My articulate reply was a hand-wave, swooping between helplessness and defiance. I dunno, I dunno, I dunno. There is nothing in my defense other than the usual stuff about the state of busy. For I do have things to write, not a day goes by without an observation that could use some remarking upon. Of course, the worst thing I can do as a producer of wordstrings is to make a mental sticky-note for later. Falls short of perfection as a system.
However, here are some random thoughts I remember:
i. There is a certain breed of person who mistakes making others uncomfortable with impressing them, or even worse, interpreting their discomfort as attraction. (NOTE: I've been guilty of this myself in the past, with much inappropriate humour to show off my tomboy coolness. For the most part, I've outgrown this tendency, and am happy to just alternately amuse and mortify close friends.)
There are at least two gents of my acquaintance that fall into this category.
One is a stiff-necked engineer who fancies himself to be a wild-and-crazy hipster kind of guy. He insists on prolonged hugs and robot-like cheeriness. His attempt to pull off suave is foiled by being an engineer (a Forrest Gumpian genus if ever there were one), and an unfortunate propensity to titter.
The other one is a Three-Named Thing Which Does Social Media. He tweets and facebooks and exhorts others to join the convo. I don't know how he makes a living. He is also a photographer. For municipal ribbon-cuttings, he lays on the ground full-length channeling Mapplethorpe and directs his models/town councilors in front of the new pump house, highway median, etc. I could enjoy him as a mere eccentric if he did not also stare, and ask ever-so thoughtful questions to show off his Active Listening skills. Creepy.
These two men make me uncomfortable. They ask impertinent questions. They mistake my unease for coyness, and whatever answer I stammer out as proof of our intimacy. Even if I mock the engineer mercilessly, he interprets this as sassy flirting. Yech. Luckily, my encounters with both men are sporadic and infrequent.
ii. The default for human behaviour is to follow the same negative pattern again and again until something breaks. It can be something relatively harmless, like making excuses for not exercising or eating better, etc. because of one's hectic life. The day of reckoning may be something innocuous, like hulk-shredding the ass of your jeans, say; or more serious, like a diagnosis of pre-diabetes from a solemn doctor. Whatever the wake-up call, it's up to each individual to heed or ignore it as they see fit.
Ignoring it leads to a curious schism, what Orwell referred to as double-think. It's the ability to hold two opposing ideas in your head--the one you know to be true and the one you know to be convenient--yet operate at will, according to the social context. Predictably, politicians and economists are masterful at this and vilified/admired accordingly. This is a societal cause for concern, or perhaps just a meta-indictment of human nature.
However, on a personal and moral level, we can control how deeply we sink into hypocrisy. Going in deep is a matter of choice. The danger of double-think as an M.O. is that it eventually turns in on itself, in a neat trick called cognitive dissonance. This is the risk one takes for the short-term rewards of suspending one's conscience.
Yes. All this serious talk of "one" doing something is my way of grappling with a friend's actions. While I have never thought her an especially profound or thoughtful person, I've always defended her as good-hearted. I've believed she tried to do the right thing, even when the results of her actions harmed others. Now I'm not so sure, or rather, I'm almost sure she is too far gone in moral relativism to understand or care about the results of her actions.
I'm raw on this point. My fellow's Ex's also has a pattern: meet someone/move in four months later/get him to buy a house instead of just paying the rent/get pregnant right away. It's helpful that she keeps the same four-digit phone number suffix wherever she goes, and decorates each house identical to the last. This has the distinct whiff of the black widow. It might only be cause for black humour, were it not for the existence of their wee and lovable daughter. It causes him great stress and uncertainty.
Well, if she holds true to her pattern she will explode her current relationship soon enough, and be on the move once again. Messy, messy, messy.
Other than those flashes of profundity, my other thoughts are along the lines of I'm so happy I'm back kick-boxing and I like skiing and I'm glad I deleted my facebook profile, I hate that shit and being gluten-free isn't that hard when you like to bake. Deep thoughts, indeed.
Another thought is that I like to write, and part of the reason I haven't written is wondering if it is frivolous and self-centred to write as I do, when I could be doing things like work and kid-time and book-keeping, etc. You know, grown-up stuff. Stuff that is satisfying on one level.
I do like to write, though. So as long as there's a person out there who likes to read, I suppose I should keep on a-bloggin'. For what it's worth.
Adieu for now,
GR
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