A lesson

You settle. Oh do you settle.
But before then, you suffer.

Reminder

The real magic in things like coffee and cigars and macarons and paintings is taking elementary things, likes fruits and leaves and eggs and paint, and making them into something extraordinary.

This applies also to more intangible things like sounds (to music) and feelings (to love).

Then all I have to do is take my experiences, all the good and happy and bad and sad and hopeless times, and make them into something extraordinary. I have to do better.

Back to Kierkegaard

In college I read Lowrie's biography of Soren Kirekegaard (SK).  I learned a lot of things about SK from that book, but the most memorable thing about it to me was a lot of effort elucidating his personality. One particularly vivid thing about him was his penchant for walks around his city of Copenhagen talking with ordinary people. I imagine him taking walks, thinking. Of course, this isn't particularly mind-blowing ... I'm told Kant was very fond of walks, too (at the exact same time and place everyday...). But what made SK's walks different is that those walks probably were more like our kind of walks than Kants. You know, being that SK probably went on walks wondering "What's the purpose of this all? Why am I struggling so hard with [insert self-improvement goal]? Is this all there is (i.e. my career, my relationships, my seemingly insurmountable problems?"

And he came up with an answer. Part of it is letting go of the vice-like hold on reason. Part of it is accepting God. Part of it is realizing... it just is that way, and that's... okay.

26!

Birthday post. YES.

I'm pretty happy right now. Last night I blew cake with my family at midnight. Greeted by family and friends overseas. Woke up to sweet Facebook bday wishes. I make it a point to reply to every single one. It's like the best thing. There's not many reasons to talk to old friends but at least when they hit me up I can ask/tell them a thing or two. And I get to reminisce on memories with that person.  I love that. Seriously.

Tomorrow I get to hangout with my best friend traveling all the way from Socal. I'm the luckiest.

God, what a kinda shitty 25th I had though. If I could only begin to say...

But it's all water under the bridge though. There were times when I didn't even know how I'd get through the day, sometimes the week... a month once! But there were some good times of course. Visited Italy and France last Winter for my mom's bday and I had a blast. I can even say it was my second time there, for both countries... Don't even deserve to be able to say that. But merci God! Grazie God! I'll visit again someday.  And I still have a great job. That's the real blessing right there. Very thankful for that every single day of my 25th. Man, I really hope I can do some good in academia.

There's not much structure to this post. I'll even update it later. I'm just spewing birthday happiness onto my blog. It's like the ultimate hair-cut, you feel great for that one day. I admit this blog has been monotonously sad the past few blogs... well it's true my 25th was a tough year.

26's looking good so far :)

Gogol's insight

Recently, I picked up Nikolai Gogol and some of his work. It's sad that I never read much of him in college. Not that I would trade him for Dostoevsky or Tolstoy or Chekhov... but I wish I at least read his "The Overcoat" or "Nevsky Prospekt" at least once then...

“What an amazing world we live in!” I thought to myself the other day as I walked along Nevsky musing over these two stories: ‘How strange, how inscrutable the games fate plays with us! Do we ever attain the object of our desires? Do we ever achieve that to which all our efforts seem to be directed? Everything happens the wrong way round. To one Providence has given a pair of splendid horses, and he rides along indifferently, oblivious of their beauty, while another, whose heart is fired with a passion for horses, is forced to go on foot and must content himself with licking his tongue at the handsome beasts which gallop past. One fellow has an excellent cook, but, alas, is unlucky enough to possess such a small mouth that it cannot accommodate more than two pieces of meat, while another has a big mouth…but, alas, has to content himself with some sort of German concoction of potatoes. What strange games fate plays with us!” 

- Nevsky Prospekt

We know this. But he said it right.

Irrelevant

In dire circumstances this weekend I opened up the book "The Problem of Pain" by C.S. Lewis hoping to find some semblance of sense of the shit I put myself through.  The idea of the title is telling enough.  I forgot how prim yet lucid Lewis wrote.  I haven't read any prose of his style in recent times; no one writes that way anymore. I only got as far as the introduction to find Lewis expressing his gentle disclaimer that the book wasn't what you're hoping for when you find a book of that title (never-mind the author himself being a professor):

“... When pain is to be born, a little courage helps more than much knowledge, a little human sympathy more than much courage, and the least tincture of the love of God more than all.” - C.S. Lewis

 His book was more of an intellectual discourse. Not particularly what I needed at the time since it was technically irrelevant to what I was hoping for... but I continued.

There's a poignant passage somewhere in the book -- I'm going off memory now -- where Lewis talks about how sad it might be to actually be in God's position.  Imagine being someone's last "choice". When all of a person's bridges are burned and all he or she has left is you for comfort or solace, or, daresay, help... that's not a particularly pleasant place for you.  You know this person is just there to see you now because you're the only person who's left.  Be it because of your kind nature or what other people say about you being a nice person -- whatever -- but this person all of sudden considers you a friend as a last resort. You should know better than to lend help to this leach.

Yet, that's God. And he's okay with that.  He knows full well the truth (no chance guess here) that you're only trying to get in good connections with him because He's the only one left. And really, He's okay with that . He loves you nonetheless. We might call God's position sad but he's okay with that. Ain't that something about Him?

There's a whole bunch of other stuff that Lewis is erudite about but I think I got what Lewis is saying.

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You know you've got it bad when you start reading Bukowski. In theory his writing is exceptionally cathartic but you'd never actually want to be in a lot of Bukowski's positions. He often writes about stuff when stuff isn't how we'd like it be. But yet... here I am... reading "Gambler's All".
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Bad things and how things are when it's bad is great to write about. Living it is another story.

I wonder who you'll meet

I meet people for three hours at a time.
And I'll never see them again.

Sometimes you meet someone who's beautiful
At least they seem so
Then you wonder what if things were different
If you actually knew this person
And then suddenly you want to become
Everything you're not

I've already internalized it
I'm not that attractive
At least not conventionally

Maybe if my skin was lighter
Or maybe if I was rich
Maybe if I was younger
Maybe if I was taller

Maybe if I wasn't broken
I wonder if we could ever be

How timid I am
The world has taught me so
And I'm tired of trying against it

So I'll just give a small smile
And wish you farewell
And wonder who you'll meet
And who will caress your lips
And touch your cheeks
And run his hands through your hair

And who will laugh at your jokes
And make you coffee in the morning
And take you dates to beautiful places
But rather is fixated on your face

And who will argue with you
About some mundane issue
And who will wipe
the tears from your face
When life is unbearable

And I'll wish it could be me

Fighting

I've been a little heavy on the drama in the previous blogs. I'll keep on running with it. 

I'm unhealthy. It's clearly obvious that I can't do too much physical activity. I can't run a mile right now. But even more, sometimes normal things are hard to do. Just waking up and making a day plan and carrying it through ... gets me tired (physically... mentally is another story). 

So I drink coffee. It helps. I know I shouldn't have to though.

But something that helps when I want to be a lazy fat man that gets me up is the thought: 

"Aaron, fight for your life". 

That helps a ton. Living is a fight. I need that realization right now. Lively things fight -- they move and cry and laugh. When babies are born? You hope they come out crying (right?)? 

I need that vitality. I need that cold water. Now more than ever.

Trying to remember

... how it felt to think something meant something for you. 

I've almost given up on this blog. Not intentionally. But if unintentional, is that worse? Or even more, who cares (whether intentional or unintentional... or at all?)? 

Honestly I'm returning to this blog even more confused than before about my life. With fleeting certainty. Pitiful (me). But it's okay. It's okay. Everything happens for a reason, remember? 

Haha I swear I have different moods than existential gloom. I don't want the world to remember me this way. In fact, I'd prefer the opposite. And there's so much beauty in this world... I try not to get dragged down by the dreary... but it's so easy.  The worst part is that when you're dragged down you often don't go alone. You take other people with you (you?).   

Honestly it's cathartic letting it out onto this blog. I'll know I'll bounce back. I still have faith that I will :) With time, yeah. With prayer, yeah. But for now, thank you. It's helpful. I'm not a strong as I think I am or hope I am.  I get tired a lot. But that's okay. It's okay. 

All in degrees. That's the key. It's okay because it's not all or nothing. In fact, it is all AND nothing. And everything in between. Let me explain:

I make a goal to sleep at 11:00 pm. I look at my clock, 10:50 pm. Okay, ten minutes left. I check Facebook, I check my calendar. I check Twitter, I check my messages. 10:59 pm. Okay, better sleep now. 11:00 pm -- wait! I forgot to check my Instagram... 11:10 pm. Shit. Okay, I'll sleep at 12 am.

Why not sleep at 11:11 pm? Or 11:25 pm? 12 am is still okay, a little on the late side. But even 11:45 pm would have worked better in my favor.  Point is --  you don't hit your goal.  Don't throw it all away. Hit your goal +1 minute. Hit your goal +2 minutes. It's okay. Still better than your goal +60 minutes. It can get worse. What's worse? Well... your day next day would be rather shitty without sleep.  (In this sense I've been sleepless far too long. Time to sleep.)

That's my current predicament. I can't get any clearer than that. If I did, what fun would that be? 

Exquisite sadness

"The agony is exquisite, is it not?" - Miss Havisham (the BBC rendition).

These are sad times. And it's reflected in our music. Everything from "Stay High" to "Pill in Ibizia" to the latest "It Ain't Me" mixes sad and somber realities with techno-synths and dope drops.

I'm taking something from this positive. Perhaps in the sad dramas of life, it really isn't about trying to "avoid the storm"... rather, to "dance in the rain". And isn't that what we all should be doing really?

Look at the early Christians. Persecuted amid the Roman purge. They had some joy and solace in Christ regardless of their limbs being ripped apart from them.

Can you really spin every situation into a beautiful one? Or rather, make something beautiful out of sadness? I think you can. And I'm ready to find out.