For the first time in quite a while, I've been in something of an anxiety hole for several hours. It's been brewing, but a comment/joke my friend made sort of sent it into overdrive? I don't know, my head's not where it needs to be.
Very little seems to "just work out," in my life. That is, I make plans, and until relatively recently, I had absolutely no one who I could trust to follow through on them besides my dad. I could drag someone out to a rushed or not-that-into-it outing extremely occasionally. Anything to do with work or something "professional" went to shit in dozens of ways over many months. Alone, I can do little bits of things here and there, or make the drive, or spend the money, but at the pace of someone alone.
In a very important sense, I feel extremely alone. This in no way speaks to the support and time spent with my people, again, relatively recently. My psychology is built on the idea that pretty much everything sucks, is broken, is trying to fuck me, or is waiting for a moment to send me spiraling the second I try to hope or believe. I don't know how many years of security I would have to live in order for this not to remain true about me. I am primed for disaster, and when that storm of influences throughout the day and living circumstances add up, I'm back, miserably "home" in my propensity to panic.
Of course, as an older person who's developed a habit for writing, "panic" looks a lot different than it did years ago. The experience isn't fogging my brain entirely, my heart isn't racing, my stomach barely drops, I'm getting out ahead of my jaw clenching before an overwhelming headache creeps in. I'm breathing deliberately, stretching my mouth, and searching for the story of why my life isn't actually a plane spiraling towards the ground.
I've said a number of times that had DCS not turned into a bleeding hellscape of wanna-be police and judgmental aggression, I'd probably still be doing that job. I loved using power responsibly, decoding the scariness of the State into actionable steps for my families, and juggling what's fundamentally too much work for any remotely healthy individual. I was really fucking good at it, I knew my place, and I taught myself I could fit, somewhat, in an environment I was absolutely convinced was not for me. I applied to a case manager position in Spencer.
Do I think they'll hire me? No, not as long as Laura is anywhere near this region's management. Here is precisely where the panic-spiral thoughts might begin.
I did NOTHING inappropriate, "cheating," illegal, or remotely questionable at my job. That is, besides develop a strong opinion about how we should and should not treat families. This got me blackballed from beginning my own case managment company that was 1 day away from getting contracted with DCS until Laura showed up. That thing I'm good at, with developed relationships all over town, and an eye towards bringing that efficiency and value to more people was shit on just as consciously and deliberately.
That's a bit of a shock to a newfound angle on your identity. I pivot to doing counseling things. Lo and behold, the same negligence, overwhelming schedules, disorganization and disregard exists across human services. So, again, I look to venture out on my own. Who do I pick a battle with next? Insurance companies, and lying middle-men who waste over a year of our time not getting us empaneled with them. What don't I offer? Any harm-reduction medication. What do people want? To find themselves stuck and comfortable in something familiar and bills their insurance.
I'm here after years of fighting to do something I've a proven track record of doing incredibly well, but for myself, or for a wage that allows me to get things like health insurance and a decent car without debt. My options are to either join almost perfectly corrupted greed and negligence machines, or stare into the void of a million other specialties that I'd have to spend weeks learning the language alone or semesters, and money I don't have, getting newly certified in. I can join these places and pay 35% of my already pathetic salary to keeping a car alive and donate approximately 75-85% of my free time in service to them in one form or another.
It's hard not to feel like I'm being unfairly punished like when I was a child. When I ran up against my mom's ego and insecurities is when I got the most shit beat out of me. It wasn't that I was so offensive and particularly destructive as a child. It was when I wasn't willing to submit. This wall of intransigence and proud smug gatekeeping and obfuscation throws me back into childhood. It's as visceral a reminder that nothing makes sense and nowhere is fair as I can ever get.
I know I'm not alone. The whole fucking world is addicted, anxious, depressed, or right on the verge as we all pretend to play middle-class. But that's the nature of your suffering, it's yours, and if you developed a habit to do so from a crippling loneliness tied to your fruitless efforts to belong, be recognized, or god forbid excel, in the words of so many condescending cunts, "good luck."
It's, somehow, even harder once you've tried. I have money from people who have seen the value in what I do. I have dozens if not well over a hundred professions from people testifying and explaining what my impact has been on their lives. I have hundreds more bullshit explicitly not supportive blown air up my ass sentiments about how important the work I'm doing is and what a meaningful and blah fucking blah job I'm doing. Something, somewhere, in this fucked up universe of ours refuses to just let me do what I'm good at and be evenly compensated for it. I don't get to balance. I have to swing between extremes because…anyone?
The living environment that allowed me to save the most cash was wholly precarious, changing constantly and without notice. The "most stable" jobs I've had require the complete subjugation of your will and morals. The most lucrative for the amount of time and effort drug studies require me to keep my fucking heart rate in check which went wildly out the fucking window the exact moment I had everything paid off and was gearing up to live on the land with thousands in the bank ready to go. That was years ago and I still suffer that "white coat syndrome" just thinking about screening. I had done consistent back-to-back studies for 2 years before that moment.
I would do nearly ANYTHING to just "keep my head above water." I don't care if it's counseling. I don't care if it's working for $5 an hour just doing all the little shit you hate to do. If my bills are paid, my time is mine, and I'm working towards something or someone that meaningfully represents my values and what I've been striving for my entire adult life, I will make it work. I dream of getting to work with my dad on the grave cleaning business. I keep half-joking, but not really, about being friends' personal assistants who have better access to funds. I've spent countless hours researching roles, niches, "weird" ways to scrape buy that don't cost more than they're worth.
I should be talking to people. The value they profess should have me never thinking about how the bills are getting paid or any amount of debt. In a world that made any fucking sense ever, that's what would be happening, and would have kept happening since I left the State in 2020. My last job should have honored the contract they hired me under and made me fully remote so I could have comfortably paid for the indefinite transition period of being a stable-enough non-profit.
I compound my suffering because part of my story is of scaling back, to again the extreme, my expectations and expenses. The last couple years notwithstanding, I've needed $5,000 to $10,000 to "basically live" each year. That's without health or home insurance. That's without a car that's likely to last more than a couple years. That's in my fort in cousin-fuck Indiana. That's eating many, many ham sandwiches, hotdogs, and tacos. I've spent almost my entire adult life trying to cut back, save, or wait for the moment I was "more stable." You think part of my spree to see "every band and comedian" isn't the recognition that I'm going to be 36 in less than a month and I've still got approximately the same problem I've had since I was 16? I went to like 6 concerts between 2007 and 2020 and saw a handful of comedians at The Comedy Attic.
I compound my suffering in knowing my capacity. I learn fucking quicker than shit. You give me the directions or coherent instruction and definitions, I will master whatever the fuck the thing is you do in less than month during business hours. No job exists that is so complicated some asshole didn't learn how to do it, and your particular field lingo and acronyms can be digested. You don't follow policy, just the 3 or 4 you've egregiously fucked up in the past or whatever's been updated that year, and only for the first few quarters. Numbers? Give me the 12 equations and 3 pieces of software you use. Documentation? I worked for the State. I can memorize dozens of forms.
I have the energy. I have the intention and will. I've ran so many experiments. I've spent so much money trying to fill in gaps in my perspective or for alleged "professionals" who can talk in circles and deliver nothing, but command insane hourly rates. I've tried working with friends. I've pitched myself in service to time-consuming work for family. I've tried enabling girlfriends. I've tried doing several odd-jobs concurrently while donating plasma and filling out online focus group bullshit. I've put in dozens of applications for anything remote to the tune of hundreds of spam emails. I just don't fucking know, dude.
There is nothing screaming louder at me than what feels like a perfectly noble and reasonable position of being the supportive, knowledgeable, energetic, accountable person I've been able to demonstrate across my roles be it social work or otherwise. WHY CAN'T I FIND A PLACE WHERE THAT MATTERS!? Dan Price is the only mother fucker on the planet trying to make it so?
Thursday, June 27, 2024
Tuesday, June 25, 2024
[1134] Play It Again
I need to complain a little bit now so I can preserve my overwhelmingly positive mood and sensibilities over the last few weeks.
I'm trying to do a few things at once. I wish to protect this "freedom" space of living considerably more budget-conscious than anyone usually can. I wish to keep myself available for opportunities, like this group that was supposed to start in July, for which I've been told increasingly conflicting things about how, or when, it would be funded. I'm also trying to ensure I can hold the line of boundaries I've put in place professionally and personally.It's all getting tested. There's some usual inconsistencies from potential clients and I had a typical facebook "conversation" that antagonized familiar spaces. You give me a number to call you the next day with? I do so, you avoid the conversation and immediately offer an excuse about a dead relative and promise to call me back midday? Yeah, my phone didn't ring.
I reached out about a potential opening for a fully-remote role in which the guy was supposed to get back to me "within the next few hours." It's day 2, I've called again, heard nothing back. I checked in about that group for July, at best it'll be ready in 2 weeks, but it's not the focus right now as the person coordinating it has much on her plate. I get sworn in as CASA and am told about the giant waiting lists and "We've got families lined up as soon as you graduate!" It's been 2.5 weeks. No one's emailed me after I asked what the hold up is, changed my supervisor before I ever got started, and I've spent more time drinking with the other volunteers than I have discussing any given family.
I also get asked, out of the blue by Byron, if he can call me about one of our mutual friends who appears to be going through some difficulties across the country. I entertain the conversation, and immediately feel not-great after hanging up the phone. I don't actually have any interest in diving back into one of his "let's try to save someone" adventures. To the extent I can help a friend, cool. Negotiating the money, time, and effort to solve a problem I'm not entirely sure is mine? It's my habitual inserting or eagerness to be involved in "supporting" those I took for granted would support me that has burned me constantly.
You know what would make me free, mentally and financially, to fuck off across the country to help? Finding me the $20,000 that wouldn't exist as debt had the last several years of effort and faith I put into helping not been betrayed.
I woke up today rearing to go. Last night I did some light rearranging of my space to make it easier to engage in some new hobbies and facilitate practicing some old ones. I started a burn barrel, picked up a package, vacuumed and layed out some of the other nagging-for-my-attention things upon waking up. I'm still eager to knock out little chores and practice. I got up earlier than usual and still wish to be swept up in the tide of "little by little" helping me get things done inside and out.
It's just unfortunate that my persistent pet-peeves and frustrations find ways to manifest in spite of my best effort. I don't control whether you call or email me back. I don't control whether you accept and work to service my conditions for rebuilding trust or accessing my well of effort and intention. I don't control whether I'm heard as "over-eager" or merely "enthusiastic" when I pitch myself as willing to work for free or across tasks when the main one is pending.
I can sit here, enjoy my coffee, shit, shower, and shave, and practice my coping skills. I don't know how to feel when it sinks in how much I'm constantly coping with just how completely full of shit people are. You have no idea how thankful I am that I have contrasting relationships to remind me that it's not everyone and always. It's a constant overwhelming threat, but the choice of how or whether to engage it is mine. Here's your blog, universe, you cunt. I'm going to go back to having fun.
Thursday, June 20, 2024
[1133] Fog Of War
You're born into a fog. It's little droplets of absolutely mystifying information sometimes cooling your face, sometimes collecting so thick you can't see and feel like you're drowning.
I find one of the defining factors of what I consider a "great" or superb-to-perfect piece of media is definition. The characters, good or bad, actually sit within the consequences of their strengths and flaws. They aren't randomly inserted at choice times because "the plot must go on." They aren't apologized for. They aren't treated like a schizophrenic episode manically punctuating a moment because a substantive idea couldn't be had. Things like "over acting" fall into this category, or the too-humbled place someone falls in being made an example of in your message-piece.
The analogy holds for the difference between a great and superb life. You can do a fair amount of "good" or "fair" things, and die without scandal or offense. But the people who lean into their characters seem to define precisely what we don't wish to be, or explicitly could. I think this is where ideas about "celebrity" versus "influencer" really diverge. A celebrity depicted timeless tropes and stories that have sustained us since we started telling them. We're drawn in. An influencer is trying to trap your attention. They're selling easy and accessible in a way someone pretending to be Hercules isn't.
Why should you want to be your character? I think about this a lot. My head echoes with the guy at a beerfest years ago who said, "You have celebrity energy." I feel like I know exactly what he's referring to, but have done next to nothing with it. I don't even know if he's actually met any celebrities, or if he's just unfamiliar with extroverts on a good day, but I'd be lying if I haven't, for years, rehearsed what I'd say on talk shows. But, what business would I have being there?
Famous chefs and political figures get their time in the sun without needing acting credits. If you spike in popularity for some viral moment, occasionally you can sucker well-known people into entertaining you for another 15 minutes when they're struggling for material. It's not something I really aspire to, but has always felt like it'd be something I should be prepared for. It may be one of the most irrational persistent thoughts I ever entertain. Bert Kreischer got mini-famous for partying. There was a couple years in college where people were shouting my name across campus still-enthused about one of mine.
Arguably, I'm more "blunt answer on the news" kind of "potential famous" at this point. I want to be known "in my world" whether it comes to social work things or if I manage to develop anything on the land. I listen to famous-enough people talk about how it's nice to not get mobbed, but it's never a bad day to have a stranger smile at you and tell you what an impact you've had on them. Garnering a certain notoriety tied to a creative approach or genuinely helpful fix to something is what I'd like most to lend my energy towards more than "look at me" or "let me sell you."
It's only exhausting to be the "life of the party" if you don't enjoy the party. If you're there out of obligation or desperation, it doesn't feel important or wise to invest in your character while you're there. If you're an appeaser who smiles and laughs at everything that doesn't earn it, or frame your existence as the thing other people need to enjoy themselves, I don't know how you refrain from resenting that immediately.
It's been about 2 days since I left off, and I've noticed another pattern that informs my foggy thoughts.
I look for people smarter than me to listen to. I like listening to nerds who specialize in some area to give me the details and history of topics I'll never have the patience or sustained interest in to research too deeply on my own. The thing about nerds, they usually only really know about that one thing. Even when they're talking about the logical fallacies or lapses in wisdom that "smart" people succumb to, breathlessly they'll mindlessly and unapologetically engage in said behavior if you give them 5 extra minutes to talk.
This makes me wonder what would happen if these people I enjoy listening to could get together and identify how to put a stop to that.
After 100 hours of Peter Boghossian interviews and videos, I can identify somewhere around 10 things he consistently does that feel like expressly poor framing, straw-manning, or frustration stoking that impede his ability to understand more about what upsets him.
The If Books Could Kill guys will matter-of-factly relay what they believe to be someone's, say Steven Pinker's, political opinions and conclusions to be and poo-poo qualifiers and context to endlessly insist there's a more insidious misstep occurring. Because they'll do so back-to-back with a genuine fact check that refutes bad research, it feels more right of a behavior and posture than it is. I think you get to score a point for calling out a bad, old, or piddling example used in service to the broader argument. You don't get to mind-read.
The amount of times Jordan Peterson is invoked as a kind of shorthand for alt-right nonsense is such a cliche lazy thing to do, he feels like the next Ayn Rand in the mind of a liberal who thinks reading or listening to him will make their head holes leak. He's become a king for speaking outside of his lane and religious apologetics, but he didn't start that way, and still sometimes recognizes when he's fallen off certain cliffs. That should matter. He's couched in so much stupid, but he's not Ben Shapiro, Candace Owens, or even the most manipulative religious dicks he gobbles like Jonathan Pageau.
The religiosity of Chris Hedges and Cornel West keeps them perfectly blind to what you'll hear argued from Sam Harris and the guests like John Spencer who specialize in the history of urban warfare. Masih Alinejad, Yasmine Mohammed, and Maajid Nawaz are functionally silenced when it comes to an honest discussion about the practical and moral consequences of cultural ::ehem:: differences. Noam Chomsky will talk out of one side of his mouth about American imperialism, and downplay what funded his early career with biting defensiveness.
I think Coleman Hughes does a decent job of bothering to engage people on different topics while being less adept, than say Sam Harris, at knowing enough particulars of a given subject matter to undermine his fastest-talking guests. Coleman can get a side-stepping apologist or defensive Ph.D. to get caught in their errant missing-the-point loop which can be interesting in shedding light on how hollow the basis for many popular and too-many-books-about ideas really are.
I just listened to Yanis Varoufakis refer to what's happening in Palestine as a "genocide," after detailing a historical picture of how France and Germany have played out politically and economically. His penchant for insightful financial analysis or digestible conceptual frames stalls outside his lane like so many on the left who think this is the first time in history war has killed or starved children and continually forget who started the whole fucking thing.
Seth Meyers, who've I've gathered has cared about real shit, has a segment where he does corrections on what he's broadcast on his main show. John Oliver will do similarly, but you can feel him routinely skirt and downplay the brunt of a critical conclusion about the position he's explaining, and pawns off deeper responsibility like Jon Stewart used to do before his return on a sensibility that, "It's comedy first, after all."
I guess I want to know, what is it that makes the ability to reason, and reason so strongly, simply, and concretely just stop at a certain point?
Is there a mechanism in the brain that gets overwhelmed or hijacked?
Is there something we can measure at the level of emotion that prevents new or conflicting information to take hold?
Why does it feel impossible and unrealistic to get a standard for discerning and discussing information to as good as it ever can get, and then strike a dissonant note so simultaneously fluidly, and weirdly consistently in that extra bit of time you give someone to talk?
At a certain point in my "learn everything" behavior, it sank into my bones the futility of the effort. Whether I was trying to record every animal name in notebooks as a child, read/watch every book, lecture, debate, or online fight related to religion versus science, or do ALL THE THINGS when it comes to home projects, playing instruments, playing video games, listening to bands or podcasts, or seeing shows. You either learn to enjoy the ride, or you suffer the infinitely incomplete indefinitely.
It feels like the project of being a "public intellectual," is to professionally create a fog around yourself as you detail out someone else's. Are you both united by reason? Occasionally? Certainly more than you're united by a god concept, but a god complex instead? I'm not sure.
In my naming different people, I feel I should shout out to Naill Ferguson, Christopher Hitchens, and Michael Shermer. For the amount of subjects they can (or did) opine on, I've gotten the most consistent sense of that general respect for reason and its process. That Naill and Ayann Hirsi-Ali are married suggests to me your heart is clearly the most irrational thing, thus invoking "passion" for your position is always a loser. My pithy grievances with Sam Harris and "free will" I'll probably take to the grave like Dan Dennett.
We'll "believe" in "science" until it threatens our "identity." Our statistics are the one true statistics and not something to contextualize with dozens more at all times. I see another in road for why people adopt the perpetual high-horse-ery of a religious system. Is there any greater power than feeling no obligation to even state plainly what it means to butt-fuck your little boys or bag your women?
The intellectual wants to feel powerful too. I think they fuck up when they wish to cling to a certain "truth," like any religious apologist, instead of the truth of a process. You'll never lift the fog just by blowing your hot air.
I find one of the defining factors of what I consider a "great" or superb-to-perfect piece of media is definition. The characters, good or bad, actually sit within the consequences of their strengths and flaws. They aren't randomly inserted at choice times because "the plot must go on." They aren't apologized for. They aren't treated like a schizophrenic episode manically punctuating a moment because a substantive idea couldn't be had. Things like "over acting" fall into this category, or the too-humbled place someone falls in being made an example of in your message-piece.
The analogy holds for the difference between a great and superb life. You can do a fair amount of "good" or "fair" things, and die without scandal or offense. But the people who lean into their characters seem to define precisely what we don't wish to be, or explicitly could. I think this is where ideas about "celebrity" versus "influencer" really diverge. A celebrity depicted timeless tropes and stories that have sustained us since we started telling them. We're drawn in. An influencer is trying to trap your attention. They're selling easy and accessible in a way someone pretending to be Hercules isn't.
Why should you want to be your character? I think about this a lot. My head echoes with the guy at a beerfest years ago who said, "You have celebrity energy." I feel like I know exactly what he's referring to, but have done next to nothing with it. I don't even know if he's actually met any celebrities, or if he's just unfamiliar with extroverts on a good day, but I'd be lying if I haven't, for years, rehearsed what I'd say on talk shows. But, what business would I have being there?
Famous chefs and political figures get their time in the sun without needing acting credits. If you spike in popularity for some viral moment, occasionally you can sucker well-known people into entertaining you for another 15 minutes when they're struggling for material. It's not something I really aspire to, but has always felt like it'd be something I should be prepared for. It may be one of the most irrational persistent thoughts I ever entertain. Bert Kreischer got mini-famous for partying. There was a couple years in college where people were shouting my name across campus still-enthused about one of mine.
Arguably, I'm more "blunt answer on the news" kind of "potential famous" at this point. I want to be known "in my world" whether it comes to social work things or if I manage to develop anything on the land. I listen to famous-enough people talk about how it's nice to not get mobbed, but it's never a bad day to have a stranger smile at you and tell you what an impact you've had on them. Garnering a certain notoriety tied to a creative approach or genuinely helpful fix to something is what I'd like most to lend my energy towards more than "look at me" or "let me sell you."
It's only exhausting to be the "life of the party" if you don't enjoy the party. If you're there out of obligation or desperation, it doesn't feel important or wise to invest in your character while you're there. If you're an appeaser who smiles and laughs at everything that doesn't earn it, or frame your existence as the thing other people need to enjoy themselves, I don't know how you refrain from resenting that immediately.
It's been about 2 days since I left off, and I've noticed another pattern that informs my foggy thoughts.
I look for people smarter than me to listen to. I like listening to nerds who specialize in some area to give me the details and history of topics I'll never have the patience or sustained interest in to research too deeply on my own. The thing about nerds, they usually only really know about that one thing. Even when they're talking about the logical fallacies or lapses in wisdom that "smart" people succumb to, breathlessly they'll mindlessly and unapologetically engage in said behavior if you give them 5 extra minutes to talk.
This makes me wonder what would happen if these people I enjoy listening to could get together and identify how to put a stop to that.
After 100 hours of Peter Boghossian interviews and videos, I can identify somewhere around 10 things he consistently does that feel like expressly poor framing, straw-manning, or frustration stoking that impede his ability to understand more about what upsets him.
The If Books Could Kill guys will matter-of-factly relay what they believe to be someone's, say Steven Pinker's, political opinions and conclusions to be and poo-poo qualifiers and context to endlessly insist there's a more insidious misstep occurring. Because they'll do so back-to-back with a genuine fact check that refutes bad research, it feels more right of a behavior and posture than it is. I think you get to score a point for calling out a bad, old, or piddling example used in service to the broader argument. You don't get to mind-read.
The amount of times Jordan Peterson is invoked as a kind of shorthand for alt-right nonsense is such a cliche lazy thing to do, he feels like the next Ayn Rand in the mind of a liberal who thinks reading or listening to him will make their head holes leak. He's become a king for speaking outside of his lane and religious apologetics, but he didn't start that way, and still sometimes recognizes when he's fallen off certain cliffs. That should matter. He's couched in so much stupid, but he's not Ben Shapiro, Candace Owens, or even the most manipulative religious dicks he gobbles like Jonathan Pageau.
The religiosity of Chris Hedges and Cornel West keeps them perfectly blind to what you'll hear argued from Sam Harris and the guests like John Spencer who specialize in the history of urban warfare. Masih Alinejad, Yasmine Mohammed, and Maajid Nawaz are functionally silenced when it comes to an honest discussion about the practical and moral consequences of cultural ::ehem:: differences. Noam Chomsky will talk out of one side of his mouth about American imperialism, and downplay what funded his early career with biting defensiveness.
I think Coleman Hughes does a decent job of bothering to engage people on different topics while being less adept, than say Sam Harris, at knowing enough particulars of a given subject matter to undermine his fastest-talking guests. Coleman can get a side-stepping apologist or defensive Ph.D. to get caught in their errant missing-the-point loop which can be interesting in shedding light on how hollow the basis for many popular and too-many-books-about ideas really are.
I just listened to Yanis Varoufakis refer to what's happening in Palestine as a "genocide," after detailing a historical picture of how France and Germany have played out politically and economically. His penchant for insightful financial analysis or digestible conceptual frames stalls outside his lane like so many on the left who think this is the first time in history war has killed or starved children and continually forget who started the whole fucking thing.
Seth Meyers, who've I've gathered has cared about real shit, has a segment where he does corrections on what he's broadcast on his main show. John Oliver will do similarly, but you can feel him routinely skirt and downplay the brunt of a critical conclusion about the position he's explaining, and pawns off deeper responsibility like Jon Stewart used to do before his return on a sensibility that, "It's comedy first, after all."
I guess I want to know, what is it that makes the ability to reason, and reason so strongly, simply, and concretely just stop at a certain point?
Is there a mechanism in the brain that gets overwhelmed or hijacked?
Is there something we can measure at the level of emotion that prevents new or conflicting information to take hold?
Why does it feel impossible and unrealistic to get a standard for discerning and discussing information to as good as it ever can get, and then strike a dissonant note so simultaneously fluidly, and weirdly consistently in that extra bit of time you give someone to talk?
At a certain point in my "learn everything" behavior, it sank into my bones the futility of the effort. Whether I was trying to record every animal name in notebooks as a child, read/watch every book, lecture, debate, or online fight related to religion versus science, or do ALL THE THINGS when it comes to home projects, playing instruments, playing video games, listening to bands or podcasts, or seeing shows. You either learn to enjoy the ride, or you suffer the infinitely incomplete indefinitely.
It feels like the project of being a "public intellectual," is to professionally create a fog around yourself as you detail out someone else's. Are you both united by reason? Occasionally? Certainly more than you're united by a god concept, but a god complex instead? I'm not sure.
In my naming different people, I feel I should shout out to Naill Ferguson, Christopher Hitchens, and Michael Shermer. For the amount of subjects they can (or did) opine on, I've gotten the most consistent sense of that general respect for reason and its process. That Naill and Ayann Hirsi-Ali are married suggests to me your heart is clearly the most irrational thing, thus invoking "passion" for your position is always a loser. My pithy grievances with Sam Harris and "free will" I'll probably take to the grave like Dan Dennett.
We'll "believe" in "science" until it threatens our "identity." Our statistics are the one true statistics and not something to contextualize with dozens more at all times. I see another in road for why people adopt the perpetual high-horse-ery of a religious system. Is there any greater power than feeling no obligation to even state plainly what it means to butt-fuck your little boys or bag your women?
The intellectual wants to feel powerful too. I think they fuck up when they wish to cling to a certain "truth," like any religious apologist, instead of the truth of a process. You'll never lift the fog just by blowing your hot air.
Monday, June 10, 2024
[1132] Hang Out To Dry
I'm, technically, decently accomplished today. I, after maybe a year or so, have finally started to disassemble my garden shed that blew over in a storm. It's a haven for mice, spiders, and all of the many creatures that inhabit southern Indiana wilderness. It antagonized my sinuses. It was, more or less, a fairly straight-forward breakdown given my history of taking down sheds and ownership of appropriate tools I've acquired. The reason it feels worth bringing up is in the nature of what I feel accomplished about.
As I said, I've torn down a few things much larger and more complicated than this one room 15' x 8'. There's nothing "new" in this for me to learn or feel that hasn't taken days, if not weeks, in the past, and the ongoing frustration of not initially having the things I needed to do it effectively. A good portion of the wood and panels were damaged upon crashing, so even as a salvage operation it's a touch wanting. It had a bunch of stuff inside, some I've moved elsewhere, but some that still needs carting or housing away from the elements. I don't suspect I'll have the desire or energy tomorrow morning to do it before I head to another concert.
This shed tear down is in the middle of what I'll call a "productivity wave." The weather has been brilliant, and I am one to often complain about how not-brilliant or feasible it is to work outside when I'd really like to. So far, I've managed to keep a chain of good happenings going at something of an even-keeled yet respectable pace.
My septic drainage system was not draining. I spent 2 weeks, very slowly and painfully, digging the muddiest of mud and sump pumping until I exposed the ends enough to figure out how to flow again. I weed whacked and dug up/attacked a dozen saplings and what I call "pricker bushes" for 4 hours. I pruned the invasive weeds threatening my driveway, scooped and dumped some rock, burnt some trash, bagged some aluminum, and rearranged some tools and shelves that had also blown over in that storm so long ago.
I've felt my cardio improving with each venture outside. I'm thinking through the projects so I'm not making a dozen ADHD trips in and outside for the scissors to cut the whacking line or reciprocating saw for choice screws that can't be pried. I'm thinking ahead to what will make an earnest approach to future projects a little easier. I've been chugging along the infinite chore list and not letting myself succumb to what feels like a sense of hopelessness that it's not that "engaging" or "the real work" that I'd otherwise like to be doing either through counseling or really any position of genuine service to someone or something I care about.
I mean this in an outsized way, I don't feel like I have much left to prove to myself. I'm convinced. I overwhelmingly tend to say what I mean, attempt to do what I say, and know what I'm capable of. I begrudge some circumstance, then throw on my pants and get back to work. I practice, even when I don't want to, some level of the things that keep me feeling generally okay or contented-enough. What kind of asshole would I be if I didn't utilize a breezy and cloudy day to approach an outdoor project like that? Especially because it didn't cost anything extra, like the fence or wood shop will.
I feel a sense of accomplishment in besting that sense of, "But I don't feel like it." My feelings don't really matter and rarely make that much sense. I understand this so well and so consistently that I routinely respond to them with a course of action that shows them how dumb and wrong they are. I don't think anyone who's been paying attention to my forays on the land for the last few years had any doubts that I could tear down another shed. I do think many would subconsciously root for that "I don't feel like it" sense to take me as it's taken them.
It's a meme, like everything now, to say you want to go off-grid or persuade all your friends to start a farm. It's this anxiety-inducing fantasy about a way to escape the trappings of modern existence. Allie professed to want to create this grand garden I'm pretty sure she's just abandoned entirely. I've heard from a dozen minor associates about their wish to grow things or raise animals or just have the space and time to reconnect with themselves and be more crafty or exploratory in their job pursuits. But, it's only the thought that they feel like engaging in. It doesn't feel right to take sentiments or dreams like that too seriously.
This fundamental disconnect I think speaks to the overwhelming amount of human misery. The, "I'm too tired," "I'm too busy," "I'm too scared," "I'm too dumb," "I'm too poor," "I'm too otherwise engaged in the pageantry of my current existence." We want familiar, predictable, "stable," and yes even stable in the nature of the chaos. We want to chirp our wishful stories like a birdsong, hear yours in return, and then retreat back to our nests for another fierce mastabatory session. Who were you singing to and why even bother?
I pointed out a couple projects that I estimated would take about a day individually, a couple weeks tops if I had the money to do them tomorrow. Some of the projects I pointed out I've managed to incorporate on this productivity train and have proven to fall along my estimations. This means I'm eating up the available occupations of time before I'm back to doing inside stuff. This means I'll be ticking boxes and crossing off lists, so "accomplished" in my little corner, realizing all of the little pieces it takes to maintain the freer nature of my circumstances.
I'm at a stage that's trying to maintain and protect my freedom. From here, it looks very much like freedom isn't what anyone really wants. Absolute freedom is of course madness. Confinement can be worse than death. "Naturally," we find ourselves boxed into the constraints of cultural norms, religious, let's call them suggestions, and our own pathological allegiance and conditioning bred from our familial circumstances. You would do the reasonable or most-desired thing, but your unreasonable parent will protest and then it will "be a whole thing…" on down the explanatory line to what practically manifests as the boundary to your cage.
People cross oceans to be "free." They brave rapey drug cartels and severe weather. People die in the name of being free from tyranny or undue oppression. When it's in-your-face bad, the value and importance of freedom will make you do anything. When it's been massaged into your working memory and language, well, you feel free already, right? That's why you come to so many shows with me.
You can't fix what you're not free to. You can't address something your vision and language aren't tuned to elucidate. We all suffer the consequences of our ignorant and hateful "leadership," and worst instincts of capitalism, and deliberate campaigns of "disinformation." When you're plugged in, it all feels very normal. It is what is. When you work to pull out? You have your most precious time to genuinely engage in a way that modern life makes impossible. I literally feel like a different and fairly helpless person when I'm locked into the middle of my "work" day. "Work" that requires me to sit around and wait, or suffer through a nonsense meeting, or commute for no reason, or fill out paperwork that could have been done 90% faster if anyone who gave a damn updated the system.
As I said, I've torn down a few things much larger and more complicated than this one room 15' x 8'. There's nothing "new" in this for me to learn or feel that hasn't taken days, if not weeks, in the past, and the ongoing frustration of not initially having the things I needed to do it effectively. A good portion of the wood and panels were damaged upon crashing, so even as a salvage operation it's a touch wanting. It had a bunch of stuff inside, some I've moved elsewhere, but some that still needs carting or housing away from the elements. I don't suspect I'll have the desire or energy tomorrow morning to do it before I head to another concert.
This shed tear down is in the middle of what I'll call a "productivity wave." The weather has been brilliant, and I am one to often complain about how not-brilliant or feasible it is to work outside when I'd really like to. So far, I've managed to keep a chain of good happenings going at something of an even-keeled yet respectable pace.
My septic drainage system was not draining. I spent 2 weeks, very slowly and painfully, digging the muddiest of mud and sump pumping until I exposed the ends enough to figure out how to flow again. I weed whacked and dug up/attacked a dozen saplings and what I call "pricker bushes" for 4 hours. I pruned the invasive weeds threatening my driveway, scooped and dumped some rock, burnt some trash, bagged some aluminum, and rearranged some tools and shelves that had also blown over in that storm so long ago.
I've felt my cardio improving with each venture outside. I'm thinking through the projects so I'm not making a dozen ADHD trips in and outside for the scissors to cut the whacking line or reciprocating saw for choice screws that can't be pried. I'm thinking ahead to what will make an earnest approach to future projects a little easier. I've been chugging along the infinite chore list and not letting myself succumb to what feels like a sense of hopelessness that it's not that "engaging" or "the real work" that I'd otherwise like to be doing either through counseling or really any position of genuine service to someone or something I care about.
I mean this in an outsized way, I don't feel like I have much left to prove to myself. I'm convinced. I overwhelmingly tend to say what I mean, attempt to do what I say, and know what I'm capable of. I begrudge some circumstance, then throw on my pants and get back to work. I practice, even when I don't want to, some level of the things that keep me feeling generally okay or contented-enough. What kind of asshole would I be if I didn't utilize a breezy and cloudy day to approach an outdoor project like that? Especially because it didn't cost anything extra, like the fence or wood shop will.
I feel a sense of accomplishment in besting that sense of, "But I don't feel like it." My feelings don't really matter and rarely make that much sense. I understand this so well and so consistently that I routinely respond to them with a course of action that shows them how dumb and wrong they are. I don't think anyone who's been paying attention to my forays on the land for the last few years had any doubts that I could tear down another shed. I do think many would subconsciously root for that "I don't feel like it" sense to take me as it's taken them.
It's a meme, like everything now, to say you want to go off-grid or persuade all your friends to start a farm. It's this anxiety-inducing fantasy about a way to escape the trappings of modern existence. Allie professed to want to create this grand garden I'm pretty sure she's just abandoned entirely. I've heard from a dozen minor associates about their wish to grow things or raise animals or just have the space and time to reconnect with themselves and be more crafty or exploratory in their job pursuits. But, it's only the thought that they feel like engaging in. It doesn't feel right to take sentiments or dreams like that too seriously.
This fundamental disconnect I think speaks to the overwhelming amount of human misery. The, "I'm too tired," "I'm too busy," "I'm too scared," "I'm too dumb," "I'm too poor," "I'm too otherwise engaged in the pageantry of my current existence." We want familiar, predictable, "stable," and yes even stable in the nature of the chaos. We want to chirp our wishful stories like a birdsong, hear yours in return, and then retreat back to our nests for another fierce mastabatory session. Who were you singing to and why even bother?
I pointed out a couple projects that I estimated would take about a day individually, a couple weeks tops if I had the money to do them tomorrow. Some of the projects I pointed out I've managed to incorporate on this productivity train and have proven to fall along my estimations. This means I'm eating up the available occupations of time before I'm back to doing inside stuff. This means I'll be ticking boxes and crossing off lists, so "accomplished" in my little corner, realizing all of the little pieces it takes to maintain the freer nature of my circumstances.
I'm at a stage that's trying to maintain and protect my freedom. From here, it looks very much like freedom isn't what anyone really wants. Absolute freedom is of course madness. Confinement can be worse than death. "Naturally," we find ourselves boxed into the constraints of cultural norms, religious, let's call them suggestions, and our own pathological allegiance and conditioning bred from our familial circumstances. You would do the reasonable or most-desired thing, but your unreasonable parent will protest and then it will "be a whole thing…" on down the explanatory line to what practically manifests as the boundary to your cage.
People cross oceans to be "free." They brave rapey drug cartels and severe weather. People die in the name of being free from tyranny or undue oppression. When it's in-your-face bad, the value and importance of freedom will make you do anything. When it's been massaged into your working memory and language, well, you feel free already, right? That's why you come to so many shows with me.
You can't fix what you're not free to. You can't address something your vision and language aren't tuned to elucidate. We all suffer the consequences of our ignorant and hateful "leadership," and worst instincts of capitalism, and deliberate campaigns of "disinformation." When you're plugged in, it all feels very normal. It is what is. When you work to pull out? You have your most precious time to genuinely engage in a way that modern life makes impossible. I literally feel like a different and fairly helpless person when I'm locked into the middle of my "work" day. "Work" that requires me to sit around and wait, or suffer through a nonsense meeting, or commute for no reason, or fill out paperwork that could have been done 90% faster if anyone who gave a damn updated the system.
That is miserable. That is a series of systems that negligently hate you through neglect. They don't care about your time. They don't care if you die in a car wreck on the commute home. They don't care if you ever get to your favorite vacation spot and enjoy it without a single thought about how your job is nagging you to come back. They don't care if 1% of your farming dream is actually real and what could manifest once you get your hands dirty. They care about the empty song they can sing into the world to signal their virtue and grasp of business as usual. You stay tamed, they stay in control. They feel as little about you as you feel for yourself.
I feel a lot about myself. I feel like a gassed up engine roaring constantly, yearning for a well-built appropriate track to race down. There's fresh tires, a whole crew working together, reasonable rules for the safe execution of shooting a well-oiled machine into the future. I'm a mass of constant kindling, waiting for the big 3 to ever all line up at once. Time, money, and tools, often in the form of another set of hands. I've had a shit ton of time begging me to irresponsibly spend so I can knock out land projects. I can make a shit ton of money provided I give some company 90% of my week and wish to spend 35% of it keeping my cars working and gassed. Often enough it's practically the rule, physical help comes with its own strings.
I said that I don't have much, if anything, to really prove to myself. I have a great many things I'd like to see and experience as a result of what I've already proven or know. I suppose I wonder, do you not see in yourself the same things I see in me? I know I got super caught up on that disparity in what I took for granted about my "friend" group and old roommates. This sucker naively genuinely believed. But I feel like part of me has always believed, or at least been doing the things that make it so it's not a belief system. I'm writing this on the back of another begrudgingly defiant series of actions in spite of my inane feelings. I don't have to believe in myself, I took pictures.
In school, I read the books. With girls, I struck the fuck out ten times for every hook up. I've taken the jobs I considered beyond my skill set and outside my frame of interest or reference. I'm living within the experiment of amassing and building with salvaged materials. I've kept the faith of an entrepreneurial spirit in investing and experimenting with ways to sustain the effort, for years, and in the midst of getting stolen from and constantly lied to. I'm seeing more shows in a month than most people I'll meet will in the next 10 years. I'm officially sworn in as a volunteer for the most uniquely stressful job they don't want to call a job. I'm spending more time with friends and my dad as I wait for work or life obligations to slot into this exceptionally hard-fought and winning picture I would like to make last for as long as I possibly can.
Alone, I know who I am, what I want, just about how I should go about it without sacrificing everything I care about, and what it could be if, oh, I don't know, the people I tend to get closest to don't scream at me, abandon me, or take advantage. I give a lot of credit to anyone who tries and fails. I can't understand not trying at all, giving up when it isn't like absolutely necessary, or failing to recognize and ride when someone has the same potential I feel I crave at this point. I feel like I've been wasted on so many people, but I also don't know how I could have done better or saved myself the grief. Thankfully, I know where I was coming from, even if they maybe never will.
I feel a lot about myself. I feel like a gassed up engine roaring constantly, yearning for a well-built appropriate track to race down. There's fresh tires, a whole crew working together, reasonable rules for the safe execution of shooting a well-oiled machine into the future. I'm a mass of constant kindling, waiting for the big 3 to ever all line up at once. Time, money, and tools, often in the form of another set of hands. I've had a shit ton of time begging me to irresponsibly spend so I can knock out land projects. I can make a shit ton of money provided I give some company 90% of my week and wish to spend 35% of it keeping my cars working and gassed. Often enough it's practically the rule, physical help comes with its own strings.
I said that I don't have much, if anything, to really prove to myself. I have a great many things I'd like to see and experience as a result of what I've already proven or know. I suppose I wonder, do you not see in yourself the same things I see in me? I know I got super caught up on that disparity in what I took for granted about my "friend" group and old roommates. This sucker naively genuinely believed. But I feel like part of me has always believed, or at least been doing the things that make it so it's not a belief system. I'm writing this on the back of another begrudgingly defiant series of actions in spite of my inane feelings. I don't have to believe in myself, I took pictures.
In school, I read the books. With girls, I struck the fuck out ten times for every hook up. I've taken the jobs I considered beyond my skill set and outside my frame of interest or reference. I'm living within the experiment of amassing and building with salvaged materials. I've kept the faith of an entrepreneurial spirit in investing and experimenting with ways to sustain the effort, for years, and in the midst of getting stolen from and constantly lied to. I'm seeing more shows in a month than most people I'll meet will in the next 10 years. I'm officially sworn in as a volunteer for the most uniquely stressful job they don't want to call a job. I'm spending more time with friends and my dad as I wait for work or life obligations to slot into this exceptionally hard-fought and winning picture I would like to make last for as long as I possibly can.
Alone, I know who I am, what I want, just about how I should go about it without sacrificing everything I care about, and what it could be if, oh, I don't know, the people I tend to get closest to don't scream at me, abandon me, or take advantage. I give a lot of credit to anyone who tries and fails. I can't understand not trying at all, giving up when it isn't like absolutely necessary, or failing to recognize and ride when someone has the same potential I feel I crave at this point. I feel like I've been wasted on so many people, but I also don't know how I could have done better or saved myself the grief. Thankfully, I know where I was coming from, even if they maybe never will.
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