Halloa blog readers :))
So, it's Tuesday, and I'm at the library. Next to my classmate, who's listening to music and drawing stuff. I have a couple hours to kill, so I thought I'd update my blog with thoughts and observations about the different communication styles of men and women.
WELL. My "best friend" (so to speak - lately I've had reservations about using the word "friend", which is one I throw around too regularly. But that's another story, to do with the Aquarian fetishization of that "F" word. Back to topic) in Lebanon, and quite conceivably the world, is an energetic, vivacious, and highly "communicative" (I'll use that word instead of "talkative", it has better connotations) Gemini man. And I can pinpoint a bunch of times during which this awesomenicitous man would ask me, "How do you know when a girl likes you?" This question, I'm exactly 99.875% sure, has men all over the globe racking their brains at some point or other. No matter how penetrating their minds may be when it comes to rocket science, sanitation-engineering, and uncovering the societally-determined "mysteries of the Universe". At the root of communication between the fair sex and the, erm, not-so-fair sex (pardon, les gars), is a disconnect that comes from differences in the way women and men respond to and process information derived from interactions with the outside world (in the context of this blog post, mainly the social realm, in which men and women are lumped together oh, I don't know, every other second or so). So, without further ado, I'll TRY (which is a big effort for me. Do I get a cookie for this, I wonder?) to cut straight to the point (okay, a few minor detours never hurt anybody - where's your sense of adventure?) in analyzing what I think various communication signals from men and women alike mean, as a general guide, I suppose. Better to read this than to go on one of those dating sites that give articles with headlines like "DOES HE LIKE ME?" <KESS ME AGAIN> (Lebanese expletives are a happiness-inducing affair, what with the bitter cold that comes with separation - I suppose - it's an overdramatization. Don't mind me, I'm just babbling some liquorice.)
Friendly
I cannot tell you how many times friendly communication signals and body language are misconstrued by both males and females. I once read an article that claimed the following: Out of 100% of all interactions between a male and female(s), 50% of friendly signals from the female(s) in question will be misread as sexual/romantic, and 50% of romantic/sexual cues from the female will be brushed off as friendliness. The article didn't list percentages, but I think these illustrate the point it was trying to make. I don't remember if the article said anything about female signal-reading skills, but I'll try to fill in that gap for you here. Mars is the masculine principle, Venus is all things feminine. It shouldn't come as a suprise, then, when I tell you that Mars in a birth chart represents sexual vitality and direct action; Venus, on the other hand, represents romance, beauty, and the arts. Therefore, it could be that men are sometimes so blinded by their desire for sexual consummation with a particular woman, that their subconcious becomes programmed to interpret any signals from a woman as purely sexual. This also has to do, I'm sure, with the (I believe) erroneous hypermarketing of carnal desire in the media over, let's say, the past seven years. It might also have to do with this idea that's put into men's heads from a very young age, that you, sir, are a man. Men are exclusively assertive, aggressive, and forward-pushers. Men have to accumulate, to overcome, and to conquer, for them to be viewed as men by society. Such notions extend to sexual conquest as well. It's inconceivable to a man that Woman X is not attracted to him - what kind of a man would I be if I couldn't "get" the girl? A man's sexual attractiveness becomes entangled with his general image of himself as an individual, and specifically an individual of the male gender. Females face a similar problem when it comes to romance. Women are programmed from an early age to be meek and submissive and receptive to the commands and superiority of men - the Disney princess movies don't help things one bit. Traditionally, women had to suppress their individual characters because finding a romantic partner and provider was necessary for a woman's "salvation" and "uplifting" from a spiritual, mental, and more-often-than-not literal destitution of a sort. And this is why you see so many women interpreting what is just friendliness from a man as a knee-jerk "he likes me". For men, the mantra is slightly reversed - "she wants me". SO, mesdames et monsieurs, what you decide to do with your psychosexual programming is your business alone. BUT, here's a bunch of signals that are commonly perceived as FRIENDLY, so that you don't run too far ahead of yourselves into a helikesmeshewantsme mess.
a) A hand on your arm is, when it comes down to it, more of a friendly thing than a sexual one. If this is done during a conversation, the person is trying to show you they're listening to you, and sympathizing and/or agreeing with what's being expressed. Also, it makes them feel closer to you, on a subconcious level. BUT NOT NECESSARILY IN A SEXUAL OR ROMANTIC WAY.
b) An open-featured smile, in which the face is relaxed and the eyes light up, is friendly, brothers and sisters. Sexual smiles come off as leary, whereas romantic ones come off as feather-headed. The open-featured lip-lift is definitely friendly.
c) A friendly hug is usually not too tight, but not too loose, either. And if a shoulder-pat is part of the deal, it's ultra-friendly. NO sexual/romantic undercurrents there. Too tight can cross into being sexual, passionate, etc. Too loose could signal detachment and/or hurt.
d) If a man or woman puts their arm around your shoulders, they feel comfortable and buddy-buddy with you. If a man does this, it could mean he feels protective towards you as well. This is a very surefire indicator of friendly emotions from one towards the other.
e) Someone ruffling your hair is strictly friendly.
f) Likewise with someone chucking you under the chin.
g) Lightly patting someone's head, cheek, shoulder, arm is also friendly. If the grip is more intense, it most probably comes with a sexual undertone.
h) Women, be careful of hugging a guy too tight - you take it as sweet, cuddly, affectionate. The response on the male side of the fence, however, may propagate a more, um, expanded range of options.
i) Women, when a man places his hand on the small of a woman's back, he feels protective and warm towards her, but this is also a territory-marking gesture - almost as if (exactly as if, actually) he's telling other "predators" to "back off - this one is mine".
And now, les filles et les gars, time for the piece de la resistance - I'm bored. I feel an infinite geometric series of yawns coming on. Maybe it's the air in this place. Anyway, this is to be continued, I guess. But can I just say one more thing?
To men: when a woman tells you about her emotions, she is baring her soul to you. She trusts you enough to do so. Don't react in a bland or dismissive way to such admissions.
To women: when a man tell you about his ambitions and expectations, he is baring his soul to you. He trusts you enough to do so. Don't react in a bland or dismissive way to such admissions.
Oh, the love between men and women, women and women, men and men. So bloody difficult to write about well. After writing this blog post, I have a newfound admiration for people who have to do this for a living. It's such prosaic, detail-oriented work. Cool, at least I learned something new about myself.
My e-mail is: bemgcasrbaquarian@gmail.com
I think I'll write an astrology post next. Gemini and Aquarius, or something like that, because I miss my cool Gemini buddy.
See you.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
Tuesday, 29 January 2013
Wednesday, 23 January 2013
Aubergine, Oxytocin, and Fighting Gravity. Ukulele.
Halloa :D
Well, I'm writing in red. For the record, red is one of my favorite colors, along with aquamarine. That's such a girl thing to say. Only women (and maybe some gay guys) actually use words like "aquamarine", "aubergine", and "peach" to describe colors. I could just say "blue". But there are different types of blue. Language is so varied, and that is part of its advantage, beauty, and ultimately its confusing character. Wow. What a strong statement. lol. By the way, it's been said that you can safely perceive people who wear blue as being loyal, stable, and reliable sorts. And you know what? I've found it to be true. My best female friend from high school always used to wear some variant of the color blue, usually a medium shade, and she's one of the most persistent women I've met, very constant in her concern for her friends and other loved ones, and unswerving in her devotion to causes and people alike. This friend has a Taurus ascendant. Incidentally, one of my musical colleagues in Lebanon was a Taurean, and he also wears those same shades of blue that my school-buddy does. And one of my earlier sweethearts exhibited similar personality traits to these other two people, and was partial to blue. WHAT am I talking about? I didn't intend to go into color analysis and its linkage to horoscopes. Actually, what do I ever intend to talk about through this blog? I have further elaboration to make upon that rhetorical question, but first, let me just say that I for one never, never liked the color blue. I won't say I have a deceitful temperament, but I've proven to myself a propensity for playing games and being manipulative emotionally and mentally. I'm being honest with myself. I'd like to believe I'm an all-righteous and politically correct chick, but I'm not that way all the time. It's the subtle, light nuances of deception I enjoy. The funny thing is, as with most game-players, at the core I'm deceiving myself first, with the playing of others coming almost as an after-thought. But I like the aqua color. It's pretty.
Back to my "rhetorical device". A question that's been going around in my head since the weekend, I'd say, is, "Why do you still update this blog?" Sure, it's really nice (miraculous, actually, to that mysticism-inclined mind of mine - read that - illusion-prone and lie-susceptible) to interact with readers of this effort in cyber-space, and writing this blog gives me something to do with those hours I can't find a better way to kill. But I don't get any money for this, and it distracts me from my writing, as in, the novel I should have psychologically prepared myself to continue months ago, and the two short stories I'm working on now, the newer one taking top priority. You know, I should have done this, I should have done that. There are lots of opportunities that have passed me by. Many chances I could have taken, but haven't. I should have done. But I have not done. So, what's done is done. The past can't be brought back, no matter how much we try. I only know my natural tendencies, and I'm quite aware of what I'm working with abilities-wise. Not just literary-talent-speaking, but also taking into consideration my levels of energy, procrastination, will-power, and tangible "pen-to-paper" results (or rather, hand-to-keyboard, in these days and times). I am limited by this set of tools, and I cannot overextend myself beyond the available sledgehammers in the toolshed. Correction. I shall not. I could, but I won't. I still remember the dangers of pushing yourself to bring to life an expectation that a) Isn't necessarily your own and b) Is mighty unrealistic at a given point and under defined circumstances in life. A nervous breakdown or two will teach anyone. To cut a long story short, I am quite aware this blog is "getting me nowhere".
But I'll continue to write. At least for now, in these moments, it's a sensible enough thing to do. This was started primarily as one of those things for me, for the happiness and entertainment and yes, even release (at points and intervals, you understand) of my soul. Don't underestimate the power and healing potential of those little things that you think don't matter, which actually matter a lot to you and the omission of which from your lives takes away a few extra specks of light from your respective existences. You find this a lot with most people. May I dare to say all? There are things that are engraved so deeply into our natures, that constitute such vital and necessary parts of the essence of a given human being, that keep being closed off and muffled in favor of some vague external expectation or ideal a person is trying to live up to. You give up doing what you're good at because your family doesn't think you have what it takes. Your fiance guilts you into leaving a career that fucking means something to you, telling you to chillax, that it doesn't matter. Well, nothing really matters. So you've got to make your own meanings out of things. No use following completely in anyone's footsteps - your path will never be the same as theirs. My mother knits. My brother plays video games. My father used to paint. I need to write. I need to sleep seven hours at least per night to feel normal. And it has to be at night. As in, asleep by eleven something P.M. And I need a balanced schedule. I need an equal mix of friends and work (okay, with maybe a little extra helping of work, on the side, you know - workaholic hang-up from the IB days). I need alone time. I need romance. These are "little" things. But go ahead. Screw up the balance of power of your life, and see where it gets you. Take it from someone who knows, and just don't. The only thing that got me was a crazy psychological episode. It got me an episode, for Heaven's sake.
It's always been important to me, figuring out what's really making me tick. One of my biggest interests is following the road of understanding what makes people do what they do. I'm so bloody bored as I'm writing this, but I want to follow through with this post. I think it's because I'm chill that I'm not motivated to write something smart-sounding tonight. So, I'll just list a bunch of random things that I think are worth mentioning. It's worth remembering that for whatever amount of time you remain alive in your current incarnation, you're stuck with this psyche you're given. So you can't overburden it with too much expectation from people. Some restrictions ought to be heeded. You're certainly not reading the words of a true liberal here, rest assured. But you need to make sure that your most driving and pivotal desires are taken care of, and made peace with, or else you're headed for an ugly life indeed, with maybe Hell to pay. So, I'm sorta shutting off now. My prosaic list:
a) Today was my first day teaching English. It's great. I've always pegged myself as a teacher sort. My benevolent-dictator side is quite happy with such arrangements. Also, I'm quite didactic, in case you haven't picked that up yet.
b) A fellow writer lent me Kafka's "Metamorphosis" to read because he found one of my works quite Kafka-esque. I like that he lent me that book of his. Safe travels to Scandinavia, buddy (that's my spirit telecommunicating).
c) My new phone is one of those stupid touch-phones. It's so hard to text with those. Fuck the new world. Fuck modernity. I wanna go back to horses on the streets (I've seen that in Dahye, in Lebanon, btw. Lebanese readers will know the especial humor in that) and hoop skirts and pantalets. Except, I would want to be a man during those times, because it really sucked for women. In my past life, I wish I had been the ferocious Jonathan Swift, or one such philosophical firebrand.
d) Asmahan is also a cool choice for a past-life experience. I read about that. One writer described her past-life experience of being Asmahan.
e) Today I leafed through Cosmopolitan in the supermarket. I used to blush when passing by those before, as early as last year, even. But now I don't care. I just look through the sex pages openly and the devil may care who sees. And usually, it's only the devil who cares ;) So, I think most of their sex-tips are pretty lame, and too male-pleasure-centric. It's just "How to please your man". I'm dying to know how my man is going to please me. That would be an article worth picking up. Actually, when both are pleased, something is being done right. Sex should be a balancing act of equality. Should be.
f) Anyway, they had an article that was quite entertaining. It's a bunch of scientific (well, by Cosmo standards anyway) trivia concerning the oh-so-glorious act of sex. Here are some of my findings:
g) Ladies, when a man touches you, you feel three times more heat than when a woman touches you. What if you're a lesbian? AND how have they measured this increase in heat, I wonder? A sexual calorimeter of sorts, perhaps? Is there no such thing out yet in the market? If not, then I'm waiting for a Scorpio with Virgo or Gemini moon and Aquarian ascendant to invent it.
h) A kiss burns five calories. zomfg, get to it, bitches. Are you fucking kidding me? But good to know. Btw, some people have sex just to burn calories. Make of that what you will. I think it's pretty absurd.
i) Wanna feel more horny, mesdames? Hug your man for exactly thirty seconds. Not more. Not less. Exactly that. Gets the oxytocin flowing. That's what's being called the "bonding hormone" by medical TV shows and science-for-dummies-type things.
j) Men think about sex nineteen times a day. For women? A measly ten times. Crap, they're winning.
k) I love some of the diction used in there, like "his penis would be fighting gravity", in reference to the girl-on-top position. trololo
l) Oh, my God. Women older than me get their sexual education and tips from this type of publication. Why are we so unerotic, and more pressingly, so uninformed? That's the most unsexy thing of all. Knowledge = power = sexy. Nothing sexy about stupidity and conformity, ever, to me.
Well, that does it. I'm so fucking bored now, I can't quote any more Cosmo wisdom. But these are actually okay tidbits (lol, tidbits). What gets me giggling is the full-on sex advice. By the way, Uhřineves is quite a nice, remote town on the outskirts of Prague that I went to today. Nice for spending the night there with a boyfriend or girlfriend, making wet love while the snow falls down outside. The woods are a little spectacular. That whole place reminds me of a description of this French town I read last year. The town in Tarascon-sur-Ariege, and it's in the south of France, which I've been to, just not to that village. What's good about Cosmo is the pictures of women. Sometimes.
I'm bored. Ladiduck. Goodbye.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
Well, I'm writing in red. For the record, red is one of my favorite colors, along with aquamarine. That's such a girl thing to say. Only women (and maybe some gay guys) actually use words like "aquamarine", "aubergine", and "peach" to describe colors. I could just say "blue". But there are different types of blue. Language is so varied, and that is part of its advantage, beauty, and ultimately its confusing character. Wow. What a strong statement. lol. By the way, it's been said that you can safely perceive people who wear blue as being loyal, stable, and reliable sorts. And you know what? I've found it to be true. My best female friend from high school always used to wear some variant of the color blue, usually a medium shade, and she's one of the most persistent women I've met, very constant in her concern for her friends and other loved ones, and unswerving in her devotion to causes and people alike. This friend has a Taurus ascendant. Incidentally, one of my musical colleagues in Lebanon was a Taurean, and he also wears those same shades of blue that my school-buddy does. And one of my earlier sweethearts exhibited similar personality traits to these other two people, and was partial to blue. WHAT am I talking about? I didn't intend to go into color analysis and its linkage to horoscopes. Actually, what do I ever intend to talk about through this blog? I have further elaboration to make upon that rhetorical question, but first, let me just say that I for one never, never liked the color blue. I won't say I have a deceitful temperament, but I've proven to myself a propensity for playing games and being manipulative emotionally and mentally. I'm being honest with myself. I'd like to believe I'm an all-righteous and politically correct chick, but I'm not that way all the time. It's the subtle, light nuances of deception I enjoy. The funny thing is, as with most game-players, at the core I'm deceiving myself first, with the playing of others coming almost as an after-thought. But I like the aqua color. It's pretty.
Back to my "rhetorical device". A question that's been going around in my head since the weekend, I'd say, is, "Why do you still update this blog?" Sure, it's really nice (miraculous, actually, to that mysticism-inclined mind of mine - read that - illusion-prone and lie-susceptible) to interact with readers of this effort in cyber-space, and writing this blog gives me something to do with those hours I can't find a better way to kill. But I don't get any money for this, and it distracts me from my writing, as in, the novel I should have psychologically prepared myself to continue months ago, and the two short stories I'm working on now, the newer one taking top priority. You know, I should have done this, I should have done that. There are lots of opportunities that have passed me by. Many chances I could have taken, but haven't. I should have done. But I have not done. So, what's done is done. The past can't be brought back, no matter how much we try. I only know my natural tendencies, and I'm quite aware of what I'm working with abilities-wise. Not just literary-talent-speaking, but also taking into consideration my levels of energy, procrastination, will-power, and tangible "pen-to-paper" results (or rather, hand-to-keyboard, in these days and times). I am limited by this set of tools, and I cannot overextend myself beyond the available sledgehammers in the toolshed. Correction. I shall not. I could, but I won't. I still remember the dangers of pushing yourself to bring to life an expectation that a) Isn't necessarily your own and b) Is mighty unrealistic at a given point and under defined circumstances in life. A nervous breakdown or two will teach anyone. To cut a long story short, I am quite aware this blog is "getting me nowhere".
But I'll continue to write. At least for now, in these moments, it's a sensible enough thing to do. This was started primarily as one of those things for me, for the happiness and entertainment and yes, even release (at points and intervals, you understand) of my soul. Don't underestimate the power and healing potential of those little things that you think don't matter, which actually matter a lot to you and the omission of which from your lives takes away a few extra specks of light from your respective existences. You find this a lot with most people. May I dare to say all? There are things that are engraved so deeply into our natures, that constitute such vital and necessary parts of the essence of a given human being, that keep being closed off and muffled in favor of some vague external expectation or ideal a person is trying to live up to. You give up doing what you're good at because your family doesn't think you have what it takes. Your fiance guilts you into leaving a career that fucking means something to you, telling you to chillax, that it doesn't matter. Well, nothing really matters. So you've got to make your own meanings out of things. No use following completely in anyone's footsteps - your path will never be the same as theirs. My mother knits. My brother plays video games. My father used to paint. I need to write. I need to sleep seven hours at least per night to feel normal. And it has to be at night. As in, asleep by eleven something P.M. And I need a balanced schedule. I need an equal mix of friends and work (okay, with maybe a little extra helping of work, on the side, you know - workaholic hang-up from the IB days). I need alone time. I need romance. These are "little" things. But go ahead. Screw up the balance of power of your life, and see where it gets you. Take it from someone who knows, and just don't. The only thing that got me was a crazy psychological episode. It got me an episode, for Heaven's sake.
It's always been important to me, figuring out what's really making me tick. One of my biggest interests is following the road of understanding what makes people do what they do. I'm so bloody bored as I'm writing this, but I want to follow through with this post. I think it's because I'm chill that I'm not motivated to write something smart-sounding tonight. So, I'll just list a bunch of random things that I think are worth mentioning. It's worth remembering that for whatever amount of time you remain alive in your current incarnation, you're stuck with this psyche you're given. So you can't overburden it with too much expectation from people. Some restrictions ought to be heeded. You're certainly not reading the words of a true liberal here, rest assured. But you need to make sure that your most driving and pivotal desires are taken care of, and made peace with, or else you're headed for an ugly life indeed, with maybe Hell to pay. So, I'm sorta shutting off now. My prosaic list:
a) Today was my first day teaching English. It's great. I've always pegged myself as a teacher sort. My benevolent-dictator side is quite happy with such arrangements. Also, I'm quite didactic, in case you haven't picked that up yet.
b) A fellow writer lent me Kafka's "Metamorphosis" to read because he found one of my works quite Kafka-esque. I like that he lent me that book of his. Safe travels to Scandinavia, buddy (that's my spirit telecommunicating).
c) My new phone is one of those stupid touch-phones. It's so hard to text with those. Fuck the new world. Fuck modernity. I wanna go back to horses on the streets (I've seen that in Dahye, in Lebanon, btw. Lebanese readers will know the especial humor in that) and hoop skirts and pantalets. Except, I would want to be a man during those times, because it really sucked for women. In my past life, I wish I had been the ferocious Jonathan Swift, or one such philosophical firebrand.
d) Asmahan is also a cool choice for a past-life experience. I read about that. One writer described her past-life experience of being Asmahan.
e) Today I leafed through Cosmopolitan in the supermarket. I used to blush when passing by those before, as early as last year, even. But now I don't care. I just look through the sex pages openly and the devil may care who sees. And usually, it's only the devil who cares ;) So, I think most of their sex-tips are pretty lame, and too male-pleasure-centric. It's just "How to please your man". I'm dying to know how my man is going to please me. That would be an article worth picking up. Actually, when both are pleased, something is being done right. Sex should be a balancing act of equality. Should be.
f) Anyway, they had an article that was quite entertaining. It's a bunch of scientific (well, by Cosmo standards anyway) trivia concerning the oh-so-glorious act of sex. Here are some of my findings:
g) Ladies, when a man touches you, you feel three times more heat than when a woman touches you. What if you're a lesbian? AND how have they measured this increase in heat, I wonder? A sexual calorimeter of sorts, perhaps? Is there no such thing out yet in the market? If not, then I'm waiting for a Scorpio with Virgo or Gemini moon and Aquarian ascendant to invent it.
h) A kiss burns five calories. zomfg, get to it, bitches. Are you fucking kidding me? But good to know. Btw, some people have sex just to burn calories. Make of that what you will. I think it's pretty absurd.
i) Wanna feel more horny, mesdames? Hug your man for exactly thirty seconds. Not more. Not less. Exactly that. Gets the oxytocin flowing. That's what's being called the "bonding hormone" by medical TV shows and science-for-dummies-type things.
j) Men think about sex nineteen times a day. For women? A measly ten times. Crap, they're winning.
k) I love some of the diction used in there, like "his penis would be fighting gravity", in reference to the girl-on-top position. trololo
l) Oh, my God. Women older than me get their sexual education and tips from this type of publication. Why are we so unerotic, and more pressingly, so uninformed? That's the most unsexy thing of all. Knowledge = power = sexy. Nothing sexy about stupidity and conformity, ever, to me.
Well, that does it. I'm so fucking bored now, I can't quote any more Cosmo wisdom. But these are actually okay tidbits (lol, tidbits). What gets me giggling is the full-on sex advice. By the way, Uhřineves is quite a nice, remote town on the outskirts of Prague that I went to today. Nice for spending the night there with a boyfriend or girlfriend, making wet love while the snow falls down outside. The woods are a little spectacular. That whole place reminds me of a description of this French town I read last year. The town in Tarascon-sur-Ariege, and it's in the south of France, which I've been to, just not to that village. What's good about Cosmo is the pictures of women. Sometimes.
I'm bored. Ladiduck. Goodbye.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
Saturday, 19 January 2013
Love
Hello blog readers :))
I was about to write "Today is Saturday, which is good", but then I found my fingers typing "Today is good", and I would like to leave it at that. I just want to stop thinking for a moment about the future, and what is to come, and realize that now, this moment, this time, is as perfect as things get. Life is perfect, now, on this cushion in the same old spot I've sat so many times trying to write stuff down, in this room that desperately needs cleaning, with my hair a mess and things and people in my life in perpetual disarray. This spot is charged with my own energy, my heart is calm. I am complete.
I want to talk about love in today's post. So often we read about it, watch movies about it, and imagine what it's going to be like when the ultimate One walks into our lives (I stated it that way on purpose, so that finding the One rings of sacrilege - it does). You know, I think this post isn't going to talk about love, but the word "love" and its uses and implications in a human life.
I think the concept of love is one of the most over-used and over-emphasized ideas floating out there in the multiverse. And we put way too many unrealistic expectations on love; we charge that word with so much meaning - it's gotten so bad that the meanings of many lives I've encountered depend on the presence of some sort of love in there, usually of the romanticized, non-lasting variant. It's crazy - I mean, you can't open Youtube - fucking Youtube, for the love of God - without having to read through some comment that ends with "ily babe <3 xox". That's what "love" has been reduced to - even less than a word. A bunch of automated characters that some people may have to look up the meaning for, if they don't know or don't use chat lingo. "I love this song." "I love that color." "I love pasta." That's what love has come to, because people don't necessarily think before spilling words out into the atmosphere, words that have no meaning and no heart, that are so fucking heartless it makes me sick to live on this planet (it wouldn't be so bad, actually, to space-travel sometime soon. And my long-cherished desire for a time-machine, I wish that to happen soon.)
If someone doesn't love you, and makes it clear to you plainly that they do not, thank your lucky stars. Even better if they say it in words, or in whichever style of communication is the dominant thread between you people. The most productive gift you can give to anyone is honesty, at least in my opinion. At least then you'd know that if you're disillusioned as a result of a love venture of sorts, that disillusionment would be fuelled by YOU, and not them. They have not led you to the acceptance of false notions. You have only deceived yourself. People who are "cruel to be kind" are to be appreciated. That sort of kindness can be a mark of character strength (surely, if the context of a situation supports such a claim). If you tell me the truth, I might be hurt, but not nearly as offended and aloof as I would be when I figure out someone has lied to me. It's a point of view worth looking at.
Back to love. For a lot of us, when the word "love" comes into mind, it springs up images of some sort. A visual image of lovers rushing towards one another. A mother holding the hand of her child. A soldier kissing his friend goodbye on a battlefield. A cat and a little boy sitting at the seashore. But these are fabrications, they are images. You can try to label these things as "real", and you might succeed, but if that is reality, it is certainly a highly ephemeral facet of it, one that can't survive for too long. It's like a flame that eventually has to be put out, until another time, when it can be rekindled again. What I mean to say is, in more practical words, there are moments of everything. There are moments of friendship. There are moments of realization. There are moments of temporary insanity. There are moments of love. And love is real in the moment. But you can't expect it to be the meaning of your life. That's too unfair to the concept of love, the beloved in question, and to you. Love, and the search for it, are not things you can build a goal upon. Love is a part of life, but it isn't life. Or else the two words would be synonymous. Love is everything around you. It's energy. Exactly that. You couldn't confine energy even if you tried. You're not conscious of having something, when you have it all the time. That's the way with love. It is everything, and consequently nothing. So don't worry about it. Taste it, feel it, philosophize it in the moment. But the One is a concrete concept. Love, on the other hand, isn't. You might not find it in the arms of the one. Don't search for it, or it keeps running away. Your mind will scare it away. Why search, when it's always there?
When I was eleven years old, I visited an orphanage. This was not the first, and I am sure it shall not be the last, tangle with an Institution of some sort in my life. I came out scared. I was frightened for maybe a year and a half after that. Then came the daemonic possession phase that kept me frightened a good long deal into the nights, especially with Shantee gone. But after that orphanage visit, I couldn't stop calling my mother to ask where she was. If she was even a few minutes late, I would panic. Where are you? When are you coming back? I was afraid something'd happened to you. I love you. I kept saying those three words to her, over and over again, every night and every day. I would make sure those words were the last from my mouth that I would speak to her at night. The idea of love had become a hysteria that I would use to prevent myself from dwelling on my fear of death. That's the root thing that plagues me the most. Even as a child, I was very intimately aware of mortality, and how astonishingly real it is. It's hard to stomach, that things and people and passions are going to die. But that is what we shall be reduced to. Or expanded to. Both, I'm sure of it. The point is, I "loved" so hard that it no longer had a meaning. I put too much fear, too many feelings of rejection, too much sadness, into the wake of love. One of those reading experiences that's always stayed with me was reading about the experience of a girl in Florida. She had been listening to the radio, specifically, a program in which a psychologist was being interviewed about the effects of divorce on children. And I remember the authoress wrote down what the psychologist had said, that the biggest fear of children whose parents have gotten a divorce is that if one parent left, then maybe the other would, too. And the authoress described pulling her car over, and feeling the hot pain well up in her throat, and crying. That is a feeling, she says, that has haunted her throughout her life. I feel the same way. Now you know where it hurts most. And you might try to hurt me, if I'm a part of your existence. Try.
Someone remarked to me recently that I use the word "love" too much. I attribute it to many people, and many things, too many for it to be charged with true meaning. Now, this guy, like me, has a passion for words and verbal communication. He's good at stringing phrases together, and he has a verbal love style. I've noticed that about him. He needs words of love. Some people are like that. And to hear that coming from him made me think about my usages of the word "love". Thing is, I'm sorta like him when it comes to words, a regular nitpicker and dissector of possible hidden meanings. In the moment, I feel I love someone, or something, and I'll say, "I love you." But, yes, it does take away the profundity of those three words to hear them said about everything, and to everyone. But I don't belong to anyone. I have no specific One to say those things to. So a verbal stream of love always comes out. I don't belong to anyone, and yet I love everyone, and am everybody's lifeblood. I feel connected, yet aloof. I rather like it that way, sometimes. But it's a double-edged sword, especially when you take your own humanity into consideration.
What I believe with my heart is that I've had two great loves for real, tangible human beings, loves that have lasted, and have had the power to reform - not necessarily to reform me, not to reform them, but just having some sort of regenerative potential. In my lifetime I have loved my mother, and I have loved H. There have been other loves, that have sprung up usually from a humanitarian concern of a kind, a "Christian sympathy" (or condescension?) for the other, a notion of temporary familiarity and maybe even brotherhood. But these loves have been personal. Tangible. Mine. H holds a mirror up to me. In her eyes, I see myself. She is all my self. My mother is another Universe altogether. We are a union of opposites, she and I. Both equally nourishing aspects of "love". These are the people to whom I rarely verbalize my love. They probably hear the words "I love you" once a year from me. It doesn't need to be verbalized. It's there, all the time. It is known unto all of us. And these are the two most challenging relationships of my life. Coincidences? I think not. I fell in love with a woman. I fell in love with a spirit. This is a side note, for those who are going to jump up and say, "Lesbians. I knew it. It figures." I'm attracted to women sometimes. Just as I'm attracted to men other times. But this "love" that people talk about is of its own class. It rotates in a different sphere than what we can hope to understand. "The heart knows its reasons, whereof reason knows nothing." "Love is not a part of sex, but sex is a part of love." Think and feel about these things. Develop your intimate relationship with Consciousness.
Look, I'm rather tired, so I'm going to go. There must be things I've left out that I would have liked to say. There are always such things, because there's so much to say. But not all of it is meaningful. Remember that, in your hearts. Sometimes silence can be the most impressive word of all. In the words of Saint Charbel, "If you do not understand my silence, you do not understand my words." Love is silent. Above all things, of that I am sure. One final thing, before I forget. If I shall ever be conventionally married, an occurence of which, at the moment, I am doubtful, it shall be to the one who is my friend, in the sense of the word that is most meaningful and necessary to me.
Have a peaceful day.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
Oh, yeah, and my e-mail: bemgcasrbaquarian@gmail.com
I was about to write "Today is Saturday, which is good", but then I found my fingers typing "Today is good", and I would like to leave it at that. I just want to stop thinking for a moment about the future, and what is to come, and realize that now, this moment, this time, is as perfect as things get. Life is perfect, now, on this cushion in the same old spot I've sat so many times trying to write stuff down, in this room that desperately needs cleaning, with my hair a mess and things and people in my life in perpetual disarray. This spot is charged with my own energy, my heart is calm. I am complete.
I want to talk about love in today's post. So often we read about it, watch movies about it, and imagine what it's going to be like when the ultimate One walks into our lives (I stated it that way on purpose, so that finding the One rings of sacrilege - it does). You know, I think this post isn't going to talk about love, but the word "love" and its uses and implications in a human life.
I think the concept of love is one of the most over-used and over-emphasized ideas floating out there in the multiverse. And we put way too many unrealistic expectations on love; we charge that word with so much meaning - it's gotten so bad that the meanings of many lives I've encountered depend on the presence of some sort of love in there, usually of the romanticized, non-lasting variant. It's crazy - I mean, you can't open Youtube - fucking Youtube, for the love of God - without having to read through some comment that ends with "ily babe <3 xox". That's what "love" has been reduced to - even less than a word. A bunch of automated characters that some people may have to look up the meaning for, if they don't know or don't use chat lingo. "I love this song." "I love that color." "I love pasta." That's what love has come to, because people don't necessarily think before spilling words out into the atmosphere, words that have no meaning and no heart, that are so fucking heartless it makes me sick to live on this planet (it wouldn't be so bad, actually, to space-travel sometime soon. And my long-cherished desire for a time-machine, I wish that to happen soon.)
If someone doesn't love you, and makes it clear to you plainly that they do not, thank your lucky stars. Even better if they say it in words, or in whichever style of communication is the dominant thread between you people. The most productive gift you can give to anyone is honesty, at least in my opinion. At least then you'd know that if you're disillusioned as a result of a love venture of sorts, that disillusionment would be fuelled by YOU, and not them. They have not led you to the acceptance of false notions. You have only deceived yourself. People who are "cruel to be kind" are to be appreciated. That sort of kindness can be a mark of character strength (surely, if the context of a situation supports such a claim). If you tell me the truth, I might be hurt, but not nearly as offended and aloof as I would be when I figure out someone has lied to me. It's a point of view worth looking at.
Back to love. For a lot of us, when the word "love" comes into mind, it springs up images of some sort. A visual image of lovers rushing towards one another. A mother holding the hand of her child. A soldier kissing his friend goodbye on a battlefield. A cat and a little boy sitting at the seashore. But these are fabrications, they are images. You can try to label these things as "real", and you might succeed, but if that is reality, it is certainly a highly ephemeral facet of it, one that can't survive for too long. It's like a flame that eventually has to be put out, until another time, when it can be rekindled again. What I mean to say is, in more practical words, there are moments of everything. There are moments of friendship. There are moments of realization. There are moments of temporary insanity. There are moments of love. And love is real in the moment. But you can't expect it to be the meaning of your life. That's too unfair to the concept of love, the beloved in question, and to you. Love, and the search for it, are not things you can build a goal upon. Love is a part of life, but it isn't life. Or else the two words would be synonymous. Love is everything around you. It's energy. Exactly that. You couldn't confine energy even if you tried. You're not conscious of having something, when you have it all the time. That's the way with love. It is everything, and consequently nothing. So don't worry about it. Taste it, feel it, philosophize it in the moment. But the One is a concrete concept. Love, on the other hand, isn't. You might not find it in the arms of the one. Don't search for it, or it keeps running away. Your mind will scare it away. Why search, when it's always there?
When I was eleven years old, I visited an orphanage. This was not the first, and I am sure it shall not be the last, tangle with an Institution of some sort in my life. I came out scared. I was frightened for maybe a year and a half after that. Then came the daemonic possession phase that kept me frightened a good long deal into the nights, especially with Shantee gone. But after that orphanage visit, I couldn't stop calling my mother to ask where she was. If she was even a few minutes late, I would panic. Where are you? When are you coming back? I was afraid something'd happened to you. I love you. I kept saying those three words to her, over and over again, every night and every day. I would make sure those words were the last from my mouth that I would speak to her at night. The idea of love had become a hysteria that I would use to prevent myself from dwelling on my fear of death. That's the root thing that plagues me the most. Even as a child, I was very intimately aware of mortality, and how astonishingly real it is. It's hard to stomach, that things and people and passions are going to die. But that is what we shall be reduced to. Or expanded to. Both, I'm sure of it. The point is, I "loved" so hard that it no longer had a meaning. I put too much fear, too many feelings of rejection, too much sadness, into the wake of love. One of those reading experiences that's always stayed with me was reading about the experience of a girl in Florida. She had been listening to the radio, specifically, a program in which a psychologist was being interviewed about the effects of divorce on children. And I remember the authoress wrote down what the psychologist had said, that the biggest fear of children whose parents have gotten a divorce is that if one parent left, then maybe the other would, too. And the authoress described pulling her car over, and feeling the hot pain well up in her throat, and crying. That is a feeling, she says, that has haunted her throughout her life. I feel the same way. Now you know where it hurts most. And you might try to hurt me, if I'm a part of your existence. Try.
Someone remarked to me recently that I use the word "love" too much. I attribute it to many people, and many things, too many for it to be charged with true meaning. Now, this guy, like me, has a passion for words and verbal communication. He's good at stringing phrases together, and he has a verbal love style. I've noticed that about him. He needs words of love. Some people are like that. And to hear that coming from him made me think about my usages of the word "love". Thing is, I'm sorta like him when it comes to words, a regular nitpicker and dissector of possible hidden meanings. In the moment, I feel I love someone, or something, and I'll say, "I love you." But, yes, it does take away the profundity of those three words to hear them said about everything, and to everyone. But I don't belong to anyone. I have no specific One to say those things to. So a verbal stream of love always comes out. I don't belong to anyone, and yet I love everyone, and am everybody's lifeblood. I feel connected, yet aloof. I rather like it that way, sometimes. But it's a double-edged sword, especially when you take your own humanity into consideration.
What I believe with my heart is that I've had two great loves for real, tangible human beings, loves that have lasted, and have had the power to reform - not necessarily to reform me, not to reform them, but just having some sort of regenerative potential. In my lifetime I have loved my mother, and I have loved H. There have been other loves, that have sprung up usually from a humanitarian concern of a kind, a "Christian sympathy" (or condescension?) for the other, a notion of temporary familiarity and maybe even brotherhood. But these loves have been personal. Tangible. Mine. H holds a mirror up to me. In her eyes, I see myself. She is all my self. My mother is another Universe altogether. We are a union of opposites, she and I. Both equally nourishing aspects of "love". These are the people to whom I rarely verbalize my love. They probably hear the words "I love you" once a year from me. It doesn't need to be verbalized. It's there, all the time. It is known unto all of us. And these are the two most challenging relationships of my life. Coincidences? I think not. I fell in love with a woman. I fell in love with a spirit. This is a side note, for those who are going to jump up and say, "Lesbians. I knew it. It figures." I'm attracted to women sometimes. Just as I'm attracted to men other times. But this "love" that people talk about is of its own class. It rotates in a different sphere than what we can hope to understand. "The heart knows its reasons, whereof reason knows nothing." "Love is not a part of sex, but sex is a part of love." Think and feel about these things. Develop your intimate relationship with Consciousness.
Look, I'm rather tired, so I'm going to go. There must be things I've left out that I would have liked to say. There are always such things, because there's so much to say. But not all of it is meaningful. Remember that, in your hearts. Sometimes silence can be the most impressive word of all. In the words of Saint Charbel, "If you do not understand my silence, you do not understand my words." Love is silent. Above all things, of that I am sure. One final thing, before I forget. If I shall ever be conventionally married, an occurence of which, at the moment, I am doubtful, it shall be to the one who is my friend, in the sense of the word that is most meaningful and necessary to me.
Have a peaceful day.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
Oh, yeah, and my e-mail: bemgcasrbaquarian@gmail.com
Friday, 18 January 2013
A Gratitude Post
Hey there :))
SO... I really don't feel like psyching myself out with more of that histrionic babble I do here on this blog, except I feel like this next post, as with most things related to me, will come out histrionic or bi-polar in some way or other... well, fuck a moose. It's a snuggly evening here in Prague, and seeing how my bitchy cats are all in the Middle East being catty about coming on Skype and infusing me with some of their snuggliness, I'm on the other side of the Universe on the computer, in hermit mode, blogging some craziness. If that last statement reeks of some kinda sadness, I'm guessing you're right.
Gosh, it's just crazy to be on the other side of the world, when you've left your heart someplace else. Some moments, like this one, fill me with so much longing. And what's really bitter is that you know what you're longing for is a romanticized illusion of a past that you never quite experienced the way your optimistic mind likes to remember it. Damn, must everything be a mirage? Am I truly so blind? Beirut isn't what I think she is - this is a lady of many secrets, with many layers to her veil and robe. Do I understand anything?
Never mind. No going around in circles. That gets you nowhere. I'll just be thankful, and write it down in this blog post. That's it. Simple. No complication. Nothing is complicated. Everything is neutral, it's the filter we see things through that can either burn us or uplift us. So, here goes this simple act of thankfulness and appreciation to whoever/whatever tugs the heartstrings of my life along. It doesn't matter who reads this, or if it makes sense, or if it sounds stupid, or smart. Whatever. It's good to release what's in your heart. Be open. Be wretched, and clingy, and ruthless, and a little crazy, and careless, and wild, and revel in the reality of things. This is what you are. Isn't it liberating? Scoundrels shouldn't act like gentlemen, and gentlemen would never dream of acting like scoundrels in the first place. Be what you are. Be a good whore, an exquisite dreamer, a staunch conservative, a flaming idealist. Stay true to the internal essence, to the driving fire within, and in this way you ensure your survival through the many crises that are bound to come into your life. If there's a disconnect from the core of your being, what the hell is going to keep your chin up through those inevitable times of disillusionment, and opposition from the world?
Anyway, here is a list of all the places, trinkets, people, chairs, and all the jazz I am thankful for. Be grateful for what you have, and you'll always end up with infinity. Positive vibrations expand you along with the Universe. How are you going to find an agreeable fate for yourself if you're constantly mousey and fearful about "what if"s? You'll scare away any good energy by being that way. Tooooo much talking. Le face palm. Below it is:
I'm grateful for computers. I'm grateful for my computer. I'm grateful for technological advancements. I'm grateful for information. I'm grateful for knowledge. I'm grateful for enquiring minds. I'm grateful for the faithful at heart. I'm grateful for God. You never fail to knock me down, and kick me back into gear when it's time to stop being a whimp. One of the best friendships of my life. I'm grateful for my mother. She is the best. Such women are so few. This woman is a saint. No, even better, because she's real, and she's all mine. I'm grateful for my brother being well in general, and having someone to regulate his life, because I think he needs that interference. I'm grateful for central heating. I'm grateful for warm water to bathe in. I'm grateful for copper hair. I'm grateful for shiny eyes. I'm grateful for good immunity. I'm grateful for optimism. I'm grateful for heart. I'm grateful for seeing-eye dogs. I'm grateful for animalhood. I'm grateful for protectors of animalhood. I'm grateful for Prague. I'm grateful for Beirut. Beirut, I love you. I'm grateful for medicine. I'm grateful for medical science. I'm grateful for compassionate priests. I'm grateful for raincoats. I'm grateful for beds. I'm grateful for sleep. I'm grateful for out-of-this-world dreams at night. I'm grateful for longing. I'm grateful for love. I'm grateful for loss. It is due to these things that we know we are natural, and that we have tried to achieve something better than ourselves. I'm grateful for toothbrushes. I'm grateful for antibacterial soap. I love soap. I'm grateful for friendly people who smile on the metro. I'm grateful for good writers. I'm grateful for Jane Eyre. I've gotten to like this book as a friend. I'm grateful for Charlotte Bronte. I'm grateful for my teachers, at school, conservatories, and university. I'm grateful for interesting subjects to learn at university. I'm grateful for reformers. I'm grateful for Nelsen Mandela. I'm grateful for Abraham Lincoln. I'm grateful for Vaclav Havel. I'm grateful for Namesti Miru. I'm grateful for the Malastrana. I'm grateful for Jana Masarika. I'm grateful for Christmas cookies. I'm grateful for baklava. I'm grateful for Lebanese food. I'm grateful for the hotness of Lebanese women. I'm grateful for the funny quirks of Lebanese people. I'm grateful for the hot-bloodedness of Lebanese men. I'm grateful for Bali, and the Philippines, the friendly places of the world to go to. I'm grateful for aeroplanes. I'm grateful for travel. I'm grateful for past-life regression therapy. I'm grateful for hypnosis. I'm grateful for huggable girls. I'm grateful for huggable guys. I'm grateful for pets. I'm grateful for lizards. I'm grateful for clitorises. I'm grateful for attentive readers. I'm grateful for active listeners. I'm grateful for oceans, and water. I'm grateful for sensitive, precognitive sorts. I'm grateful for people who make you feel like you can be yourself. Because everyone can be themselves. It's just great when people allow you to be that. I'm grateful for good friends. I'm grateful for second chances. I'm grateful for solitude. I'm grateful for Vietnamese food. I'm grateful for the Lewis Carrolls of the world. I'm grateful for teaching. I'm grateful for speech. I'm grateful for communication. I'm grateful for lovers. All lovers are good lovers, because loving is always well. I'm grateful my life has been blessed. God has put a loving hand over my life.
Well, folks, it's been spat out. I am so tired. I'm going to sleep soon, in like half an hour. Two things I'd like to leave you with: a) Remember to always smile, not necessarily the physical mannerism of it, but make room in every day to wear a small but certain spiritual smile. It is a cleansing practice. b) Remember that the only thing you need to give up in order to not be broken is the idea that you are broken to begin with. There are no people in progress, not really. People are wholes. But, for Heaven's sake, just because you're whole doesn't mean you have to be a perfect one.
Last but not least, I am grateful for the readers who reach out to me concerning this blog. I appreciate that you guys take time out of your days to give the content of this blog a glance. And your messages have been really sweet. All of you are from different walks of life, and yet it's striking to me how similar the goals you're all looking to achieve are. Proof of the fact that we are more united than separated, all the time and everywhere we are in the world.
"God does not play dice with the Universe." - Albert Einstein
See you guys, and God bless you.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
SO... I really don't feel like psyching myself out with more of that histrionic babble I do here on this blog, except I feel like this next post, as with most things related to me, will come out histrionic or bi-polar in some way or other... well, fuck a moose. It's a snuggly evening here in Prague, and seeing how my bitchy cats are all in the Middle East being catty about coming on Skype and infusing me with some of their snuggliness, I'm on the other side of the Universe on the computer, in hermit mode, blogging some craziness. If that last statement reeks of some kinda sadness, I'm guessing you're right.
Gosh, it's just crazy to be on the other side of the world, when you've left your heart someplace else. Some moments, like this one, fill me with so much longing. And what's really bitter is that you know what you're longing for is a romanticized illusion of a past that you never quite experienced the way your optimistic mind likes to remember it. Damn, must everything be a mirage? Am I truly so blind? Beirut isn't what I think she is - this is a lady of many secrets, with many layers to her veil and robe. Do I understand anything?
Never mind. No going around in circles. That gets you nowhere. I'll just be thankful, and write it down in this blog post. That's it. Simple. No complication. Nothing is complicated. Everything is neutral, it's the filter we see things through that can either burn us or uplift us. So, here goes this simple act of thankfulness and appreciation to whoever/whatever tugs the heartstrings of my life along. It doesn't matter who reads this, or if it makes sense, or if it sounds stupid, or smart. Whatever. It's good to release what's in your heart. Be open. Be wretched, and clingy, and ruthless, and a little crazy, and careless, and wild, and revel in the reality of things. This is what you are. Isn't it liberating? Scoundrels shouldn't act like gentlemen, and gentlemen would never dream of acting like scoundrels in the first place. Be what you are. Be a good whore, an exquisite dreamer, a staunch conservative, a flaming idealist. Stay true to the internal essence, to the driving fire within, and in this way you ensure your survival through the many crises that are bound to come into your life. If there's a disconnect from the core of your being, what the hell is going to keep your chin up through those inevitable times of disillusionment, and opposition from the world?
Anyway, here is a list of all the places, trinkets, people, chairs, and all the jazz I am thankful for. Be grateful for what you have, and you'll always end up with infinity. Positive vibrations expand you along with the Universe. How are you going to find an agreeable fate for yourself if you're constantly mousey and fearful about "what if"s? You'll scare away any good energy by being that way. Tooooo much talking. Le face palm. Below it is:
I'm grateful for computers. I'm grateful for my computer. I'm grateful for technological advancements. I'm grateful for information. I'm grateful for knowledge. I'm grateful for enquiring minds. I'm grateful for the faithful at heart. I'm grateful for God. You never fail to knock me down, and kick me back into gear when it's time to stop being a whimp. One of the best friendships of my life. I'm grateful for my mother. She is the best. Such women are so few. This woman is a saint. No, even better, because she's real, and she's all mine. I'm grateful for my brother being well in general, and having someone to regulate his life, because I think he needs that interference. I'm grateful for central heating. I'm grateful for warm water to bathe in. I'm grateful for copper hair. I'm grateful for shiny eyes. I'm grateful for good immunity. I'm grateful for optimism. I'm grateful for heart. I'm grateful for seeing-eye dogs. I'm grateful for animalhood. I'm grateful for protectors of animalhood. I'm grateful for Prague. I'm grateful for Beirut. Beirut, I love you. I'm grateful for medicine. I'm grateful for medical science. I'm grateful for compassionate priests. I'm grateful for raincoats. I'm grateful for beds. I'm grateful for sleep. I'm grateful for out-of-this-world dreams at night. I'm grateful for longing. I'm grateful for love. I'm grateful for loss. It is due to these things that we know we are natural, and that we have tried to achieve something better than ourselves. I'm grateful for toothbrushes. I'm grateful for antibacterial soap. I love soap. I'm grateful for friendly people who smile on the metro. I'm grateful for good writers. I'm grateful for Jane Eyre. I've gotten to like this book as a friend. I'm grateful for Charlotte Bronte. I'm grateful for my teachers, at school, conservatories, and university. I'm grateful for interesting subjects to learn at university. I'm grateful for reformers. I'm grateful for Nelsen Mandela. I'm grateful for Abraham Lincoln. I'm grateful for Vaclav Havel. I'm grateful for Namesti Miru. I'm grateful for the Malastrana. I'm grateful for Jana Masarika. I'm grateful for Christmas cookies. I'm grateful for baklava. I'm grateful for Lebanese food. I'm grateful for the hotness of Lebanese women. I'm grateful for the funny quirks of Lebanese people. I'm grateful for the hot-bloodedness of Lebanese men. I'm grateful for Bali, and the Philippines, the friendly places of the world to go to. I'm grateful for aeroplanes. I'm grateful for travel. I'm grateful for past-life regression therapy. I'm grateful for hypnosis. I'm grateful for huggable girls. I'm grateful for huggable guys. I'm grateful for pets. I'm grateful for lizards. I'm grateful for clitorises. I'm grateful for attentive readers. I'm grateful for active listeners. I'm grateful for oceans, and water. I'm grateful for sensitive, precognitive sorts. I'm grateful for people who make you feel like you can be yourself. Because everyone can be themselves. It's just great when people allow you to be that. I'm grateful for good friends. I'm grateful for second chances. I'm grateful for solitude. I'm grateful for Vietnamese food. I'm grateful for the Lewis Carrolls of the world. I'm grateful for teaching. I'm grateful for speech. I'm grateful for communication. I'm grateful for lovers. All lovers are good lovers, because loving is always well. I'm grateful my life has been blessed. God has put a loving hand over my life.
Well, folks, it's been spat out. I am so tired. I'm going to sleep soon, in like half an hour. Two things I'd like to leave you with: a) Remember to always smile, not necessarily the physical mannerism of it, but make room in every day to wear a small but certain spiritual smile. It is a cleansing practice. b) Remember that the only thing you need to give up in order to not be broken is the idea that you are broken to begin with. There are no people in progress, not really. People are wholes. But, for Heaven's sake, just because you're whole doesn't mean you have to be a perfect one.
Last but not least, I am grateful for the readers who reach out to me concerning this blog. I appreciate that you guys take time out of your days to give the content of this blog a glance. And your messages have been really sweet. All of you are from different walks of life, and yet it's striking to me how similar the goals you're all looking to achieve are. Proof of the fact that we are more united than separated, all the time and everywhere we are in the world.
"God does not play dice with the Universe." - Albert Einstein
See you guys, and God bless you.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
Wednesday, 16 January 2013
"Women are meant to be loved, not understood" - let kids be kids, Fifty Shades of Grey, and Alice-in-Wonderland-wetness
Hey blog readers :)
I have to say, this is getting quite boring for me, blogging down the mundanities (is that a word? Like I care) of my day-to-day "depression" stories - I have to snicker when I refer to my sundry moods as such. Still, blogging about stuff does get it out somewhat, and I'll take being an open person over having a bunch of closed pages in my heart that need a reader. I don't much like closing off - not that being open is easy. But it's better. Words are charged with energy. They take up energy out of your being, when they're left unsaid. I don't believe in throwing out globs of energy (I am lacking a more effective metaphor to get the point across) to fill the air with more unwanted and negative vibrations. Poor oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen particles, having to rinse out all that rubbish and pollution and crazy ENERGY. A moment of silence for you guys... aaaaaand it's gone :D Still, my heart doesn't have much storage space for silent resentment, sadness, anger, and all their associates. Hear that, you mofos? This heart doesn't have room for you guys anymore. I am kicking you out. Over the past months, I've done a good job at consciously barring the way of negative thoughts into my mind. But my heart has been having other ideas all this time, like some ADD kid who won't sit still and keeps right on buzzing despite everyone being annoyed (that's me, btw. When I was a kid, you literally had to root me to the spot or else I would keep running around and falling over my own shadow. My mother used to liken sitting me down for dinner to driving a rivet into the wall that refused to fit). Whatever way, you guys, I'm relatively calm now, so no more limp-blue discourse on meaninglessness and things of the sort. I do believe things can get rather meaningless from time to time, but that's a part of life. I'm making peace with it. Not everything is full of action and excitement and novelty. Sometimes life is just boring. And that's okay. All things considered, it's a nice feeling, being bored. Some people won't ever have that privilege. I am blessed with the unlikely gift of boredom. Among other things. I don't understand why I'm so lucky. But thank you God. My life is amazing. I'm just being a brat about some things. And I guess as long as I understand that, and appreciate things, and see the truth for what it is, I'm good. On a final note, being bored, as with many seemingly unpleasant things, has its plus-side. The Turkish telenovella industry, for one, has capitalized remarkably upon the daily drudgery that Middle Eastern housewives have to go through, waiting for their husbands all day to come home, and with their kids at school. The Smartphone people understand the value of boredom, too. Excessive boredom is a very twenty-first-century thing, I believe. From the stories of my family members and my older-generation friends, I am led to believe that what we're experiencing nowadays, us kids and more grown-up people alike, is the most significant Boredom Epidemic in the scope of this crazy contraption called "Human Life on Earth".
People used to have fun in those days. Kids could be kids. This might sound weird coming from me, seeing how I'm eighteen years old, but back when I was a kid, if you were bored, you went outside to play in the fucking grass with other kids. We kicked a ball around, we rough-housed, we caught frogs and let them go. I used to run with dirt on my jeans and blood on my scraped knees from having fallen upside down off the monkey bars - a slightly disturbing thing to say, I'll wager (zomg), but my point is, things were real, goddamit. I feel sorry for the little kids these days, who are growing up with iPads and cellphones and missing out on the joys of being young and not caring about that stuff and laughing at the grown-ups for being so stupid. I'm not too sure if this is a problem with European little kids, as I haven't met too many of those in my stay here in the Czech Republic (which is unfortunate, because I think kids are so much more interesting than grown-ups. I am not a paedophile - isn't it sad how I feel I need to justify myself for saying something as simple as "I like kids"? Societal lingo has become too twisted like that, for people to take anything cleanly), but I can tell you it is an alarming problem with Middle Eastern little kids. Every other five-year-old in Lebanon has some form of technological device that they can't possibly need or understand and appreciate how to use. There's a direct proportionality between this growing acquaintanceship of Kids and Technology and an increase in child arrogance and talking back to parents. I wish I could conduct research on this, for the love of God. I guess I shouldn't be telling anyone how to parent their child, but I'll say that I appreciate those "old-fashioned" parents who insist that their kids be kids. Your kids will remember that, and cherish you for it. Don't burden your young ones with this information overload we all seem to be suffering from lately. Let kids be kids. Every chance in which they're allowed to be kids is precious. Because God knows we can't be forever young. So please, let them live. But then again, if everybody's doing it, that becomes the normal way of life, and then your kids are going to get pissy about you not letting them go with the flow. Ah, I am so outdated. Le resigned sigh.
You know what's another result of this Boredom Epidemic gripping our restless brains (which weren't, by the way, quite so restless even a few years ago. We've lived in a time in which little kids with nothing wrong with them are getting medicated for "anxiety" and attention-span-related problems. What a crazy, small-minded world we live in)? Authors know we've gotten bored, and stupid. We've gotten so bored that things (I didn't say books, just... things) like Fifty Shades of Grey register as smash-hit literature to people of our century. Yep, I have to say something about this book (they're actually a series of three books, but I've only gotten through the first eighty-something pages of the first one, so I won't talk about the other two). This won't be a book review or analysis - I don't want to scare you away with a simile - ooh, scratch that, onomatopoeia always does the trick ;) ("joke" intended for understanding by literature nerds only).
You know, when you just hear the title, not knowing anything about the content of the book, what do you see? In my case, I saw a psychologically riveting novel about a generic dark theme having the potential to keep my attention for a few days, and maybe even touch me in some way. I think it had something to do with the word "grey". So when one of my friends raved to me about this book, and encouraged my buying it, I was glad somebody had given me the permission to see what all the commotion is about. Then, when I got to the duty-free shop of the Beirut airport, I hesitated in front of the stack of Fifty Shades of Greys. I vaguely felt that something about this book would not be enjoyable. My Uranus intuition was right - drat. This book, by the way, is being marketed as an erotic novel, a point I'll come back to. I bought the book, thinking it would be a nice read for the airplane and the metro stations in Praha. Let me tell you now, that if you are a woman in the way I define a woman to be, you will find nothing erotic or sophisticated about this book at all. I think the lady just ripped off Twilight and made it into some absurb porn thing. Well, I don't want to be too severe on the lady, she's gotten enough flack already. Before I forget, I read this review of the book in which a husband mentioned that since his wife read this book, their sex life improved dramatically, and that he has been encouraging his wife to read more erotic novels from that time. Can I just say that you, sir, have pinpointed something very frustrating about women that gets at me from time to time - but myself being a woman, I haven't necessarily figured that thing out >.< Oh, and good man. H'm, now I've got myself chewing on that idea - part of me would like to know what is it about women that makes us such frustrating creatures, to one another and to men, as I am a fan of the fair sex in a more-than-contemplative way. But I think Oscar Wilde had it right when he said, "Women are meant to be loved, not understood". Quite so. And it gets mighty hard to understand their fixation with something as sordid as Fifty Shades.
Can I ruin the plot? The main character is a girl, Anastasia Steele, who gets fucked over and over again by a multi-billionaire sex-god "dominant" guy, Christian Grey (that's what all the greyness is about). The lack of character development, not to mention the high-school-level writing style, are dismaying aspects of the novel, to be sure. But here's what really bothered me about this "book": it is so antifeminist. The thing that first jumped out at me was how fixated on external appearances, and how insecure, Ana Steele is. I perked up when my friend told me Ana is a literature major - projection, I suppose. But you know, she's so clueless, not just about literature, but about things in general. But the real problem with this book, aside from it making women look hare-brained, is how something as unhealthy and abnormal as Ana's obsession with Christian (why did the author have to choose this name, of all names? Some crazy trying-to-be-avant-garde thing? Or is that giving her too much credit?) is made to look normal, and even desirable (hence the label of the novel as "erotic"). The girl doesn't know a thing about the guy, except that he is sexy as fuck, and a billionaire at age twenty-seven, and stylish, and an accomplished pianist, and a well-read fellow. But damn it, those are surface-level things. Yes, even "intelligence" is a surface-level thing, when it comes down to looking for a lover. Man, she "falls in love" with this pretty, shiny exterior, but on the inside, he's just some crazy fucker who keeps gasping all the time and wanting to hit her. He just didn't do it for me, sex-appeal wise. I'm not against bondage, so don't read me wrong. But I think if a woman wants to be totally dominated by a man, and go into an agreement like the one Ana goes into (and she does go into an official agreement, mind you, with paperwork, lawyers, and all), then she should make sure the chosen man is a man in more than just anatomy. Dude, she doesn't even check to see what the agreement is all about before signing the paper - she's just so overcome by his hotness that she signs on the spot, without asking questions. She makes us seem like gold-digging weaklings who can't take care of ourselves. I think the authoress isn't smart enough to project such an idea intentionally. And that's what's so dangerous about books like this one - it projects the unconscious message that women have been programmed to accept as our "truth" from the days of our girlhood. But women, you can choose what you put into your brain. Awareness of the implications of such books is a must. Also, my mind immediately jumps to the fifteen-year-old girls who might read this book. Is this really the message we ought to be projecting to our young women? We already have such few positive role models to take lessons from. And no, this book isn't "making an artistic statement" (what a hackneyed phrase) by being so "avant-garde". This book isn't arthouse, it's very commercial stuff, so bottom line is: girls are going to read this, and be influenced by it, and be seduced by the falsity it preaches. Chicas, Christian Grey isn't real, for the love of God - such a guy isn't human. Real men are so few, and far between. If you're going to fall in love with someone, fall in love with a man, who is strong and makes you feel and won't let you disrespect the purity of sex even if you wanted to. And you don't need a man. That's the crucial thing to remember from all this. Not one of you needs a man to feel complete. Sure, we're women, and we desire men. But don't be fooled by this idea that you're not powerful. And, out of sympathy for the fellas, can I just say that it's not fair to them when you put such an impossible standard like Christian Grey for them to try to achieve. Dear guys, a lot of us women complain how you guys want and expect the impossible from us. But actually, you guys are a lot more forgiving and fair when it comes to accepting us as we are. I haven't yet had a boyfriend who expected me to be Pamela Anderson. It's not like I've dated perfect angels who never upset me. But at least they didn't try to lift me up to some unachievable standard. I think what guys understand about us, that we don't necessarily understand about them, is that real people are beautiful. Men and women are beautiful because of their imperfections, because they've seen and experienced and lived. I don't want the perfect man, or the perfect woman. That's boring. Darkness, and light, and all the interesting shades of color between those extremes - those are things worth exploring, rather than the multiple shades of some fake Christian Grey. Can I just add one more thing? This novel reads like a fanfiction written by a teenager, so don't waste your fifteen bucks on it. If you're really curious, borrow it from a friend or a library. But please, buy candy or something with the money. Go out to the movies. Rent a porno and masturbate. I'm not dissing you fanfiction writers out there - I have Alice in Wonderland fanfiction tucked in the back of my wardrobe. Yes, I've gone there. But to publish that? I think that's a piece of writing the world should be spared of. Oh, and guys, maybe we do need you just a bit - we love you guys.
So, if you've managed to read through that all, you don't get a prize, but this is over for now, so smile :D I've enjoyed writing this, and it was a good way to kill boredom. I can't worry about whether this bores you to tears, or makes you cry, or whatnot. This is one of those posts that I wrote and posted for me, so I'm glad.
Have a pleasant Wednesday night, and God bless you.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
I have to say, this is getting quite boring for me, blogging down the mundanities (is that a word? Like I care) of my day-to-day "depression" stories - I have to snicker when I refer to my sundry moods as such. Still, blogging about stuff does get it out somewhat, and I'll take being an open person over having a bunch of closed pages in my heart that need a reader. I don't much like closing off - not that being open is easy. But it's better. Words are charged with energy. They take up energy out of your being, when they're left unsaid. I don't believe in throwing out globs of energy (I am lacking a more effective metaphor to get the point across) to fill the air with more unwanted and negative vibrations. Poor oxygen, nitrogen, and hydrogen particles, having to rinse out all that rubbish and pollution and crazy ENERGY. A moment of silence for you guys... aaaaaand it's gone :D Still, my heart doesn't have much storage space for silent resentment, sadness, anger, and all their associates. Hear that, you mofos? This heart doesn't have room for you guys anymore. I am kicking you out. Over the past months, I've done a good job at consciously barring the way of negative thoughts into my mind. But my heart has been having other ideas all this time, like some ADD kid who won't sit still and keeps right on buzzing despite everyone being annoyed (that's me, btw. When I was a kid, you literally had to root me to the spot or else I would keep running around and falling over my own shadow. My mother used to liken sitting me down for dinner to driving a rivet into the wall that refused to fit). Whatever way, you guys, I'm relatively calm now, so no more limp-blue discourse on meaninglessness and things of the sort. I do believe things can get rather meaningless from time to time, but that's a part of life. I'm making peace with it. Not everything is full of action and excitement and novelty. Sometimes life is just boring. And that's okay. All things considered, it's a nice feeling, being bored. Some people won't ever have that privilege. I am blessed with the unlikely gift of boredom. Among other things. I don't understand why I'm so lucky. But thank you God. My life is amazing. I'm just being a brat about some things. And I guess as long as I understand that, and appreciate things, and see the truth for what it is, I'm good. On a final note, being bored, as with many seemingly unpleasant things, has its plus-side. The Turkish telenovella industry, for one, has capitalized remarkably upon the daily drudgery that Middle Eastern housewives have to go through, waiting for their husbands all day to come home, and with their kids at school. The Smartphone people understand the value of boredom, too. Excessive boredom is a very twenty-first-century thing, I believe. From the stories of my family members and my older-generation friends, I am led to believe that what we're experiencing nowadays, us kids and more grown-up people alike, is the most significant Boredom Epidemic in the scope of this crazy contraption called "Human Life on Earth".
People used to have fun in those days. Kids could be kids. This might sound weird coming from me, seeing how I'm eighteen years old, but back when I was a kid, if you were bored, you went outside to play in the fucking grass with other kids. We kicked a ball around, we rough-housed, we caught frogs and let them go. I used to run with dirt on my jeans and blood on my scraped knees from having fallen upside down off the monkey bars - a slightly disturbing thing to say, I'll wager (zomg), but my point is, things were real, goddamit. I feel sorry for the little kids these days, who are growing up with iPads and cellphones and missing out on the joys of being young and not caring about that stuff and laughing at the grown-ups for being so stupid. I'm not too sure if this is a problem with European little kids, as I haven't met too many of those in my stay here in the Czech Republic (which is unfortunate, because I think kids are so much more interesting than grown-ups. I am not a paedophile - isn't it sad how I feel I need to justify myself for saying something as simple as "I like kids"? Societal lingo has become too twisted like that, for people to take anything cleanly), but I can tell you it is an alarming problem with Middle Eastern little kids. Every other five-year-old in Lebanon has some form of technological device that they can't possibly need or understand and appreciate how to use. There's a direct proportionality between this growing acquaintanceship of Kids and Technology and an increase in child arrogance and talking back to parents. I wish I could conduct research on this, for the love of God. I guess I shouldn't be telling anyone how to parent their child, but I'll say that I appreciate those "old-fashioned" parents who insist that their kids be kids. Your kids will remember that, and cherish you for it. Don't burden your young ones with this information overload we all seem to be suffering from lately. Let kids be kids. Every chance in which they're allowed to be kids is precious. Because God knows we can't be forever young. So please, let them live. But then again, if everybody's doing it, that becomes the normal way of life, and then your kids are going to get pissy about you not letting them go with the flow. Ah, I am so outdated. Le resigned sigh.
You know what's another result of this Boredom Epidemic gripping our restless brains (which weren't, by the way, quite so restless even a few years ago. We've lived in a time in which little kids with nothing wrong with them are getting medicated for "anxiety" and attention-span-related problems. What a crazy, small-minded world we live in)? Authors know we've gotten bored, and stupid. We've gotten so bored that things (I didn't say books, just... things) like Fifty Shades of Grey register as smash-hit literature to people of our century. Yep, I have to say something about this book (they're actually a series of three books, but I've only gotten through the first eighty-something pages of the first one, so I won't talk about the other two). This won't be a book review or analysis - I don't want to scare you away with a simile - ooh, scratch that, onomatopoeia always does the trick ;) ("joke" intended for understanding by literature nerds only).
You know, when you just hear the title, not knowing anything about the content of the book, what do you see? In my case, I saw a psychologically riveting novel about a generic dark theme having the potential to keep my attention for a few days, and maybe even touch me in some way. I think it had something to do with the word "grey". So when one of my friends raved to me about this book, and encouraged my buying it, I was glad somebody had given me the permission to see what all the commotion is about. Then, when I got to the duty-free shop of the Beirut airport, I hesitated in front of the stack of Fifty Shades of Greys. I vaguely felt that something about this book would not be enjoyable. My Uranus intuition was right - drat. This book, by the way, is being marketed as an erotic novel, a point I'll come back to. I bought the book, thinking it would be a nice read for the airplane and the metro stations in Praha. Let me tell you now, that if you are a woman in the way I define a woman to be, you will find nothing erotic or sophisticated about this book at all. I think the lady just ripped off Twilight and made it into some absurb porn thing. Well, I don't want to be too severe on the lady, she's gotten enough flack already. Before I forget, I read this review of the book in which a husband mentioned that since his wife read this book, their sex life improved dramatically, and that he has been encouraging his wife to read more erotic novels from that time. Can I just say that you, sir, have pinpointed something very frustrating about women that gets at me from time to time - but myself being a woman, I haven't necessarily figured that thing out >.< Oh, and good man. H'm, now I've got myself chewing on that idea - part of me would like to know what is it about women that makes us such frustrating creatures, to one another and to men, as I am a fan of the fair sex in a more-than-contemplative way. But I think Oscar Wilde had it right when he said, "Women are meant to be loved, not understood". Quite so. And it gets mighty hard to understand their fixation with something as sordid as Fifty Shades.
Can I ruin the plot? The main character is a girl, Anastasia Steele, who gets fucked over and over again by a multi-billionaire sex-god "dominant" guy, Christian Grey (that's what all the greyness is about). The lack of character development, not to mention the high-school-level writing style, are dismaying aspects of the novel, to be sure. But here's what really bothered me about this "book": it is so antifeminist. The thing that first jumped out at me was how fixated on external appearances, and how insecure, Ana Steele is. I perked up when my friend told me Ana is a literature major - projection, I suppose. But you know, she's so clueless, not just about literature, but about things in general. But the real problem with this book, aside from it making women look hare-brained, is how something as unhealthy and abnormal as Ana's obsession with Christian (why did the author have to choose this name, of all names? Some crazy trying-to-be-avant-garde thing? Or is that giving her too much credit?) is made to look normal, and even desirable (hence the label of the novel as "erotic"). The girl doesn't know a thing about the guy, except that he is sexy as fuck, and a billionaire at age twenty-seven, and stylish, and an accomplished pianist, and a well-read fellow. But damn it, those are surface-level things. Yes, even "intelligence" is a surface-level thing, when it comes down to looking for a lover. Man, she "falls in love" with this pretty, shiny exterior, but on the inside, he's just some crazy fucker who keeps gasping all the time and wanting to hit her. He just didn't do it for me, sex-appeal wise. I'm not against bondage, so don't read me wrong. But I think if a woman wants to be totally dominated by a man, and go into an agreement like the one Ana goes into (and she does go into an official agreement, mind you, with paperwork, lawyers, and all), then she should make sure the chosen man is a man in more than just anatomy. Dude, she doesn't even check to see what the agreement is all about before signing the paper - she's just so overcome by his hotness that she signs on the spot, without asking questions. She makes us seem like gold-digging weaklings who can't take care of ourselves. I think the authoress isn't smart enough to project such an idea intentionally. And that's what's so dangerous about books like this one - it projects the unconscious message that women have been programmed to accept as our "truth" from the days of our girlhood. But women, you can choose what you put into your brain. Awareness of the implications of such books is a must. Also, my mind immediately jumps to the fifteen-year-old girls who might read this book. Is this really the message we ought to be projecting to our young women? We already have such few positive role models to take lessons from. And no, this book isn't "making an artistic statement" (what a hackneyed phrase) by being so "avant-garde". This book isn't arthouse, it's very commercial stuff, so bottom line is: girls are going to read this, and be influenced by it, and be seduced by the falsity it preaches. Chicas, Christian Grey isn't real, for the love of God - such a guy isn't human. Real men are so few, and far between. If you're going to fall in love with someone, fall in love with a man, who is strong and makes you feel and won't let you disrespect the purity of sex even if you wanted to. And you don't need a man. That's the crucial thing to remember from all this. Not one of you needs a man to feel complete. Sure, we're women, and we desire men. But don't be fooled by this idea that you're not powerful. And, out of sympathy for the fellas, can I just say that it's not fair to them when you put such an impossible standard like Christian Grey for them to try to achieve. Dear guys, a lot of us women complain how you guys want and expect the impossible from us. But actually, you guys are a lot more forgiving and fair when it comes to accepting us as we are. I haven't yet had a boyfriend who expected me to be Pamela Anderson. It's not like I've dated perfect angels who never upset me. But at least they didn't try to lift me up to some unachievable standard. I think what guys understand about us, that we don't necessarily understand about them, is that real people are beautiful. Men and women are beautiful because of their imperfections, because they've seen and experienced and lived. I don't want the perfect man, or the perfect woman. That's boring. Darkness, and light, and all the interesting shades of color between those extremes - those are things worth exploring, rather than the multiple shades of some fake Christian Grey. Can I just add one more thing? This novel reads like a fanfiction written by a teenager, so don't waste your fifteen bucks on it. If you're really curious, borrow it from a friend or a library. But please, buy candy or something with the money. Go out to the movies. Rent a porno and masturbate. I'm not dissing you fanfiction writers out there - I have Alice in Wonderland fanfiction tucked in the back of my wardrobe. Yes, I've gone there. But to publish that? I think that's a piece of writing the world should be spared of. Oh, and guys, maybe we do need you just a bit - we love you guys.
So, if you've managed to read through that all, you don't get a prize, but this is over for now, so smile :D I've enjoyed writing this, and it was a good way to kill boredom. I can't worry about whether this bores you to tears, or makes you cry, or whatnot. This is one of those posts that I wrote and posted for me, so I'm glad.
Have a pleasant Wednesday night, and God bless you.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
Saturday, 5 January 2013
When did Peter Pan get involved in all this? Peter Pan, existential musings, and a whole lotta hopeless.
Halloa readers :)
So it's a New Year and all, five days in, according to the Western calendar. I would say "Happy New Year", except I must have said it in a previous blog post, and of all people, I realize that the New Year is nothing but 365 days added to a life - what ought to be celebrated is a life change of some sort, and not a maybe-undeserved life-extension pack from Heaven Unltd. Someone sounding morose, maybe a little too real? Wait, it gets colder.
I probably won't talk too much today, but while I was typing that, my mind just went "ha!" We'll, the purpose of this blog post is to write down an excerpt from my journal, which I might like to revisit later on. This is my journal from 2009 till 2011, and it's nestled on one of my bookshelves in Lebanon. It is a pink-and-blue friend without a name, and it has had to stomach a lot of bullshit from this young person. I thank you, dear journal, for not chastising me and putting me down and being patient, although you really should have pulled my leg a little at some instances. Anyhoo, I won't be taking this journal back to the Czech Republic - let it stay here, in this attic of memories, where it belongs. But this is an excerpt I've gone back to over the years, and it's one of the less personal observations I've made in that book.
Here it goes, a glimpse into a fourteen-year-old's mind. It's pouring torrents outside now, btw - jugfuls of water spilling out of the heavens, punctuated by bolts of Uranian lightning:
Sat., 28th of Nov., 2009
Dear Diary,
Soon the date I have here written will change to the 29th of November and so on. It is changing even now, drawing closer and closer to that bigger second digit. I'm growing older; every second, in thought and in spirit, in mind and in body. All my life I have grown up too fast, too soon, too early, and sometimes even too late. I would turn around frantically once and my childhood would have run away with my youth, hand in hand, leaving me stuck in an interphase that has puzzled me every waking moment of my life. I am possessed by the look of youth; yet my heart is weary; my soul obscure and opaque to everyone, not excluding my own self. Soon I shall be an old hag looking back at these pages, and this very moment, and at the song stuck in my head, having forgotten my present feelings and embraced their heavy World (hardly, for I will never be good at following their rules acceptingly.) I shall be old, with wrinkles under my eyes and on my cheeks, wondering in disbelief where my days had gone, and why I had let them go and pass. Yet I hope that death is peaceful; they say it is, yet they have never died; then I could leave my wear and heartwrenched state behind and unite with the elements of the world (the flowers, the soil, the trees) and pay them service and gratitude. Maybe someday I'll become part of a young girl's bed, dreaming her dreams and whispering her secrets, longing (maybe) to be back in her place or looking fondly at her, waiting for her to join me in Heaven. Life is strange, and music is sweet. Death will come, and I can never express what's inside me; the way I feel about change & growing old. It's too complex for the most complex words to describe; words can only describe a small part of it.
Before you ask, I'll answer: yes, I was on my way to depression at that time. Or maybe I was depressed - how can I remember? I don't remember anything of the past few years, except some captured moments, I suppose. I used to think I have a good memory, but when I really examine that statement I'm not so sure. Details have become fuzzy, there are people I've forgotten and moments that have to be brought to my mind by others who do remember them, and there are definitely feelings I've left behind. Hell, I don't even remember what happens in a book after I've read it. Why all this detachment, I wonder?
Anyway, the passage above jumped out at me today because yesterday night, when I got back home from my aunt's, I thought aloud and was overcome by a sense of nothingness in my world, and indeed the whole world at large. What do we do but grow old and waste Time, watching helplessly as it passes by and rubs it in our faces as well. "Ha, you're old, and lonely, and nobody's gonna be there for you. Loser." Time is like a mean jerk of a player, constantly out of reach, and always eager to leap over your shoulder at the next new conquest. If there's something I never have enough of, it's Time. I don't know where it goes, it just does. And the more I try to hold onto it, the more insistently it wants to go. Bla bla bla. What I know how to do is talk, fill pages and pages with meaningless talk that doesn't explain to me the mysteries of the universe. There's so much I don't know. I feel like I'm in a darkness, and constantly running, always with arms wide open, despite past hurt and frustration, because the only path I know and believe in is the one labeled "forward". I resent living in the world of memories. It annoys me. And people who won't let go of the past, and let who you previously were go along with it, annoy me to the point that I feel a gunshot to their head would be too much of a service to them. Nah, come on, I'm not that hot-headed. I don't care. But I just want to be released. From what? I'm not too sure.
You know, there's this quote I've seen before. Nothing intellectual or fancy, just a quote that says something like this: "Before diagnosing yourself with clinical depression, first make sure that you are not just surrounded by assholes". This isn't another post on soulmates or relationships or anything like that. But I'll just say I can think of a few people who really shouldn't be in my life, because they're so negative and unwilling to change along with and embrace life as it comes. It's your choice to be stuck in the past, but I don't want to be, and I choose differently. I'm not gonna start saying, "Oh, I'm depressed, nobody loves me, flalalahala". Depression doesn't do this. It shuts me down completely, or at least much more profoundly. I'm not some melancholy owl sitting in an egg-cup. I talk, I read, I go out with my friends, I see my family, I work on my stories. I eat, I drink, I emote. I function. Therefore, I am not undergoing clinical depression.
I have a hard time knowing what I want. Look at this life, and tell me what is missing, what the hell is making me itch so damn much for changes.
A Life:
Female, eighteen years old. Spry and attractive. Some good friendships, others not so good. Love available for action and reaction. Healthy. Forward-looking. Financially relaxed. I hate describing my life, and labeling things. But what the hell is missing?
Oh, God isn't missing, by the way. Nothing is missing. I don't know. Recently, I visited the residence of a deceased Lebanese saint. Walking through those grounds and that monastery, I was overcome with an extreme sense of love. It was too strong and too potent, to charged for me to be able to carry it. So I let myself drop before it instead, on my knees, in some of the most sincere and hungry prayer I have ever let myself submit to in my life. I forgave everyone then and there whom I had ever felt had done me an injustice, including myself. I wished I could pray forever.
I love God. But why doesn't it last? Why doesn't anything last in my life? Because I don't want to grow up. A friend of mine once told me I'm stupid, and need to grow up. The "stupid" made me cringe a little, but the growing-up suggestion rings true. Kids are unsatisfied. Kids don't settle down. Kids look for changes everywhere they go, for new names and faces, and interesting horizons and expansion of their mindframes. Adults have real lives - they touch down in reality. I'd like to say I'm really grown up and all. Some people seem to think it. "You have wisdom", they tell me. And maybe I do, by their standards, but if anything I'm a wise fool. Then again, wisdom is a little foolish - because once you see how non-lasting things really are, you don't take anything too seriously anymore. What lies ahead for me in this lifetime? More work? Responsibilities? Restriction? If this is what lies ahead, then I must face my life with a cool head and a courageous heart. Or is it a good deal of fun that lies ahead? If so, then I shall be jolly, and wear flowers in my hair. I've always been a mixture of both character types, actually. And now I'm short on Time. Oh, Lord, where do all the moments go?
There's one thing I'm afraid of. It's the knowledge that I can't go on being Peter Pan forever. What happens when childhood's over and Wendy is no longer there to hold my hand? Where do I go? Do I continue to seek, or resign myself to what I have? This is meaningless. It all is. And that's the great joy of it. At least I'm not sad, and there's a new adventure to be tasted every day. Another phase of my life shall soon begin, and we'll see what the next day brings.
Okay, I'm going to go now, to a new village. Journeys and travel are the best things in life.
Once again, e-mail is bemgcasrbaquarian@gmail.com
Salutations.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
So it's a New Year and all, five days in, according to the Western calendar. I would say "Happy New Year", except I must have said it in a previous blog post, and of all people, I realize that the New Year is nothing but 365 days added to a life - what ought to be celebrated is a life change of some sort, and not a maybe-undeserved life-extension pack from Heaven Unltd. Someone sounding morose, maybe a little too real? Wait, it gets colder.
I probably won't talk too much today, but while I was typing that, my mind just went "ha!" We'll, the purpose of this blog post is to write down an excerpt from my journal, which I might like to revisit later on. This is my journal from 2009 till 2011, and it's nestled on one of my bookshelves in Lebanon. It is a pink-and-blue friend without a name, and it has had to stomach a lot of bullshit from this young person. I thank you, dear journal, for not chastising me and putting me down and being patient, although you really should have pulled my leg a little at some instances. Anyhoo, I won't be taking this journal back to the Czech Republic - let it stay here, in this attic of memories, where it belongs. But this is an excerpt I've gone back to over the years, and it's one of the less personal observations I've made in that book.
Here it goes, a glimpse into a fourteen-year-old's mind. It's pouring torrents outside now, btw - jugfuls of water spilling out of the heavens, punctuated by bolts of Uranian lightning:
Sat., 28th of Nov., 2009
Dear Diary,
Soon the date I have here written will change to the 29th of November and so on. It is changing even now, drawing closer and closer to that bigger second digit. I'm growing older; every second, in thought and in spirit, in mind and in body. All my life I have grown up too fast, too soon, too early, and sometimes even too late. I would turn around frantically once and my childhood would have run away with my youth, hand in hand, leaving me stuck in an interphase that has puzzled me every waking moment of my life. I am possessed by the look of youth; yet my heart is weary; my soul obscure and opaque to everyone, not excluding my own self. Soon I shall be an old hag looking back at these pages, and this very moment, and at the song stuck in my head, having forgotten my present feelings and embraced their heavy World (hardly, for I will never be good at following their rules acceptingly.) I shall be old, with wrinkles under my eyes and on my cheeks, wondering in disbelief where my days had gone, and why I had let them go and pass. Yet I hope that death is peaceful; they say it is, yet they have never died; then I could leave my wear and heartwrenched state behind and unite with the elements of the world (the flowers, the soil, the trees) and pay them service and gratitude. Maybe someday I'll become part of a young girl's bed, dreaming her dreams and whispering her secrets, longing (maybe) to be back in her place or looking fondly at her, waiting for her to join me in Heaven. Life is strange, and music is sweet. Death will come, and I can never express what's inside me; the way I feel about change & growing old. It's too complex for the most complex words to describe; words can only describe a small part of it.
Before you ask, I'll answer: yes, I was on my way to depression at that time. Or maybe I was depressed - how can I remember? I don't remember anything of the past few years, except some captured moments, I suppose. I used to think I have a good memory, but when I really examine that statement I'm not so sure. Details have become fuzzy, there are people I've forgotten and moments that have to be brought to my mind by others who do remember them, and there are definitely feelings I've left behind. Hell, I don't even remember what happens in a book after I've read it. Why all this detachment, I wonder?
Anyway, the passage above jumped out at me today because yesterday night, when I got back home from my aunt's, I thought aloud and was overcome by a sense of nothingness in my world, and indeed the whole world at large. What do we do but grow old and waste Time, watching helplessly as it passes by and rubs it in our faces as well. "Ha, you're old, and lonely, and nobody's gonna be there for you. Loser." Time is like a mean jerk of a player, constantly out of reach, and always eager to leap over your shoulder at the next new conquest. If there's something I never have enough of, it's Time. I don't know where it goes, it just does. And the more I try to hold onto it, the more insistently it wants to go. Bla bla bla. What I know how to do is talk, fill pages and pages with meaningless talk that doesn't explain to me the mysteries of the universe. There's so much I don't know. I feel like I'm in a darkness, and constantly running, always with arms wide open, despite past hurt and frustration, because the only path I know and believe in is the one labeled "forward". I resent living in the world of memories. It annoys me. And people who won't let go of the past, and let who you previously were go along with it, annoy me to the point that I feel a gunshot to their head would be too much of a service to them. Nah, come on, I'm not that hot-headed. I don't care. But I just want to be released. From what? I'm not too sure.
You know, there's this quote I've seen before. Nothing intellectual or fancy, just a quote that says something like this: "Before diagnosing yourself with clinical depression, first make sure that you are not just surrounded by assholes". This isn't another post on soulmates or relationships or anything like that. But I'll just say I can think of a few people who really shouldn't be in my life, because they're so negative and unwilling to change along with and embrace life as it comes. It's your choice to be stuck in the past, but I don't want to be, and I choose differently. I'm not gonna start saying, "Oh, I'm depressed, nobody loves me, flalalahala". Depression doesn't do this. It shuts me down completely, or at least much more profoundly. I'm not some melancholy owl sitting in an egg-cup. I talk, I read, I go out with my friends, I see my family, I work on my stories. I eat, I drink, I emote. I function. Therefore, I am not undergoing clinical depression.
I have a hard time knowing what I want. Look at this life, and tell me what is missing, what the hell is making me itch so damn much for changes.
A Life:
Female, eighteen years old. Spry and attractive. Some good friendships, others not so good. Love available for action and reaction. Healthy. Forward-looking. Financially relaxed. I hate describing my life, and labeling things. But what the hell is missing?
Oh, God isn't missing, by the way. Nothing is missing. I don't know. Recently, I visited the residence of a deceased Lebanese saint. Walking through those grounds and that monastery, I was overcome with an extreme sense of love. It was too strong and too potent, to charged for me to be able to carry it. So I let myself drop before it instead, on my knees, in some of the most sincere and hungry prayer I have ever let myself submit to in my life. I forgave everyone then and there whom I had ever felt had done me an injustice, including myself. I wished I could pray forever.
I love God. But why doesn't it last? Why doesn't anything last in my life? Because I don't want to grow up. A friend of mine once told me I'm stupid, and need to grow up. The "stupid" made me cringe a little, but the growing-up suggestion rings true. Kids are unsatisfied. Kids don't settle down. Kids look for changes everywhere they go, for new names and faces, and interesting horizons and expansion of their mindframes. Adults have real lives - they touch down in reality. I'd like to say I'm really grown up and all. Some people seem to think it. "You have wisdom", they tell me. And maybe I do, by their standards, but if anything I'm a wise fool. Then again, wisdom is a little foolish - because once you see how non-lasting things really are, you don't take anything too seriously anymore. What lies ahead for me in this lifetime? More work? Responsibilities? Restriction? If this is what lies ahead, then I must face my life with a cool head and a courageous heart. Or is it a good deal of fun that lies ahead? If so, then I shall be jolly, and wear flowers in my hair. I've always been a mixture of both character types, actually. And now I'm short on Time. Oh, Lord, where do all the moments go?
There's one thing I'm afraid of. It's the knowledge that I can't go on being Peter Pan forever. What happens when childhood's over and Wendy is no longer there to hold my hand? Where do I go? Do I continue to seek, or resign myself to what I have? This is meaningless. It all is. And that's the great joy of it. At least I'm not sad, and there's a new adventure to be tasted every day. Another phase of my life shall soon begin, and we'll see what the next day brings.
Okay, I'm going to go now, to a new village. Journeys and travel are the best things in life.
Once again, e-mail is bemgcasrbaquarian@gmail.com
Salutations.
Signed, your friendly Water Bearer.
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