Here's an interesting thought experiment that might be a more interesting real experiment that might actually blow open the doors to weight loss. Does muscle tension effect your weight?
This thought stemmed from my noticing that one of the common responses people have after a session of hanna somatics is that the released body part or their whole soma feels "lighter". At first, I just cataloged this as an interesting sensation to have but slowly, it started to occur to me that actually, the perception of body weight has a great deal to do with muscle tension.
Think about it...
For example, if you were to pick up a twenty pound weight, your muscles have to contract a certain extant. and not just the muscles of the lifting hand, but the muscles throughout your soma as you refind balance with this added weight. How do we know that we've picked up twenty pounds? The sensors in our fingers and hand send information to the brain that we are holding something and the muscles that tense to compensate for its weight send the message that the something is heavy. Let's quantify this a bit and say that maybe your muscles on that side increase their contraction to 20% of their maximum contractile ability.
What happens though if we tense our muscles without having that weight? When your posture starts to firm up over the course of development, something once thought of as the inevitable outcome of aging, that rigidity is linked to an increase in the resting level of your muscles. In an earlier posting, I discussed the stretch reflex and resting levels of a muscle. So, as we habituate certain postures and contractions, the resting level of certain muscles raise to 10, 15, 20, 50% of their maximum capacity.
With Hanna Somatic techniques, we use the engagement of the sensory motor cortex to inhibit muscle contraction, effectively lowering a particular muscle's resting level. The fact that people feel lighter as this resting level decreases seems to imply that whether we are lifting a barbel or simply tightening our muscles continually over time, the sensing of weight is the same. So when the muscles around our arm are looser, we sense that arm as lighter than before.
Part 2
So, I was chewing on that thought for awhile and I mentioned it to a colleague. She told to me that an interesting thing has been happening... Her weight has been slowly and steadily dropping over the past few months. As she continues to do Hanna Somatic exercises, shedding deep layers of tension, she has also been shedding pounds. This could also be explained by changes in diet and aerobic activity, but as a personal trainer, her intake/output is pretty well regulated.
So anyway, what if this were true and actually had an effect on how we store calories? Think about it. If your muscles are relatively tense, your internal sense is that you're actually heavier than what the scale shows. Your metabalism which regulates the storing and burning of calories is set not to what that scale says but to what your soma perceives unconsciously. So someone could diet all they want to but if their body is regulating itself for more weight than they actually have, it'll be an uphill battle.
If on the other hand, they focus on releasing and lowering tension, their muscles will become more relaxed, and their soma will sense that they are now "lighter". Once they are sensed as being lighter, there will be no need to hang on to those excess calories and I imagine that, still exercising of course, the weight will easily start to fall off...
I would sat that I've felt this myself but its harder for me to pinpoint. I have lost about 20-30 pounds in the past few years but have also greatly improved my diet and exercise routines. Anybody else have personal or secondary experience with this?
[MISS MANNERS] On becoming ill-mannered..
This morning while walking from my house to BART I had a bit of a wardrobe malfunction. First off, my skirt was clinging to the stockings and riding up. But even worse, the elastic appeared to have fled the scene and the stockings themselves began sliding off. skirt up + tights down = a-w-k-w-a-r-d. I tried hitching them up a few times, I ducked into not one but two corner stores for emergency hose, no luck. so I did what any girl would do; I ducked behind a car on 16th street, looked both ways and removed said garments. I do believe the gents in the alley were appreciative.It made me think, though, about propriety and manners and whatnot. Believe it or not, I was raised with them. Elbows off the table, switch your knife from left to right while cutting your steak, ask permission to be excused, don't talk with your mouth full, don't interrupt, call adults by Mr. and Mrs. unless they specifically tell you otherwise, no white shoes before memorial day, etc. I've worn white kid gloves(see above), and not just playing dress-up.
While I've retained some of what I was taught, I would not by any means be considered a ladylike well mannered woman. I interrupt people with far too colorful vocabulary while chewing food with my elbows on the table. I sit down on the floor of BART when there are no seats, often while eating (much to the horror of jackson j.) and drinking (coffee mostly, but I admit to the occasional champagne in a jar). I take my stockings off on 16th st.
I have to admit, that there's a fraction of me that feels like "well my goodness gracious - what would miss manners think?!" Because try as we might, some things, like freckles and herpes, you just can't shake. So despite the slow disintegration of my good manners, politeness means a lot to me. I respect my elders. I give my seat to pregnant women. I clear my plate and apologize for everything and thank people like it was going out of style. And so I worry a bit as I waltz around in public eschewing the civilities that my forbearers worked so hard to maintain. Not because I feel like those mannerisms should exist or be exalted for their own sake, but because other people around me may not share my outlook and I'd feel bad offending them.
Ultimately though, I don't care, and I just wanted to make that known. In the words of Cartman, "WhatEVAH, I do what I WANT!". Sure, I won't be invited to tea with the upper echelons of society but so what? I'd be happier drinking champagne from a jar on the floor BART. So I'd like to thank the activist warriors of the past century for making this world a freer, less uptight place. or if not this world, at least this city.
godbless you san Francisco.
the end.
[WHY BOTHER] It's late
Tonight I watched Waltz with Bashir, which is a beautiful and difficult film. I recommend it.
The movie left me feeling incredibly sad and powerless; why do we humans always fuck it up with violence and avoidance and complacency? Now I can’t sleep. What if we really can't change anything or make a difference? What if it is too hard to care?
Lily’s eco-warrior hero Sandrine sums up how I often see the world:
Not infrequently, people treat my effort to live my values like it’s a cute/annoying affectation. Either like I sort of ruined their party, but they forgive me, or like I’m a mildly interesting (to ten year olds and nerds) exhibit on dinosaurs. But really, I just don’t want to have been complacent in a bunch of stuff that I know in my heart is wrong.
I guess I have to believe that if enough people allowed themselves to care enough to try, then things could be different. And, honestly, I don't understand how someone could look at the world and not fixate on all of the bad things.
But then again, this morning, on my way to work, some woman had pulled her enormous SUV over on the shoulder of the on-ramp to rescue a little mangy injured dog. And at the BART station last week, a little kid came up to me and asked me for a hug. Maybe there is hope for us.
The movie left me feeling incredibly sad and powerless; why do we humans always fuck it up with violence and avoidance and complacency? Now I can’t sleep. What if we really can't change anything or make a difference? What if it is too hard to care?
Lily’s eco-warrior hero Sandrine sums up how I often see the world:
When I enter a friend's bathroom and look at the shelves full of body products, I see toxic, cancer-inducing chemicals in wasteful, non degradable plastic containers. When someone shows me their new clothes, I see third-world sweatshops, chemically-grown cotton, and oil consuming overseas shipping. A piece of meat on a plate is the flesh of an antibiotic-injected, tortured and cruelly slaughtered sensitive being, fed on the product of extensive and earth-damaging monocultures. […]I see a deprived and dying planet and greed ruling over common sense.
Not infrequently, people treat my effort to live my values like it’s a cute/annoying affectation. Either like I sort of ruined their party, but they forgive me, or like I’m a mildly interesting (to ten year olds and nerds) exhibit on dinosaurs. But really, I just don’t want to have been complacent in a bunch of stuff that I know in my heart is wrong.
I guess I have to believe that if enough people allowed themselves to care enough to try, then things could be different. And, honestly, I don't understand how someone could look at the world and not fixate on all of the bad things.
But then again, this morning, on my way to work, some woman had pulled her enormous SUV over on the shoulder of the on-ramp to rescue a little mangy injured dog. And at the BART station last week, a little kid came up to me and asked me for a hug. Maybe there is hope for us.
[ECO-WARRIOR] Try This At Home!
Let me say straight out that I am not an eco-warrior. I wish I were and I do try to be better. I think what separates the eco warriors from the wasteful masses isn't just that they do things more consciously, but that they are conscious of doing things more consciously. Change is a state of mind. Ergo, if I thought of myself as a DIY kind of girl, I'd do more DIY projects. If I thought of myself as really eco-friendly, I would be more friendly to the world, and if I thought of my self as an eco-friendly-DIY-kind-of-girl then I would be a GIY girl (green it yourself) and would know all sorts of tricks and tips to living green. So I'm trying it on for size, and this is how I'm going to start:MAKING YOUR OWN CLEANING PRODUCTS:
This is my next big goal and I'm really excited about it and think you should join me. By making your own products, you use fewer toxic chemicals, avoid extra packaging as well as the waste that comes from processing all those chemicals, and you save money. All you need is a few basic incredients (pretty much just pure liquid soap, borax, vineger and baking soda. maybe some lemons. thats it.
All Purpose Cleaner: • Add ½ cup pure liquid soap (ex. pure castile soap) to 1 gallon of hot water. This solution is safe for all surfaces and is very effective for most jobs. • For a clean scent and to help cut grease, add ¼ cup of lemon juice to the above recipe. • For a stronger cleaner, double the amounts of soap and lemon juice in the above recipe.
Tub and Sink Cleaner: • Sprinkle baking soda on porcelain fixtures and rub with a wet rag. Rinse well to avoid a hazy film. • Cream of tarter and White Vinegar mixed together to make a paste. • 2 tsp. Borax, 4 tsp. of white vinegar, 3 - 4 cups of hot water mixed into a spray bottle.
Window and Mirror Cleaner: • Put ¼ cup of vinegar in a 16 oz spray bottle and fill to the top with water. A few drops of detergent may be added for preventing streaks. Spray on surfaces. Rub with a diaper, other lint free rag, or sheet of newspaper.
Laundry Detergent: • Add ½ cup washing soda and ½ cup of Borax to water as washer is filling. Add clothes (this is sufficient for a large load and will clean and deodorize your clothes). • The first time you try the above recipe, your water will look like you have added soap or detergent (that is how much soap is left in our clothes after washing and rinsing).
Softening Fabrics (including wool): • Add ¼ cup white vinegar to rinse cycle or to a dispenser ball (this does not make your clothes smell like vinegar). • To make blankets soft and fluffy: add 2 cups of white vinegar to a washer tub full of water. Rinse cotton and wool blankets in washer tub after washing. This leaves blankets free of soap and their nap is soft and fluffy.
Spot Cleaner: • Use ¼ cup of borax and 2 cups of water. Dissolve in water, sponge on stain and let it dry or pre-treat before washing.
Stain Removers: • An equal mixture of salt and white vinegar will clean coffee and tea stains from china cups. • Fruit and Wine stains: Immediately pour salt or cold soda water on stain and soak in milk before washing. • Grease stains: Strain boiling water through white cottons and follow with dry baking soda or rub with washing soda in water. • Ink stains: Soak in milk or remove with hydrogen peroxide. • Blood stains: Immediately pour salt or cold soda water on stain and soak in cold water before washing. • Coffee and Chocolate stains: Mix egg yolk with lukewarm water and rub on stain. • Chewing gum: rub with ice, gum will flake off.
Drain Cleaner: • Pour ½ cup of baking soda down the drain first, then ½ cup of vinegar. Let it fizz for a few minutes. Then pour down a tea kettle full of boiling water. Repeat if needed.
Oven Cleaner: • Do not use this cleaner on self cleaning ovens. Mix 1 cup of baking soda with enough water to make a paste. Apply to oven surfaces and let stand a little while. Use the scouring pad for scrubbing most surfaces. A spatula or bread knife is effective to get under large food deposits
Air Fresheners: • Dissolve 1 tsp of baking soda in 2 cups of hot water; add 1 tsp of lemon juice. Pour the solution into a spray bottle and spray as you would an air freshener. • Place a few slices of a citrus fruit, cloves, or cinnamon in a pot with enough water to simmer gently for 1-2 hours. • Use baking soda in your garbage or refrigerator to help reduce odors at their source.
Floor Cleaner with Fragrant Herbs: • Combine in a pale or bucket: 1/8 cup liquid soap or detergent, ¼ - ½ cup white distilled vinegar or lemon juice, ½ cup fragrant herbal tea (peppermint is great as it adds antibacterial qualities). Swirl the water around until it is sudsy. Scrub floor with mop or rag.
Scouring Powder: • Combine pure soap with table salt or baking soda on the surface to be cleaned. Scrub with a firm bristle brush. • Baking soda alone on a damp sponge is also effective on most surfaces. • Personalize scouring powder by adding an aromatic herb or flower. Put ingredients in blender and run until the fragrance has infused the powder.
Disinfectant: • Borax has long been recognized for its disinfectant and deodorizing properties. Mix 1/2 cup Borax into 1 gallon hot water or undiluted vinegar and clean with this solution. • For a fragrant smell, add a few sprigs of fresh thyme, rosemary or lavender to the above recipe. Steep for 10 minutes, strain and cool. Store in a plastic spray bottle.
Furniture Polish: • Dissolve 1 tsp lemon oil in 1 cup vegetable oil. Apply with a clean dry rag.
Insecticide: •Sprinkle borax powder around your refrigerator and stove as a cockroach deterrent. • A mixture of borax and sugar or honey will attract and kill silverfish and ants
Shoe Polish: • Did you know that shoe polish is so toxic that you can't just throw it in the trash, you have to dispose of it as a hazardous material? crazy. crazier still, it turns out a banana is a great replacement.
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SHOUT OUT: For more eco-sass and GIY inspiration, check out my friend Sandrine's blog. She is an actual real life eco-warrior and she does it with such style and sassiness, she is a total inspiration/hero.
FREE SWIM!!!!
Remember when you were a kid on a hot day in the summer and you were left to your own devices for hours on end in the pool while your parents pretended to lifeguard while they [suntanned/read/sipped bacardi/etc.] ...? GodDAMN that was fun! You held your breath and dove down deep and time just ceased to exist. For those precious moments you were the most perfect [mermaid/ninja/whatever the hell it was you were doing down there at the bottom] ever. You were beautiful. You were 100% imagination and free time.Ok. Now channel that, and then write whatever and then just click post and dont think about it too much.
There are only two requirements:
1) that you write/draw/ponder/film/link with abandon. for real. no hesitation. no judgement. only love. really seriously. like Diane Court before her father felt threatend by Lloyd Dobbler and went to prison, you can say anything.
2) that your title begins with a indication of the general overall subject:
example 1: (POLITICS) Making the Case for Retroactive Impeachment Proceedings...
example 2: (FEARS) Mountain Lions: how worried should I be?....
And so on....
The (Un)Known Universe
As I think I've mentioned previously, I am not a math person. While I have great respect for those who are, I accepted a long time ago that this was not the direction my life was headed (I think the precise moment was in third grade when everyone had to make brown paper bag covers for their textbooks and I oh-so-subtly decorated mine with "I HATE MATH" in really big block letters.) Given this intense distaste for mathematics, I have made it part of my life's work to avoid it and any related subjects at all costs. The fact that my university had pretty much no core curriculum requirements played a surprisingly large part in my decision to go there. Unfortunately, I learned later on that they did in fact have a few requirements, much to my dismay, and that I had to take three math/science courses in order to graduate.To that end I took physics and astronomy (and yes, I am aware that that's two courses not three - at some point they just took pity on me and looked the other way.)
Physics was like, eh. whatever, laws of physics and whatnot; good times with Newton, nothing shocking. I found my Astronomy class however to be surprisingly enlightening; not in the sense that I learned a lot about astronomy, but in the sense that I found that astronomers themselves had a lot to learn. It suddenly became clear that the percent of knowable information that we knew for sure was in fact roughly equal to the amount I had previously thought we had yet to discover. I had always assumed that, while we'd not yet ventured on to create living arrangements on other planets or anything, that was soon to come, and on the whole we'd gotten most of it figured out and were just working out the kinks. And here I'm just talking about our solar system - clearly there was much much more to be discovered beyond, but in terms of our little planetary neighborhood I thought we had a good lay of the land, so to speak. But no.
It all seemed fine and dandy until we got to the chapter on Dark Matter. It sounds spoooooky and mysterious because in a sense it is. We know its there because mathematically it has to be, but we don't know what the "it" is.
So, fine. Weird and a little disappointing, but there were still lots of numbers and equations involved so I could throw them a bone. But then all of a sudden we're talking about not just Dark Matter but Dark Energy as well and you look at the numbers and we are not talking about a small corner of the sky here (please note the accompanying photo.) It just felt like, what on earth!? How are you going to have this whole field of science devoted to knowing whats out there and have all sorts of fancy shmancy expensive equipment and write any number of big heavy textbooks on the subject and then casually slip it in there in Chapter Seven like its no big deal that, in fact, you've done the numbers and deduced that ultimately you know shockingly little and have only come so far as to know that you don't know but whatever it is there's quite a lot of it out there and since you can't see it or measure it and know nothing at all about it, you've decided to call it "Dark Energy" and "Dark Matter" and leave it at that!? Come on!
I'm not being fair. I know that. It's hard work and its work I couldn't even begin to fathom doing. Seriously. Props to astronomers. For real. But good lord, come up with a better sounding name at the very least! Something a little less Harry Potter-esque? Geez.
Anyways, those were my thoughts on the subject then, circa 2001. Nowadays, I kind of like it. It makes me appreciate the human-ness of scientists. They must be a humble lot, with an offbeat sense of humor, I think, in order to come up with and keep those names. I was thinking of this when I saw this article recently in the New York Times. It's interesting and kinda freaky. But it also echoes the same sense of excitement and genuine awe that those silly monikers embody, and I like that. Sometimes scientists don't really know what they're doing either. :)
Explorers
Recently, I stumbled across a movie that I saw as a kid. The movie, called "Explorers" (http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089114/) is about three kids (two of whom are the very young Ethan Hawke and River Phoenix!) who build an awesome spaceship and travel into outer space. Very cool. I remembered seeing the movie as a kid, and remember thinking it was awesome that these kids built their own spaceship. So, in a moment of Netflix-fueled nostalgia, I moved it to the top of my queue.
A week or so later, I was watching it with a small group of friends. It began just as I remembered- awesome. But about halfway through, the movie takes a turn for the awful. It turns out I had blocked the second half of the movie out of my memory because it is so tremendously bad. Without going into too many details, lets just say it involves singing, dancing, movie-quoting terribly cheesy looking, psuedo-muppet aliens. Wow. What a waste of a great first half of a movie.
Anyhow, I guess my point is that I hope whenever we finally figure out this space travel thing (or maybe whenever the combined cuteness of a young Ethan Hawke and River Phoenix ever occurrs again in the natural world) there are no stupid stupid singing aliens. I mean, really.
A week or so later, I was watching it with a small group of friends. It began just as I remembered- awesome. But about halfway through, the movie takes a turn for the awful. It turns out I had blocked the second half of the movie out of my memory because it is so tremendously bad. Without going into too many details, lets just say it involves singing, dancing, movie-quoting terribly cheesy looking, psuedo-muppet aliens. Wow. What a waste of a great first half of a movie.
Anyhow, I guess my point is that I hope whenever we finally figure out this space travel thing (or maybe whenever the combined cuteness of a young Ethan Hawke and River Phoenix ever occurrs again in the natural world) there are no stupid stupid singing aliens. I mean, really.
Actual Breaking News From Space: Terror in orbit: ISS piss recycler in fire alarm mishap
I really had no idea how prescient this topic was, but apparently the galaxy is a'twitter about urinary issues in space....
GOLDEN-POND™ DRINKS MODULE MOISTENS SPACE PANTS/BROWS
By Lewis Page • Posted in Science, 21st November 2008 19:51 GMTA quarter-billion-dollar recycler unit - shipped into orbit aboard the space shuttle so as to slake the thirst of hardworking astronauts with a revitalising crystal flow of their own reprocessed urine - is playing up. According to the AP, space aces aboard the International Space Station (ISS), to which the shuttle Endeavour is currently docked, had managed to produce a "test batch" of urine by Thursday afternoon.
Many a slip 'twixt the cup and the ... well.No doubt parched after their exertions in unloading the shuttle's cargo of improvements to the station - of which the recycler is only one - the thirsty astronauts fired up the golden shower reprocessor unit. (Suggested trade name: Golden Pond™.) Unfortunately, a loud fire alarm was triggered at once, doubtless causing the luckless void-voyagers to fear that the machine had managed to create some kind of fearful piss-based combustible* rather than the wholesome thirst-quenching refreshments they had been looking forward to.
The threat of a devastating golden fire or explosion gutting the ISS was no doubt a sobering one, possibly leading to the unplanned escape of some potential recycler feedstock into the station's atmosphere. Crafty NASA lag-boffins had anticipated this, in fact, as the machine is designed to harvest evaporated bodily fluids as well as those deposited directly.
The fire alarm, heard over the radio, reportedly startled two astronauts doing maintenance work outside the station in spacesuits. Despite the sudden panic, however, neither of them allowed their toolbags to get away from them on this occasion.
The fire alarm was subsequently found to be spurious, and NASA ground controllers monitoring the complex urine-extractor hinted that snags in its embedded software might b
e to blame. "These are the growing pains we expect to see," flight director Ginger Kerrick told reporters eager for details on the urine-related uproar."These are very complicated pieces of
equipment with very complicated software to control them."
Once the re-wee machine is up and running smoothly, it's expected to allow the ISS to support six astronauts rather than the current trio.
The final frontier
My niece is terrified of outerspace. She says it is "creepful."
And frankly, unless extra-planetary space travel would allow me to wear unitards and hang out with Guinan:
I'm bound to agree with her.
And frankly, unless extra-planetary space travel would allow me to wear unitards and hang out with Guinan:
I'm bound to agree with her.
NEW TOPIC: EXTRA-PLANETARY TRAVEL
A few thoughts on Space....1) A couple days ago a story came out that really didn't make front page, but in my book it should have: astronomers have taken the first pictures of planets outside our solar system. In other words, ours is not the only sun out there. Given the fact that the earth's ability to sustain life depends entirely upon its specific distance from the sun, that means that there are quite possibly other planets out there that are similiarly placed around other suns out there and similarly able to sustain life.
2) According to Wikipedia:"As of November 2008, the world's population is estimated to be about 6.72 billion (6,720,000,000). In line with population projections, this figure continues to grow at rates that were unprecedented before the 20th century, although the rate of growth has almost halved since its peak of 2.2% per year, which was reached in 1963. The world's population, on its current growth trajectory, is expected to reach nearly 9 billion by the year 2042."
3) The price for a flight brokered by Space Adventures to the International Space Station aboard a Soyuz spacecraft is now $20–28 million. Flights are fully booked until 2009. For a cheaper experience, you can settle for a suborbital flight, peaking at an altitude of 100-160 kilometres (100 km, being the the internationally defined boundary between Earth and space)
Passengers would experience three to six minutes of weightlessness, a view of a twinkle-free starfield, and a vista of the curved Earth below. As of November 2007 Virgin Galactic had pre-sold nearly 200 seats for their suborbital space tourism flights, according to the company's president. Virgin is certainly not the only company investing in space tourism - a variety of space-hotels, space islands (Hilton is all about them), and other related travel options are in the works.
I'm just saying, you might wanna start saving. Or just hope the price drops and make your reservation now.
two little seperate thoughts
1) ON the WEIRDNESS and NEWNESS of JOY:
This morning, skimming though google news, i found myself smiling as i did yesterday and the day before, seeing headlines here and there discussing the aftermath of the election. As Obama rapidly prepares to take over, we get to watch him unfold and spread out.
There was so much talk early on about Being Ready on Day One and which sounded like a kind of hollywood extravaganza of red phones and button pushing and explosions of tempers and missiles, and blood and triumph! But the real day one is about education funding, and Guantanamo, and green energy and science and all the good stuff and the bad stuff the make up the structure in which we all live. Now that the election is over, we can take a step back and see the bigger, smaller wins. It kind of feels a little like watching fireworks: there are the big booming ones that rattle the the earth and reverberate through our bodies. but the really good ones don't stop there - they shoot off a bunch of littler explosions to follow and each one is a happy little surprise. We were rattled and shouting with the first BOOOOOOM! of "President Obama". But its not over! no no there's more! because now we get the little guys....
boom!... Ending military tribunals & closing guantanamo*!
poof!.. Stem Cell research!!!
bam!...Funding for non-pro-life family planning orgs!
pow!.... Attorney Generals that aren't criminals!
Of course, of course (of course!) we should be wary. We should all read the last chapter of Al Franken's Lies and the Lying Liers who Tell Them and memorize that shit. Because now is not the time to hand the DNC the keys and pass out in the back seat. Obama is amazing and thank the lord we have him, but he's not exactly the most progressive tool in the shed by any means. We absolutely must be vigilant and take him to task when his decisions aren't what we thought we were signing up for.
But while we keep one eye on the ball, i just wanted to throw it out there that i am loving these little after shocks, It is infinately pleasureable watching the fireworks, each headline a reminder of all the little things he will do on day one, and two and three and so on. How odd and wonderful it is to know that each task or decision that lands on his desk, will, at the very least, be handled with care and thoughtfulness.
poooofff!!!!
pow!
ba booooooom!
--footnote--
*yes i know, this ones a little tricky. it might not be that great. but whatever it is it will be someting better than we have now. _________________________________________________________
2) On the BATTLE of GOOD v. EVIL:
While I stand firm in my decision to explore this newfound feeling of joy, I do recognize that my bubbly enthusiasm over this election is a little problematic. Because, as I said above, he's not as progressive as iIwish he were. He's not some kind of second coming or Neo. (woah though, if he was...) He will disappoint. More than once. Probably a lot.
And McCain? It's true, he's bad. he really does suck and had he won that would probably have sealed the deal on the rapid demise of the planet. But he's not THE DEVIL. In fact, not only is he not totally and completely EVIL personified (that's Dick Cheney, silly!), he probably means well in his own special (yet scary and volatile) way. He'd maybe even make a couple good decisions (but thank god he won't have to).
So, whats with my newfound zeal? Why am I - why are so many of us - suddenly thinking in absolutes and binaries? When did we become so black and white???
Wait wait yes! i know when!: the last 8 years!
All of Bush's good and evil rhetoric - the kind that made patriotism a weapon, that legitimated wars and that wittled our privacy laws down to bare bones, its seeped in! We have all been contaminated by BushThink!
Scary, for sure. but also, how ironic it is, how funny, that in the end, he won the battle and lost the war. He did some serious damage to our conceptions and collective conciousness, but ultimately he lost to his own rhetorical army. After 8 long years, we embrace his looney binary of GOOD v. EVIL but he gets cast as the Bad Guy, tossed into the rubble of the RNC to lick his wounds. And McCain the Gremlin shrinks back into the shadows from whence he came with the Ice Queen Palin melting into the arctic seas, while shining Prince Obama takes the crown and the his beautiful bride at his side and he frees the innocent and annoints his lowly sidekicks and sets the animals from their cages and birds start fluttering and the dark forests alights with butterflies and streams and swirling sunshiney breezes with new seeds and and whatever, whatever whatever the end! yayyyyy!
I'm not saying that's a good thing, it is no way to frame international or national policy. but it's funny nonetheless.
ELECTION NIGHTMARES
Last night i had a dream that it was election night and the numbers for Obama and McCain were so tight that a weird joke write-in ballot prank meant that somehow Obama and McCain cancelled eachother out and Molly Ringwald became president. But, quite obviously, there was an uproar and so somehow, with the shocking but steadfast support of Meryll Streep, the Olson Twins took over. which involved flying a plane. underwater. it was fucking terrifying.
FULL RELEASE
This is what victory looked like. In a collective burst of enthusiasm, all the pent up frustration and stress was released(appropriately?) all over Castro street.
we truly are social ANIMALS!
Asking us to believe
Some ungodly number of months ago, I was discussing with a friend whether to vote for Obama or Hilary in the primary. The most convincing argument we came up with is the one Obama has since made in his acceptance speech at the DNC and again last night. He talked about it at the Wesleyan Commencement. It's in a quote at the top of barackobama.com. Dr. Pepper was referring to it this morning. It's that Obama gets good people fired up about getting involved with politics. Or, as he says, he's asking us to believe in our ability to change Washington.
Democracy, I think, is a preventative measure. Checks and balances are not designed for getting things done, but rather for slowing down the inevitable badness that pervades political people. And despite Bush and Cheney's best efforts at ungearing, the great machine creaked and groaned, straining against such badness as had not been foreseen even by the founders, and at last seems poised to spit them out, squinty eyed and frazzled onto the unforgiving pages of books written by people like Stephen Colbert. So, the power of this change is not exactly Obama, or as the Onion says, "Black Man Given Nation's Worst Job". Rather, it lies in the collective force of a lot people like those in the streets last night, who decide to take some sort of political action.
In Yeats' apocalyptic poem "Slouching Toward Bethlehem", he sets the scene: "The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity". I know there were many good people fighting the Bush administration, but personally, I lacked conviction, and there are many much less politically inclined than I. So as we count down the days until January 20th (is it really 2009 already?), I will try to remember not to be complacent. For, while this is a tempting message:
He's just a guy who needs our help.
Democracy, I think, is a preventative measure. Checks and balances are not designed for getting things done, but rather for slowing down the inevitable badness that pervades political people. And despite Bush and Cheney's best efforts at ungearing, the great machine creaked and groaned, straining against such badness as had not been foreseen even by the founders, and at last seems poised to spit them out, squinty eyed and frazzled onto the unforgiving pages of books written by people like Stephen Colbert. So, the power of this change is not exactly Obama, or as the Onion says, "Black Man Given Nation's Worst Job". Rather, it lies in the collective force of a lot people like those in the streets last night, who decide to take some sort of political action.
In Yeats' apocalyptic poem "Slouching Toward Bethlehem", he sets the scene: "The best lack all conviction, while the worst / Are full of passionate intensity". I know there were many good people fighting the Bush administration, but personally, I lacked conviction, and there are many much less politically inclined than I. So as we count down the days until January 20th (is it really 2009 already?), I will try to remember not to be complacent. For, while this is a tempting message:
He's just a guy who needs our help.
Bittersweet Hope
Last night I went to bed with hope. Coming off an evening of celebration in the wake of Obama’s landslide victory, I was feeling good. Even the prop 8 gap seemed like it could be closing. This morning I woke up to reality. At 9:50am I stood at the corner of Telegraph and Durant in Berkeley and watched as police officers wrote tickets to unsuspecting pedestrians and bikers on all four corners in the midst of a relatively quiet morning with little car traffic. I thought about my roommate Dave fighting poverty and violence in the East Oakland schools as the officer writing my ticket explained, “It’s for your own safety.” In Sudan the celebration in neighboring Kenya is quieted by the overwhelming presence of the bleak situation and the recognition that the new president will probably not be able to eliminate their pain. And in California we are confronted with the emotional turmoil that emerges when we put the Obama victory side by side with the fact that 52 percent of voters made same-sex marriage unconstitutional in our golden state. This morning the hope turned bittersweet.
As I attempt to reconcile the Obama victory with the passing of proposition 8, I think back to a statement written by Nancy Fraser that I sent to a few friends when I first got interested in the election and decided to support the Obama campaign. At the time Obama was battling Hilary Clinton and the statement reflects on the feminist potential of the two Democratic candidates. In the piece titled “Hilary or Barack? Two Views of Feminism,” she writes:
I was distressed to read that the President of NY State N.O.W. excoriated Ted Kennedy for "betraying women" by endorsing Barack Obama instead of Hillary Clinton (NYT, 2/1/08). But I was not entirely surprised. That view reflects what has by now become the mainstream self-understanding of American feminism as a political interest group. To the extent that feminists understand themselves in this way, as defending women's policy interests within the existing framework of politics-as-usual, they have found an excellent standard-bearer in Hillary Clinton. But that is not the only way to understand feminism. Not so long ago, many of us saw ourselves
as participants in a transformative social movement, which aspired to remake the political landscape. Intent more on changing the rules of the game than on playing it as it lays, we mobilized energies from below to stretch the bounds of what was politically thinkable. Expanding public space and invigorating public debate, our movement projected, not a laundry list of demands, but the inspiriting vision of a non-hierarchical society that nurtured both human connections and individual freedom. Some feminists continue to cleave to that self-understanding. For us, Barack Obama represents a better vehicle for feminist aspirations than Hillary Clinton. The democratizing energies now converging on him promise to create the terrain on which our sort of feminism can once again flourish. Drawing its momentum from activist forces, and inspiring the latter in turn, the Obama campaign offers feminists, and other progressive forces, that rarest of political opportunities: the chance to help build and shape a major realignment of American politics. That is a prospect worthy of the best and the highest in American feminism.
It is this vision of politics that I turn to as I search for inspiration on the day after the election, as reality sets in. I am reminded of an encounter I had with Wayne, a “redneck” social worker (yeah, I didn’t think it possible either) who helped me replace a flat tire on the side of the road in the middle of the Nevada desert. He was telling me about his Native American wife (the plot thickens) and how she was mesmerized by Obama’s glow when they went to hear him speak. I thought he – they – were crazy until last night, when I think I caught a glimpse of “the glow” during his victory speech. But while I think we have chosen a pretty impressive candidate to be the face of the movement, it is not this glow that gives me hope. Nor is it about race. Obama’s victory is an incredible moment for American race relations – one I would not have thought was possible until very recently – and is an important symbol especially for people of color in this country. But Obama’s race is mostly symbolic. He is not intrinsically tied to black interests any more than Condoleezza Rice. I worry that all this talk about race will tie us into the kind of representational “politics-as-usual” that Fraser warns about.
Nor is it about Obama’s integrity and whether or not he keeps his promises. Sure, if we are lucky he will get us out of Iraq, push through the Employee Free Choice Act, support the forthcoming effort to rule Prop 8 unconstitutional (like Prop 187 in 1994), lay the foundations for more equitable health care and education systems, and make inroads into green design. Maybe he will even take those police officers off the corners in Berkeley and put them in the East Oakland schools as community organizers! (yeah right). But there is only so much he can do as an individual – indeed, his administration is going to inherit quite a mess – and more importantly, it is not his integrity, passion, and glow that make this such an historic moment.
Individuals do not make history, and Obama is not going to save this country any more than MLK or Malcolm X created the civil rights movement. People and social movements from below are what drive change, and this is what is most inspiring about Obama. As Fraser suggests, he is part of a transformative social movement that is changing the terrain on which political struggles are fought. The evidence of this movement was all over the place last night, from the packed crowd at the victory speech in Chicago to the people I encountered parading through the streets and dancing in the clubs of Oakland. It feels like there is something much larger going on here. Something more progressive than I have felt in this country in a long time – maybe ever.
Obama’s victory last night was not quite the culmination of struggle as marked by the 1994 democratic election in South Africa. In that case Mandela’s victory represented a long history of resistance to colonial domination and was the product of a truly remarkable social movement forged out of the progressive coalition of trade unions, the Communist Party, black consciousness organizations, women’s rights groups, and other community based movements. In this case, in the United States, the struggle is just beginning again. We have yet to form such alliances, to come together around a progressive agenda for systemic transformation. But for me Obama represents the hope that such a movement is in fact beginning in this country. And it is this prospect that gives me hope in light of our defeat on Proposition 8. Movements and change take time to build, but yes we can build them. And if we do, eventually, same-sex marriage might be just one of the many things we achieve. It seems that hope may live another day.
As I attempt to reconcile the Obama victory with the passing of proposition 8, I think back to a statement written by Nancy Fraser that I sent to a few friends when I first got interested in the election and decided to support the Obama campaign. At the time Obama was battling Hilary Clinton and the statement reflects on the feminist potential of the two Democratic candidates. In the piece titled “Hilary or Barack? Two Views of Feminism,” she writes:
I was distressed to read that the President of NY State N.O.W. excoriated Ted Kennedy for "betraying women" by endorsing Barack Obama instead of Hillary Clinton (NYT, 2/1/08). But I was not entirely surprised. That view reflects what has by now become the mainstream self-understanding of American feminism as a political interest group. To the extent that feminists understand themselves in this way, as defending women's policy interests within the existing framework of politics-as-usual, they have found an excellent standard-bearer in Hillary Clinton. But that is not the only way to understand feminism. Not so long ago, many of us saw ourselves
as participants in a transformative social movement, which aspired to remake the political landscape. Intent more on changing the rules of the game than on playing it as it lays, we mobilized energies from below to stretch the bounds of what was politically thinkable. Expanding public space and invigorating public debate, our movement projected, not a laundry list of demands, but the inspiriting vision of a non-hierarchical society that nurtured both human connections and individual freedom. Some feminists continue to cleave to that self-understanding. For us, Barack Obama represents a better vehicle for feminist aspirations than Hillary Clinton. The democratizing energies now converging on him promise to create the terrain on which our sort of feminism can once again flourish. Drawing its momentum from activist forces, and inspiring the latter in turn, the Obama campaign offers feminists, and other progressive forces, that rarest of political opportunities: the chance to help build and shape a major realignment of American politics. That is a prospect worthy of the best and the highest in American feminism.
It is this vision of politics that I turn to as I search for inspiration on the day after the election, as reality sets in. I am reminded of an encounter I had with Wayne, a “redneck” social worker (yeah, I didn’t think it possible either) who helped me replace a flat tire on the side of the road in the middle of the Nevada desert. He was telling me about his Native American wife (the plot thickens) and how she was mesmerized by Obama’s glow when they went to hear him speak. I thought he – they – were crazy until last night, when I think I caught a glimpse of “the glow” during his victory speech. But while I think we have chosen a pretty impressive candidate to be the face of the movement, it is not this glow that gives me hope. Nor is it about race. Obama’s victory is an incredible moment for American race relations – one I would not have thought was possible until very recently – and is an important symbol especially for people of color in this country. But Obama’s race is mostly symbolic. He is not intrinsically tied to black interests any more than Condoleezza Rice. I worry that all this talk about race will tie us into the kind of representational “politics-as-usual” that Fraser warns about.
Nor is it about Obama’s integrity and whether or not he keeps his promises. Sure, if we are lucky he will get us out of Iraq, push through the Employee Free Choice Act, support the forthcoming effort to rule Prop 8 unconstitutional (like Prop 187 in 1994), lay the foundations for more equitable health care and education systems, and make inroads into green design. Maybe he will even take those police officers off the corners in Berkeley and put them in the East Oakland schools as community organizers! (yeah right). But there is only so much he can do as an individual – indeed, his administration is going to inherit quite a mess – and more importantly, it is not his integrity, passion, and glow that make this such an historic moment.
Individuals do not make history, and Obama is not going to save this country any more than MLK or Malcolm X created the civil rights movement. People and social movements from below are what drive change, and this is what is most inspiring about Obama. As Fraser suggests, he is part of a transformative social movement that is changing the terrain on which political struggles are fought. The evidence of this movement was all over the place last night, from the packed crowd at the victory speech in Chicago to the people I encountered parading through the streets and dancing in the clubs of Oakland. It feels like there is something much larger going on here. Something more progressive than I have felt in this country in a long time – maybe ever.
Obama’s victory last night was not quite the culmination of struggle as marked by the 1994 democratic election in South Africa. In that case Mandela’s victory represented a long history of resistance to colonial domination and was the product of a truly remarkable social movement forged out of the progressive coalition of trade unions, the Communist Party, black consciousness organizations, women’s rights groups, and other community based movements. In this case, in the United States, the struggle is just beginning again. We have yet to form such alliances, to come together around a progressive agenda for systemic transformation. But for me Obama represents the hope that such a movement is in fact beginning in this country. And it is this prospect that gives me hope in light of our defeat on Proposition 8. Movements and change take time to build, but yes we can build them. And if we do, eventually, same-sex marriage might be just one of the many things we achieve. It seems that hope may live another day.
Michelle Obama - Why the Cardigan?
Tears are beginning to build in my eyes as I watch the Obama family walk across the stage in Chicago. We did it. We finally did it, and we did it by a landslide. Aaaand, I didn't want to say it then with everyone cheering n'all, but damn, what the hell was Michelle Obama wearing?
Seriously, what the HELL was that? Maybe the dress would have been alright, even though purple and grey are this season's colors -- black and red combos are distinctly not -- if she hadn't thrown that cardigan on over the thing. I realize, it's Chicago. It's cold. Cardigans are great on cold fall nights. But eeegh. The combo was an eye sore.
Don't get me wrong. I love Michelle, she is a beautiful, intelligent, strong woman who's outfit did end up looking a lot better than Cindy McCain's smock last night. Can't wait to see what she's got for the inauguration.
Seriously, what the HELL was that? Maybe the dress would have been alright, even though purple and grey are this season's colors -- black and red combos are distinctly not -- if she hadn't thrown that cardigan on over the thing. I realize, it's Chicago. It's cold. Cardigans are great on cold fall nights. But eeegh. The combo was an eye sore. Don't get me wrong. I love Michelle, she is a beautiful, intelligent, strong woman who's outfit did end up looking a lot better than Cindy McCain's smock last night. Can't wait to see what she's got for the inauguration.
Prop h8
The first time I watched 24, I snarked at how Hollywood it was for the producers to make the president black, when that would clearly NEVER happen in this country. Yesterday morning, as I filled in my little "Barack Obama/Joe Biden" arrow, my optimism was cautious at best. Projection after projection, I waited for the ax to fall. It didn't.
So now I'm thinking about prop 8 and I'm thinking and about Martin Luther King, Jr. I'm thinking maybe he was right when he said that the arc of the moral universe bends toward justice. I'm thining about what Obama said about doubting that America is a place where all things are possible. I'm thinking about what he said about this victory belonging to us. I'm thinking about the poem I read this morning in the New York Times that included the line, "And there, the golden one, the adored, in silhouette,/Drinking it in behind bulletproof glass;/Crowds, crowds in hats, t-shirts, delirious,/With drumsticks and banners — /Galvanically us,/Us whom we’ve been waiting for." I'm thinking, "we'll probably lose this time." But in 2000 a similar marriage ban passed in California 60% to 30% - this time it is still to close to call. And according to CNN, yesterday people aged 18-29 voted against prop hate 61% to 39%. I'm thinking that looks good for the not-so-distant future.
I've decided to be happy with that. I may never see the day... but then again.
So now I'm thinking about prop 8 and I'm thinking and about Martin Luther King, Jr. I'm thinking maybe he was right when he said that the arc of the moral universe bends toward justice. I'm thining about what Obama said about doubting that America is a place where all things are possible. I'm thinking about what he said about this victory belonging to us. I'm thinking about the poem I read this morning in the New York Times that included the line, "And there, the golden one, the adored, in silhouette,/Drinking it in behind bulletproof glass;/Crowds, crowds in hats, t-shirts, delirious,/With drumsticks and banners — /Galvanically us,/Us whom we’ve been waiting for." I'm thinking, "we'll probably lose this time." But in 2000 a similar marriage ban passed in California 60% to 30% - this time it is still to close to call. And according to CNN, yesterday people aged 18-29 voted against prop hate 61% to 39%. I'm thinking that looks good for the not-so-distant future.
I've decided to be happy with that. I may never see the day... but then again.
EUPHORIA!
My favorite image so far has been from Pink is the New Blog!
I'm pretty pleased to have voted in a swing state -- feels like I really helped him win!
me so happy
At 9:23am on this fine day, I got bear-hugged by a large, intoxicated, semi-toothed black man on the corner of 19th and Valencia. It was a beautiful thing, and I was happy to oblige.
Good job America, Keep up the good work.
on the other side, What The Fuck California! Did we really say yes to discrimination. very disappointing.....
Good job America, Keep up the good work.
on the other side, What The Fuck California! Did we really say yes to discrimination. very disappointing.....
Making History
As I waited in line this morning, ballot in hand, ready to cast my vote, I got a text message from a friend saying:
"I just cast a ballot for a black president for the first time.
"I just cast a ballot for a black president for the first time.
It felt amazing."
When I read it, I was suddenly filled with so much emotion that I almost burst into tears. It really does feel amazing when you stop and think about it. I find the idea of 'transcending race' or being 'colorblind' in America highly problematic to say the least (and far too big of a subject to discuss here.. maybe another subject?). Many pundits have argued that one of the key aspects of the increasingly powerful youth vote is that many younger generations in America do not think of race as a factor in their vote. I can't say the same, since my voting policy in general is that if I don't know who candidates are (I'm talking board members and stuff obviously) or don't have an opinion about any of them, I vote for a person of color or a woman (ideally a woman of color!) unless they are a crazy right wing nut. I'm sure a lot of people would disagree with me on that, but there you have it. We all get to vote how we want and that's how I want it.
That said, while race was a factor for me, it was certainly not a primary part of my decision by any means, so I guess I got a little sidetracked and kind of forgot what an amazing amazing thing it is that in a couple months we could actually have a black man running the country. When I got that text this morning, I remembered again how monumental his win will be (I'm trying out optimism). This is very young country. If you went back in time a hundred years ago and told people about Obama, they'd laugh or kill you or both. When you learn history from a text-book, its easier to forget how short a century really is. My great grandparents were around to see the Emancipation Proclamation ratified. My grandparents spent half their lives living separately and "equally" and probably thought nothing of it. My parents grew up in towns where the only people of color were the ones wearing maids outfits. Martin Luther King, had he not been murdered for being a black man with political power, would have been in his 80's today. But in fact he was murdered for being a powerful black man and it really wasn't that long ago.
And yet here we are.
When I got my friend's text today while I waited in line, I thought of the lines and the wait and the enormous victory of a different election - the 1994 elections in South Africa. Again - not that long ago. People who'd spent their whole lives trapped under apartheid were finally able to vote, and not only that, to vote for a black man. Hundred's of thousands of people lined up for 3 days to exercises their right to vote. The number of eligible voters in 1994 was estimated at 21.7 million--about 16 million of whom had never voted before. The world stopped and watched as Nelson Mandela became the first head of a new democracy in a country that wouldn't have dared to hope for such a thing a few years back.
I'm not saying that this election is identical to theirs. But today, as in that election, the world is watching and waiting and holding its breath, hoping that we too will line up and change the course of history. So standing there waiting in line in my own country, also weighed down by a history of apartheid and white rule, about to cast my first vote ever for a black president, I felt more than my usual burst of weird civic pride that i always get when i get my "I Voted!" sticker.
It felt more like an honor.
When I read it, I was suddenly filled with so much emotion that I almost burst into tears. It really does feel amazing when you stop and think about it. I find the idea of 'transcending race' or being 'colorblind' in America highly problematic to say the least (and far too big of a subject to discuss here.. maybe another subject?). Many pundits have argued that one of the key aspects of the increasingly powerful youth vote is that many younger generations in America do not think of race as a factor in their vote. I can't say the same, since my voting policy in general is that if I don't know who candidates are (I'm talking board members and stuff obviously) or don't have an opinion about any of them, I vote for a person of color or a woman (ideally a woman of color!) unless they are a crazy right wing nut. I'm sure a lot of people would disagree with me on that, but there you have it. We all get to vote how we want and that's how I want it.
That said, while race was a factor for me, it was certainly not a primary part of my decision by any means, so I guess I got a little sidetracked and kind of forgot what an amazing amazing thing it is that in a couple months we could actually have a black man running the country. When I got that text this morning, I remembered again how monumental his win will be (I'm trying out optimism). This is very young country. If you went back in time a hundred years ago and told people about Obama, they'd laugh or kill you or both. When you learn history from a text-book, its easier to forget how short a century really is. My great grandparents were around to see the Emancipation Proclamation ratified. My grandparents spent half their lives living separately and "equally" and probably thought nothing of it. My parents grew up in towns where the only people of color were the ones wearing maids outfits. Martin Luther King, had he not been murdered for being a black man with political power, would have been in his 80's today. But in fact he was murdered for being a powerful black man and it really wasn't that long ago.
And yet here we are.
When I got my friend's text today while I waited in line, I thought of the lines and the wait and the enormous victory of a different election - the 1994 elections in South Africa. Again - not that long ago. People who'd spent their whole lives trapped under apartheid were finally able to vote, and not only that, to vote for a black man. Hundred's of thousands of people lined up for 3 days to exercises their right to vote. The number of eligible voters in 1994 was estimated at 21.7 million--about 16 million of whom had never voted before. The world stopped and watched as Nelson Mandela became the first head of a new democracy in a country that wouldn't have dared to hope for such a thing a few years back.
I'm not saying that this election is identical to theirs. But today, as in that election, the world is watching and waiting and holding its breath, hoping that we too will line up and change the course of history. So standing there waiting in line in my own country, also weighed down by a history of apartheid and white rule, about to cast my first vote ever for a black president, I felt more than my usual burst of weird civic pride that i always get when i get my "I Voted!" sticker.
It felt more like an honor.
Election Day Blues?
I voted today at approximately 7:50AM. That was after getting to the polls about 7:10, and waiting in line. Aside from the fact that I had to move my car by 8, I was pretty enthused. Voting feels good, and it was good to see a big turnout.
Happy and sporting my red "I Voted!/Ya Voté!" sticker, I hopped in my car and headed to work. I was listening to NPR during my commute. During my 30 min. commute, I came close to tears not once, but twice. And no, it had nothing to do with the annoying traffic or the red PT Cruiser that kept cutting me off.
The first thing, was a story about Barack Obama's grandmother who just passed away yesterday. I don't know why really (aside from the obvious general sadness that comes with people dying), but it really got to me. The woman lived to within a day of (possibly/hopefully/please god) seeing her beloved grandson make history. That's sad. It also made me think of a lot of things (on a far smaller scale) that my deceased grandparents (all of them) missed. That's sad.
As if that wasn't enough, the next piece on NPR was about Prop 8 and how close that proposition has become recently in polls. That is scary. Then they proceeded to interivew a bunch of people who had rushed to San Francisco City Hall today to get married before the possible passage of this ridiulous constitutional ammendment. Who are these Californians that believe its ok to deny a group equal rights for no other reason than sheer bigotry? That made me very sad.
So here I am, with a heavy heart. I can't shake it. I just hope tonight's results are able to cheer me up. Its hard having faith in people these days.
Happy and sporting my red "I Voted!/Ya Voté!" sticker, I hopped in my car and headed to work. I was listening to NPR during my commute. During my 30 min. commute, I came close to tears not once, but twice. And no, it had nothing to do with the annoying traffic or the red PT Cruiser that kept cutting me off.
The first thing, was a story about Barack Obama's grandmother who just passed away yesterday. I don't know why really (aside from the obvious general sadness that comes with people dying), but it really got to me. The woman lived to within a day of (possibly/hopefully/please god) seeing her beloved grandson make history. That's sad. It also made me think of a lot of things (on a far smaller scale) that my deceased grandparents (all of them) missed. That's sad.
As if that wasn't enough, the next piece on NPR was about Prop 8 and how close that proposition has become recently in polls. That is scary. Then they proceeded to interivew a bunch of people who had rushed to San Francisco City Hall today to get married before the possible passage of this ridiulous constitutional ammendment. Who are these Californians that believe its ok to deny a group equal rights for no other reason than sheer bigotry? That made me very sad.
So here I am, with a heavy heart. I can't shake it. I just hope tonight's results are able to cheer me up. Its hard having faith in people these days.
ELECTION DAY SPECIAL
Generally speaking, we here at SOMAblog Central try to choose topics that are open ended and maliable and invite creativity and multiplicity. We are not a news blog, we are not a creative writing blog. we are both and neither. We have affection for topics that are both current and timeless, depending on how the word or phrase or hazy idea strikes your fancy.
As we mused on what subject to would replace Amusment Parks, we found it difficult to think of thought-provoking topics that didn't somehow or someway relate to the political landscape in which we found ourselves. We mused and mused. Ultimately we lost interest in non-election musing and our minds wandered away.
Walking away from my polling station today, beaming and brimming with post-vote euphoria, i made a unilateral decision and decided to stage a topical coup and declare, without consultation with my behind-the-scenes SOMA peeps, that electoral affection cannot be denied.
so there you have it: ELECTION DAY SPECIAL!
As always, your take on the subject is yours. pictures, drawings, memories, declarations, research, anything. so go forth my fellow blog citizens. talk amongst yourselves.
and don't forget to vote!!!!!!
As we mused on what subject to would replace Amusment Parks, we found it difficult to think of thought-provoking topics that didn't somehow or someway relate to the political landscape in which we found ourselves. We mused and mused. Ultimately we lost interest in non-election musing and our minds wandered away.
Walking away from my polling station today, beaming and brimming with post-vote euphoria, i made a unilateral decision and decided to stage a topical coup and declare, without consultation with my behind-the-scenes SOMA peeps, that electoral affection cannot be denied.
so there you have it: ELECTION DAY SPECIAL!
As always, your take on the subject is yours. pictures, drawings, memories, declarations, research, anything. so go forth my fellow blog citizens. talk amongst yourselves.
and don't forget to vote!!!!!!
Some blurry memories as this topic fades into the background.
-The rides, waiting until I was tall enough to go on the big-n-scaries and then waiting more until I was brave enough to go on the bigger-n-scariers. Mainly, conquering the overwhelming knowledge that I would die if I went upside down(absolutely and instantly die)
-The crazy flying chicken ride at Riverside. Giant swinging carousel that you could steer. It was amazing, and it made me hurl
-Company picnics with my parents and my dad's coworkers. But most importantly, sneaking off with my vegetarian father to eat hotdogs. My first rendesvous with the wonderful guilt and pleasure around processed meat products
-Band trips to disney world, falling in love with the girls behind the costumes. So mysterious as they slink back behind the security zones to take off their heavy sweaty furry covers to drink gallons of gatorade before coming back to be groped and prodded by bratty kids and their brattier parents for another 20minute span. I WILL TREAT YOU BETTER!!!
-The side of the road carnival that would suddenly appear for a few weeks in the empty dirt plot next to Lamonte's gas station. The friday night snogging on the ferris wheel, as the town you knew was transformed into a creepy fantasy land of dropouts, runaways, and societal castoffs. Oh how I wanted to leave it all behind and join them as they packed up and headed on down the road.
-And lastly, here's to six flags for making things bigger, thrillier, cleaner than ever before and at the same time, taking all the fun out of the dangerous, cheesy and blissfuly unreproducable....
-Honorable mentions: epcot center, water country, the matterhorn, funhouses, haunted boat rides, and the zipper(which is still way too big-n-scary for me)
-The rides, waiting until I was tall enough to go on the big-n-scaries and then waiting more until I was brave enough to go on the bigger-n-scariers. Mainly, conquering the overwhelming knowledge that I would die if I went upside down(absolutely and instantly die)
-The crazy flying chicken ride at Riverside. Giant swinging carousel that you could steer. It was amazing, and it made me hurl
-Company picnics with my parents and my dad's coworkers. But most importantly, sneaking off with my vegetarian father to eat hotdogs. My first rendesvous with the wonderful guilt and pleasure around processed meat products
-Band trips to disney world, falling in love with the girls behind the costumes. So mysterious as they slink back behind the security zones to take off their heavy sweaty furry covers to drink gallons of gatorade before coming back to be groped and prodded by bratty kids and their brattier parents for another 20minute span. I WILL TREAT YOU BETTER!!!
-The side of the road carnival that would suddenly appear for a few weeks in the empty dirt plot next to Lamonte's gas station. The friday night snogging on the ferris wheel, as the town you knew was transformed into a creepy fantasy land of dropouts, runaways, and societal castoffs. Oh how I wanted to leave it all behind and join them as they packed up and headed on down the road.
-And lastly, here's to six flags for making things bigger, thrillier, cleaner than ever before and at the same time, taking all the fun out of the dangerous, cheesy and blissfuly unreproducable....
-Honorable mentions: epcot center, water country, the matterhorn, funhouses, haunted boat rides, and the zipper(which is still way too big-n-scary for me)
Thunder Mountain
My brother wouldn't be happy about this post. But when I think of amusement parks, I can't help but remember our first family trip to Disneyland. I was probably seven, which means my brother must have been about 4. He was a cute thing with his shock of blond hair...
At any rate, we arrived at Disneyland bright and early, and as a roller coaster junkie (seriously, I love 'em) I dragged us straight to Thunder Mountain. Which at the time was the second biggest roller coaster at the park after Space Mountain (because Splash Mountain barely counts as a roller coaster). We waited in line for what seemed like ages for a small and excited child, and finally made it to the front. We settled into the cars and we were off! Into the dark. The ride begins by ascending a steep, watery hill with noises and flashing lights and other goodness. Unfortunately, a small amount of water made it on to my sweet little brother's lucky, pink, unicorn shirt that he wore everywhere. He cried through the whole ride.
And that was it. For the rest of the day he wouldn't go on any rides that didn't have "It's A Small World" in the title. For that matter, we couldn't even walk by The Matterhorn because the Yeti roars every few minutes and that was too reminiscent of the terror of water on the unicorn shirt.
It just goes to show you how much parents will do for their kids- my mom and dad took turns riding Small World for the rest of the day. And that's enough to drive you batty.
At any rate, we arrived at Disneyland bright and early, and as a roller coaster junkie (seriously, I love 'em) I dragged us straight to Thunder Mountain. Which at the time was the second biggest roller coaster at the park after Space Mountain (because Splash Mountain barely counts as a roller coaster). We waited in line for what seemed like ages for a small and excited child, and finally made it to the front. We settled into the cars and we were off! Into the dark. The ride begins by ascending a steep, watery hill with noises and flashing lights and other goodness. Unfortunately, a small amount of water made it on to my sweet little brother's lucky, pink, unicorn shirt that he wore everywhere. He cried through the whole ride.
And that was it. For the rest of the day he wouldn't go on any rides that didn't have "It's A Small World" in the title. For that matter, we couldn't even walk by The Matterhorn because the Yeti roars every few minutes and that was too reminiscent of the terror of water on the unicorn shirt.
It just goes to show you how much parents will do for their kids- my mom and dad took turns riding Small World for the rest of the day. And that's enough to drive you batty.
The Ride's To Die For
With all this discussion of amusement parks and carnivals-- and that brief but haunting brush-with-death thrill of the rides-- I grew curious... Just how likely are you to die on an amusement park (or carnie) ride?
Interestingly, the facts are hard to come by. In the United States, there is no official source that records amusement park accidents; most states do not require parks to legally report them. Because of this, it's difficult to get an accurate count of fatalities. There are of course a slew of gruesome stories in the news. Mothers dropping out of rides; small children being dragged under coaster tracks, still clutching their cotton candy. But the most current numbers are a little harder to come by:
-A 2005 report by the US Consumer Product Safety Commission said there were a total of 67 fatalities from 1987 through 2004. Although according to Theme Park Insider, the CPSC only collects data by surveying emergency rooms, and this data does not even include major theme parks like Disneyworld Orlando.
(However, interesting to note: of the fatalities in the CPSC report, the majority came from amusement parks, only a third as many came from carnival rides.)
-Overall, it seems that the number of fatalities per year hover around 4-5. According to the International Association of Amusement Parks and Attractions (IAAPA), you have a 1 in 9 million chance of dying on a ride. But, given that the IAAPA's job is to promote amusement parks, I'd say your chances are a little higher than that.
-The IAAPA would also have you believe that the majority of accidents are caused by stupid people doing stupid things (standing up on rides, taking off their seatbelts, panicking and trying to get out of the ride etc.) But this is only partially true, watchdog organizations point to various mechanical problems as well. For every dumb drunk guy falling out of a ride, there are plenty of malfunctioning lap belts, loose ball bearings and cars derailing.
Frankly, I find all this a little troubling. Sure, statistically-speaking, your chances of dying on a ride are still pretty low no matter what the actual numbers shake out to be. But why all the mystery and confusion around reporting and inspection?
These shady facts won't keep me from an occasional rickety boardwalk ride. But certainly gives new meaning to that fleeting 'Wow-I-could-die-on-this' thought as your car teeters over that first vertical plunge.
happy riding.
Amusement Parks
"...Is all a tremulous heart requires."
As a kid living in Yosemite, every time I visited my enate paternal relatives in Orange County, they would take me to Disneyland, despite my protests that what I really wanted to do was go to the beach. The last time I went, my friend and I took mushrooms and hung out on Tom Sawyer's Island all day. I knew that a certain period of my childhood was irretrievably lost and it was an immense relief. There's something so wholesome about the bigger amusement parks which always stunk to me of hypocrisy, somehow. 'Look, we're so family-friendly', they'd scream while pilfering your wallet and foisting ghastly food on you.
What I had not lost, however, was a love of the divier fairs, the ones with sketchy-looking thrill rides and an atmosphere of vague, carnie-like menace, roving packs of teenagers checking each other out, people dizzy from sugar highs or disoriented by rides like the Zipper or that crazy centrifugal Disk-O one that flattened your back to your seat and then tilted sideways. 'If this thing breaks,' you'd think, 'we'll either all be flung into the ether or maybe this thing will go careening through the fair like a stray Frisbee on its side.' How that might be worse than the fate foretold by the rickety, clackety sound of the cars bumping up to the top of an ancient looking roller coaster I couldn't say but death sometimes seemed a thankful release from the nausea induced by too many bumper car crashes on top of a stomach overfilled with whatever 'treats'; viscous nachos, slightly rancid corndogs, cotton candy in sufficient quantities to cause shivering, mediocre crepes that sat heavily, almost petulantly, in your gut. The bad kids stumbled and swaggered under the influence and snuck off to make out in the outer reaches of the fair under the cloak of evening's penumbra but everybody was desperate to lose their equilibrium by some means and break the tedium of their normal physical lives, stuck morning after morning in their same, predictable body.
Shockingly, it's like this in places all over. County fairs in the San Joaquin heat, amidst the townies in Cambridge who took me off to punt on the Cam beneath willow trees that filtered out the whirling frenzy, under the glowering, ominous Lombardy sky at the Lunapark while Milanese kids smoked up clouds of hash, garishly backlit by all the desperate neon, listening to the crunch of gravel under your shoes on a painfully cold Spring day at the Foire du Trône, the smell of waffles and beer in the morning air while your exhalations wafted visibly into the grey Parisian sky, so cold that the rides would make your white knuckles hurt.
Still you'd do it all again, wouldn't you?
As a kid living in Yosemite, every time I visited my enate paternal relatives in Orange County, they would take me to Disneyland, despite my protests that what I really wanted to do was go to the beach. The last time I went, my friend and I took mushrooms and hung out on Tom Sawyer's Island all day. I knew that a certain period of my childhood was irretrievably lost and it was an immense relief. There's something so wholesome about the bigger amusement parks which always stunk to me of hypocrisy, somehow. 'Look, we're so family-friendly', they'd scream while pilfering your wallet and foisting ghastly food on you.
What I had not lost, however, was a love of the divier fairs, the ones with sketchy-looking thrill rides and an atmosphere of vague, carnie-like menace, roving packs of teenagers checking each other out, people dizzy from sugar highs or disoriented by rides like the Zipper or that crazy centrifugal Disk-O one that flattened your back to your seat and then tilted sideways. 'If this thing breaks,' you'd think, 'we'll either all be flung into the ether or maybe this thing will go careening through the fair like a stray Frisbee on its side.' How that might be worse than the fate foretold by the rickety, clackety sound of the cars bumping up to the top of an ancient looking roller coaster I couldn't say but death sometimes seemed a thankful release from the nausea induced by too many bumper car crashes on top of a stomach overfilled with whatever 'treats'; viscous nachos, slightly rancid corndogs, cotton candy in sufficient quantities to cause shivering, mediocre crepes that sat heavily, almost petulantly, in your gut. The bad kids stumbled and swaggered under the influence and snuck off to make out in the outer reaches of the fair under the cloak of evening's penumbra but everybody was desperate to lose their equilibrium by some means and break the tedium of their normal physical lives, stuck morning after morning in their same, predictable body.
Shockingly, it's like this in places all over. County fairs in the San Joaquin heat, amidst the townies in Cambridge who took me off to punt on the Cam beneath willow trees that filtered out the whirling frenzy, under the glowering, ominous Lombardy sky at the Lunapark while Milanese kids smoked up clouds of hash, garishly backlit by all the desperate neon, listening to the crunch of gravel under your shoes on a painfully cold Spring day at the Foire du Trône, the smell of waffles and beer in the morning air while your exhalations wafted visibly into the grey Parisian sky, so cold that the rides would make your white knuckles hurt.
Still you'd do it all again, wouldn't you?
Country First
I’m riding the Amtrak from New York to Boston, which I suppose bears some resemblance to a roller coaster. I tried to imagine the things around me in amusement park terms, but the New England fall landscape is too august, or September, as it turns out, for comparing foliage to cotton candy. Instead, I tried to invent an imaginary ancient history for thrill rides – Egyptian pyramids as early slip’n’slides, Carthaginian warriors careening down the trunks of larger elephants, something about a whirling dervish...
Except that for some reason, amusement parks demand more respect than this. Even though I was traumatized by a misunderstanding in the spinning tea cup in Orlando at age 8, and get motion sick just from the electric rubber smell of the bumper cars, and was once denied a giant green bear even after sinking an improbable 19 footer in a misshapen rim, still, I feel my discontent is more the product of my own character flaws than of something mean or base in the institution.
In Annie Hall for example, Woody Allen’s character visits (as a time-traveling ghost) his childhood home which sits under a large Coney Island roller coaster, and watches a great rattling form the foundation of an even greater nervousness.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that amusement parks are American. There's something larger than me happening when I go for the 50 pointer in the skeeball, when the floor drops out underfoot in the Tilt-A-Whirl, when lunch is a corndog and a fried dough. But nauseated and bloated, powdered sugar on my thigh, pocket full of tan paper tickets, I feel a twinge of disloyalty. I heard John McCain. Somehow, I know, everyone knows, I’m not putting my country first.
Except that for some reason, amusement parks demand more respect than this. Even though I was traumatized by a misunderstanding in the spinning tea cup in Orlando at age 8, and get motion sick just from the electric rubber smell of the bumper cars, and was once denied a giant green bear even after sinking an improbable 19 footer in a misshapen rim, still, I feel my discontent is more the product of my own character flaws than of something mean or base in the institution.
In Annie Hall for example, Woody Allen’s character visits (as a time-traveling ghost) his childhood home which sits under a large Coney Island roller coaster, and watches a great rattling form the foundation of an even greater nervousness.
I guess what I'm trying to say is that amusement parks are American. There's something larger than me happening when I go for the 50 pointer in the skeeball, when the floor drops out underfoot in the Tilt-A-Whirl, when lunch is a corndog and a fried dough. But nauseated and bloated, powdered sugar on my thigh, pocket full of tan paper tickets, I feel a twinge of disloyalty. I heard John McCain. Somehow, I know, everyone knows, I’m not putting my country first.
Where Would Jesus Go?
Although I just trashed them, I do think that there is also something truly weird and amazing and cool about some kinds of amusement parks. Not the corporate conglomerates, but the real theme parks.
A real theme park can be a thing of beauty. A park that is just so obsessively in love with one single thing that it celebrates it with abandon on the daily. Places that go so over the top that you have to just love them for being so unabashedly themselves. So while I will not come with you to Disneyland, I could definitely be into a trip to Butterfly World or Mini Town (these are actually real places but they're in South Africa, so there you go - 2 more reasons to travel there!). Even though butterflies actually scare me! and, well, I can't actually say anything bad about Minitown. I loved every centimeter of it. But you get the point.Of all the themes out there, and oh my there are many, I think I am most fascinated by the phenomenon of religious theme parks. Probably the biggest and most well known in the US is The Holy Land Experience, down road from Disneyland in FL, but there are many more: Suoi Tien Theme Park; Tiger Balm Gardens; Gangadham; the Islamic Civilisation theme park, Dinosaur Adventure Land (once again, not what it sounds like) the now-defunct Heritage USA, to name a few.
To be sure: I am also repelled and afraid of these parks in many ways. Taking history-altering, genocide-causing icons and images and histories, essentializing them to the point of caricature and then twisting them around into something that can be enjoyed by children and families without critique is without a doubt, terrifying. And while mixing inculcation and profit has certainly been done many times before, that does not make it cool. For example, the fact that there are not one but SEVERAL creationist theme parks gives one serious reason for pause.
But: in the same way that I am fascinated by cults and serial killers and celebrity socialites, I do also think there is something fantastically weird and beautiful about places like the Holy Land Experience. Its kind of an amazing testament (pun only sort of intended) to the true bizarreness of human beings. If there's a god, (I'm currently flirting with atheism) can you imagine what he/she/zee thinks of this? Its kind of crazy! Not even kind of! But amazing! We are the weirdest animals on the planet! Dogs and pigs? Not recreating the passion of Christ on an hourly basis. But us? Totally! Why not make it every HALF hour! Woo!fear and loathing in six flags great adventure
So, I hate amusement parks. I truly consider it a form of torture. The lines, the screaming children, the sweatiness, the stickiness, the overpriced greasy food, the nauseating rides, crowds of half naked people waddling around like sheep, all of it. You couldn't pay me enough to go to one.
But my dislike is deeper than that. I hate amusement parks because I can't fathom why other people do and that makes me feel lonely and weird. You know when you're with a bunch of people and someone tells a joke that is so not funny you wouldn't even have known it was supposed to be a joke except that the people around you are laughing. And you just stand there thinking, "What the hell is wrong with you people? Or is it me? I mean, I'm the only one who thinks that was not remotely funny, so maybe I just lack a sense of humor? But no that's not true - I've laughed a lot before. I make other people laugh. But that shit was just not funny. It was dumb. But can no one else see that? Are they all idiots? Maybe they're just being polite. But then why do they keep riffing on it and re-telling it? That's above and beyond polite laughter. That’s genuine. But why? What the hell am I missing? This is crazy."
That’s how I feel about amusement parks. I just stand there looking around at all the families and teens on dates and birthday parties and all I can think is, "Really guys? Really? This is not fun! Are you just going through the motions of fun because that’s what you feel like you should do or do you actually believe that what you are experiencing right now is fun? You can't possibly be enjoying this right? Why are you all here?? What is wrong with you? What is wrong with me? This is insane!
So I guess I'm asking you guys the same question. Am I alone? And if I am, can someone please tell me what I'm missing?
But my dislike is deeper than that. I hate amusement parks because I can't fathom why other people do and that makes me feel lonely and weird. You know when you're with a bunch of people and someone tells a joke that is so not funny you wouldn't even have known it was supposed to be a joke except that the people around you are laughing. And you just stand there thinking, "What the hell is wrong with you people? Or is it me? I mean, I'm the only one who thinks that was not remotely funny, so maybe I just lack a sense of humor? But no that's not true - I've laughed a lot before. I make other people laugh. But that shit was just not funny. It was dumb. But can no one else see that? Are they all idiots? Maybe they're just being polite. But then why do they keep riffing on it and re-telling it? That's above and beyond polite laughter. That’s genuine. But why? What the hell am I missing? This is crazy."
That’s how I feel about amusement parks. I just stand there looking around at all the families and teens on dates and birthday parties and all I can think is, "Really guys? Really? This is not fun! Are you just going through the motions of fun because that’s what you feel like you should do or do you actually believe that what you are experiencing right now is fun? You can't possibly be enjoying this right? Why are you all here?? What is wrong with you? What is wrong with me? This is insane!
So I guess I'm asking you guys the same question. Am I alone? And if I am, can someone please tell me what I'm missing?
NEW TOPIC: Amusement Parks
Love them or hate them, they cannot be denied.
Such as they are, please do share your thoughts, feelings, artwork or boobs.
heh.
Predictably, It's time to move on....
S.O.M.A. says:
The only thing that's permanent in the world is the fact that nothing is permanent. Even blog topics.
Goodbye to both boring and shocking!
Sometimes a moving train is just a moving train
I saw it coming, saw the bright headlights of the familiar train cutting through the darkness of night. Heard the engine smoothly burning up fuel powering the tons of steel. I couldn’t see the tracks but I knew where they usually go every night about this time. Id stood here before and every time they went right through this very spot. Would it be different tonight? It was a new day, the train couldn’t possibly run reliably every time, especially now that it had a new driver. Maybe he wasn’t familiar with the route, the elaborate junction of tracks and directions. But really, I was just hopeful. I wanted to believe it would pass me tonight, if I willed it, if I was good, if I only wanted it badly enough. And so I stood on the tracks, beautiful in their reliability. I left my life in the hands of fate and watched the train barrel right through me. How fucking predictable. Maybe some tracks are set too deep, and a train too heavy to be influenced by hope. So maybe I should stand somewhere else next time.
un-predicting the predictable
(a word of warning: this is kind of really depressing. sorry)
As a few of you know, I have sort of an odd job right now that requires me to speak to dying and/or grieving people all day about said death. It is, obviously, a bit of a downer. (also uplifting in many ways.) It's impossible for me not to put myself into the shoes of whoever I'm talking to and imagine how they are feeling. But because it's something that I talk about everyday, I have also grown accustomed to talking about it and thinking about it and so I tend to forget sometimes that constantly imagining myself facing death or loss might actually have a lasting effect. Not the kind that ends when you hang up the phone or leave the office.
As you might imagine, this has caused me to dwell upon and re-evaluate my own personal opinions or beliefs about death. Like the afterlife. Like reincarnation. Like god. The purpose of a brief existence. The way we show our love for people before they die and after. Ceremony. And so on… certainly too much to go into here. But I bring all this up because death is something that is both unpredictable and not.
Almost all of the deaths I deal with are long drawn out illnesses with a distinct cause and often a fairly common end. People who know exactly what chemical poisoned them and people who know quite well what the prognosis is. And this is very sad. But within this there are many kinds of death. Some kinds that one can see ahead of time and live slowly through and face. Some kinds that one could never have expected and are never conscious of (assuming one could be conscious for their own death which, again, is a whole other topic). I listen and imagine how angry I would be to know that from a certain point on, I never had a fighting chance and never will. But knowing you have a terminal disease could also be a good thing. You can ponder it, you can plan for it. You can write wills or find god or both. You can spend more time with your kids. You can say goodbye.
Those cases, you could say, are predictable deaths. As opposed to the other people I talk to, who brought their loved one in for a basic checkup and a month later stood at their grave wondering what the hell happened. And why. And could they have known? And if they had known, what would that mean? What would they have done differently? These are people who, while knowing of course that all of us die eventually, go through their day to day believing that the people around them will stick around until tomorrow and next week and next thanksgiving. I think that’s most of us. We need to predict life. It would be debilitating if we didn't.
But death is ultimately predictable. We all will die. No only that, but our lifestyles and habits are often indicators. This is why life insurance is so lucrative. And yet there is often so much shock in the process of grieving. So much disbelief. Even though that (the disbelief) is our own doing. If we accepted death as a fairly common event, we might not feel so shocked. And yet despite all evidence, most of us walk around imagining unpredictability.
So which is preferable? To know or not to know?
I keep thinking about a particular story of a person who found out they had a terminal disease and then turned around and killed themselves. While truly terrible, this kind of makes perfect sense to me. For that person, it was better to know. They could predict their own death by causing it. ( though in doing so they made it all the more shocking then to their loved ones.)
I don’t know. I'm not sure what it is I'm asking. Something beyond just "if you were about to die would you want to know." or actually no - that’s it exactly.
As a few of you know, I have sort of an odd job right now that requires me to speak to dying and/or grieving people all day about said death. It is, obviously, a bit of a downer. (also uplifting in many ways.) It's impossible for me not to put myself into the shoes of whoever I'm talking to and imagine how they are feeling. But because it's something that I talk about everyday, I have also grown accustomed to talking about it and thinking about it and so I tend to forget sometimes that constantly imagining myself facing death or loss might actually have a lasting effect. Not the kind that ends when you hang up the phone or leave the office.
As you might imagine, this has caused me to dwell upon and re-evaluate my own personal opinions or beliefs about death. Like the afterlife. Like reincarnation. Like god. The purpose of a brief existence. The way we show our love for people before they die and after. Ceremony. And so on… certainly too much to go into here. But I bring all this up because death is something that is both unpredictable and not.
Almost all of the deaths I deal with are long drawn out illnesses with a distinct cause and often a fairly common end. People who know exactly what chemical poisoned them and people who know quite well what the prognosis is. And this is very sad. But within this there are many kinds of death. Some kinds that one can see ahead of time and live slowly through and face. Some kinds that one could never have expected and are never conscious of (assuming one could be conscious for their own death which, again, is a whole other topic). I listen and imagine how angry I would be to know that from a certain point on, I never had a fighting chance and never will. But knowing you have a terminal disease could also be a good thing. You can ponder it, you can plan for it. You can write wills or find god or both. You can spend more time with your kids. You can say goodbye.
Those cases, you could say, are predictable deaths. As opposed to the other people I talk to, who brought their loved one in for a basic checkup and a month later stood at their grave wondering what the hell happened. And why. And could they have known? And if they had known, what would that mean? What would they have done differently? These are people who, while knowing of course that all of us die eventually, go through their day to day believing that the people around them will stick around until tomorrow and next week and next thanksgiving. I think that’s most of us. We need to predict life. It would be debilitating if we didn't.
But death is ultimately predictable. We all will die. No only that, but our lifestyles and habits are often indicators. This is why life insurance is so lucrative. And yet there is often so much shock in the process of grieving. So much disbelief. Even though that (the disbelief) is our own doing. If we accepted death as a fairly common event, we might not feel so shocked. And yet despite all evidence, most of us walk around imagining unpredictability.
So which is preferable? To know or not to know?
I keep thinking about a particular story of a person who found out they had a terminal disease and then turned around and killed themselves. While truly terrible, this kind of makes perfect sense to me. For that person, it was better to know. They could predict their own death by causing it. ( though in doing so they made it all the more shocking then to their loved ones.)
I don’t know. I'm not sure what it is I'm asking. Something beyond just "if you were about to die would you want to know." or actually no - that’s it exactly.
Would you want to know?
Predicting the Future, Gypsy Style
In high school, I got way into Tarot Cards. I went to a private boarding school and one night some earthy hippy chick whipped out a Goddess Deck and told my friend's fortune while I watched. Instead of wanting my turn, I wanted to be the one doling out turns.
Admit it -- the thought of Tarot Cards telling you the real truth about what's next gives you a little frisson. And for me, the thought of being the one who channels the power to tell you the real truth about what's next for you gives me a surge of frissons. Part of it is the thought of the invisible entity, ethereal mana, or [insert your spin on a higher power here], that moves my hands and yours into picking the exact 12 or 4 or 1 card(s) that will startle you with dazzlingly appropriate awesomeness or terrify you into treading cautiously. Slice out my soul and call me a vessel, honey, I'm that kind of freak.
After a while though, my tarot-carding evolved from Master Reader of Your Future excitement into: 1) a collection -- there are a heck of a lot of thematic tarot decks out there, and I have the Native American Medicine cards, the Osho Zen Tarot, the Celtic deck, the Chakra deck, the Greek Mythology deck, and so forth, just to name a few, not to mention African Bones and Runes and a Ouiji board knock-off called the Psychic Mandala or some shit like that; 2) a way of ascertaining the truth of a situation -- not how a particular situation or concern will turn out, but how it actually is, now, and why.
What I got good at when doing tarot readings was not prediction but guiding interpretation. A friend would say, what will happen with my boyfriend? They'd shuffle the deck while focusing on their question. Solemnly and deliberately choose the 12 cards, hand outstretched seeking unseen energy, eyes closed in concentration. We'd lay out the Celtic Cross. Go through it card by card (a note here to say, I still read the meanings of the cards out of the books, I have by no means grown to the point where I've memorized the cards -- a direct result of the collecting side of things; I have so many I haven't 'bonded' with one deck). And what inevitably happens is this: "That card is SO TOTALLY SPOT ON! I have been in a period of self-imposed isolation due to a red-haired man! My red-haired ex-boyfriend Tim hurt me so deeply that I just can't let my current boyfriend Donald get close to me and yet I've been wondering why he's so distant! WOW!" Or else, this: "That card doesn't make any sense. I've actually been feeling spread too thin because of all the people in my life, not isolated; if I had a choice, I'd get more alone time and readily embrace a little fucking loneliness; and I don't know anyone with red-hair, although I'd like to light my ex-boyfriend Tim's head on fire, even after all these years. Maybe that's what Donald means when he says I haven't let go of him?"
Skeptics tend to focus on whether or not the cards are right, rather than what the cards can do for you. It seems that regardless of the so-called 'correctness' of the cards, there are epiphanies to be had; in scenario A the seeker agrees with the card because it unlocks recognition of how things really are; in scenario B the seeker rejects the card out of recognition of how things really are; in both cases, recognition happens. It's a kind of therapy, a way to self-impose a reality check. That recognition comes out of it, my friends, is what's predictable. Sometimes it will take 15 or 20 minutes of discussion to draw out what the card is succeeding or failing to say; that's where I come in. I'm pretty good at finding the right thread that unravels the seams and drops the veil. You might walk out of one of my readings going "tarot cards are a crock of shit, ha!" but you'll inevitably go home and apologize to Donald for the way your previous relationship with Tim fucked you up, and you guys will have the kind of steamy intimate sex that ensues from an unburdened psyche. Yeah, you can thank me for that, but no need to send pictures. The cards are my fetish, not the aftermath.
And lastly, there's always the self-fulfilling prophecy aspect of predictability. Every so often after a reading, it's not uncommon to hear from someone a week or two later: "Elise!! I just had my groceries checked out by an older-black-haired woman and I swear she was looking at me strangely! I realized my food issues are what's blocking me from succeeding in my career!! Isn't that UNCANNY?"
I wouldn't say it's uncanny, but whatever gets you to the recognition part, baby, that's fine with me.
Admit it -- the thought of Tarot Cards telling you the real truth about what's next gives you a little frisson. And for me, the thought of being the one who channels the power to tell you the real truth about what's next for you gives me a surge of frissons. Part of it is the thought of the invisible entity, ethereal mana, or [insert your spin on a higher power here], that moves my hands and yours into picking the exact 12 or 4 or 1 card(s) that will startle you with dazzlingly appropriate awesomeness or terrify you into treading cautiously. Slice out my soul and call me a vessel, honey, I'm that kind of freak.
After a while though, my tarot-carding evolved from Master Reader of Your Future excitement into: 1) a collection -- there are a heck of a lot of thematic tarot decks out there, and I have the Native American Medicine cards, the Osho Zen Tarot, the Celtic deck, the Chakra deck, the Greek Mythology deck, and so forth, just to name a few, not to mention African Bones and Runes and a Ouiji board knock-off called the Psychic Mandala or some shit like that; 2) a way of ascertaining the truth of a situation -- not how a particular situation or concern will turn out, but how it actually is, now, and why.
What I got good at when doing tarot readings was not prediction but guiding interpretation. A friend would say, what will happen with my boyfriend? They'd shuffle the deck while focusing on their question. Solemnly and deliberately choose the 12 cards, hand outstretched seeking unseen energy, eyes closed in concentration. We'd lay out the Celtic Cross. Go through it card by card (a note here to say, I still read the meanings of the cards out of the books, I have by no means grown to the point where I've memorized the cards -- a direct result of the collecting side of things; I have so many I haven't 'bonded' with one deck). And what inevitably happens is this: "That card is SO TOTALLY SPOT ON! I have been in a period of self-imposed isolation due to a red-haired man! My red-haired ex-boyfriend Tim hurt me so deeply that I just can't let my current boyfriend Donald get close to me and yet I've been wondering why he's so distant! WOW!" Or else, this: "That card doesn't make any sense. I've actually been feeling spread too thin because of all the people in my life, not isolated; if I had a choice, I'd get more alone time and readily embrace a little fucking loneliness; and I don't know anyone with red-hair, although I'd like to light my ex-boyfriend Tim's head on fire, even after all these years. Maybe that's what Donald means when he says I haven't let go of him?"
Skeptics tend to focus on whether or not the cards are right, rather than what the cards can do for you. It seems that regardless of the so-called 'correctness' of the cards, there are epiphanies to be had; in scenario A the seeker agrees with the card because it unlocks recognition of how things really are; in scenario B the seeker rejects the card out of recognition of how things really are; in both cases, recognition happens. It's a kind of therapy, a way to self-impose a reality check. That recognition comes out of it, my friends, is what's predictable. Sometimes it will take 15 or 20 minutes of discussion to draw out what the card is succeeding or failing to say; that's where I come in. I'm pretty good at finding the right thread that unravels the seams and drops the veil. You might walk out of one of my readings going "tarot cards are a crock of shit, ha!" but you'll inevitably go home and apologize to Donald for the way your previous relationship with Tim fucked you up, and you guys will have the kind of steamy intimate sex that ensues from an unburdened psyche. Yeah, you can thank me for that, but no need to send pictures. The cards are my fetish, not the aftermath.
And lastly, there's always the self-fulfilling prophecy aspect of predictability. Every so often after a reading, it's not uncommon to hear from someone a week or two later: "Elise!! I just had my groceries checked out by an older-black-haired woman and I swear she was looking at me strangely! I realized my food issues are what's blocking me from succeeding in my career!! Isn't that UNCANNY?"
I wouldn't say it's uncanny, but whatever gets you to the recognition part, baby, that's fine with me.
predictable yet somehow shockingly heartbreaking
Diego Luna, the love of my life, the man who was supposed to find me and fall in love with me and sweep me into his beautiful arms has fathered a baby and its not mine.
i suppose this isn't shocking to anyone else, but somehow it is to me. we were supposed to be together. now how will he make passionate love to me with his girlfriend and child hanging around. i'm serious. i kind of want to cry.
Me and Diego in happier times,
pondering our future together
Predicting Big Stuff
If you knew me a few years ago, you probably were unable to escape a conversation with me in which I brought up Karl Popper, a medium obscure Austrian-English 20th century philosopher. In retrospect, I think I tended to invoke Popper with the same kind of gleeful enthusiasm as I did, at age 3, when I asked a fellow sandbox-mate if he wanted to see how wide I could open my mouth. He obliged by emptying his bucket of sand right in. Regardless of the perils, I'll plunge ahead with some Popper.
So Popper wrote a book called "The Open Society and It's Enemies". It is not an ordinary philosophy book. He is practically seething with anger. Why? He was born to Jewish parents who converted to Christianity, but nonetheless was forced to leave Austria in 1937 because of the Nazis. He pounded out "The Open Society" in New Zealand, trying to explain how such a seemingly civilized world could turn so barbaric so quickly. His point is this: the big social theorists (Plato is the subject of volume 1, Hegel and Marx are the subjects of volume 2, but many others are implicated along the way) are trying to distill patterns in history with a view to predicting the future. This pursuit is, was, and always will be, according to Popper, not only misguided, but dangerous. By postulating determinism in the course of human events, such philophies as Plato’s republic or Marx’s proletariat revolution relieve responsible democratic citizens of the ability to influence society, and thus lead eventually to totalitarianism.
As the captain bravely suggested, all is instability. Plato lived during a tumultuous time and devised The Republic as a means of maintaining order. Step by step, Popper attempts to reveal Plato’s republic for what it really was – a totalitarian state with none other than Plato at the helm. And in his wake, many other great thinkers and writers followed. But determining the future on the evidence of the past is just too hard.
Popper had a lot more to say about this, but I think I’ll leave it at that. With some luck, I’ll find ways to mix Popper into future subjects. Please don’t pour sand in my mouth.
So Popper wrote a book called "The Open Society and It's Enemies". It is not an ordinary philosophy book. He is practically seething with anger. Why? He was born to Jewish parents who converted to Christianity, but nonetheless was forced to leave Austria in 1937 because of the Nazis. He pounded out "The Open Society" in New Zealand, trying to explain how such a seemingly civilized world could turn so barbaric so quickly. His point is this: the big social theorists (Plato is the subject of volume 1, Hegel and Marx are the subjects of volume 2, but many others are implicated along the way) are trying to distill patterns in history with a view to predicting the future. This pursuit is, was, and always will be, according to Popper, not only misguided, but dangerous. By postulating determinism in the course of human events, such philophies as Plato’s republic or Marx’s proletariat revolution relieve responsible democratic citizens of the ability to influence society, and thus lead eventually to totalitarianism.
As the captain bravely suggested, all is instability. Plato lived during a tumultuous time and devised The Republic as a means of maintaining order. Step by step, Popper attempts to reveal Plato’s republic for what it really was – a totalitarian state with none other than Plato at the helm. And in his wake, many other great thinkers and writers followed. But determining the future on the evidence of the past is just too hard.
Popper had a lot more to say about this, but I think I’ll leave it at that. With some luck, I’ll find ways to mix Popper into future subjects. Please don’t pour sand in my mouth.
two more cents
I have to agree with Lily on this one, our universe is in flux, which means that everything in it is in flux and is constantly moving. The simple fact that things are in movement means that there are interactions between them(humans, trees, strange sea monsters on the shores of long island). Our world is constructed around this ever changing universe. And so I think stability is a myth. What we have is dependability and predictability. As we better understand the world around us, we start to notice trends and can foresee the effects of our actions. And I think that there is comfort in that for sure. We all need to rest and recharge after stressful periods of adjustment and change. Plus, individually we have different thresholds for security and uncertainty. But as humans, I think it is dangerous to rest too long in that comfort because then we stop growing and evolving. This is why we have such a developed conscious brain, allowing us to grow and adapt to change and this is what fundamentally separates us from other beings. The progress humans are able to make within one lifetime and pass on to their children would take years for animals or plants to do through genetic mutation. 
Maslow talks about this in his Hierarchy of needs, before you can achieve higher levels of being and consciousness you must satisfy your base needs of survival and security. Instead of looking at these levels as needs, we can think of them as developmental stages of growth and stability. Finding ease and skill at one level allows you to be comfortable working through the challenges of the next level as if it were a new level in a video game. How long do you shoot at the ducks before you’re ready to try the fast moving clay discs?
Looked at another way, the world is in constant motion and before we can stand on our feet, we must understand and predict the forces of rotation and gravity. Before we can catch and throw a baseball or body we must be balanced and in flow with our environment. A pirate can fight and drink far out to see with only one good leg only because he or she is comfortable navigating the pitching of the boat and swinging of the masts.
I think we have to let go of waiting for the world to stop moving and the oceans to settle down. What we can do though is understand our own place within that world and the ways that we are influencing it. By understanding ourselves, the ways we engage and interact with a constantly changing world; we can find our own inherent stability even under the most turbulent situations. To continue the nautical metaphor, we can sit like a buoy in the water, being battered by waves and shat on by sea birds or we can strap on some fins and swim through it.
On another note, I’ve been reading a bit of Foucault lately, and in the opening to his book on Madness and Civilization, he talks a lot about sailors and how they were often the crazy outcasts of society. It makes me wonder also if adjusting to the more unstable aspects of sea life makes one unfit for the structure and consistency of flat roads and cities. Or is it just the booze and dirty dirty sea love...
Maslow talks about this in his Hierarchy of needs, before you can achieve higher levels of being and consciousness you must satisfy your base needs of survival and security. Instead of looking at these levels as needs, we can think of them as developmental stages of growth and stability. Finding ease and skill at one level allows you to be comfortable working through the challenges of the next level as if it were a new level in a video game. How long do you shoot at the ducks before you’re ready to try the fast moving clay discs?
Looked at another way, the world is in constant motion and before we can stand on our feet, we must understand and predict the forces of rotation and gravity. Before we can catch and throw a baseball or body we must be balanced and in flow with our environment. A pirate can fight and drink far out to see with only one good leg only because he or she is comfortable navigating the pitching of the boat and swinging of the masts.
I think we have to let go of waiting for the world to stop moving and the oceans to settle down. What we can do though is understand our own place within that world and the ways that we are influencing it. By understanding ourselves, the ways we engage and interact with a constantly changing world; we can find our own inherent stability even under the most turbulent situations. To continue the nautical metaphor, we can sit like a buoy in the water, being battered by waves and shat on by sea birds or we can strap on some fins and swim through it.
On another note, I’ve been reading a bit of Foucault lately, and in the opening to his book on Madness and Civilization, he talks a lot about sailors and how they were often the crazy outcasts of society. It makes me wonder also if adjusting to the more unstable aspects of sea life makes one unfit for the structure and consistency of flat roads and cities. Or is it just the booze and dirty dirty sea love...
More Thoughts on Unpredictability (I guess I have a lot)
Q: Something i would not have predicted?
A: Monsters washing up on the shores of Long Island.
seriously though. WTF?
seriously though. WTF?Self-fulfilling Prophecies (Or, This is way to much information)
When I chose this topic, I had a couple things in mind. One was, as raised briefly by Miss Jessie, the power of positive thinking, because my sister has recently been listening to The Secret on tape and has fallen totally and completely under its spell and has had several uncannily positive things occur in her life since said spell-falling. Miss Jessie and Dr. Pepper have both posed the antithesis of the Secret - specifically, that if you say you will get something (the apparently elusive "History Award") or say you will enjoy something (Napoleon Dynamite) you won't. I've always fallen more in the 'don't set your sights to high" camp, which is why its shocking that my own flesh and blood has suddenly morphed in a positive person, but I do think there's something to be said for the self-fulfilling prophecy, at least in its more negative form, which is something I've been thinking about a lot in the past few years.
A couple years ago I was really depressed. I felt bored and stuck and generally disconnected from most of my social interactions, which was odd because it was a time where I was quite social. I had plans most nights a week. I had friends and a community and I threw parties and had friend dates and whatnot. But ultimately, I was miserable. It seemed like no matter how many fun plans I made, I just couldn't seem to grab hold of the "fun" part. They were just plans.
Sitting in my therapists office one Friday afternoon I started talking about this feeling of disconnect and frustration and boredom. "Well, what are you doing tonight?" She asked.
Lily: "Blah and Blah are coming over and we're going to cook dinner and drink some wine and then maybe meet up with people afterwards at a bar."
Therapist: Well that sounds fun.
Lily: Yeah, it does.
Therapist: So whats the problem? Are your friends really boring or something?
Lily: No they're great. I guess it just feels like there's no point. I feel like I already know what conversations we'll have, what music we'll listen to, what sides of a discussion that people will take. The mood. All of it. Its boring. I feel like, what's the point of actually going through with the plans at this point, if I already know how they'll play out.
Therapist: You're not psychic, you know.
Lily: Yes, I know.
Therapist: Who made these plans initially?
Lily: I did.
Anyways, I won't recount the entire conversation but the point was this: I was boring myself. I made things predictable. Not because I could look into the future and predict how things would be, not because I could somehow control situations and people, but because I could look into the future and try to predict how I might respond to any number of possible scenarios. When I "made plans" I wasn't thinking "Hmmmm what am I in the mood to do?" It was more like "What would this be like? What about this? Or that?" and while I believed myself to be just trying to assess my desires, I was actually running through a hundred different scenarios and possibilities of what might happen or what could be said and how I might respond, in order to achieve some safe and pleasant outcome. I was "goal oriented" you might say. All contingencies planned for. I didn't use to be this way, and its hard to know when or why it started, but it was basically like I was living in a choose your own adventure book that I'd been re-reading for way way to long.
All of this may seem like, wow. That girl is crazy. And yes, you would have a point. Hence the therapy. But I digress.
Ever since this moment of epiphany, the goal of my life has been to stop thinking and planning and spiralling away. I've been trying to do the opposite of that feels comfortable or knowable. If I think I know how something will be, I'll probably choose the other option just because, why not? You never know. But more than that, if I think about an upcoming event and find myself imagining a scenario, I tell myself to shut the hell up and think about something else instead. Being a relatively anxious person, I'm only occasionally successful, but the result has been a year I could not have predicted, with friendships and love and a job and a bunch of crazy outfits I would not have put my money on a year ago. And I'm happy with this. Very. Like the Captain said, let the dice roll with everything else (although, goddamn the sleeping thing is BRILLIANT. Hence my addiction to Ambien. But that’s another blog altogether).
I guess what I'm wondering is, is it possible, or even wise, to get to where my sister is now, trying and sometimes succeeding at predicting good things? Because the problem with not imagining a future is that, it leaves you with very few long term goals. Its hard to work towards the unknown. You can't really build a resume or work towards a degree for nothing in particular. Or can you? Can you just do what feels good in that moment and hope that your desires are consistent enough and your path forward winding enough that you end up with all the cards falling in place? Because ultimately, what does "in place" mean, if you've got no plan? Aren't the cards right where you thought they'd be, if what you thought was, "I sure hope these cards fall wherever they feel like falling?"
A couple years ago I was really depressed. I felt bored and stuck and generally disconnected from most of my social interactions, which was odd because it was a time where I was quite social. I had plans most nights a week. I had friends and a community and I threw parties and had friend dates and whatnot. But ultimately, I was miserable. It seemed like no matter how many fun plans I made, I just couldn't seem to grab hold of the "fun" part. They were just plans.
Sitting in my therapists office one Friday afternoon I started talking about this feeling of disconnect and frustration and boredom. "Well, what are you doing tonight?" She asked.
Lily: "Blah and Blah are coming over and we're going to cook dinner and drink some wine and then maybe meet up with people afterwards at a bar."
Therapist: Well that sounds fun.
Lily: Yeah, it does.
Therapist: So whats the problem? Are your friends really boring or something?
Lily: No they're great. I guess it just feels like there's no point. I feel like I already know what conversations we'll have, what music we'll listen to, what sides of a discussion that people will take. The mood. All of it. Its boring. I feel like, what's the point of actually going through with the plans at this point, if I already know how they'll play out.
Therapist: You're not psychic, you know.
Lily: Yes, I know.
Therapist: Who made these plans initially?
Lily: I did.
Anyways, I won't recount the entire conversation but the point was this: I was boring myself. I made things predictable. Not because I could look into the future and predict how things would be, not because I could somehow control situations and people, but because I could look into the future and try to predict how I might respond to any number of possible scenarios. When I "made plans" I wasn't thinking "Hmmmm what am I in the mood to do?" It was more like "What would this be like? What about this? Or that?" and while I believed myself to be just trying to assess my desires, I was actually running through a hundred different scenarios and possibilities of what might happen or what could be said and how I might respond, in order to achieve some safe and pleasant outcome. I was "goal oriented" you might say. All contingencies planned for. I didn't use to be this way, and its hard to know when or why it started, but it was basically like I was living in a choose your own adventure book that I'd been re-reading for way way to long.
All of this may seem like, wow. That girl is crazy. And yes, you would have a point. Hence the therapy. But I digress.
Ever since this moment of epiphany, the goal of my life has been to stop thinking and planning and spiralling away. I've been trying to do the opposite of that feels comfortable or knowable. If I think I know how something will be, I'll probably choose the other option just because, why not? You never know. But more than that, if I think about an upcoming event and find myself imagining a scenario, I tell myself to shut the hell up and think about something else instead. Being a relatively anxious person, I'm only occasionally successful, but the result has been a year I could not have predicted, with friendships and love and a job and a bunch of crazy outfits I would not have put my money on a year ago. And I'm happy with this. Very. Like the Captain said, let the dice roll with everything else (although, goddamn the sleeping thing is BRILLIANT. Hence my addiction to Ambien. But that’s another blog altogether).
I guess what I'm wondering is, is it possible, or even wise, to get to where my sister is now, trying and sometimes succeeding at predicting good things? Because the problem with not imagining a future is that, it leaves you with very few long term goals. Its hard to work towards the unknown. You can't really build a resume or work towards a degree for nothing in particular. Or can you? Can you just do what feels good in that moment and hope that your desires are consistent enough and your path forward winding enough that you end up with all the cards falling in place? Because ultimately, what does "in place" mean, if you've got no plan? Aren't the cards right where you thought they'd be, if what you thought was, "I sure hope these cards fall wherever they feel like falling?"
Oh, you can predict my future, can you? A quick rant on movies and expectations.
Predictability is such a scary thing. I think I am with the captain when he says that for the most part it is best to "let the dice roll" and see what happens. I think I am happiest in life when I am in a space where I am feeling open and ready for any potential outcome (within reason, of course, whatever that means). But that does eliminate one of young adult life's great past-times (oh, the twenties...those were the days). How much fun is it to talk about the future, whether our own, or those of mutual friends? I mean, this is the essence of gossip. Yeah, you like gossip.
But lets get to something even more exciting than gossip: movies. Here is where predictability really gets me in trouble, because my own expectations are so malleable, ready to be shaped by other peoples predictions. You know what I am talking about: "Oh, have you seen [insert cult classic, e.g. Napoleon Dynamite, Be Kind Rewind]. Its sooooo good. You will love it." OR: "Have you seen [insert blockbuster movie that even the documentary people like, e.g. Iron Man, Batman]. Normally I'm not into that kind of movie, but it is so well done. You should see it." Now my expectations are raised. That movie is doomed.
Point is, I even liked Undercover Brother because I thought it was gonna suck (and its also kind of genius). And if you tell me a movie is really good, it better be freaking amazing enough to outlive the expectations you just created for me. So don't come around with this, "oh my god, that movie is the shit", shit. That is right up there with telling me some restaurant is the best ____ food ever when you've never been there. A simple, "yeah, I liked it" or "its worth seeing" is good.
But lets get to something even more exciting than gossip: movies. Here is where predictability really gets me in trouble, because my own expectations are so malleable, ready to be shaped by other peoples predictions. You know what I am talking about: "Oh, have you seen [insert cult classic, e.g. Napoleon Dynamite, Be Kind Rewind]. Its sooooo good. You will love it." OR: "Have you seen [insert blockbuster movie that even the documentary people like, e.g. Iron Man, Batman]. Normally I'm not into that kind of movie, but it is so well done. You should see it." Now my expectations are raised. That movie is doomed.
Point is, I even liked Undercover Brother because I thought it was gonna suck (and its also kind of genius). And if you tell me a movie is really good, it better be freaking amazing enough to outlive the expectations you just created for me. So don't come around with this, "oh my god, that movie is the shit", shit. That is right up there with telling me some restaurant is the best ____ food ever when you've never been there. A simple, "yeah, I liked it" or "its worth seeing" is good.
A Few Thoughts On Predictions, Futures and The Cosmonaut Gods
I am terror-stricken of my power to predict the future. Specifically, my own future. While reason and logic, chance and humility might say otherwise, I cannot ignore that the ways I think about my future will directly impact the events of it. This terrifies me.
Presently, I am very attuned to my powers. As I think about my move to Portland, I don't know what the vast empty space of my future holds (besides a lot of rain). But I wonder, how will my thoughts dictate the future? Should I go for the whole positive-thinking thing- could I truly envision the future I desire? Or, should I try to avoid any positive thoughts, any real optimism at all, for fear that this might only jinx good things from ever occurring?
Yes, the great Jinx. Traditionally, I've been a staunch believer in its power. It's better not to hope, than hope and be disappointed. And if you think something will happen-- it won't.
When I was little, I remember using the Jinx on my sister. I was mad at her for some petty reason, and so to get my revenge, I spoke aloud some unspeakable wish we both knew she had for the future. Who knows what it was exactly- maybe some school award. But the minute the words left my mean little mouth- we both knew: now it would never come true. And it didn't.
(Let me just say, I'm even a little scared to put my thoughts about the Jinx into words. For one thing, it's a little frightening to expose others to the twisted logic of your mind. But more than that - could I somehow be jinxing myself for speaking about jinxes? A twisted web indeed.)
The future- and predicting the future. It gets even more trickier as we grow older. For example, how do you predict a future with someone else? What happens when you stop envisioning the History Award, and switch to the kind of future that includes a life with someone? And if that someone doesn't want the same 2.5 kids- energy-efficient vehicle-future that you've mapped out... what of our powers then? Can positive-thinking and good thoughts really piece together a murky present? Are you completely powerless? Or, as the Great Jinx says, was your problem in merely thinking happy thoughts about your future in the first place?
The shameful part is, as my own future gets less and less easier to call, I've had loads of fun trying to predict other peoples' future. I look around at my own life and think, I never would've predicted I'd be here. And yet, I've won a few top-shelf drinks off predictions about my friends' lives. Can other people see our future before we do?
Of course happiness is what scares me the most. This is usually when I get the most nervous about the future. When I'm feeling happy or hopeful, I feel like I'm teetering mid-air, waiting for the gods to slam me back down. As an agnostic, I have quite a lot of faith in these gods. I see little gnome-like creatures sitting in front of some sort of cosmonaut control panel; when they see my happy-meter blinking towards 10 they laugh their wicked laugh and, with the press of a red button, zap me back to 4.
But I wonder sometimes what it would be like to be one of those curious people who enjoy good times, without hunkering down for the inevitable bad. Not the wired-prozac types, but those fulfilled peaceful people, who don't really live in fear of their power to affect their future. Or, I wonder what would it be like to believe - I mean really believe, not just I -watch-Oprah-read -The-Secret believe- that you could envision a happy future?
I think about these things and it's a little calming as I consider my powers now. Of course, other times I find myself thinking: maybe the gods won't be able to see through all the rain in Portland.
But it's a start anyway.
Presently, I am very attuned to my powers. As I think about my move to Portland, I don't know what the vast empty space of my future holds (besides a lot of rain). But I wonder, how will my thoughts dictate the future? Should I go for the whole positive-thinking thing- could I truly envision the future I desire? Or, should I try to avoid any positive thoughts, any real optimism at all, for fear that this might only jinx good things from ever occurring?
Yes, the great Jinx. Traditionally, I've been a staunch believer in its power. It's better not to hope, than hope and be disappointed. And if you think something will happen-- it won't.
When I was little, I remember using the Jinx on my sister. I was mad at her for some petty reason, and so to get my revenge, I spoke aloud some unspeakable wish we both knew she had for the future. Who knows what it was exactly- maybe some school award. But the minute the words left my mean little mouth- we both knew: now it would never come true. And it didn't.
(Let me just say, I'm even a little scared to put my thoughts about the Jinx into words. For one thing, it's a little frightening to expose others to the twisted logic of your mind. But more than that - could I somehow be jinxing myself for speaking about jinxes? A twisted web indeed.)
The future- and predicting the future. It gets even more trickier as we grow older. For example, how do you predict a future with someone else? What happens when you stop envisioning the History Award, and switch to the kind of future that includes a life with someone? And if that someone doesn't want the same 2.5 kids- energy-efficient vehicle-future that you've mapped out... what of our powers then? Can positive-thinking and good thoughts really piece together a murky present? Are you completely powerless? Or, as the Great Jinx says, was your problem in merely thinking happy thoughts about your future in the first place?
The shameful part is, as my own future gets less and less easier to call, I've had loads of fun trying to predict other peoples' future. I look around at my own life and think, I never would've predicted I'd be here. And yet, I've won a few top-shelf drinks off predictions about my friends' lives. Can other people see our future before we do?
Of course happiness is what scares me the most. This is usually when I get the most nervous about the future. When I'm feeling happy or hopeful, I feel like I'm teetering mid-air, waiting for the gods to slam me back down. As an agnostic, I have quite a lot of faith in these gods. I see little gnome-like creatures sitting in front of some sort of cosmonaut control panel; when they see my happy-meter blinking towards 10 they laugh their wicked laugh and, with the press of a red button, zap me back to 4.
But I wonder sometimes what it would be like to be one of those curious people who enjoy good times, without hunkering down for the inevitable bad. Not the wired-prozac types, but those fulfilled peaceful people, who don't really live in fear of their power to affect their future. Or, I wonder what would it be like to believe - I mean really believe, not just I -watch-Oprah-read -The-Secret believe- that you could envision a happy future?
I think about these things and it's a little calming as I consider my powers now. Of course, other times I find myself thinking: maybe the gods won't be able to see through all the rain in Portland.
But it's a start anyway.
There are very few things that I wish I could predict. In no particular order
1When I will be able to fall asleep and for how long. Knowing this a few days in advance will drastically help my scheduling.
2How much is really 'enough'. Will one more drink put me over the edge, maybe three shots of tequila would be fine before church. I'd like to know.
3When you're actually going to show up. Fucking flakes!(this is directed to no one in particular)
That's about it, I say let the dice roll with everything else.
1When I will be able to fall asleep and for how long. Knowing this a few days in advance will drastically help my scheduling.
2How much is really 'enough'. Will one more drink put me over the edge, maybe three shots of tequila would be fine before church. I'd like to know.
3When you're actually going to show up. Fucking flakes!(this is directed to no one in particular)
That's about it, I say let the dice roll with everything else.
CAN YOU GUESS THE NEW TOPIC???
Exactly. Assuming you didn't look over there to the right and read what it is.
Having exausted the Food Topic (for now at least) I think its time to move on, and we here at blog headquarters think that the Captain's most recent post is a good place to both end and begin.
And so without further ado, we offer you yet another topic: Predictability. Of which there are many kinds. The psychic, the scientific, the social, and the lack thereof. The known and the unknown and the murky inbetween. Intuition or calculation.
Talk amongst yourselves.
or rather, with us. here. on the blog.
Having exausted the Food Topic (for now at least) I think its time to move on, and we here at blog headquarters think that the Captain's most recent post is a good place to both end and begin.
And so without further ado, we offer you yet another topic: Predictability. Of which there are many kinds. The psychic, the scientific, the social, and the lack thereof. The known and the unknown and the murky inbetween. Intuition or calculation.
Talk amongst yourselves.
or rather, with us. here. on the blog.
Se Fini!
Well my dears, I do believe it's time to clear the plates. Many lovely dishes, but it seems like we are all rather stuffed. Please, have some coffee and digest for a moment while we bring out dessert...
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