime, I don't know what's going on with my cat. Some days she's great, other days less so. Her kidneys are clearly failing but it seems to be a slower process than with my dearly departed boy. I feel like I'm holding my breath waiting for that to play out as well. Also, working from home is a misery with that cat. I love her, but she is anti-productivity or self-improvement as a general rule and it drives me nuts. Difficult all around.
But clearly things are changing. And have been changing. And I have wasted a lot of time and money with my head in the sand. And things cannot continue as they have indefinitely.
Thursday, June 28, 2018
Thunderbird by Jack McDevitt
Thunderbird by Jack McDevittMy rating: 3 of 5 stars
3 stars is a little low, I should probably have given it 4. I really like McDevitt and his sensibilities in general. I just find it sad that the natural and inevitable conclusion of humanity finding a stargate turns out to be: we aren't ready. That said, given the current state of the world, I can't help but agree. I wanted to escape and instead got a poignant reminder of how far we have to go as a species in terms of culture and kindness.
Good book, as was the first, depressingly accurate read of the human race at present.
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Monday, June 25, 2018
when is it too much?
How much connectivity is too much and how would we know when we've crossed that line? What standards do we have for human health and happiness that aren't unbearable restrictive and in and of themselves harmful to human health and happiness?
There seems to exist a strain of thought that posits we need more information, more context, in ever increasing quantities provided by technological mediums that annihilate time and space and transcend the boundaries of this puny flesh. That the ultimate goal of human life is to know it all, possibly all at once. But to reach that far infinity of knowledge would make us god and biologically speaking we don't seem designed to handle the rigors required of godhood.
So how much information do we try to process before this puny flesh rebels in an avalanche of crude emotional frustration? Where is the reasonable line between godhood and mortality?
I think, at this point, given the paucity of knowledge we have so far collected, trying to set that line fixedly would be folly. But it seems like something we should think about. At what point does trying to process too much information just make us miserable? Is processing information feeds endlessly truly necessary or even desirable in finding the balance between growth and happiness? At what point does our generally laudable tendency to push the limits of our capabilities pass beyond self edification and into realms of counterproductive misery?
To speak somewhat less obliquely, my basic thesis is that the human animal in human flesh is social (to varying degrees by individual), and requires semi-frequent contact with other humans to remain psychologically and physically healthy. Further, that while media can enhance these connections, a human being would not be fulfilled by social interactions mediated entirely by technology of various sorts. So there must exist a healthy balance somewhere between social media and first-person socializing. Also, we do not currently know where that line is or how to define it.
How does the social animal change when we go from socializing primarily in churches and schools to corporate structures with colleagues, and personal socialization greatly atrophied in favor of social media. Which is not to say people don't socialize in churches and schools, but the latter seems increasingly plagued by tech enthusiasts who keep asking "well can't we just use tech to mediate that?" As if mediating all human interaction by a tech interface automatically makes it better.
The questions are: what does healthy socialization look like? How much does it vary by individual? What social interactions are worth NOT mediating via tech, no matter how challenging? How do we know that? What does it look like to rely on mediated social interaction too much? How do we know that? What kind of regular public meetings (religious services, classes, festivals) are important to maintain for the mental and emotional health of social primates such as ourselves? How do we make sure they continue to exist? How do we move forward technologically while still maintaining healthy communities for ourselves?
There are about 50 more questions to ask in this vein. The answers will vary depending on perspective, but I dearly wish we asked them more often.
My sense of modern society is that it is trying very hard to leave the limitations of these bodies behind, but also that as long as we keep waking up in them we will be unable to. i propose instead of imagining how we might become more godlike machines we first consider how we might become happier and healthier primates. What's the point of becoming machines if it won't make us happy? How can we know how to be happy then if we don't know how to be happy now?
There seems to exist a strain of thought that posits we need more information, more context, in ever increasing quantities provided by technological mediums that annihilate time and space and transcend the boundaries of this puny flesh. That the ultimate goal of human life is to know it all, possibly all at once. But to reach that far infinity of knowledge would make us god and biologically speaking we don't seem designed to handle the rigors required of godhood.
So how much information do we try to process before this puny flesh rebels in an avalanche of crude emotional frustration? Where is the reasonable line between godhood and mortality?
I think, at this point, given the paucity of knowledge we have so far collected, trying to set that line fixedly would be folly. But it seems like something we should think about. At what point does trying to process too much information just make us miserable? Is processing information feeds endlessly truly necessary or even desirable in finding the balance between growth and happiness? At what point does our generally laudable tendency to push the limits of our capabilities pass beyond self edification and into realms of counterproductive misery?
To speak somewhat less obliquely, my basic thesis is that the human animal in human flesh is social (to varying degrees by individual), and requires semi-frequent contact with other humans to remain psychologically and physically healthy. Further, that while media can enhance these connections, a human being would not be fulfilled by social interactions mediated entirely by technology of various sorts. So there must exist a healthy balance somewhere between social media and first-person socializing. Also, we do not currently know where that line is or how to define it.
How does the social animal change when we go from socializing primarily in churches and schools to corporate structures with colleagues, and personal socialization greatly atrophied in favor of social media. Which is not to say people don't socialize in churches and schools, but the latter seems increasingly plagued by tech enthusiasts who keep asking "well can't we just use tech to mediate that?" As if mediating all human interaction by a tech interface automatically makes it better.
The questions are: what does healthy socialization look like? How much does it vary by individual? What social interactions are worth NOT mediating via tech, no matter how challenging? How do we know that? What does it look like to rely on mediated social interaction too much? How do we know that? What kind of regular public meetings (religious services, classes, festivals) are important to maintain for the mental and emotional health of social primates such as ourselves? How do we make sure they continue to exist? How do we move forward technologically while still maintaining healthy communities for ourselves?
There are about 50 more questions to ask in this vein. The answers will vary depending on perspective, but I dearly wish we asked them more often.
My sense of modern society is that it is trying very hard to leave the limitations of these bodies behind, but also that as long as we keep waking up in them we will be unable to. i propose instead of imagining how we might become more godlike machines we first consider how we might become happier and healthier primates. What's the point of becoming machines if it won't make us happy? How can we know how to be happy then if we don't know how to be happy now?
Tuesday, June 19, 2018
myths and notes
I am finally making some progress on my mythology research. introductory as it is. I learned a lot from the Egyptian mythology reference book I just finished and the Poetic Edda is fascinating, both in content and just by how fragmentary and debated it all is due to lack of contextual information. My impression is that a lot of cultural information did not survive the transition from oral histories to written ones.
I see Neil Gaiman rewrote the Norse Mythologies, which is something I thought of doing 15 years ago but never did (as I'm sure 1000 others have considered as well). It makes sense that he would do it, he being an actual writer who writes, but I wish I had done my own version. I am considering doing an interpretation of some Egyptian fables though.
I think I have it in my head that Gaiman has staked some territory on modernizing myths, but that doesn't really hold up to examination I think. I mean, there are plenty of other authors doing their own take on these common myths for one.
More importantly though, I don't think there is "canon" as such when it comes to ancient mythologies. The fragments we have through the Edda and various archeological finds in egypt and Greece are by no means complete, and more importantly represent only a partial understanding of those myths by those particular people at that particular time. The Edda is not how it was, it is just the earliest version we have of those stories, as related by these particular story tellers. They were telling these tales through the lens of their own experience and culture and time period and, truthfully, each of us can do the same, whether we choose to commit them to paper or not. There are ways to do that that are truer to the original sources than not, but like all art, myths get to be what we see them as. The object may be less to describe the world through myth, but to describe the storyteller in how they relate to myth. So I guess I have given myself permission to write what I need to.
The other things I want to write is something about archetypal ideas that exist as beings on higher planes who are in conflict, and life on earth affected by the fallout of the victors and losers over time. I probably need to read more Jung to flesh this idea out. I'm not sure explicitly what my influences are here, and maybe I don't need to to write a flight of fancy, but I would like to not be recreating the wheel when I talk about it. If there's a history of thought here, I want to tap into it I guess.
That last is a weird idea, and it is probably just confirmation bias, but I I am interested because I am often struck at how ideas sweep a populace. Either as a natural progression of ideas as they bump into each other or, more fantastically, as a kind of psychic weather that the solar system drifts through on it's journey through the galaxy. The first I want to read academic schools of thought about and the second fantastic stories about. I may have to write the second myself.
I see Neil Gaiman rewrote the Norse Mythologies, which is something I thought of doing 15 years ago but never did (as I'm sure 1000 others have considered as well). It makes sense that he would do it, he being an actual writer who writes, but I wish I had done my own version. I am considering doing an interpretation of some Egyptian fables though.
I think I have it in my head that Gaiman has staked some territory on modernizing myths, but that doesn't really hold up to examination I think. I mean, there are plenty of other authors doing their own take on these common myths for one.
More importantly though, I don't think there is "canon" as such when it comes to ancient mythologies. The fragments we have through the Edda and various archeological finds in egypt and Greece are by no means complete, and more importantly represent only a partial understanding of those myths by those particular people at that particular time. The Edda is not how it was, it is just the earliest version we have of those stories, as related by these particular story tellers. They were telling these tales through the lens of their own experience and culture and time period and, truthfully, each of us can do the same, whether we choose to commit them to paper or not. There are ways to do that that are truer to the original sources than not, but like all art, myths get to be what we see them as. The object may be less to describe the world through myth, but to describe the storyteller in how they relate to myth. So I guess I have given myself permission to write what I need to.
The other things I want to write is something about archetypal ideas that exist as beings on higher planes who are in conflict, and life on earth affected by the fallout of the victors and losers over time. I probably need to read more Jung to flesh this idea out. I'm not sure explicitly what my influences are here, and maybe I don't need to to write a flight of fancy, but I would like to not be recreating the wheel when I talk about it. If there's a history of thought here, I want to tap into it I guess.
That last is a weird idea, and it is probably just confirmation bias, but I I am interested because I am often struck at how ideas sweep a populace. Either as a natural progression of ideas as they bump into each other or, more fantastically, as a kind of psychic weather that the solar system drifts through on it's journey through the galaxy. The first I want to read academic schools of thought about and the second fantastic stories about. I may have to write the second myself.
faithless
I don't like this version of myself. Timid to a fault. Total, unreliable flake socially. Breaking half my social engagements out of anxiety or depression or just a general lack of self-esteem. I don't say this to be hard on myself, but I don't like being this fragile and this ... incapable. It just makes it impossible to connect with people in a way that feels good.
I have no purpose. I have no community. I have few friends to lean on. Consequently my self-esteem is in tatters and I have no well of strength to draw upon. Or rather, I do, but I have lost the discipline or the know-how.
the one thing I miss about religion is the well of strength to draw on bit, and if the price wasn't so high ( a complete abandonment of my critical thinking and self respect) I'd be tempted to go back to it. I think that is why I am looking for some kind of replacement spirituality/philosophy. I need something bigger to believe in, but I have no interest in being taken in by the first charismatic cult to come my way. (I both loved and hated yoga for this reason).
There's a book called "fuck your feelings" which is just advice to do the necessary regardless of how you feel. It is probably good advice that I am not following. Discipline can be defined as doing the thing even when you don't feel like it. So discipline is good, but maybe not in and of itself. What purpose you apply your discipline to factors in.
But doing all the things when they feel wrong is not ideal. Doing all the things but feeling nothing, having no internal purpose or compass is still empty. I'd be getting thinner or getting a lot done, but to what end? I think I am hesitant to really start pulling because I'm afraid of ending up 5 miles in the wrong direction.
I think the argument that sways me the most is that adulthood comes with certain obligations and expectations (which I have not really been living up to) and that I can at least try to meet some bare minimums while going on my spiritual quests. Maybe "other people are counting on you to be functional" suffices as motivation in the short term. I don't give a shit about making the rich richer, but it is good to be there when other people need you to be.
But regardless of my discipline, I think my relationships and social connections will suffer until my self-esteem is better, and my self-esteem won't be better until I ground myself with a better sense of who I am and why I am here. This is why dating and friendships have been so spastic lately, I can't share myself with people until I know who I am and what I have to share. I can't know where I exist in relation to other people until I have some independent sense of my own position.
I don't know man, disconnection is not fun. I don't recommend it. I keep hoping for a divine flash of inspiration, but the gods won't tell me shit, lazy fuck that I am.
I guess it's on me then. Oh good.
I have no purpose. I have no community. I have few friends to lean on. Consequently my self-esteem is in tatters and I have no well of strength to draw upon. Or rather, I do, but I have lost the discipline or the know-how.
the one thing I miss about religion is the well of strength to draw on bit, and if the price wasn't so high ( a complete abandonment of my critical thinking and self respect) I'd be tempted to go back to it. I think that is why I am looking for some kind of replacement spirituality/philosophy. I need something bigger to believe in, but I have no interest in being taken in by the first charismatic cult to come my way. (I both loved and hated yoga for this reason).
There's a book called "fuck your feelings" which is just advice to do the necessary regardless of how you feel. It is probably good advice that I am not following. Discipline can be defined as doing the thing even when you don't feel like it. So discipline is good, but maybe not in and of itself. What purpose you apply your discipline to factors in.
But doing all the things when they feel wrong is not ideal. Doing all the things but feeling nothing, having no internal purpose or compass is still empty. I'd be getting thinner or getting a lot done, but to what end? I think I am hesitant to really start pulling because I'm afraid of ending up 5 miles in the wrong direction.
I think the argument that sways me the most is that adulthood comes with certain obligations and expectations (which I have not really been living up to) and that I can at least try to meet some bare minimums while going on my spiritual quests. Maybe "other people are counting on you to be functional" suffices as motivation in the short term. I don't give a shit about making the rich richer, but it is good to be there when other people need you to be.
But regardless of my discipline, I think my relationships and social connections will suffer until my self-esteem is better, and my self-esteem won't be better until I ground myself with a better sense of who I am and why I am here. This is why dating and friendships have been so spastic lately, I can't share myself with people until I know who I am and what I have to share. I can't know where I exist in relation to other people until I have some independent sense of my own position.
I don't know man, disconnection is not fun. I don't recommend it. I keep hoping for a divine flash of inspiration, but the gods won't tell me shit, lazy fuck that I am.
I guess it's on me then. Oh good.
Thursday, June 07, 2018
There but for the grace of god go I
There but for the grace of god go I is an awkward saying. I heard it a lot as a kid and it took me a while to parse it. Maybe I was not a bright kid. I don't know. It just didn't make a lot of sense to me for the longest time.
Eventually, it clicked. "If god wasn't looking out for me, I would be that person." Honestly, this initially struck me as kind of a shitty condescending snobbery. "I may have my struggles, but at least I'm not you, you poor wretched bastard. #Blessed"This said, of course, with absolutely no intention to help the individual currently being pitied.
Assuming somewhat more charity in the reading, it's a reminder to be grateful. If you are a fervent believer, specifically to god, who has not let you fall through the cracks of society, in his or her or its divine wisdom. And it is good to be grateful. People report change in their lives merely by adopting a grateful mindset and it strikes me as something I should try. Although I have not. There with no sense of gratitude go I.
Falling through the cracks used to look so far away. If there was a world where I was on the street or addicted to drugs or an elderly shut-in it was through the woods and over the hills and across the ocean and far, far away.
Now, it feels like one weekend of bad choices away and I'm not sure I love that. Although without community and without purpose you are almost by definition if not falling through the cracks of society, at least eyeing them flirtatiously. There's just so little in this civilization that I love and consumerism is time-filling but empty. Why not fall through the cracks if this is all we're going to be doing with ourselves? Creating a world where kids legitimately fear being shot to death in class and the working class has a lifetime of debt and no brighter future to work towards, led ever forward by fools, cowards and psychopaths. There but for the grace of god go we. And if god isn't protecting us from this shit, well, there we go.
Part of my problem with "success" is my instinctive response to looking like a success in this society is, essentially, "there but for the grace of god go I." Instagram influencers, climbing the corporate ladder, saving the world with another stupid app, acquiring wealth and losing my goddamn mind, gaining political power in the USA and losing my goddamn soul. There but for the grace of god go I.
Of course, it is this nearness to the "go I" part of the saying that helps me understand how shitty it is. The inherent judgement of the other as less than. Of how much that saying describes christian america and how much it damns christian america in the description. A person steeped in genuine humility wouldn't think that way I think. I don't know, maybe instead of looking at people we could just help. Or at the very least try not to hurt. Doing Less Harm would be a solid improvement in modern american life I think. Democratic party, you are welcome to that slogan.
I am not really doing my part, although I want to. I'm not so good with people, homeless or otherwise, so maybe I shouldn't be on the frontlines in terms of people management, but there are many, many opportunities to not be a self-absorbed consumer in this society. I should probably get off my ass and try one. Hospice volunteers are still needed I would imagine.
Hospice still seems like good and necessary work. No self-comforting illusions there. There you will some day go, grace of god or no.
Eventually, it clicked. "If god wasn't looking out for me, I would be that person." Honestly, this initially struck me as kind of a shitty condescending snobbery. "I may have my struggles, but at least I'm not you, you poor wretched bastard. #Blessed"This said, of course, with absolutely no intention to help the individual currently being pitied.
Assuming somewhat more charity in the reading, it's a reminder to be grateful. If you are a fervent believer, specifically to god, who has not let you fall through the cracks of society, in his or her or its divine wisdom. And it is good to be grateful. People report change in their lives merely by adopting a grateful mindset and it strikes me as something I should try. Although I have not. There with no sense of gratitude go I.
Falling through the cracks used to look so far away. If there was a world where I was on the street or addicted to drugs or an elderly shut-in it was through the woods and over the hills and across the ocean and far, far away.
Now, it feels like one weekend of bad choices away and I'm not sure I love that. Although without community and without purpose you are almost by definition if not falling through the cracks of society, at least eyeing them flirtatiously. There's just so little in this civilization that I love and consumerism is time-filling but empty. Why not fall through the cracks if this is all we're going to be doing with ourselves? Creating a world where kids legitimately fear being shot to death in class and the working class has a lifetime of debt and no brighter future to work towards, led ever forward by fools, cowards and psychopaths. There but for the grace of god go we. And if god isn't protecting us from this shit, well, there we go.
Part of my problem with "success" is my instinctive response to looking like a success in this society is, essentially, "there but for the grace of god go I." Instagram influencers, climbing the corporate ladder, saving the world with another stupid app, acquiring wealth and losing my goddamn mind, gaining political power in the USA and losing my goddamn soul. There but for the grace of god go I.
Of course, it is this nearness to the "go I" part of the saying that helps me understand how shitty it is. The inherent judgement of the other as less than. Of how much that saying describes christian america and how much it damns christian america in the description. A person steeped in genuine humility wouldn't think that way I think. I don't know, maybe instead of looking at people we could just help. Or at the very least try not to hurt. Doing Less Harm would be a solid improvement in modern american life I think. Democratic party, you are welcome to that slogan.
I am not really doing my part, although I want to. I'm not so good with people, homeless or otherwise, so maybe I shouldn't be on the frontlines in terms of people management, but there are many, many opportunities to not be a self-absorbed consumer in this society. I should probably get off my ass and try one. Hospice volunteers are still needed I would imagine.
Hospice still seems like good and necessary work. No self-comforting illusions there. There you will some day go, grace of god or no.
Sunday, June 03, 2018
Stuck Schmuck
So I'm stuck still. I'm pretty sure I've written some version of the last post 3 times now. I guess I'm still chewing on it. I clearly need to read some more. As it turns out, people have thought through some of these thoughts before.
Like everyone and their dog*, I'm still thinking of starting a podcast. More to flex creative muscles than anything. Or even just to practice conversational skills that are clearly getting rusty. Or maybe talking to myself would feel more acceptable if I could claim it was a podcast.
Similarly, I've been thinking of doing a stand-up routine. Some jokes about how I sat down to play one video game and 20 years later got up to get some water and discovered I was a fat, depressed shit. Ha! The jokes, as you might intuit, would be self-deprecating. Although largely as catharsis. My sense of self-flagellation is, in its own way, jovial. If I am frustrated by my choices, I am also amused by them on some level. Partly because I understand them as choices not intrinsic faults.
I'm still hooked into gaming. It's nuts. It's fun, but ... it's still not quite who I want to be. God of War has sparked some thoughts about gods and such, but I'm not sure I needed to spend 40 hours in the game to do that.
To use the metaphor of the Jophur, there is a master ring that is slowly forming. A mantra of increasing frequency is "free yourself of this burden." That burden being the labors given to me by video games. Or any of the other lotus flowers I keep eating. The burden is apathy. Free yourself of apathy. And addiction.
This is not a good state to date from. Potential suitors just get frustrated by my lotus-eater ways and I do not blame them. I'm not sure I would date me in this state. And by 'not sure' I mean '100% would not'. I used to think it was all timing. "Oh the timing for us is terrible." Well, the timing is always terrible when I'm not ready.
At the same time, my hermetic ways are driving me nuts. I both value my independence and crave human contact. There's an exciting electric tension between the two that I would happily ditch in a second for a good shoulder rub. I miss people but I'm not sure how I want to fit with them yet. And for someone who has rarely been lower, I am strangely picky. I don't just want any community, I want one that makes sense to me and that I resonate with. That community has yet to spontaneously generate in my living room though.
I am still too unsure who I am and where I fit post-Adventism. It makes it difficult to connect with people. I like the concept of gods giving you labours. Like, if you can't find something to do, well, the gods have some chores they need doing. At least then if someone asked what I was doing with my life I could say, "Oh, descending into the underworld to bring back the beauty of Persephone for reasons that are not mine to understand." We might all still judge me for not creating labors for myself, but we'd agree it was good to have purpose.
I should be in therapy, but part of the reason I'm not is, yes money, but also I'm not really ready to do the thing. I am forever on the cusp of revelation and change but always end up eating one more lotus flower. They are delicious, and do we not have more than enough time on this island?
We do not. Free yourself of this burden.
*"hi, welcome to More Bark than Bite, a podcast by me, Sparky the Talking Dog!"
Like everyone and their dog*, I'm still thinking of starting a podcast. More to flex creative muscles than anything. Or even just to practice conversational skills that are clearly getting rusty. Or maybe talking to myself would feel more acceptable if I could claim it was a podcast.
Similarly, I've been thinking of doing a stand-up routine. Some jokes about how I sat down to play one video game and 20 years later got up to get some water and discovered I was a fat, depressed shit. Ha! The jokes, as you might intuit, would be self-deprecating. Although largely as catharsis. My sense of self-flagellation is, in its own way, jovial. If I am frustrated by my choices, I am also amused by them on some level. Partly because I understand them as choices not intrinsic faults.
I'm still hooked into gaming. It's nuts. It's fun, but ... it's still not quite who I want to be. God of War has sparked some thoughts about gods and such, but I'm not sure I needed to spend 40 hours in the game to do that.
To use the metaphor of the Jophur, there is a master ring that is slowly forming. A mantra of increasing frequency is "free yourself of this burden." That burden being the labors given to me by video games. Or any of the other lotus flowers I keep eating. The burden is apathy. Free yourself of apathy. And addiction.
This is not a good state to date from. Potential suitors just get frustrated by my lotus-eater ways and I do not blame them. I'm not sure I would date me in this state. And by 'not sure' I mean '100% would not'. I used to think it was all timing. "Oh the timing for us is terrible." Well, the timing is always terrible when I'm not ready.
At the same time, my hermetic ways are driving me nuts. I both value my independence and crave human contact. There's an exciting electric tension between the two that I would happily ditch in a second for a good shoulder rub. I miss people but I'm not sure how I want to fit with them yet. And for someone who has rarely been lower, I am strangely picky. I don't just want any community, I want one that makes sense to me and that I resonate with. That community has yet to spontaneously generate in my living room though.
I am still too unsure who I am and where I fit post-Adventism. It makes it difficult to connect with people. I like the concept of gods giving you labours. Like, if you can't find something to do, well, the gods have some chores they need doing. At least then if someone asked what I was doing with my life I could say, "Oh, descending into the underworld to bring back the beauty of Persephone for reasons that are not mine to understand." We might all still judge me for not creating labors for myself, but we'd agree it was good to have purpose.
I should be in therapy, but part of the reason I'm not is, yes money, but also I'm not really ready to do the thing. I am forever on the cusp of revelation and change but always end up eating one more lotus flower. They are delicious, and do we not have more than enough time on this island?
We do not. Free yourself of this burden.
*"hi, welcome to More Bark than Bite, a podcast by me, Sparky the Talking Dog!"
Psyched out
When I am trying to make sense of things I am grateful for the help I find, even in the oddest places. I just finished Till We Have Faces and that contained some helpful passages, even if it did not end with me reconverting to Christianity. Or converting to Christianity. I'm not sure I ever really gave it any particular devotion. It was just the one meal on offer throughout my first two decades. When the only meal is fish you can declare yourself a proud eater of fish, even though you don't really like fish that much and would probably eat other things given the opportunity.*
Legion, oddly enough, offers me some help.** I mean, it's a wanton dive into psychological craziness. Kind of a joyful counterpoint to Lynch's heavy shamanic dream states. I appreciate both for the enthusiasm it embraces the Marvel telepathic mutants and all their attendant craziness and for the questions it brings up. Frankly these days I like any work that tries to make any sense of how the human mind works and dives in without hesitation. Plus that show is pretty dang creative. Just mesmerizing to watch.
I just love the way Legion talks about ideas, as living things, good or bad. I think I need to read more book on psychology (and, again, see a therapist). Like everyone on the show seems half mad, but it seems to be a sort of good natured ribbing about the kind of monkeys we tend to be, and how even the shallowest analysis of how we think leaves one with that impression. My favorite element this season is Division 3, an organization trying to defend against imminent psychic assault but without only one half-crazed mutant on the roster with any actual ability in that realm. Any scene set there features an announcer in the background describing various symptoms as signs of psychic attack. "Disorientation is not normal. If you feel something, say something." and so on.
We have such a rich and detailed vocabulary surrounding physical health, as limited as we know that knowledge to be, but it's much harder to describe a healthy psychology, at least for the non-psychologist. Is this because of an overall trend towards materialism and reason? We know the mind is a product of a brain so we tend to focus on the health of the brain and its attendant chemicals rather than the thoughts it thinks and the feelings it feels and their intrinsic coherence. Or maybe it's capitalism, and we can only define sane as that which leave a body producing and consuming at an acceptable rate. I'm not sure I like where we're at in thinking about our thinking, is all I'm saying. Which is why I like shows like Legion and Twin Peaks: the return.
One of Vonnegut's books (the Sirens of Titan?) starts with someone babbling about a primitive age was so primitive it didn't even understand the 53 portals to the soul (or something like that). Which I took as Vonnegut's acknowledgement that as limited as our knowledge of bodies is, our capacity for discussing and assessing the mind and the soul is even more so.
Which is why I like reading C.S. Lewis. For all the christian apologist stuff, he seems to be one of the few authors that takes the struggle to reconcile how best to reconcile the needs of our feelings and the needs of our intellect. We live in a materialist age and we talk with a faint embarrassment when it turns out our feelings exist at all. How unreasonable. What a lack of discipline.
In David Brin's uplift series he talks about an alien race that is composed of a series of layered rings, each with its own thoughts, that makes decisions by consensus. And the race called the Jophur, which employ a master ring to provide a coherent sense of identity to the composite being, and brings order to the stack through electrical shocks. I'm not sure we are meant to be the Jophur exactly.
I'm not sure we should live lives in constant religious ecstasy. Or forever committing horrors against other people out of fear of the gods. Or at the whim of whatever emotion takes us. But I don't think we are complete without letting that side of ourselves free on a semi-regular basis. This, to me, is the central benefit of religion, the freedom and permission to feel your goddamn feelings without shame. Taking the time to feel deep down what it means to be part of something bigger than ourselves, which we transparently are even from the most secular point of view. We are all very reasonable now but we are also very repressed as a result. We remain creatures that feel first and think second, and maybe it serves us poorly to shackle and punish that first part of us 24/7.
I think we might have over-corrected in our pursuit of reason and it worries me. And I feel it a lot in this culture and it bothers me. I just want an understanding that our feelings are as important as our thoughts, and that there's such a thing as thinking that does more harm than good as much as there is such a thing as emotions that hinder more than they help.
It's balance, baby, balance. That is all I am trying to say. There's a time to think and a time to feel and we could be less shit about how we talk about that in this culture.
*Not to be crass, but it occurs to me this metaphor, while not clever, works equally well for sexual orientation.
**Help that I should probably be seeking form a qualified therapist. But who has the money for that shit?
Legion, oddly enough, offers me some help.** I mean, it's a wanton dive into psychological craziness. Kind of a joyful counterpoint to Lynch's heavy shamanic dream states. I appreciate both for the enthusiasm it embraces the Marvel telepathic mutants and all their attendant craziness and for the questions it brings up. Frankly these days I like any work that tries to make any sense of how the human mind works and dives in without hesitation. Plus that show is pretty dang creative. Just mesmerizing to watch.
I just love the way Legion talks about ideas, as living things, good or bad. I think I need to read more book on psychology (and, again, see a therapist). Like everyone on the show seems half mad, but it seems to be a sort of good natured ribbing about the kind of monkeys we tend to be, and how even the shallowest analysis of how we think leaves one with that impression. My favorite element this season is Division 3, an organization trying to defend against imminent psychic assault but without only one half-crazed mutant on the roster with any actual ability in that realm. Any scene set there features an announcer in the background describing various symptoms as signs of psychic attack. "Disorientation is not normal. If you feel something, say something." and so on.
We have such a rich and detailed vocabulary surrounding physical health, as limited as we know that knowledge to be, but it's much harder to describe a healthy psychology, at least for the non-psychologist. Is this because of an overall trend towards materialism and reason? We know the mind is a product of a brain so we tend to focus on the health of the brain and its attendant chemicals rather than the thoughts it thinks and the feelings it feels and their intrinsic coherence. Or maybe it's capitalism, and we can only define sane as that which leave a body producing and consuming at an acceptable rate. I'm not sure I like where we're at in thinking about our thinking, is all I'm saying. Which is why I like shows like Legion and Twin Peaks: the return.
One of Vonnegut's books (the Sirens of Titan?) starts with someone babbling about a primitive age was so primitive it didn't even understand the 53 portals to the soul (or something like that). Which I took as Vonnegut's acknowledgement that as limited as our knowledge of bodies is, our capacity for discussing and assessing the mind and the soul is even more so.
Which is why I like reading C.S. Lewis. For all the christian apologist stuff, he seems to be one of the few authors that takes the struggle to reconcile how best to reconcile the needs of our feelings and the needs of our intellect. We live in a materialist age and we talk with a faint embarrassment when it turns out our feelings exist at all. How unreasonable. What a lack of discipline.
In David Brin's uplift series he talks about an alien race that is composed of a series of layered rings, each with its own thoughts, that makes decisions by consensus. And the race called the Jophur, which employ a master ring to provide a coherent sense of identity to the composite being, and brings order to the stack through electrical shocks. I'm not sure we are meant to be the Jophur exactly.
I'm not sure we should live lives in constant religious ecstasy. Or forever committing horrors against other people out of fear of the gods. Or at the whim of whatever emotion takes us. But I don't think we are complete without letting that side of ourselves free on a semi-regular basis. This, to me, is the central benefit of religion, the freedom and permission to feel your goddamn feelings without shame. Taking the time to feel deep down what it means to be part of something bigger than ourselves, which we transparently are even from the most secular point of view. We are all very reasonable now but we are also very repressed as a result. We remain creatures that feel first and think second, and maybe it serves us poorly to shackle and punish that first part of us 24/7.
I think we might have over-corrected in our pursuit of reason and it worries me. And I feel it a lot in this culture and it bothers me. I just want an understanding that our feelings are as important as our thoughts, and that there's such a thing as thinking that does more harm than good as much as there is such a thing as emotions that hinder more than they help.
It's balance, baby, balance. That is all I am trying to say. There's a time to think and a time to feel and we could be less shit about how we talk about that in this culture.
*Not to be crass, but it occurs to me this metaphor, while not clever, works equally well for sexual orientation.
**Help that I should probably be seeking form a qualified therapist. But who has the money for that shit?
Psyche!
Till We Have Faces by C.S. LewisMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
Probably my favorite novel by C. S. Lewis. I'm not really into christian apologetics at the moment, but I appreciate his facility with words, his in-depth knowledge of mythology and philosophy and most importantly his honest attempt to reconcile the irrational and rational sides of humanity and how best to tend to each without diminishing the other. This is the kind of conversation I wish there were more of in the world. For him, the answer was best expressed in Christianity, but for me I'm not so sure. I do feel him a kindred spirit in that particular search though, the desire to reconcile thoughts with feelings in a way that is beautiful and alive.
Some of his best work and one that will leave you thinking for some time after. Who are you really? What is your true voice and what story does it tell you over and over without ceasing? Where is you face? Why do you hide it?
View all my reviews
Friday, May 11, 2018
Call Me by Your Name
Call Me by Your Name by André AcimanMy rating: 5 of 5 stars
I watched the movie first, although the movie compliments the book nicely. The book has some insights into Elio's thinking that the movie failed to convey so well. Elio's obsessive over-thinking and the strange dance shy people do all rang very true for me. the prose is beautiful and engaging and I was underlining frequently.
The movie truncates and wraps up and neatly cauterizes what the book draws out into an open wound. I was weeping by the final pages over these two beautiful idiots both for what they had and that they never had and by extension perhaps for what I have had and never had. Could they not be together because of timing? Fear? A random and ultimately cruel universe? I'm not sure and I'm not sure it matters what it was specifically, but I found it affecting nonetheless. I do think of Oliver as a traitor though. In that, Elio was quite correct.
I adore this book. Like all good art, I think it changed my life.
View all my reviews
Thursday, May 10, 2018
to write or not to write.
I have vowed to write more, but have yet to be disciplined about what to write. I've had several story ideas I was very excited about, which have since faded to nothing because I forgot to write them down. Also, I am still pre-occupied with the general trainwreck that is my life. But here are some things I've been thinking about.
I, an poorly educated stem major, have been thinking about and reading some about philosophy, ethic, morals, purpose, etc. Christian apologists tend to claim christianity supplanted the pagan gods for a reason, and I am inclined to agree if not for all of the same reason. I think we are ripe for the next great moral framework to supplant christianity but it hasn't happened quite yet. It could be humanism, but it isn't yet. It could be some fusion of old and new ideas and gods but it hasn't happened yet. It is still trying to be born, stymied greatly by the dystopian horror also currently trying to breach the amniotic sac of bad ideas and break it's way into our world. Maybe the next phase only gets born as opposition to a greater evil though. I do not have the details or evidence to argue these assertions just yet.
I am still at war with my addictions. I cannot yet break from from bad habits of technology or diet or lack of exercise into habits that I am sure would make me feel much better. Getting closer every day, but no watershed moment just yet. Good art keeps trying to save my life though. Call Me by Your Name, however flawed, nudged something lose and I am still turning it over. It's not quite depression, it's more a lack of purpose and connection, as I believe I've mentioned before. Hoping to get it before it gets me.
The other cat is starting to show the same signs of kidney failure as the last. She and I do not have the same connection as I did with Zapp, but I am not looking forward to another round of "hey, your cat is dying." I want to write a book on cats and religion and history. A history of religion and cats. I'm not even quite sure that's the book idea I had. God, I need to write these things down.
My face is almost not completely fucked, although I still need to actually meet a dermatologist to confirm. Hooray?
I, an poorly educated stem major, have been thinking about and reading some about philosophy, ethic, morals, purpose, etc. Christian apologists tend to claim christianity supplanted the pagan gods for a reason, and I am inclined to agree if not for all of the same reason. I think we are ripe for the next great moral framework to supplant christianity but it hasn't happened quite yet. It could be humanism, but it isn't yet. It could be some fusion of old and new ideas and gods but it hasn't happened yet. It is still trying to be born, stymied greatly by the dystopian horror also currently trying to breach the amniotic sac of bad ideas and break it's way into our world. Maybe the next phase only gets born as opposition to a greater evil though. I do not have the details or evidence to argue these assertions just yet.
I am still at war with my addictions. I cannot yet break from from bad habits of technology or diet or lack of exercise into habits that I am sure would make me feel much better. Getting closer every day, but no watershed moment just yet. Good art keeps trying to save my life though. Call Me by Your Name, however flawed, nudged something lose and I am still turning it over. It's not quite depression, it's more a lack of purpose and connection, as I believe I've mentioned before. Hoping to get it before it gets me.
The other cat is starting to show the same signs of kidney failure as the last. She and I do not have the same connection as I did with Zapp, but I am not looking forward to another round of "hey, your cat is dying." I want to write a book on cats and religion and history. A history of religion and cats. I'm not even quite sure that's the book idea I had. God, I need to write these things down.
My face is almost not completely fucked, although I still need to actually meet a dermatologist to confirm. Hooray?
Friday, May 04, 2018
Call me by your name
I finally got around to watching Call Me By Your Name this week and I'm still thinking about it days later.
I don't think it's the most epic romance I've ever seen, but it was sweet and lovely and life affirming and such a stark contrast to the life I've been living.
Let's set aside the gay stuff for a second, even though it's more or less central to the whole experience. Just lingering by proxy in such an idyllic setting was ... shocking? Invigorating? I traditionally go to movies to escape to outer space but who knew what I really needed was lingering shots of riding bikes through the Italian countryside? That depiction of life, albeit as inherited wealth, complete with servants, was so refreshing. Even in a much more modest home, would I enjoy swimming every day, riding bikes into town and community events like dancing and volleyball? Yes, yes I would.
Are some of these community things absent from my life because times have changed or just because I have changed into someone who tries very little to improve his life? I don't know, but my relation to the setting of this film is simple longing. Well, longing is a central theme of the film and my relationship to it in general, but specifically the setting. Goddamn gorgeous.
Continuing to put the gay stuff aside temporarily, I also felt a strong sense of desire for Elio's family life. When I was young I dated my own Marzia, the daughter of a professor with a rich family life. their house was a clutter of musty books and their conversations were about music and writers that largely went over my ADD comic-book loving head, but I adored them all the same. Talking about philosophers and composers and the finer points of the humanities is extremely soothing to me, as it turns out, and I appreciate having a friendly place to do that. Elio's family life reminds me much of that time I spent with her and her family.
We even had a similar arc to Elio and Marzia, albeit years later. She admitted she broke up with me because she felt there was always a part of me I couldn't give to her and when I started dating men it clicked. She remains one of my truest friends and still the only ex I have a good and strong connection with. She' is also the sole reminder of what a delight the humanities loving lifestyle can be whenever I visit her and her own giant collection of books and music.
So I long for that scholastic home life, but I also greatly envied Elio a family that only cared that he was happy and supported him no matter who he happened to love. I kept waiting for it to go dark, for his father to become irate, but it never happened. I'm not sure Elio understands how good he has it. But I can't be the only queer watching this with an ache in their heart about how their own family experience contrasts with the almost high fantasy portrayal here. I'm not saying it's unrealistic, just so pure and life affirming that it almost doesn't feel like real life. Real life, historically, being less affirming of the humanity of those experiencing it.
I mean, this film is a pure gay coming of age fantasy in many ways. An ideal setting, an ideal family, an ideal lover, an understanding ex-girlfriend, etc. that's kind of what makes it beautiful. A pure and good expression of the world it is possible to create.
I say it's not an epic romance because while I found the lead actors both handsome and good at their craft, the chemistry didn't seem quite believable to me. As a man who has kissed men I didn't quite buy their sexual chemistry. Of course, epic romance and smoking sex scenes is not really the intent here anyway. It was much more about Elio's awakening and Oliver's liberation at being allowed to be exactly who he was without pretense for a few sweet moments.
Elio's adolescent weirdness rang extremely true for me and Timothee Chalomet did such great work with it. The sense of longing he had for Oliver was very real to me. And rang very true of how weird I was as an adolescent and how I was when I first started to try and date men, albeit at a more advanced age.
Oliver's sense of liberation when he finally gets to be with Elio struck a chord as well. It's left fairly ambiguous whether the both of them are gay or just bisexual but this is clearly a part of them they don't get to express openly in 1983. The sense of joy at being able to let their guard down with each other is very real. Was the tragedy that their joy was to be short-lived solely due to circumstance or from the assumption that this is something they would not be allowed to have long term? Part of the tragedy is we just don't know. Does Oliver get engaged to a woman because he is truly bisexual or because he gives up on ever having what his heart truly desires? Much like Elio's father did, as he reveals in a moving final speech.
So as much as the film is about longing it is also about loss. About letting loss numb you to the point you stop believing you can be who you truly want to be and be with who you truly want to be with. It happened to Elio's father. It may have happened to Oliver. Only Elio, in a moving and lingering final shot on his face as he stares into the fire and lets himself feel what he feels, refuses to cut part of himself away to spare himself pain.
This movie is begging us not to surrender our deepest selves in the face of pain or loss or a world actively hostile to who we truly are. And so I am still thinking about it several days later.
I don't think it's the most epic romance I've ever seen, but it was sweet and lovely and life affirming and such a stark contrast to the life I've been living.
Let's set aside the gay stuff for a second, even though it's more or less central to the whole experience. Just lingering by proxy in such an idyllic setting was ... shocking? Invigorating? I traditionally go to movies to escape to outer space but who knew what I really needed was lingering shots of riding bikes through the Italian countryside? That depiction of life, albeit as inherited wealth, complete with servants, was so refreshing. Even in a much more modest home, would I enjoy swimming every day, riding bikes into town and community events like dancing and volleyball? Yes, yes I would.
Are some of these community things absent from my life because times have changed or just because I have changed into someone who tries very little to improve his life? I don't know, but my relation to the setting of this film is simple longing. Well, longing is a central theme of the film and my relationship to it in general, but specifically the setting. Goddamn gorgeous.
Continuing to put the gay stuff aside temporarily, I also felt a strong sense of desire for Elio's family life. When I was young I dated my own Marzia, the daughter of a professor with a rich family life. their house was a clutter of musty books and their conversations were about music and writers that largely went over my ADD comic-book loving head, but I adored them all the same. Talking about philosophers and composers and the finer points of the humanities is extremely soothing to me, as it turns out, and I appreciate having a friendly place to do that. Elio's family life reminds me much of that time I spent with her and her family.
We even had a similar arc to Elio and Marzia, albeit years later. She admitted she broke up with me because she felt there was always a part of me I couldn't give to her and when I started dating men it clicked. She remains one of my truest friends and still the only ex I have a good and strong connection with. She' is also the sole reminder of what a delight the humanities loving lifestyle can be whenever I visit her and her own giant collection of books and music.
So I long for that scholastic home life, but I also greatly envied Elio a family that only cared that he was happy and supported him no matter who he happened to love. I kept waiting for it to go dark, for his father to become irate, but it never happened. I'm not sure Elio understands how good he has it. But I can't be the only queer watching this with an ache in their heart about how their own family experience contrasts with the almost high fantasy portrayal here. I'm not saying it's unrealistic, just so pure and life affirming that it almost doesn't feel like real life. Real life, historically, being less affirming of the humanity of those experiencing it.
I mean, this film is a pure gay coming of age fantasy in many ways. An ideal setting, an ideal family, an ideal lover, an understanding ex-girlfriend, etc. that's kind of what makes it beautiful. A pure and good expression of the world it is possible to create.
I say it's not an epic romance because while I found the lead actors both handsome and good at their craft, the chemistry didn't seem quite believable to me. As a man who has kissed men I didn't quite buy their sexual chemistry. Of course, epic romance and smoking sex scenes is not really the intent here anyway. It was much more about Elio's awakening and Oliver's liberation at being allowed to be exactly who he was without pretense for a few sweet moments.
Elio's adolescent weirdness rang extremely true for me and Timothee Chalomet did such great work with it. The sense of longing he had for Oliver was very real to me. And rang very true of how weird I was as an adolescent and how I was when I first started to try and date men, albeit at a more advanced age.
Oliver's sense of liberation when he finally gets to be with Elio struck a chord as well. It's left fairly ambiguous whether the both of them are gay or just bisexual but this is clearly a part of them they don't get to express openly in 1983. The sense of joy at being able to let their guard down with each other is very real. Was the tragedy that their joy was to be short-lived solely due to circumstance or from the assumption that this is something they would not be allowed to have long term? Part of the tragedy is we just don't know. Does Oliver get engaged to a woman because he is truly bisexual or because he gives up on ever having what his heart truly desires? Much like Elio's father did, as he reveals in a moving final speech.
So as much as the film is about longing it is also about loss. About letting loss numb you to the point you stop believing you can be who you truly want to be and be with who you truly want to be with. It happened to Elio's father. It may have happened to Oliver. Only Elio, in a moving and lingering final shot on his face as he stares into the fire and lets himself feel what he feels, refuses to cut part of himself away to spare himself pain.
This movie is begging us not to surrender our deepest selves in the face of pain or loss or a world actively hostile to who we truly are. And so I am still thinking about it several days later.
Tuesday, May 01, 2018
Inifity War = a numb ass at the theater
I don't know if I need to spill ink over Infinity war. It was what it was. I liked it as a spectacle. It is basically a comic book cross-over in movie form with all the good things and bad things that brings. All your favorite heroes meet each other! Hooray!
But aside from spectacle, it relies heavily on the character work from all the pervious films to drive this one, because there's no time to develop it here. You really, really have to care about a character coming in to the film to even start to care what happens to them here. A lot of amazing things happen that land with no weight because you know the ending will absolutely be reversed, and, more importantly, there's not enough time to establish any sense of stakes and therefore, inevitably, loss with any of the characters. I think it's supposed to be Tony carrying the emotional weight here, but he's not really given any more time than the others to develop it.
The only death that seemed sad was spider-man's, but that's largely because they pulled the "I don't want to go," line which was powerful the first time I saw a character say it, but seems cheaper and cheaper as a trope the more time goes on. Even the post-credits scene is less an emotional after-punch than an ad for the next movie. Not that that's particularly unusual, but it doesn't help things land any harder.
I don't know, it didn't crush my soul and I liked it okay. I can 100% see why someone would be tired of these things at this point though.
Also, my ass really was numb at the end.
But aside from spectacle, it relies heavily on the character work from all the pervious films to drive this one, because there's no time to develop it here. You really, really have to care about a character coming in to the film to even start to care what happens to them here. A lot of amazing things happen that land with no weight because you know the ending will absolutely be reversed, and, more importantly, there's not enough time to establish any sense of stakes and therefore, inevitably, loss with any of the characters. I think it's supposed to be Tony carrying the emotional weight here, but he's not really given any more time than the others to develop it.
The only death that seemed sad was spider-man's, but that's largely because they pulled the "I don't want to go," line which was powerful the first time I saw a character say it, but seems cheaper and cheaper as a trope the more time goes on. Even the post-credits scene is less an emotional after-punch than an ad for the next movie. Not that that's particularly unusual, but it doesn't help things land any harder.
I don't know, it didn't crush my soul and I liked it okay. I can 100% see why someone would be tired of these things at this point though.
Also, my ass really was numb at the end.
Monday, April 02, 2018
Goodbye, good friend
Nobody tells you when they're young, that in all likelihood you will have to kill your cat. That's not the way they would actually say it, they would say "put to sleep" or some softer euphamism. But the reality is, if you don't lose your cat to accident or some natural, sudden death you will be the one who has to decide when killing them is more of a mercy than letting them suffer. It is a miserable and heart-breaking decision and I don't wish it on anyone.
I had to say goodbye to my big, dumb, wonderful cat Zapp a couple weeks ago and I was not prepared to either make that decision for him or to let him go. In the end I have no regrets about the timing of the decision, but the weeks leading up to and the day itself were a misery I do not soon want to repeat.
He had been declining slowly for 6 months or so, and then in the last month rapidly, although truthfully his end was ultimately about as peaceful as any creature could hope for. I don't think he felt too good between kidney failure and some underlying problem (probably cancer), but I felt the decision of when to end it was his to make and my job was to intuit when he was done. I think the vet disagreed with me, but I got it to within a day or so I think. On that score I did right by him.
He still wanted to do his routine. And although it was stressful for me more or less waiting for him to die or to decide he finally wanted to, there was an opportunity for many kindnesses in that last month. He was having trouble bending his head for food, so I raised his food and water dishes. He couldn't jump up on the toilet to get water from the sink splashed on him, so I picked him up and put him down, with a kiss on the back of the head as payment. He would purr throughout. I think at the end he was just happy to be held.
Of course, eventually you run out of time for kindnesses and care, as the body of a creature you love deteriorates beyond your ability to help until the range of kindnesses available reduces to one final act: a cessation of suffering and a peaceful death. When I reached this point I understood it was a kindness, but it felt like complete garbage and a terrible betrayal.
The last half hour was terrible. I was sobbing hopelessly because there was literally no hope of more time with him, and he still reached out with his paw in the way he always did when I wasn't paying enough attention to him. "Hey, stop that. This is our time, spend it with me."
he was already mostly gone, and by the time the second injection was administered he was gone within moments. I kissed him on the back of the head and told him I'd love him forever but did not linger. He was already gone.
The urn they gave me was an entirely unsuitable floral tin that I plan on replacing with a more appropriate container. Probably the one with Bastet on it that I liked.
Towards the end, clearly more for me than for them, I bought a statue of Bastet and lit some incense to her for the protection of my cats in this life and the next. I'm not sure that does anything at all, but I felt better. I find I am hungry for ritual, around even the death of my cat. I want a service, a ritual, a formal set of practices I can perform to honor him and say goodbye. Ancient Egypt had that in the worship of Bastet, but we proud irrational rationalists have long since abandoned such nonsense.
But still, I miss it. I want to reach for a cultural tool here, and obvious and meaningful rituals to perform, but find myself grasping at empty space. We don't believe in the importance of rituals anymore and you don't really notice until you actually need it and it's not there. I will probably have to make my own, and I will make my own, but I still wish for a commonly understood practice to cope with it.
That said, I am also dissatisfied with the rituals we have for our own species. I attended the fourth funeral in a year for an elderly relative who has moved on and did not enjoy the Adventist version of such, for a variety of reasons. It seems to bring my family some comfort, but the rituals of a belief system I no longer buy into and am actively angry about bring me no comfort.
So I will buy an urn and light some more incense and put his picture up on the wall and miss him terribly.
Why did I love that fuzzy thing? What purpose does it serve? Why was that such a significant relationship to me and why is the sense of loss so profound? I don't understand any of this right now. Certainly my human social web is in tatters and this loss serves to highlight that, and the need to repair it, in a number of ways. But still, answers and understanding are not things I have a lot of right now.
It is certainly a reminder that I do not have forever to get my ship in order. I find myself battling a lot of regret. Did I do enough for him? Was I present when he was sick? Was I present enough when he was well? Did I give him a good life? Did I take him for granted? He knew he was loved (he would nightly crawl up beside me on the couch and purr contentedly) and he had a decent life, but I find myself reflecting on the shambles I've been and wondering how I could have done better if I was, I don't know, actually trying at life. In any case, I hope he looks back kindly from wherever he is now. I hope I can learn to look back kindly on myself as well.
So that's that. My life's a mess and my wonderful, beautiful cat is dead. Best cat I ever knew. I wish you could have met him.
Thursday, March 01, 2018
Southern Reach Review
Acceptance by Jeff VanderMeerMy rating: 4 of 5 stars
I would have hated this series when I was younger, too much writing, not enough resolution and revelation. Now that I am ancient of days (early forties) I enjoyed it a great deal.
Look, at some point you realize some stories are plot-driven, full of mysteries where the deepest satisfaction lies in the resolution. In the confirmation that what is happening is knowable and the satisfaction of mapping it all out.
Other stories are meant to be experiential, where the satisfaction lies not in the mapping or the knowing but the transcendent experience of the inexplicable. These stories may purposely thwart knowing, not to spite you, but to shift your attention to the experience of not-knowing or understanding and the joys that may be found there. It's a kind of transcendence edging, for better or for worse. Hanging on the cusp of revelation, tasting it on the tip of your tongue, feeling it in the tips of your fingers, but never quite getting there.
We've all experienced stories with a dissatisfying resolution. Sometimes it comes from a poorly crafted story or characters. Some writers are good at crafting questions but poor at answering them. Some answers are disappointing because they turn the mystery mundane. It was just Old Man Higgins in a suit and the Force is really just micro-organisms in the right concentration. Transcendent fiction eschews the concept of answering them entirely, focusing instead on that wonderful sense of excitement that comes from not knowing, chewing endlessly on the tantalizing hints provided. Answer fiction is order and materialism and experiential fiction is spiritual mysticism. Neither is superior, they are just addressing different needs in different readers.
Southern Reach is a trilogy that falls squarely into experiential fiction, much more David Lynch than not. The entire point of the series is the experience of encountering life or intelligence or something so alien and so different from human experience that interacting it with it leaves you less human than when you started. Of how maddening it is to attempt to rationally understand something which will forever defy the scientific progress of your understanding because you don't have the context or tools or senses to render it explicable. That, at best, it must first be understood irrationally, and that in that process you will be irrevocably altered. It is quantum slit experiment, except that the observation changes, and possibly mutates, the observer.
It's not that answers aren't supplied. By the end of the series you understand where area X comes from and the vague outlines of what it is, but not what it might think or want. What it might think or want is not the point. The psychological and body horror of being changed by something just by interacting with it at all is. You get full character arcs and resolution. It may not be the resolution you are hoping for for them, but their arcs are tangible and, to me, satisfying.
A lot of this kind of experiential fiction depends on the artistry of the author. Lynch is not popular because he gives satisfying answers; he is popular because he excels at filming sequences that feel like dream sequences or being on psychotropic drugs. Likewise, Southern Reach fails or succeeds on the quality of Vandermeer's prose, which is high. I came for the weird story, but I stayed for the evocative writing and compelling characterizations.
Do I recommend this series? Absolutely. So long as you're into more the experience of psychological and body horror resulting from contact with the alien and not hoping too much for a rational mapping and understanding of everything that's happening. That's not the point and it's not a bad thing.
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