One thing about not posting for a while, the first sentences of a new entry are supported by a pretty large stack of potential topics. (The jury is still out whether the title of this entry applies to this rule).
I can reach into this here deep comfy hat and pull out anything from ex-girlie stuff, to reflections about school, to my job search, to chemically encouraged introspections, or even just "summer." And any one of those topics comes complete with a handful of digressions that will surely make this into a dauntingly long entry. What the hell, right? Lots of words look pretty.
.Chapter 1: Girl
First of all, when it comes to revisiting significant periods in one's own life, Coincidence is always waiting in the wings to fuck with you. In an effort to inventory the sizable library of digital crap that I've accumulated over the years, I was going through old documents that have long since been burned to CD and forgotten. Papers dating from junior year of highschool were especially funny to read, because I could clearly notice my purposeful verbosity. Highschool teachers get off on 11th graders using words like "propensity" and making sentences that have so many syllables you would get dry-mouth by reciting just one of them. I think the A's I got on papers were purely based on word-choice. But even more signifigant than old papers were the chat logs I saved when I was going through a breakup a couple years ago. It was my first real serious relationship so of course when it ended, I was seriously fucked up for a while. For what I think is the first time since I stopped being phased by the whole thing, I confronted all of the bullshit through which I put myself (not to mention her, and a couple of my other friends). In retrospect, I handled it...errm...poorly. Seeing first hand my weasly spinelessness literally makes me wince. I mean, I see where I was coming from and all, but in all honesty, I wish I could go back to my past self and slap his poncy ass back to reality.
What's funny is that Coincidence saw a perfect opportunity to screw with me. Since 2001 we've been physically far from eachother. She lives in Ohio and schools in Ithaca, NY, myself in Pennsylvania. After not seeing her for more than a year or even acknowledging what transpired, I got a call from her cell that she and her friends were passing through town and needed a bathroom, a day after I had been sifting through the worst memories I have of her. Coincidence, you're a real card.
.Chapter 2: School
Done? You bet your ass I'm fucking done. I pulled lesser grades than I would've wanted, but I can't say the professors graded unfairly. In fact, for the work I did, they were generous on level rivaling that of voluntary organ donors. I think with any academic endeavour, I have to see how shitty I can do while still getting by, before I can actually apply myself. As it happens, college for a liberal arts student is pretty easy. If I wasn't so used to getting As and Bs for playing CMR3/4 and napping, I would surely have a solid 4.0. Yes, I feel guilty for this.
.Chapter 3: Jobs
I don't really want to talk about it.
.Chapter 4: Chemicals
Should I even talk about this? I have to pose an assumption before I do. I'll assume that anyone who reads this who might be put off by me doing drugs understands that I am a responsible 22 year old and can take care of myself. I understand moderation, it's as simple as that.
I visited my friend at school last weekend and, to say the absolute least, had a blast. We did stuff, and were sweet, and had an all-around awesome time. We ate and made up enduring quotes.
"Humanity is sobriety."
I was walking with my friend discussing something that I can't entirely recall. I believe we were comparing ourselves, in the state that we were, to the other people around us, sober, just going about their business, accepting interaction with other people as a matter of course. Accepting anything as a matter of course in the state that we were in is essentially impossible. So as we were walking down a walkway as everyone else was, I would look at a stranger's face. I would think of my significance to them, basically nothing, and I would be bewildered at how much of the human civilization is based on a really basic coping mechanism. Religion helps us cope with the unforseen future; small talk helps us cope with the enormous amount of variables involved with meeting someone new; culture is the manifestation of a bunch of people being really bored. Pretty much everything human can be narrowed down to a need for coping. That seems really nihilistic, but at the same time, if coping is the glue holding our civilization together, then it's really proved to be a fantastic impetus to keep us moving on to the next day.
It was an extremely cerebral experience that left me feeling refreshed and grounded. So much went through my head, but even so, it's possible to sum up in one word:
"Oops."
Posted by Alchemae at May 16, 2004 05:25 AM