Dewey Dell

“…I would think how words go straight up in a thin line, quick and harmless, and how terribly doing goes along the earth, clinging to it, so that after a while the two lines are too far apart for the same person to straddle from one to the other; and that sin and love and fear are just sounds that people who never sinned nor loved nor feared have for what they never had and cannot have until they forget the words.” WF

but at what proportion...

Perception = x Memory + y Senses; 1 = x + y

The end.

indulge

"Such private choices, though technically 'free,' are quite literally dysfunctional with respect to our values and norms. Privatization means the choices we make eventually determine the social outcomes we must suffer together, but which we never directly choose in common.

"This explains how a society without villains or conspirators, composed of good-willed but self-seeking individuals, can produce a culture that so many of its members despise. Consumer capitalism does not operate by fielding self-conscious advocates of duplicity. Rather, it generates thinking on the model of the narcissistic child, infantilizing consumers to the point where puerility is not simply an option; it is a mandate. If the attitudes and behaviors that result turn out to undermine cultural values extraneous to capitalism’s concerns — however deeply relevant they may be to moral and spiritual frameworks and to the shape of an ideal public culture — that is too bad. This ethos does not disdain civilization; it is merely indifferent to it. Consumer capitalism encourages individuals to indulge in behavior — however corrupting to civilization — that is useful to consumerism.

"Even as an ethos of limitless consumption encourages us to regress, privatization compels us to withdraw from our public selves, to secede from the public square and fence ourselves in behind gated communities, where we deploy private resources to turn what were once public goods, such as garbage collection, police protection, and schooling, into private commodities. What we fail to see is that when public goods are privatized, they are subverted. You cannot protect a few in the midst of general insecurity; you cannot educate a few in the midst of societal ignorance."

multitasking... tasklessly

“There is time enough for everything in the course of the day, if you do but one thing at once, but there is not time enough in the year, if you will do two things at a time."

"that not privation but luxury is the wolf at the door"

“You should not have too many people waiting on you, you should have to do most things for yourself. Hotel service is embarrassing. Maids, waiters, bellhops, porters and so forth are the most embarrassing people in the world for they continually remind you of inequities which we accept as the proper thing. The sight of an ancient woman, gasping and wheezing as she drags a heavy pail of water down a hotel corridor to mop up the mess of some drunken overprivileged guest, is one that sickens and weighs upon the heart and withers it with shame for this world in which it is not only tolerated but regarded as proof positive that the wheels of Democracy are functioning as they should without interference from above or below.” TW

Poey

"From childhood's hour I have not been
As others were - I have not seen
As others saw - I could not bring
My passions from a common spring.
From the same source I have not taken
My sorrow; I could not awaken
My heart to joy at the same tone;
And all I lov'd, I lov'd alone."

hiatus

Temporarily (?) discontinued.

poof

Maybe this isn’t a breakdown at all; maybe this is an awakening from the breakdown I had six years ago, a return to a self I was too cowardly to explore (or is it too late?). Or maybe instead of retreating into a false state of dull adulthood, this time I’m retreating into a lost state of infantilism. Well regardless of motive, this feels far more natural, more personal than my prior escapist effort. What it means and whether or not it sticks is completely inconsequential.

I dislike my apartment. I purchased all its furnishings during a period in time when I was least acting like myself. Much later, post-change, a friend even remarked that I wasn’t even dressing like myself and that my appearance had become dull and formalized. (In fact I was completely hysterical at the time and doing my best to suppress a breakdown by repressing my own persona… such lovely solutions I come up with!) So as an act of self-rebellion and rejuvenation I’ve been slowly and creatively trashing the place. I always kept my place so clean, not just out of my natural compulsion, but mainly because I’m so secretive. I couldn’t leave stuff just laying around because I didn’t want people snooping at what I was writing or what I was reading. I always made an effort to clean up after myself because I didn’t like people coming over and being able to piece together what I was doing during the day before they arrived. It’s actually quite silly because most of the time my habits are innocuous. I could be doing something as simple as watching a DVD, but I wouldn’t want someone seeing that I had or knowing what I'd watched just by observation; I would want it to be my choice as to whether or not I felt like telling them, and even then I’m highly whimsical about which things I choose to share, especially when it comes to the most mundane of details.

It would probably be rare or at least uncharacteristic for any guest to be snoopish enough to be reading something I had left out, but my paranoia does not require reason. And in reality, it’s not like I had people over that often, but really just one person. [Disclaimer: There wasn’t really a need to be secretive. Things that were intentionally hidden were not really things that needed to be known. There wasn’t even the least bit of suspicion of nosiness, and actually to some dismay the case was quite contrary. My habits were/are secretive purely for the sake of being secretive.] But since I live alone and don’t really have guests over anymore, I find myself oddly letting loose.

I no longer have to clean my bed off every weekend, so it’s become completely littered with books and clothes. I have scraps of papered notes piled up on every table surface, lists all over the place, sorted stacks of DVDs sprawled about the floor, and other disorder and unfinished projects laying in wait. Since I have huge lists of vocabulary words I’m trying to memorize, but never seem to pick up, I’ve decided instead to use tiny Post-it notes and am slowing covering the wall along my bed with vocabulary words (definitions on the back). Now whenever I feel sick of reading or writing in bed I can lay there and relax by scanning my word wall and seeing how many I can add to memory. I hope to cover the entire wall, constantly adding new words and taking some down when I feel I have them memorized long-term. I also have a pile of clothes I’m meaning to give away, stacked-up like an ever-increasing bonfire in the middle of my bedroom. (I tend to wear the same ten or so things over and over so I see no point in having as much, unworn, as I do.) I thought about just throwing away as much as I could of everything, living as austerely as possible, but that seems a bit hasty. I’ve kept a lot of out nostalgia that I no longer think are worth keeping, e.g., I pretty much still have everything I’ve written since I was eleven. I’ve been tempted to throw it all out as a means of purging myself of past selves but since such things take up so little physical space, I have a hard time justifying letting them go. But slowly I am trying to junk a lot of nonessentials one by one, replacing them in lesser quantity with things more inspiring and less wallowing.

Yes, of course I’m not a messy person, and so what I consider chaotic is still quite organized by most people’s standards. Besides, it’s not really a matter of uncontrolled clutter so much as building up a sanctuary instead of the present prison. Perhaps that’s a bit hyperbolic but its induced mentality can make all the difference.

...and worse. (that which is fragile is being shaken)

Try all I want, I can't lock myself away.

I am not as victim to solitude as I'd like to be. I keep getting thrown off track by that which is external and uncontrollable. I use these instances as excuses, as justifiable intimidation. But new lights reveal the rough terrain of those steps immediately before me and although I will not traverse this allotted path with grace, I will not cower as my first reaction, to regret that which is inevitable and exacerbate that which is unknown.

I will keep going.

back mind

My lack of honesty alienates me more than any lack of companionship could.

awake

My pen struggles to keep up with my thoughts. The light comes back on after I have bedded myself. The eyes pop open well before the alarm clock has rung. I cannot keep up. Of course I'm just gibbering here, stalling before getting ready for work, but I haven't been this alert (and also this sensitive) in so long that I don't know what to make of it. I am both grateful for its return and intimidated by its fragility.

Perhaps it is only the tea.

the trollop

The onset of panic spurred by sudden alienation has finally subsided and returned once again to a livable equilibrium. Although in varying degrees, I repeatedly succumb to the possibility of beneficial human interaction when I know my rightful place to be solitary. Such a dream-like tromp will one day break me, irreparable, as each failed instance further chips away the protective cover I sustain myself within. My susceptibility is pure foolery and I cannot trust myself enough to remain level-headed when offered that which is desired but unwieldy; I fall apart.

And so sequestered, I return to the one reliable outlet (and inlet): the written word. There I am safe. There, my environment can be controlled. I now find myself writing and reading more profusely than I have in years. I can’t say that things are necessarily better now (in many respects, unspoken, quite worse), but I find myself less affected, more manageable, and stable. Perhaps this can be made into a life after all.

***

I don’t need anyone. Is such a statement defensive or liberating? Is it a delusional lie? Is it fear? Is it a bold stance for independence or a sign of just how wounded and alone I feel, scraping together what little dignity I have left into an obvious misappropriation? In part, I willfully go looking to get hurt, dragging myself into situations in which I know the destructive outcome. But is it out of enjoyment or punishment? Maybe my foolery really isn’t so at all: I rarely let on just how perceptive I am, how much I foresee the consequences but cannot (or will not?) occlude the momentum of my behavior. Frightfully, I pursue certain poor choices just to prove myself right in my perceptions, and unfortunately, I’m usually right. But could that also mean that I subconsciously partake in creating those negative consequences? I’m reactive. My only strength is defense. I wouldn’t know what to do if I wasn’t struggling against something. Usually such battles are internal and there the outcomes can be beneficial; the danger lies in those which are external and that is why I withdraw from interaction, to purge myself of this bad habit.

starved

Engulfed by a hunger for affection, which desperation long ago made so very unlikely, these reactive passions inflict an incessant sorrow, imperturbable. They carry so much weight and strain against an inner nature that impedes more so than it will ever define.

lured

"Actually, art too is, or should be, an addiction - which is only to say, a permanent discipline of the mind and the emotions according to given mode. As for danger, every artist who attempts something very big or very original subjects himself to considerable risk. Practical failure in his project (self-judged or other judged) may have serious consequences."