The thoughts are gone. It went in waves, of course, like many things - a gradual decline. You stopped writing fiction, and then you stopped writing blog posts, and then you stopped writing emails, and then you ceased to be the one thing you always wanted to be. Many a post in this blog have alluded to giving up on what one might want or desire over the course of existence. Perhaps it's for the best.
There is no conditional "perhaps" in front of the best that previously happened. Through all the tumult and stress and foot stomping and regrets and critiques, your wife stood there in her dress and smiled and you smiled and a weird calmness - about singing in front of a crowd, speaking in front of a crowd, a permanence you for years derided as silly or even stupid - washed over you. There was a rightness here, like the rightness you feel when exploring the streets of Kuala Lumpur, tropical heat and palm trees and rotten durian all assaulting you, of watching a sunset from Darwin beaches, perfect colors splashed across a clear, warm sky, of drinks at a dive bar in Vietnam, company louder - just barely - than the 6 month old billboard hits, but this time it was about a person, not a place, not a time. Or maybe it was a time, a forever stretched out into the very horizon you sat and meditated on from as many corners of the world as possible. A person forever, not setting and rising but there embedded into you like the heart she has tattooed on her wrist. The passport has been unstamped since 2016.
There is a pursuit, at times, of so many things that it is hard to figure out what they are. A pursuit of reading and writing more, a pursuit of video games, a pursuit of travel. It's easy to dwell on the nil here, but harder to spend time with a brief reward. Two classes aced, a life partner, a sense of self that might come and go but at least is no longer the transparent it once permanently was. You sit and painfully watch the clock wishing the night with her wasn't about to end, when in the past, you just wanted it to end, to fall asleep, to never wake up. Now you want it to stretch on for eternity, cuddled up on the couch, laughing all of life's anxieties away. Still there is more around the corner. The counter says two blog posts in two months, one of them not even yours. The book sits next to the bed folded on its spine still somewhere where you left off. Your friends talk about a game in ways you barely understand anymore.
So many references dangle in and out of earshot, quotes, in-jokes, a sort of language owned only by the most select people, you revel in what it means. For so long your language was global, only shrouded in niche internet references insomuch as the internet can be niche, now you have a network of one where language is your own creation, your own household. It feels weird and new and exciting. You and your wife can speak a version of English only you understand. An actual love language. It's weird to think millions more exist.
You still have no idea where any of this leads. All seemed impossible. You knew being a writer was impossible years ago. You knew moving to southeast Asia was impossible years ago. You knew being married was impossible years ago. You knew singing in front of a crowd was impossible years ago. Who knows what you'll think is impossible tomorrow? The counter for May ticks to two. In three days June will read 0. It's easy to focus on the nil.
Thursday, May 30, 2019
Thursday, May 2, 2019
goodness/you in this light
How do you measure goodness?
On the fridge, a bag of very, very tiny measuring spoons hang in a plastic bag pinned against the chalky white texture of the door via a circular magnet. The spoons are so small that they look like straws. Even smaller. It's a wonder how such a thing could hold or carry anything.
How do you measure goodness?
Worth is innately tied to our work. If you don't work, you aren't deserving. This is a mantra, the mantra, what we are couched in from day one. Help those who will help themselves. How can someone love you if you don't love yourself. It absolves us of all collective badness. You are your own person. This community is not mine.
How do you measure goodness?
Find someone you trust and, as a social experiment someday, ask them to define "work." In my experience, you will soon have someone tripping over their own conditional statements. Work is often the job, that is the first start, it's what we have to do to survive. Most people will start to expand - housework is work (with many caveats, usually from men), but before you know it, there becomes a breakdown. Homework is necessary, not work. It is not "labor hours." But then labor hours are just our job, and our house, our hygiene, these are not our job in a strict sense, but they can be. You can get turned away from a job interview because your clothes are too wrinkled, your hair not combed, your fingernails dirty. And before you know it, the common argument - the common attempt to define work -- breaks down. Writing is work if it's for your job, if you receive money for it, but outside of work? It is a hobby. It is a creative outlet. The nature of the work is not changed in any material way. Housework isn't real work. Homework isn't real work. Flossing your teeth every day isn't real work. Before you know it, the stay at home mom doesn't do any work. She has no goodness. She is not worthy.
How do you measure goodness?
A man comes out of a haircut with a new hairdresser drenched in sweat and nervous to have suggested a change. For years it was the same haircut, at the same person, disappointed each time with the results but knowing that hair would grow back. The new haircut was better. There are changes, ideas, but the man felt better coming out, minus the shirt now feeling like it had been dipped in a tub. Discomfort revisited and overcome. The only reason he went was because his fiancée was there with him, a guide, a comfort in a sphere considered so anxious the man would have not done it without her. Some light. It was such a small thing made big by anxiety, by fears, by a brain sometimes out of control, careening down the tracks. Someone was there to help it along.
How do you measure goodness?
Most billionaires have given money to charity, many of them large amount. As a percentage of their wealth though, they give very little. And as they run roughshed over the environment and labor, people debate if they have bought enough credit to do so. The donations pay for the badness. The capital revenues are work, so they are worthy. Work has been defined. Goodness has been measured in dollars. The stay at home mom is not worthy, again.
How do you measure goodness?
My parents defined goodness as a 4.0 with no exceptions, as good performance in sports with no exceptions. Anything less was badness, was a flaw needing to be yelled out, scrubbed out, like the cleanliness we were coached on from day one of our existence as kids (me and my sister). We were a simulacrum, or an attempt at one. Because it all made sense, we've all heard it. Good grades, good job, now worthy. Goodness attained.
How do you measure goodness?
We can't define work, we can't define worth, we can't measure goodness. The spoons are too small for me to handle. Try as I might, the powder escapes. Try as I might, I can't estimate the creek in the park. Try as I might, I can't measure the time I have spent measuring the time I have spent. We know bad when we see it, we toss and turn over consumption and friendship. Goodbye to John, he dropped the n word. Goodbye to Chris, he was a bully.
How do you measure goodness?
There is very little I, personally, have contributed to this world. I have not, alas, made a billion dollar donation, canvassed for people's rights, or dedicated my entire life to the soul pursuit of ethical goodness after I lost 3 years of sleep over agonizing about a friend's tacky boots.
How do you measure goodness?
Perhaps I fit inside the spoon. Perhaps the people who try their hardest to be there for me are the goodness, and that's all I can offer myself. Perhaps that's good enough, for me, for them, for all of us. Perhaps it's not. In the time you were reading this, someone overdosed and died. Someone died in a war. What goodness was available is now lost.
How do you measure goodness?
I skim this post and roll my eyes, mostly. I'm not fond of much of my writing, but this feels, unambiguously, like my high school self in a way. Vacuous and poorly formed. Not enough distance, not enough deference to elaborate sentence schemes and self-deprecation. Nothing really intelligent or revelatory or noteworthy. Killer Mike said prepare to be average. Can that be measured? It is my first post in over a month. I can not measure any goodness here. Just a void.
How do you measure goodness?
The spoons hang still on the fridge. A small webpage on a college website updates my total accumulated credit hours by 4. A check arrives in the mail connotating a reimbursement of taxes paid. The worth is unambiguous. I have no idea what it means.
-End
On the fridge, a bag of very, very tiny measuring spoons hang in a plastic bag pinned against the chalky white texture of the door via a circular magnet. The spoons are so small that they look like straws. Even smaller. It's a wonder how such a thing could hold or carry anything.
How do you measure goodness?
Worth is innately tied to our work. If you don't work, you aren't deserving. This is a mantra, the mantra, what we are couched in from day one. Help those who will help themselves. How can someone love you if you don't love yourself. It absolves us of all collective badness. You are your own person. This community is not mine.
How do you measure goodness?
Find someone you trust and, as a social experiment someday, ask them to define "work." In my experience, you will soon have someone tripping over their own conditional statements. Work is often the job, that is the first start, it's what we have to do to survive. Most people will start to expand - housework is work (with many caveats, usually from men), but before you know it, there becomes a breakdown. Homework is necessary, not work. It is not "labor hours." But then labor hours are just our job, and our house, our hygiene, these are not our job in a strict sense, but they can be. You can get turned away from a job interview because your clothes are too wrinkled, your hair not combed, your fingernails dirty. And before you know it, the common argument - the common attempt to define work -- breaks down. Writing is work if it's for your job, if you receive money for it, but outside of work? It is a hobby. It is a creative outlet. The nature of the work is not changed in any material way. Housework isn't real work. Homework isn't real work. Flossing your teeth every day isn't real work. Before you know it, the stay at home mom doesn't do any work. She has no goodness. She is not worthy.
How do you measure goodness?
A man comes out of a haircut with a new hairdresser drenched in sweat and nervous to have suggested a change. For years it was the same haircut, at the same person, disappointed each time with the results but knowing that hair would grow back. The new haircut was better. There are changes, ideas, but the man felt better coming out, minus the shirt now feeling like it had been dipped in a tub. Discomfort revisited and overcome. The only reason he went was because his fiancée was there with him, a guide, a comfort in a sphere considered so anxious the man would have not done it without her. Some light. It was such a small thing made big by anxiety, by fears, by a brain sometimes out of control, careening down the tracks. Someone was there to help it along.
How do you measure goodness?
Most billionaires have given money to charity, many of them large amount. As a percentage of their wealth though, they give very little. And as they run roughshed over the environment and labor, people debate if they have bought enough credit to do so. The donations pay for the badness. The capital revenues are work, so they are worthy. Work has been defined. Goodness has been measured in dollars. The stay at home mom is not worthy, again.
How do you measure goodness?
My parents defined goodness as a 4.0 with no exceptions, as good performance in sports with no exceptions. Anything less was badness, was a flaw needing to be yelled out, scrubbed out, like the cleanliness we were coached on from day one of our existence as kids (me and my sister). We were a simulacrum, or an attempt at one. Because it all made sense, we've all heard it. Good grades, good job, now worthy. Goodness attained.
How do you measure goodness?
We can't define work, we can't define worth, we can't measure goodness. The spoons are too small for me to handle. Try as I might, the powder escapes. Try as I might, I can't estimate the creek in the park. Try as I might, I can't measure the time I have spent measuring the time I have spent. We know bad when we see it, we toss and turn over consumption and friendship. Goodbye to John, he dropped the n word. Goodbye to Chris, he was a bully.
How do you measure goodness?
There is very little I, personally, have contributed to this world. I have not, alas, made a billion dollar donation, canvassed for people's rights, or dedicated my entire life to the soul pursuit of ethical goodness after I lost 3 years of sleep over agonizing about a friend's tacky boots.
How do you measure goodness?
Perhaps I fit inside the spoon. Perhaps the people who try their hardest to be there for me are the goodness, and that's all I can offer myself. Perhaps that's good enough, for me, for them, for all of us. Perhaps it's not. In the time you were reading this, someone overdosed and died. Someone died in a war. What goodness was available is now lost.
How do you measure goodness?
I skim this post and roll my eyes, mostly. I'm not fond of much of my writing, but this feels, unambiguously, like my high school self in a way. Vacuous and poorly formed. Not enough distance, not enough deference to elaborate sentence schemes and self-deprecation. Nothing really intelligent or revelatory or noteworthy. Killer Mike said prepare to be average. Can that be measured? It is my first post in over a month. I can not measure any goodness here. Just a void.
How do you measure goodness?
The spoons hang still on the fridge. A small webpage on a college website updates my total accumulated credit hours by 4. A check arrives in the mail connotating a reimbursement of taxes paid. The worth is unambiguous. I have no idea what it means.
-End
Tuesday, April 2, 2019
Guest Post
This post is a guest post from my soon to be wife because I refused to write a blog post and instead made dinner.
Our relationship with food is tenuous, it sustains us but ultimately distracts us. Right now there is hemming and hawing over the fact that food is necessary. The kitchen harbors a pacing man, listing the ingredients to a dish we will never finish. He hums along to hozier, he pulls the asparagus from a vase- in short, he is distracting himself, distancing himself from some further notion. He would love for this to be a simple night, a restful night. He would love for this to be a productive night. He cannot decide, and decides not to decide. He wishes there were someone else to make this decision. He won't accept the decision when it comes.
Days are like meals- overfull, necessary, and tedious. We drizzle them in fat, oil, sugar, and heat, we watch them sear, applaud ourselves the little victories. We still fall asleep, overfull, overworked, overtired. We still fall, hunger full of empty notions.
The cabinets are slamming, falling against the cheap 70's style grain. The drawers are shifting, the water running. We are all noise, no sight. We are all days, no nights.
Our relationship with food is tenuous, it sustains us but ultimately distracts us. Right now there is hemming and hawing over the fact that food is necessary. The kitchen harbors a pacing man, listing the ingredients to a dish we will never finish. He hums along to hozier, he pulls the asparagus from a vase- in short, he is distracting himself, distancing himself from some further notion. He would love for this to be a simple night, a restful night. He would love for this to be a productive night. He cannot decide, and decides not to decide. He wishes there were someone else to make this decision. He won't accept the decision when it comes.
Days are like meals- overfull, necessary, and tedious. We drizzle them in fat, oil, sugar, and heat, we watch them sear, applaud ourselves the little victories. We still fall asleep, overfull, overworked, overtired. We still fall, hunger full of empty notions.
The cabinets are slamming, falling against the cheap 70's style grain. The drawers are shifting, the water running. We are all noise, no sight. We are all days, no nights.
Wednesday, March 13, 2019
break or broken
the best writing you ever did was after taking a multiyear break. no blogging, no fiction, nothing. you came back with ideas and motivation and in 2 years punched out dozens of stories and hundreds of blog posts.
your mind tells you it was a waste. time in your 20s, wasted. the writing isn't good enough, doesn't matter, anyways. no stories published, blog posts old and forgotten, some deleted out of poor quality or revealing info, who knows.
you squint and realize you haven't written fiction in years. you dream of a scifi novel, or even a melancholy short story. your blog is its quietest in 4 years. a break was good last time. but now you're 30. everything decays now. life is busier now. you're not getting better, not learning, so why not keep trying. write nothing, force ideas, stare at a screen. was the break important? was the writing even better when you came back? do you tell yourself that to justify abandoning your lifelong dream? you wrote before about how it's best to abandon it when you're young and won't be disappointed that it doesn't come true later on. you're still drawn to the screen, the black text on white background, the idea that maybe today it'll be different. it never is.
your mind tells you it was a waste. time in your 20s, wasted. the writing isn't good enough, doesn't matter, anyways. no stories published, blog posts old and forgotten, some deleted out of poor quality or revealing info, who knows.
you squint and realize you haven't written fiction in years. you dream of a scifi novel, or even a melancholy short story. your blog is its quietest in 4 years. a break was good last time. but now you're 30. everything decays now. life is busier now. you're not getting better, not learning, so why not keep trying. write nothing, force ideas, stare at a screen. was the break important? was the writing even better when you came back? do you tell yourself that to justify abandoning your lifelong dream? you wrote before about how it's best to abandon it when you're young and won't be disappointed that it doesn't come true later on. you're still drawn to the screen, the black text on white background, the idea that maybe today it'll be different. it never is.
Tuesday, March 12, 2019
all at once/make it last
it's not uncommon to hear someone grapple with the difficulty of wanting to eat a good meal all at once, to completely entirely indulge, and yet want to draw it out and make it last. both have cons intrinsic to food; eating too fast is a quick route to physical discomfort, while at a certain point, too slow can cause the quality to degrade say, via, a cooling temperature or slow change in texture from when something first hits the plate.
this is just food though, and while it's the most common application of said conundrum, it is far from the only. there's a desire to have everything and nothing, all at once and make it last. to live an entire life with the person you love right here and now, have it all and feel it all and taste it all, and yet a desire to drag it out, to not blast off this rocky vestibule and into the vast nothingness of death. and it's not even entirely something so profound. it presents itself in slightly different ways and different sectors but with the same sort of conundrum. the tears shed by emma on her last day at the high school newspaper were similar; a sense of finality, closing, the end of one stop when all she would talk about was how excited she was about college, and then it was here, it was now, and she was crushed. we talk about plowing through college to avoid debt and time and study and homework and yet the end feels like an impenetrable, unknowable object, waiting with just another cycle of future excitement and sad closing. we want it all at once; the degree, the knowledge, the experiences, the nervous makeouts, and none of it all at once, the closure, the ending, the job. we want the taste but not the bloating, the sunsets but not the chores, the love and warmth but not the separation caused by the likes of work or family. maybe that's the difficulty. it's not whether we eat the meal all at once or overtime. it's that every option comes with a tradeoff we don't want, a repercussion we wish to trade in for something else. and as you get older, more and more of these become a personal choice you have control over, and not a parent, or teacher, or peer. maybe we're all stuck staring down at the plate not having made up our minds. what would you like for dinner? i don't know.
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