On Grapefruits And Graveyards

The only way to make sense out of change is to plunge into it, move with it, and join the dance. - Alan Watts

On a sunny Tuesday morning in early May of the plague year, I finally offered to cut the grapefruit that my four year old daughter had been coveting since last week. The heavens rejoiced in her mind as she bound around the kitchen yelling, “YES!” On a whim, I purchased a grapefruit at the supermarket the week prior. As the world as we know it breaks down in fundamental ways, buying something as unessential as a grapefruit seemed almost transgressive. In the previous time, what would be as outdated and blasé as eating a grapefruit for breakfast? What is this? Some 1980s fad diet? Now, eating a grapefruit for/with breakfast has taken on some luxurious undertone in my mind. 

Since unpacking the groceries, this fruit took on great significance for her. La niña appeared, mainly to see if I had brought home some sort of “prize” from the supermarket, and then transitioned into interrogation mode regarding this purchase- what's this? What does it taste like? Can I have 'a piece'? Why does a GRAPEfruit have an orange rind? Since the moment it was shelved in the refrigerator, she's argued with me to cut up this fruit for her at every meal. She needed a grapefruit right NOW for a variety of reasons.

Finally, this morning the grapefruit was cut open. I segmented a half for her to try and placed it before her. Digging in, she ate two segments and then pushed it aside, to “save for later.” When I asked if she liked it, she gave a resounding yes, but that the real trouble was she was so full, there was no more she could eat. I offered her an out, “...but it's ok if you also don't like it.” Of course, the Iron Lady refused to recant her previous statements on the tastiness of grapefruits.

If you have never bargained with a small child, you've never truly experienced the unrelenting psychic stamina of another person. It's almost as though a pre-pubescent child's ability to physically stand in a freezing pool, teeth chattering and lips blue, can transfer to their mental state when required. Young children have “endurance.” This may sound like a cold assessment, but I'm awed by their skill. If only I had the endurance for endless small talk, bad arguments, or unrelenting pleas to cut random citrus fruits.

Since work has been minimized due to the new virtual format and constant worry about how much stress we can and should be putting on academic work during a pandemic, la niña and I have been walking quite a bit. We have a usual loop, in which I vary the path slightly, but typically head up a long, unbroken stretch of sidewalk that connects our town to a much cuter and prettier one which has a real downtown and a harbor to walk through. Tired of the usual the other day, I brought up going on a new adventure. We took a leisurely walk around a local cemetery. It's on a hilltop cleaning surrounded by a wooded area about 2 miles from our house, nestled inside one of the typical housing developments in this area. We took a Polaroid camera and a snack to visit tombs (her word) and learn more about them.

While walking through the back end of the cemetery, I saw a name on a gravestone that I recognized. Someone I had gone to school with since first grade (maybe kindergarten, even) was buried there. In fact, she'd died in 2014. The obituary revealed little when checked. This woman was not someone I was close to, although we'd gone to school together for 12 years. She was born in November and was likely one of the older students in my graduating year; I, on the other hand, with a late summer birthday, was always one of the youngest. While everyone matures at their own rate, sometimes the gap of nearly a year does create noticeable developmental differences. At some point in upper elementary school, she stood up for me to some other kids who were being a nuisance. That's pretty much the only memory I have of her besides thinking that in high school, she likely smoked cigarettes, which was what most suburban teenagers seemed to be into in the late 90s.

This "find" didn't necessarily provide pause for the contemplation of my own mortality – that's a nearly daily meditation anyhow. Instead, it led me down a line of thinking about the degree of anonymity our lives take on when removed from a daily routine. After a month of not being at work, I realized I hadn't thought of someone I see on a near-daily basis usually in the entire time we'd been away until that very moment. It was startling in a sense. And not necessarily because I'm a uniquely selfish asshole, but because removed from the daily grind, everyone's vision narrows to what's right in front of them. When people are imprisoned or held captive for a long time, sometimes they relay their time in that experience with a degree of calm more fit for a Buddhist monk. One of the reasons why is likely because they learned to accept their reality, to not struggle against it or to pin hopes on wishing it away. Maybe the suggestion for our quarantine time now should be to keep calm and meme on? Jokes aside, accepting that this is what the near entirety of the world is experiencing now would be a step toward allowing ourselves the space to breathe and be without having to answer to all of the demands we typically put on ourselves. 

When you consider the transitions we consistently face in our lives – graduations, promotions, moves, relationships, births, deaths, et al – it's no wonder internally we face such a degree of turmoil despite the mundanity of those events. Everyone goes through changes all of the time; change is the constant, not anything else about life is a constant as much as we would love that to be the case. Some of the changes we face, like aging, are much more gradual (and possibly) less abrasive to our psyches. But it is worth sharing our feelings about those tumultuous events with those we trust and/or love because, as it turns out, empathy is a great healer. It provides us the room to accept the situation and ourselves (physically, emotionally and spiritually). 

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recommended reading/listening:

interview - https://thedewdrop.org/2019/12/06/deneen-fendig-duncan-trussell/

music-  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7zikXou8vDc 

What's so funny about peace, love and understanding?

This weekend was an impromptu 4 day one due to 2 snow days in a row at the tail end of the week. While it was nice to be off, on Thursday I noticed that one of my guinea pigs was refusing solid food. This is a bad sign in an animal whose entire purpose in life seems to be to eat and poop. Since I was waaaay snowed in on Thursday, I had to improvise by blending up some veggies and hay pellets and trying to hand-feed her. She was mildly receptive, but not really gobbling it up. On Friday I was able to order special food from Amazon for one day shipping and went and got some baby food to hand-feed with in the interim. The food never arrived on Saturday (and I had to actually call Amazon this morning for a refund). She is on the special food now (I found it at a small, local pet store that I forgot existed until today). I don't know if she will make it through this time - once guinea pigs stop eating solid food, it's kind of a bad sign/sign of the end. 

Vets don't seem to know what to do with these little guys either. The last one I had that needed medical care spent 2 scary nights alone at the vet where they shaved his teeth down (which I don't even think was the problem - they just wanted to charge me $2000) and died as soon as I brought him home (heart attack). So I don't really want to put her through the same stressors so either she will gert better or die naturally at home. 

But after the many trials and tribulations of trying to feed a tiny mammal out of an even tinier syringe, I am tired. But also thoughtful.  I have had 4 rescue guinea pigs and 1 store-bought pig. The store bought one died after a year (so sad). The rescue pigs have been heartier, though I don't know from where they originate. The 2 girls I have now are both around 5 or 6 years old. They are cute and friendly and just kind of hang out all day. There's not too much to interact with as they do not have the intellect of a dog or cat, but they are cuddly. On Friday night, after hand-feeding Twinkie, I sat in front of the heater in my bedroom with her on my lap and just cried. Here I was, on a Friday night, sitting in my robe, on the floor in the bedroom, crying my eyes out over a mammal with the life span of maybe 8 years. But I just couldn't help it. Whenever animals or babies are sick, I become a wreck of a human. I just start weeping for every little life out there. As she sat on my lap, I could hear her heartbeat and I watched as she looked around, but sat contentedly without moving. I thought that maybe I could have done more in the time that I had her - taken her out every single day, given her better treats, just been there to do more. But I can't because I work, and I have to keep on truckin' every day, even if that means not always being able to do what I would really like to do all of the time.

That led me to think about what we prioritize in society. Do we prioritize caring for the pets and the people in our lives? I mean, I think the average person would say they personally do, but I don't think our culture does. In fact, I would argue that our system is set up to do the opposite - move on, buy something new, trudge forward no matter what. The elderly are so quaint, with their reminiscing, but come on grandma, just die already so we can bulldoze your house. I mean, sure it's not as disturbing
as that, but I am sure as you read that line, you smirked a little bit. The past is boring! I teach history - I know what most people think about having to look back, and even worse, learn from it. Gasp.

When I was in a better place yesterday, I read this Atlantic article about stressors and their effect on the unborn fetus. Written by a husband and father, it raised a lot of interesting issues regarding how maternity leave is handled in the US. It seems as though there are two poles - the traditionally conservative view of protecting the fetus (more so than the mother's health) by limiting what the mother can/should do during pregnancy, and the more modern feminist view of a woman having complete equality to men no matter what, including not being labeled as "disabled" during their pregnancy (and thereby not getting any special treatment during those 9 months by their employers). I'm weighing in to say both sides are wrong here. Sure, I might disagree that pregnant women shouldn't be labeled as disabled -it's kind of weird honestly- but maybe a different distinction that disallows their employer from requesting that they continue on as though their condition is completely NOT a hindrance to their expected duties. We have to focus on equity and not absolute equality in cases like these. Otherwise we put undue stress on everyone. If we truly care about women, children, families, traditions, equity in the workplace, gender pay gaps, etc, we need to recognize individuals as unique and that a one-size-fits-all ruling will likely harm many people it was created to help. For example, single mothers or women working part time are less likely to be able to feasibly take much time off before or after their babies are born due to the fact that they might HAVE to work. This may also stress the mother, and subsequently, the baby out, causing a host of health problems for both in the future. Their employment status is not always due to their "inability to work hard" or their education level. There are a lot of good people out there today who are well-educated, qualified and willing to work, but there's nothing out there but a sea of entry level, retail and various part-time jobs.

So I am asking, what can we do to change this course we're currently on as a society - a course that finds every expenditure a chore. Sometimes a society needs to INVEST (which is a nice way of saying, spend some goddamn money) to get returns. If you want to clean up poor neighborhoods and end achievement gaps between the US and other countries, money and time has to be invested into improving public schools, not just constantly poking at them. This would include actually training and hiring quality teachers, ensuring that the school is run well, that funds are used properly, etc. It does not necessarily mean that a new curriculum or testing strategy should be adopted. Sure, Finland is homogenous and has a small population so their methods work for them, blah blah. I have heard all of the criticisms of Finland's schools and why it wouldn't work here. If that's the case, shouldn't Finland take the easy way out and just test the shit out of their kids? I mean, why spend time and energy and money to pay teachers more, have more class options and activities for a cohort of children that could learn easily from drill and kill since there's less diversity to overcome? Well, because the teachers and education community in Finland VALUE what they do by providing students with an enriched environment full of openness, play and personal inquiry. 

And to think, this all started with thoughts about a sick guinea pig. Some days I would just like to turn my brain off. 

The Final 14 Seconds of the Cosmic Calendar

I've written a bunch of posts on spirituality, the meaning of life, humans and human interaction, and yet, I continue to gravitate toward the subject. The learning is never over, and while watching the finale of "Avatar: the Last Airbender" (yes, the children's cartoon series), I was reminded of my queries all over again. I am going to quickly recap the moral struggle faced by Aang in the last episode:
The main character, and the last airbending nomad alive, Aang, is conflicted over how he will be able to defeat the scourge of humanity that is the Fire Lord. This guy is so in need of an ass-beating, it's insane. Everyone knows it, yet no one is powerful enough to defeat him except Aang, but Aang is doesn't want to kill him. Aang's crew, even his true love, Kitara, all want him to kill the Fire Lord to save the world. Conflicted, Aang, sleep-swims (?) to an island off the coast of the beach where he and his posse have set up base. When he wakes up on the island, he realizes that it's moving. He's far away from his friends, but tries to use the time to meditate and to reach his former lives. Even his past incarnations as the Avatar, including the previous airbender avatar, all ask him to consider sacrificing his convictions to save the world. Their arguments are based on ridding the world of evil and injustice, and rooted in utilitarianism. Logical and based in their own experiences as the avatar, Aang cannot deny their wisdom, but also cannot accept it.

Finally, he confronts a truly universal master, an ancient Lion-Turtle, whose back Aang has been riding on (it's so massive, it's an island). The Lion-Turtle, once a guardian of humanity,  had something very interesting to impart on Aang, "The true mind can weather all lies and illusions without being lost. The true heart can touch the poison of hatred without being harmed. From beginningless time, darkness thrives in the void, but always yields to purifying light. In the era before the Avatar, we bent not the elements, but the energy within ourselves. To bend another's energy, your own spirit must be unbendable, or you will be corrupted and destroyed." 

Aang literally "sees the light" as the Lion-Turtle shows him how to bend pure energy. In his final battle against he fire lord, when given the opportunity to kill him, he does not. As any real villain would, the Fire Lord interprets this as weakness and tries to destroy Aang. Yet, Aang ultimately is able to bend the Fire Lord's energy to remove his ability to bend fire and wreak havoc on humanity. He takes away the Lord's abilities instead of killing him, leaving him to think about his abuses of power until he understands and accepts what he did. 

I agree with Aang. I don't think I could kill someone even if they were evil and destructive. It's not my place to wield power like that, nor do I think it's any human's. Today we couch our killing in legal language to sanitize it, take the "messiness" out of it by ensuring no blood is spilled (in the US anyway), and call it "capital punishment." It's still expunging another life and it's still against most everything that is preached in every religion and moral code employed by humankind. Killing is killing. The STATE killed Murderer X, but we are the state. It's not some sort of external entity that we passively watch, although many of us do act like that. 

My beliefs in this are only further strengthened by something that I saw/heard on the science program "Cosmos." Host Neil deGrasse Tyson was walking along a "cosmic calendar" to put into perspective universal versus human existence. Only in the last 14 seconds of the cosmic calendar do ALL recorded human events (re: history) exist. He says something so simple and yet so poignant, that I can't stop thinking about it. All the heroes, kings and queens, anyone we've ever known or have heard of, all did it in the last 14 seconds of the cosmic calendar (here's Carl Sagan saying it - and it makes me cry every fucking time). Wow. No, like seriously contemplate that. Wow. Recorded history is 14 seconds of almost 14 billion years of time. And to even understand the whole of what brought you (yes, YOU) here right now, is almost unimaginable.

How many twists and turns every atom that makes up your presence has gone through - how many life cycles of birth, death and rebirth (in some way), each particle, each cell has experienced to bring you to be here had to have happened an infinite number of times and could have turned out a similarly infinite number of ways. But it didn't - because you're here now. And I think that just makes me wonder what the hell we ARE doing - as a species, as a society, as individuals. ON ALL LEVELS. We're here because we're here and now what? We've been awakened to the vast beauty of the world around us only recently, and have squandered so much with our careless touch - even the destruction of ourselves.

And an argument for killing (notice I didn't use execute, or remove, or get rid of, but kill) rapists and murderers is that it's impractical to provide for them for the duration of their lives since they've wronged others. And yes, it's impractical if the key point of human society was to be efficient and tidy. But is it? The Nazis were pretty efficient. And no, I'm not conflating capital punishment with genocide, but utilitarian arguments have the same cold edge to me no matter the scale.

So now what? Way back in my first post, I joked that we needed a fascist of love to spread a new message. But I really don't think forcing anyone to do anything will ever work. Again, it's a clean and efficient way of working - force submission and expunge the outliers, but it isn't sustainable. It breeds more problems than it solves. Aang's crew, all those who supported his power, but questioned his sanity when he could not use it to destroy, were converted into believers when they saw how his choice played out. He didn't destroy the destructive force. He took away its power and yet showed acceptance of its existence. Maybe those "evil" beings that use their power for wrongdoing and self-gain need to experience the removal of their power, whether it be physical strength, intellectual acuity, money, et al. To sit and realize that they're HUMAN just like everyone else. That their power will fall one day - to another, stronger power, or even just to mortality. Our desire to create a name for ourselves, to live forever in the annals of history is laughable when we put it in perspective - the final 14 seconds of 14 billion years of time. And those 14 seconds won't mean much if humans aren't around to continue to propagate the message through time and space. Seems so futile and desolate if you look at it from an angle of self-preservation, but freeing and beautiful if you consider that you even got a chance to play at all.

The Stranger

“But what is happiness except the simple harmony between a man and the life he leads?”-Camus

When I get to points like this, there's little I can do or say to really make myself feel better besides laughing at the absurdity of everything.

'Cause right now, I'm like the Dude in this scene of The Big Lebowski and I need a "Stranger" to set me straight:

Why am I like this? I'm frustrated. At myself, at society, at humanity in general. Maybe a cynical eye is blinding me to the wonderful possibilities in this world, but it surely seems like the bad guys are winning. What does that even mean? The bad guys are winning? Am I living in a fucking soap opera? Thankfully, no, although I do understand the reason that people create drama - to entertain themselves and to distract from the ultimate downer, death (whoofa). In the past few weeks, I have been thinking about a few different aspects of life, but I haven't had cause enough to sit down and write a coherent, fluid post. Maybe this will end up being disjointed in the end, but maybe not. The two main threads I keep coming back to are "time" and "freedom."

Way back in the spring, in my initial post, I had contemplated pulling an all-out Thoreau, moving to some remote area and never looking back. While that urge has hit me more than a few times since then, I have yet to do so. Is it out of cowardice on my part? Or inertia? Or is it that I am not ready to give up on this path yet? In this pondering of why I haven't left for sincerely greener and more isolated pastures, I come back to the idea that I can find what I am looking for wherever, and can also find sadness, frustration and discontent wherever I run to. So if I move to Montana or the Yukon, my new locale will not solve my problems? Nope, not quite. But there is something that I think can be taken away right here, or wherever your "here" may be -that comes from this sort of quiet lifestyle, and that is the dissolution of time. Why does time seem to move more slowly in the American South? Or the countryside? Or, hmm, anywhere but a world-city like the NY-Metropolitan area? Because it actually does. There's not that infernal, constant ticking looming over every aspect of life in those areas further removed from the bustle of modern society. The tendrils of constant connectivity to the life-force of the city are weaker. Don't get me wrong - I love being in NYC. If I lived there, I would be OK with it. But I would probably have to walk a lot to be able to get out of the hustle-and-bustle headspace of the rat race.

Smashing our concept of time and its effect on our lives is something I am trying to cultivate. Can I speed through my chores to sit on a computer for an extra 20 minutes? Sure, but what if I just spent time actually peeling potatoes for the act of peeling potatoes?  What would I get out of that? Would there be some sort of satisfaction in this rote action?

This practice of being present is a Zen realization on the importance of everything that you do, according to Alan Watts - “Zen does not confuse spirituality with thinking about God while one is peeling potatoes. Zen spirituality is just to peel the potatoes.” Not especially enlightened or creative, but this type of mindfulness, I have found, is important in feeling as though you're not constantly under pressure. Similarly, and in a much lighter vein, according to Ron Swanson of Parks and Rec, I should never half-ass two things, but "whole-ass" one thing because the outcome will likely be more satisfying if done right. It's funny how libertarian, manly-man carnivore Swanson coincides with the Zen attitude that I admire and try to emulate, but I think it takes repeated efforts to show us humans that the way to contentedness always takes the same (but in a good way), measured steps even thought it may come to us in different packages (Alan Watts, Ron Swanson, Winnie the Pooh, The Dude, etc).

I go in and out of modes of being - sometimes I am pretty good at just "peeling the potatoes" and other times I am full of frenetic energy that leaves me wanting to punch through walls (or faces). This wildness, when trapped in our regimented social order, is a bad combination. It furthers my frustration, leading to feelings of despair and hopelessness. Millions of questions fly through my mind - how can people not SEE that this way of life is stifling creativity, destroying dreams, destroying the planet, etc? Is there a solution to this sort of trapped feeling? Yes and no. I don't expect everyone to sympathize or even understand the sentiments I am expressing here. Which is OK as long as others can even consider that there may be some alternatives to what we're doing now, as a society. This is what Rousseau was getting at with the corrupting nature of society. And for whatever reason, I am bad at suppressing these feelings sometimes. But that also begs the question, should I even have to? 

Ultimately, "peeling potatoes" is what I need to continue to propagate within myself because the hours of worrying over all of the elements that I cannot control is truly a wearying, thankless task. I am in good company though because even Ron Swanson has had some missteps along the way of becoming a true master of life.

Every creature on this Earth dies alone.

Donnie: Well, life isn't that simple. I mean, who cares if Ling Ling returns the wallet and keeps the money? It has nothing to do with either fear or love.

Kitty Farmer: Fear and love are the deepest of human emotions.

Donnie: Okay. But you're not listening to me. There are other things that need to be taken into account here, like the whole spectrum of human emotion. You can't just lump everything into these two categories and then just deny everything else.

More personal-preferences-cum-objective-statement-about-life going on in this post. I promise it will have some sort of point that can be more generalizable though - promise. But who the fuck am I kidding? It's all just some bullshit, right?

One of my favorite movies is Donnie Darko. I guess at face value, a viewer might say that it is about time travel: by anticipating a horrible end for various people, Donnie sacrifices his own life to save those of ones he loves. For those who haven't seen it, throughout the movie, it is alluded to that Donnie has "issues" and that his perceptions of the world are warped (and wrong). Maybe he does, but like the point he's making above, does that really matter as much as we think? We'd like to think that issues that exist in this world would be more easily resolved if everyone thought the way that we did - “If this were a dictatorship it would be a heck of a lot easier... as long as I'm the dictator. Hehehe.” - GWB - I mean, really, that's true, but totally a boring, old, cop-out answer. Instead of learning to compromise with people, I'll just let them cower in fear of my power! Ha. Ridiculous.

Donnie represents an anti-hero - irascible, misanthropic and altogether misunderstood. Furthermore, the saliency of his insights into human society make others shy away from him. No one wants to be around someone that reminds them of their own worst fears. Death, instability, anger, fear, loneliness. Why would we want to be around that when we can compartmentalize and categorize our experiences to make them more livable as a whole? Well, I'll tell you why, and Donnie did too, to actually experience life, which isn't always about happiness and security ("Sometimes you’re supposed to be sad. It’s OK, it’s the flip side. And it’s actually good." - Louis CK). We make mistakes, we fuck up royally, but we can still get back out  there to retry, to experience again.

I face this sort of dilemma on a daily basis though, as it's not always a life-and-death, save-your-girlfriend-from-a-horrible-end sort of day. From Facebook arguments to workplace woes, there is a stuckness to the way that people approach life; a closing off of their experiences. I was recently told, during an all -important Facebook debate, that the argument I was trying to make, by analogous thinking on my part, was irrelevant because it was bringing in examples that were tangental or analogous, but not directly on topic. So? Is there a standard format for argumentation that always must be followed? If so, our politicians are fucked because they're doing it wrong all.the.time. It seemed to me to be more of a situation in which one party was trying to control for an outcome. This is a common skin for some - controlling everything that happens, from who they talk to, to how they talk to them, to where they're seen and who they're seen with, blah blah, so...Plastics. But don't forget....control is an illusion. The mirage is strong and some people will go quite far to deny they're vying for control. They'll readily admit to having no free will or their fate is in God's hands or science is the answer, et al. But challenge whatever their roulette wheel has randomly (*cough*bullshit*cough*) stopped on and BAM: now you're their enemy because you chose to question. And maybe my disdain at control is just another form of control - oh gods, the horror! So why continue to discuss and press? To challenge people. To determine whether there is more to learn and to potentially change (One day, observing a child drinking out of his hands, he cast away the cup from his wallet with the words, "A child has beaten me in plainness of living."- Diogenes the Cynic [WWDD -  What Would Diogenes Do?]) So this is where I would say that identifying that control (which is really just another way of saying "desiring" a certain outcome, so I am ripping off the Buddha big time here) is a problem and attempting to go more with the flow is not the same type of stuckness.

Today, I was talking to some students about the Weather Underground, and how some of the people involved went on to become active members of society after their years of destruction. We debated whether that was "unusual" and some of the students were adamant about the possibility of second chances. One student insisted that we are too harsh on each other, that people can change not only physically, but mentally and spiritually. It was an interesting discussion that helped some of them consider the role of judgment in American society's nature. This is especially prevalent when it comes to failures, mistakes and missteps (mighty and otherwise). Maybe there isn't enough leeway given for people who commit wrongs in their pasts. That would also hold true for Donnie, who, being maligned as a weirdo, was outcasted even though he was on the threshold of making amazing connections about our own existence to anyone who was listening. Unfortunately, since most of his interactions were erased by time travel to save others, it turns out that no one but himself would be privy to his newfound understanding of the world. But maybe that's why he's laughing, because he's letting go of control finally and it's so easy. He let go of the fact that he can't actually teach anyone anything and that he's now dying, alone. He's reached enlightenment in a way that was so easy in the end. A complete acceptance of death.


And of course, a relatable song! New Machine, part 1, Pink Floyd:

I have always been here
I have always looked out from behind the eyes
It feels like more than a lifetime
Feels like more than a lifetime
Sometimes I get tired of the waiting
Sometimes I get tired of being in here
Is this the way it has always been?
Could it ever have been different?
Do you ever get tired of the waiting?
Do you ever get tired of being in there?
Don't worry, nobody lives forever,
Nobody lives forever

On Existentialist Crises and a Case against Suicide

Fourteen years ago, I wanted to die, as in, not be alive anymore. But not actively, passively. I wanted to not have to live each day. I'd chalk this up now to an existentialist crisis that had its roots in my late childhood. "Not being" had come upon me suddenly when I was 9. Any sort of consistency and predictability was shaken. Throughout the years that followed, the crisis was not resolved because it wasn't fully understood nor could it be dealt with adequately.

Due to the lack of resolution, however, there were times that were deep, dark holes of anguish and frustration over the growing realization that one cannot define life [maybe it's what drove me toward atheism (soft atheism) in the present]. I intuited that there were no answers, or at least none that would satisfy me at that moment {or even now}. Maybe there is an answer that I will adopt at some point, but in the throes of an existential crisis that finally surfaced at 18, there was nothing comforting. Maybe it was almost like a fasting monk's vision, but when you're at the end of your rope, you start to see everything more clearly, for a time. And you begin to notice what you're "de-potentializing" by ending it all.

Part of giving up or giving in to the nihilism that "nothing matters" is that it helps you to see what you do to control as much as you can about your experience of this world, our "life" narratives. Imagine what would happen if you stopped performing actions that offer you a sense of power over your own destiny. You'd probably be a lot less stressed actually. Fuck control, because you don't actually have it. Even if your motto is "Everything happens for a reason," or, "God has a plan," both of which superficially embrace a random element to existence, you're still trying to make rational sense of the irrational. The universe is not uncaring, the universe doesn't have that capacity. We like to personify the universe as "cold" or "unfeeling" but that's not fair to the universe. To bring it down from the infinite to something more tangible, rocks also "don't care" about your existence, but we're using human emotions to classify something that doesn't have them. Rocks "be" and cannot care or not care. The universe also just "is."

 There is more than your own self in the driver's seat. Imagine we're all driving giant cars with individual steering wheels that give us some pull, but not as much as we think we have. We're so damn focused on the road ahead, we can't see the dashboards of all of our vehicles are actually connected. Control is a coy mistress, she knows exactly what she's doing, but you're letting her, too. Control or more correctly, power over, is dangerous. At any moment that answer you thought was there could be gone. Because it isn't actually there. It's a construct of your thoughts, of your memory, and even if others have similar memories, it won't be exactly the same as yours.

Think about telling a story with someone else. They remember details that you don't, you fill in gaps that they glossed over. You complete each other's narratives. When it comes to our own memory of ourselves, we're only relying on ONE set of details - and humans have repeatedly proven to be pretty fucking terrible eyewitnesses. People claimed to have seen a leprechaun and Big Foot. NO. WTF. Occam's razor people, Jesus.

Embrace the random. I have been trying to for 14 years. It's hard sometimes. But it would pay off if I could.