'Was that awkward?' a frequent afterthought of mine. I find disconnection in this modern world, not all the time and not with everyone, just in general. I find it in the devices we use for discourse, most commonly texting and social networking; anything devoid of emotion really. I will hear someone--in person--express an emotion, an emotion relevant to what's going on right in front of me. I do not react. I ponder it. I meditate on what's going on. This can be an inappropriate response. The delay is rude. This common dissonance inches me in the direction of being a non-person. Me, the automaton. You can cry your heart out to me and I'll stand like a statue; still with a blank expression transfixed on my face. It's dehumanizing but it isn't so much a pressing issue for me so much as it is a basic observation. Alas it is a problem I do not care to solve, as I am--perhaps ironically--unaffected by it.
This brings me to another point: nobody is looking for me. I do not have my phone on me at all times because I have nobody keeping tabs on me. I have only scheduled meetings or the notion that I'll hang out with someone in a two day period. I exist in routine, spontaneity is sparse. It's somewhat weird having no need to check my phone to see if someone is trying to get a-hold of me because seldom they are. I do not miss it. It's just strange. I'm confronted by this fact somewhere alone and strange, or perhaps somewhere I shouldn't be. There is no one tugging at my pant leg to question where I am or what the hell I'm doing, thankfully. I am a free range creep. I do not miss the days of rampant social living, dependent friends or family. I just don't carry around my cell phone with idle hopes of being asked how I'm doing or if I'm free on any given day. I'm content like this. I go to work. I hang out with co workers. I come home. I hang out with my room mates. I have late nights and days off. I meet my friends for fun. It's easy. I prefer this to the gray area of reaching out to someone or trying to meet the hand of someone else. My world is a crowded city street, I respect everyone's personal space, apologize for the occasional shoulder I bump and I'm pleasantly surprised by the occasional, almost familiar face I run into.
Starving Monsters, Sleeping Giants
What do you work for?
Experiencing nothing but marginal change.
Know not what more you want, know not what you want with what you've got.
Know that you can't leave, know that leaving won't change your condition.
Geography is not the problem.
The absence of motivation is the problem.
The absence of momentum is the problem.
The monster has grown overfed, nothing but seven deadly sins.
It's rival, the giant, lies dormant.
No intrinsic forces compel either to live or die, they just go on eating and sleeping.
Permalinks are a myth. Not really, they probably work on some websites. I like the idea of a permalink, linking to something that will not expire. I never heard the term link rot before, but I guess that's what it's called. The above image and the below video, for instance, will probably eventually rot. Like a video a posted some months back is now just a YouTube frame with the title of that old video in it. It's just frustrating to click on a link to see that it now leads to nowhere, or an error page of some sort. Reminds me of when people used to delete their profile on MySpace then all of their comments would disappear. I get attached to the digital mementos so it's saddening to know that they're even more transient than everything else.
The story of vomit. Earlier this month I had caught some form of food or alcohol poisoning. I was drinking gin & tonics and eating a lot of tamales. I didn't eat or drink an exceptional amount of either things relative to my normal intake. But the following morning I woke up around 8am and realized my stomach was feeling weird. I laid in bed for a good 40 minutes still dreaming, but the fact that my stomach hurt starting getting incorporated into some of my dreams. I got up and went to the toilet, see if I should vomit. It was difficult at first, I had gagged myself a few times to no avail but eventually I puked a lot. The consistency was very solid. So after some of this I crawled back to bed with the comfort of knowing I still had an hour or so of rest until I had to work. A restless hour or so later I walked to the bus stop a block and a half away. At the bus stop I still felt uneasy. I sat at a curb there staring toward the direction the bus was coming from, grasping my head and feeling sick. I started walking back home, I ignored the bus stopping for the couple running past me. Past the auto dealer I felt the necessity to vomit. I puked in front of and behind a dumpster. In pain I continued on my way back home, vomiting once more in a puddle in front a neighbor's house. Around 11am I called my superior, let him know I had to feel ill awhile more before I could make it into work. He made jokes of how I over slept or drank too much. It was decided I'd make it in for the latter half of my shift. I watched a movie and puked once more in the four extra hours I had worked into my day. That puke was painful. I let out the quantity of water I had drank that morning to feel better. Then there was a lot of dry heaving, burping, and pressure on my stomach amounting to nothing. My stomach was empty but the ill remained. Anyway, I made it into work for the dinner shift and I was grumpy at worst. The point of the story was just to tell about my day of food poisoning. The following day at work I ate no solid foods. And for the next few days I lightened up significantly on alcohol. Nothing seemed appealing to me. I reveled in that feeling, like anything bad for me or distasteful actually had no appeal.
"I'm not enthused."
I've picked up the phrase "I probably won't." lately. I like it. It's honest. Anyway, this has got to end somehow. So here's an inconclusive, incongruous paragraph.
It isn't until you microwave most of your meals that you realize just how precious the minutes and seconds of your life are. And if you've never microwaved most of your meals or ever wanted to kill yourself then you don't know what I'm talking about.
