variety pack

This is a collection of things I’ve written in my phone at various moments. These are in chronological order from when I got the phone, so it represents a bit of my stream of consciousness over the past year.

* Perhaps part of my disbelief has to do with the discovery that just about everything that people do has a rational explanation, and that there is no need for a supernatural element to understand my life or any other person’s.

* In holding disdain for people who give in to certain aspects of pop culture by attaching implications of attitude and values to specific products, brands, labels, and styles, we commit the same error as they do by believing that these have any meaningful connection to personal character.

This sprung from a surge of hipster-hate in my social circles.

* It’s easy to confuse a desire for certain feelings and emotions with a desire for the people once attached to those emotions.

* Rather than feeling resentment or envy when witnessing romantic love, we should grateful for the presence of something so beautiful, and rejoice in it.

It can get very lonely when all the people in my house are gone. I have learned that I am highly dependent on regular, quality socialization.

* I am glad knowing that I am the person that I hope to become.

I was very proud of myself when I acquired that last job.

* The things that make this job better don’t seem to contribute much to overall happiness.

The novelty wore off after two months.

* Write a story centering around a reality where snow is the color of tar.

Walking almost two miles in the snow to go to job you hate brings on thoughts like this.

* Every smell unlocks a memory nearly forgotten. It’s a bittersweet thankfulness that I haven’t forgotten, tainted by the lack of recent, powerful memories to fall back on.

* My sense of place has been completely destroyed. What do I do when there is no one and nothing to indicate what the best decision is. It seems as though there are only worse options, standing in this dim light.

This was around Christmas. That job really made the future look very grim. There’s nothing quite as confusing as being told that you smile too much.

* Even the stories you thought perfect have been ruined. What is your hope now?

A friend of mine nearly captured what I thought was the perfect fairy tale romance. I was really crushed when I saw it didn’t work out.

* Hunger is a constant reminder of what life will be like if I fuck up again.

I’m grateful to have experienced the hunger that I did, but I don’t want to do it again. Kind of like the psych ward.

* Currently, I live in a world designed for my demographic. What will my outlook on the world be when I am no longer a part of the target demographic everywhere I go?

I walk through downtown every day to go to work. There’s a shop with this mannequin in this really amazing dress, posed really elegantly. While that dress isn’t made for me, it is very clearly made in the fashion of women my age. I had a brief thought of how sad I would be if the mannequin were dressed in something I didn’t like. What if, 20 years from now, the mannequins are dressed in clothes I hate, but the generation after me loves? Will I like the world less? Will I care at all?

* Everything that can be said about capitalism’s virtues can also be said of war.

This is an undeveloped thought that occurred to me during a discussion about the merits of libertarianism. I might run with it in the future.

* What if music appreciation is strongly linked with sense of time and consistency of assessment?

I still don’t know why I love techno so much.

* Don’t ever think of yourself as replaceable.

I had a rather morbid thought: if I died right now, the world would lose nothing more than an office worker. A new one would be doing my job in a month. It made me very angry to think about my worth being measured in those terms.

* Ask why more often. We should want to know other peoples’ justifications.

People don’t demand enough of each other. While I trust my friends’ judgment of quality, I should also want to know the reasoning by which they made those judgments. Simple, really.

* Imagine your feet in place of someone, here, a thousand years ago.

* By making your feet like the terrain beneath you, the painful parts become normal, and the outliers become a pattern of delicate intricacies that can in no other way be known.

Barefoot walking/running has invoked some weird thoughts. It gets very zen after 5 minutes of walking on sharp gravel. That’s about as best as I can describe it.

* When faced with sharks, it is advantageous to have another shark with which to beat another shark. Having a shark is better than not having a shark. In this way, survival rate increases with number of sharks.

My logic is impenetrable.

* The thought of experiencing it.

So much of my head is filled with thoughts of experiences.

* There’s a woman out there that you want. Go find her.

I get like this when I see a uniquely beautiful woman.