why i am so wise*

* the title of this post is a self-joke. it is a reference to the Penguin Great Ideas series version of works by Nietzsche. the reason it is a 'joke' is because when i think Nietzsche i think a lot of things, but wise isn't one of them. brilliant, maybe. smart, sure. compelling, occasionally. wise? not quite. in fact, wisdom is so far from how i see Nietzsche that i find the title to be... well humorous (although i haven't read this particular collection, so i'm not certain whether the title was intended to be humorous or not).


SOME OF MY FAVOURITEST SONGS OF ALLLLL TIME, A LIST:

- a sunday smile, beirut
- what a wonderful world, eva cassidy
- gravity, bic runga
- mr jones, counting crows
- i'll try anything once, julian casablancas
- roads, portishead
- jazzybelle, outkast
- my weakness, moby
- wild is the wind, nina simone
- bachelorette, bjork
- new slang, the shins
- brown eyed girl, van morrison
- in the air tonight, phil collins
- scarborough fair canticle, simon & garfinkle

i suppose it could go on forever.


___*___*___*

the plane landed (late). i'm home for 4 days, then off again. none of this makes me feel particularly good. to be honest i'm not sure i feel any whichway about it. it just is. is what needs to happen now. i know better now than to fight the tide of the times; i've learnt that much over the last few years. sometimes you have to tumble along and wait till you land where you're supposed to land. it's not a process i'm ever going to be completely comfortable with. i'm probably too proactive and too regimented to leave my future up to circumstance. but, despite my best efforts all my victories/failures have been entirely circumstantial. sometimes i get letters in the mail. acknowledgments of my applications. some are rejections. i like it, as a token. as evidence that people are maybe actually reading my letters. flipping through my resume and thinking: who is this q-guy, do we like him? (meanwhile, my plan B is now firmly standing on its two feet and my position on the faculty has been confirmed, if i want it). (so there's that. smaller dream, but then, dreams shouldn't have any volume anyway).


___*___*___*

i did finally watch the tree of life. i'm not sure what i think of it yet, i liked soo much of it but the ending really bugged me. if anyone has an opinion i'm keen to hear about your experiences with it.


___*___*___*

if i dream nowadays it's about the zombie holocaust. it sounds amusing but it's not really.


___*___*___*

life isn't often episodic, not the way hollywood films are. if anything, it's thematic - with the themes leaking into one another like held notes on a pipe organ. sometimes two themes can exist simultaneously for years. developing a little bit here, a little bit there. then finally, one disappears into the other. maybe colours is a better example than held-notes. like watercolours that slowly shift and merge into one another.

for years my theme was: home. then 'just like that' it seems to have subsided. i think i stopped feeling it. or wanting it. or understanding it. i made my peace with the fact that i don't know what it feels like anymore. my current theme is: age.

'did it make you sad?'
'what?'
'all the babies.'
'oh.'
'they're all pregnant right?, that's what you said, they're all... pregnant or having babies.'
'yah, they are._____ but no. not sad._ not exactly.'
' ? '
'distant. it made me feel far away. and worse, it made me feel... far away and drifting farther away still, like there was some crossroads and if i... '
' ... '
'you know the rest. maybe.'
'i think i get it.'
'i just felt behind in life. whatever that means - since there's no objectivity to these things. who can compare the things they've been through versus the things i've dealt with - '
'right'
'right. but. __still.'

a g e . in other words: time when you start to see time as a distance. that's what age is. when you start to conceive and understand and feel and measure time in terms of distances to/from people, places, experience, ___that's age.
___also, it's a physical thing. a thing that happens in and to your body. my face is 'squishy'. my skin. there's something to it, it's weird i don't remember it being like this. my patterns of fatigue and the way my excitement feels is different. my thoughts have a way of drifting into nothing and coming back again, their pace is different. anyway it's something that happens in you because you grow to resemble your favourite tree. also, it happens to you, something you didn't want anything to do with and it falls on you like a blanket.

anyway.


___*___*___*

i'm exhausted but i refuse to sleep. i have a long day tomorrow too. still. ___this is the first alone moment i've had in over a week, i'll be sorry to see it go.


___*___*___*

i'm tired.
i'm scared. i don't even know of what. just of something. something waiting.

a great note to sleep on.