Bottoms up.

Oh, I have been bitten in the bum by my prevarication.

Right now, a fib is keeping me from fixing myself dinner. I am very hungry, but my desire to preserve the lie’s believability is keeping me stapled to my seat. I really shot myself in the foot on this one—the lie I used could have been avoided and I would have been able to eat!

Ah, well, that’s what lying gets you. And it’s so totally stupid, why I’m lying. I don’t like one of my apartment-mates very much, but I didn’t really figure that out until after several conversations with him. I get the impression he thinks I’m still his buddy. He invited me out to dinner and my mind said "no no no" and I said I’d eaten already.

And I’ve set myself up for an unpleasant event in the future, for when he looked sad that I said no, I told him we could go somewhere when I come back (I’m going home for two weeks; I leave on Saturday). I think his memory is shit, though, so if I can scrap up a bit of luck, he’ll forget!

Yes, I am an asshole and a dumb ass. I could put in the effort to be honest, but I’m probably never going to see this bloke again, so I don’t see the point in riling up bad feelings for what is going to be tiny gains.

I’m still working on being good, okay? On some days, I’m an absolute goody two-shoes, I swear (my um…money-free forays into cultural appreciation don’t count), but then you have times like these, and I am shit.

I think duplicity’s the worst vice I’ve got. I also think it’s one I’ll never entirely get rid of. As much as I think "more good is good," my pragmatic side is like, "You can accomplish more by working toward your own good." In this case, my good means my comfort—no interpersonal headaches or lasting ill-will.

I suppose deep down I am a misanthrope (funny how my eighth grade English/history teacher got that right). I do fantasize about how wonderful it would be if I didn’t have to worry about this sort of thing and could just be off in my private world. Select visitors are all right, but I prefer hiding out in my observing tower.

Oh, dear, I’m sounding more and more like an asshole. More recently, I’ve been noticing that I can’t find the asshole in a group of people I’m in, which then means I’m the douche. Which is a position I’d hoped to never find myself in, but there you go. I am an asshole. I am not proud of the fact, but at least I can admit it.

Oh, good lord, the aforementioned apartment-mate has knocked on my door at least three times while I was writing this post and the last time, I audibly let out an exasperated sigh when I opened the door and he noticed. I made up an excuse, but I don’t know if it worked. God dammit.

I think I’m going to have to go to bed on an empty stomach. 

Life, in its infinite, swirly magic-ness, has got me in its grip again. I feel surprisingly good, like I’ve got warm bubbles inside me.

Sometimes, I wish the feeling were permanent. Imagine the things I could do, if I were always in a positive frame of mind.

But just earlier today, I was thinking to myself how even being sad makes me feel happy sometimes.

Ecch, I guess that just means I still don’t know what I really want.

I do know that every so often, I get overwhelmed by the beauty in the world. Is it real or is it imagined? I can’t help but think I’m participating in this bourgeois make-believe world of idiots when I get all overcome. I do, and I do not want, to be swept away by meaningless emotion.

Sunday, August 19, 2:50 AM

Well! I’ve come off that high. My nose is filled with the smell of chlorine. Me and my flatmates finally got our shit together enough to try and clean up, which essentially meant a bleach holocaust. Except now everything smells kind of fishy. Is that normal?

It did put a considerable cramp in my day, though, so aside from a bit of scrubbing, I didn’t do anything much today. I had intended to take care of a few things, but a mix of irritation, anxiety, and fatigue kept me hidden in my room. I can’t wait until I go home. That’s in two weeks, and I’ll be there for two weeks, being pampered and enjoying television and good weather and very possibly seeing old high school friends. I’ve been way out of touch with them this year, so I actually do look forward to catching up.

As a side benefit of my job, I have become increasingly better at chitchat, I think. Oh, sometimes I have serious/interesting conversations, but there are many bits where awkward silence is chased away with "weird news story of the day" or lab gossip or talk of parking tickets and suchlike mundanity. It can be empty, and does make a part of my soul wither, but there are collateral gains. Sometimes this stuff can lead to more pleasant topics, for instance. Or it breaks the monotony of waiting for the timers to go off. There’s also elements of stress relief when one talks problems out (more her than me, I suppose). Close to that is how it can help build trust or familiarity. So in general, I tolerate it reasonably well (I actually rather like the weird news stories—I have been visiting Fark probably since I was 14, and I am 20 now). I have my concerns about the dulling of my own mind, but I always have those. Plus, engaging in small talk gives me a bit of perspective into what’s going on in other people’s minds: both by the actual content of what they say as well as by hinting at thought processes that go into generating small talk.

Did the preceding paragraph sound a bit on the sociopathic side? I’m afraid that it did, though I’m leaning more towards "pathetically socially inept." I don’t think the wires are all hooked up right in me for social functions. Some cocktail of nature and nurture fucked me over in that department. Ah, well.

Friday, August 24, 12:31 AM

And even lower we go. I’m feeling pretty bottom of the barrel at the moment, though the current variety of sad is one of the better ones—it’s soft and nighttime and you’re lying down and staring up. It’s uncertainty and yearning, but there’s this overarching sense of awe that prevents despair. What really gets you is how dynamic and intertwined everything seems—events and people winding around each other or spinning in place. So many individual parts, all moving in their own way, all at the same time. I suppose what I am experiencing is that "small" feeling, that "wow" that comes from realizing how overwhelming the world can be.

And what is my place in all this movement and flow? As is so bothersomely common amongst the undergraduate crowd, I am in something of an identity crisis. Who am I, who do I want to be, and is there any reconciling of the two? For example, previously, I have spoken of my affection for my misanthropy, but what is that affection born of? Now it seems like I was just grasping at straws, hoping for shreds of personality to stick. I feel as if there is some sort of template me, but what actually composes that template is never clear in my mind. Maybe it’s because I’m trying to break it down into traits when it’s a gestalt—one thing feeding into another, harnessing and carrying each other, whipping things up into a frenzy. And here’s me, scratching my head.

This time, I’m worried about other people, too, rather than just me me me, all me, all the time. What is to become of the people I know? Do they ache as I ache? If so, in what way? People are ciphers that I so badly want to crack. Sometimes when I’m talking to a person, I wonder what they’re actually thinking.

I suppose it comes back to me, though. When I wonder what they’re thinking, I am interested in seeing how my perception of the world compares with theirs. The set of experiences and feelings and thought processes that culminate to who a person is at any moment is discrete and unique to each person, and to be able to lay everything out and see what is essentially a map of the mind would explain so many things.

See, if there were a legitimate way to study this kind of thing, I would be so there, but so far all our technology is kind of crude. While working at the lab this summer, I’ve been pondering where in the hell in the mad, wide field of neuroscience I want to go, and I’ve mostly lead myself in circles. It’s kind of funny, deciding on this stuff, because one road might make me a king, while another makes me a leper. Though I put a lot of stock behind the idea that one’s success is determined by how hard one works, I do believe there is some vital element of luck which I can’t do anything about—when you’re not even thinking about it, time and place conspire with and against you.

But that’s what makes tomorrow exciting.

It’s not as if I had anything especially strenuous planned today, but nevertheless, I have fallen into indolence. It is 2:00 PM, the only thing I’ve eaten since I awoke at 11-something is junk food, and I am still in my pajamas. By tonight, I need to have gone to the gym (as much as I abhor physical activity, the thought of obesity is even worse), done my laundry, and attempted to cook curry.

And currently, the motivation to get up and properly start the day is simply not there. I suppose what I am exhibiting is inertia—when I am in motion, it is so easy to continue, but from the vantage point of stillness, movement seems a heavy prospect.

Part of this lack of willpower stems from my dislike of my apartment. Or simply, that I hate living with other people. I cannot help but feel like I am being watched. I become tense and agitated and all manner of terrible thoughts fill my head.

In some way, though, I feel…comforted by my misanthropy. Sometimes I think I am losing myself or that my personality is getting away from me (whatever that means), but knowing that I still have this deep-seated aversion to people confirms that I’m still all in here. "Misanthropy" is a very strange trait to value, but then again, "misanthropy" isn’t really the right word. I’m just very shy and self-conscious. People can be so judgemental and my nerves begin to fray at the very thought of people putting their opinions on me. It is a very silly girl thing, I suppose.

I don’t know why I should be so excessively concerned with the thoughts of others. Evolutionarily, females are more wired to analyze social networks and relationships, but I think my experiences have sort of inverted the whole thing in my case. I feel a bit like B.F. Skinner’s been around to test me. That is, growing up and now, I have an innate interest in social kind of stuff, but because of whatever unpleasant happenings in my development, my analytical skills are geared more towards alleviating my fear in social situations rather than being able to engage in normal, pleasant interactions. I mean, sometimes fixing the former simply means performing a heightened version of the latter (trying to fit in or go unnoticed), but that I have to do that at all just highlights the comedy I’m stuck in.

Honestly, whenever I read articles like this one or this one (both from the New York Times), I feel just a tiny bit of affinity. The first article is about Asperger’s, which is sort of one of my "pet" interests, one of those things I keep bumping into and can be fascinated by. It loops well with all this "female need to socially connect" stuff I keep playing with. The second is about Williams syndrome, which is interesting to me in that people with it seem to exhibit no social fear, but generally have very shallow connections with people. There’s a girl who has taught herself a shitload about sports just so she can have conversations with people. Oftentimes, I feel that how I talk to people gets tied up in that superficial stuff. My poison might be celebrity gossip or reality television, but the basic idea is the same. Otherwise, there is no conversation. I don’t know why I have nothing to say to people. I’ve said before, it’s not like my thoughts are typically very deep. Perhaps I am just hopelessly boring.

Which is absolutely awful if true. You know, I consume all this media, but then I have nothing to show for it. And then there’s the career in science, but also the thought that what I do will ultimately be of no import. But how could I possibly do anything great if I move along with such a despairing attitude?

It would be so easy to give up, but I would so much rather rage. I would have no peace with myself if I were to lie down.

I didn’t notice it so much in Freaks and Geeks, but Judd Apatow really does focus a lot on these total loser/slacker types who don’t want to do anything useful with their lives. I think that’s why I didn’t like 40-Year-Old Virgin or Knocked Up very much. I get the sinking feeling that those characters he portrays really do represent how most of us will end up, and I just get so depressed. People just stop trying or caring! I hope I at least come out of my life with the dignity that I wanted something and worked for it.

I think in some ways I have already decided that my work will become my life. I think there is a lot I would be willing to sacrifice for this magic science thing. I know that most people would think that’s horrid, but I think that makes it all the more mine.

I was about to say that I think it’s terribly selfish of people to work solely towards the happiness and comfort of themselves and their families, but then I realized that that is essentially what I want out of science. My happiness, I think, will largely be united with my scientific success. I actually am not completely certain that my passion is so strong and true, but I definitely want it to be.

But talk to me in a few years time, and see how I’m doing as friends and other girls my age begin to get married and have children. I am already in a state of dread!

(I told you I was a pack rat.)

This is goodbye, I think. Blog-City (and to a lesser extent, BlogSource) has been a wonderful home to me. If you are so inclined, I can now be found here: http://pule.blogsome.com

So, one last entry. It’s undoubtedly going to be crappy because I’m just moving sites. It’s not like I’m dying or something. But here it goes:

As I’ve been moving my posts from here to their new location, I have felt a rush of all kinds of things. I know I only started blogging just over four years ago, but stepping back into the past as I transfer everything over, it feels like so much has happened.

I’ve been reading over my old posts, and all I can think of is clichés. Essentially, things have changed, things have stayed the same.

Though this will only further mess up the post numbering system Blogsome has, I really would like to pop in and say a few things so that this blog has an actual proper post.

So the current song running through my head is 10538 Overture by Electric Light Orchestra. It was featured at the end of what is probably my favorite episode of Life on Mars. Life on Mars is a great show—the wonderful marriage of sci-fi and cop show. And John Simm (who plays main character Sam Tyler) is oddly attractive. He shouldn’t be, but he is. It boggles my mind.

SPOILER! coming up:

The ending of the show still has me reeling. On the one hand, what the FUCK, the whole two series, Sam is trying to return to the future; he struggles so hard, begging the doctors, Maya, his mother, anyone to keep him alive while he fights in his head. And then he fucking commits suicide to go back to fantasyland where you have Gene Hunt to beat up the uncooperative detainees and sweet Annie Cartwright to cuddle. I know he was in a coma, but this change of heart didn’t seem believable. Part of what made Sam was his determination. Letting him kill himself just shits on that. And Sam seems to care deeply about his mother, yet he goes off and abandons her even though she was the one who insisted the doctors keep him on life support. On that point, we may be arguing taste, though, because I’m just really annoyed at how ungrateful Sam was for jumping off a bloody building.

On the other, his life in 1973 is probably infinitely more colorful, rich, and rewarding, even if it is fake. When Sam returns to 2006 (or 2007?), the world is gray and tied up in paperwork and procedure and he hasn’t even got Maya anymore. And I’d be lying if I wasn’t initially kind of happy that Sam was to reunite with his past chums; I like Gene and Annie and everyone else in Manchester because I got to know their personalities; everyone in the future was largely anonymous. I think generally, though, despite my frustration, the ending is really good. It got me excited, made me think and offered a lot of ideas to toy with, and left me with warm fuzzies.

END SPOILS!

Anyway, out on the old Blog-City blog, I had a post in draft mode all about me entertaining ideas of sex. The short and sweet of it is that I sometimes wonder if I’m asexual. I simply cannot imagine myself engaging in the act. I like the way an orgasm feels, but all the attendant conditions to achieve that state when another person is involved put me off.

And these notions of sex were brought about by what I think is a nascent relationship with a boy. Oh, yes, it is in a primordial state, but I have mentioned this person before in my blog. Goodness, that means it’s been on super-slow brew since my first year of college! From what I have gleaned in conversation with him, he is about as clueless and inexperienced as I am. And I don’t think I’m helping things because my signals are incredibly mixed. Largely because I don’t know what to think myself. In many ways he and I are similar, which is something I value a lot, but I still feel incredibly hesitant to push things forward! The first reason is shallow: he is too short. I think he’s about my height or shorter. I had sort of conceived long ago that my ideal partner would not be shorter than myself. I am five-foot-two or five-foot-three, which is quite short, so someone shorter than I am is incredibly short…it would look weird. There’s other reasons, too, but I’m getting all addled having to admit anything. I’ll just rattle off a list, lavish explanation can come later. So: he’s pervy (enjoys porn quite a bit), I would hear no end of it from our mutual acquaintances in the college, seems incredibly money-oriented (wants a high-paying, potentially soulless job), fiscally conservative, Christian, physically I am not his ideal of a female, he’s trying to bodybuild (man titties, muscle or fat, are not okay), skateboards (I know that’s a totally stupid gripe, but I am being completely honest here), and that’s about it so far. Oh, wait, he drinks. Ugh.

What I am essentially saying, then, is that he does not conform with my notion of perfect. And as much as perfect is a fool’s pursuit, knowing all the above cons, it is hard for me to be attracted to him, at least not in the way of previous boys I have found charming. Perhaps, then, what I am seeing is the division between infatuation and reality. But that just leads to me wondering why reality has to be such a piece of shit for me. Yes, that is an exaggeration considering well, everything, but I’m just terribly jealous of all those lovey-dovey people who seemed to have found the person whom their red string leads to.

But there’s still a month of summer left, so there is a scrap of time to sort some things out.

On to a topic which causes me considerably less consternation:

Have been reading Michael Palin’s Diaries while I wait around for timers to go off at work. I am conflicted. A lot of the entries make extensive mention of weather or food/drink, which is starting to wear me down (the book covers 1969-1979, and I’m at the end of 1976). The political/local issues are more interesting though sometimes dry or confusing (when I’m not familiar with what he’s referring to). The inter-Python stuff is good, but during the years Flying Circus was actually being made (which is what I was really hoping to get a glimpse into), show entries are rather sparse. Cute people stories (particularly Michael’s behavior to others, especially friends and family) were hoped for, too, but you tend to get more of a laundry list of people he interacted with that day without much detail of what was said or felt. You do get Mike’s opinion of people, but there aren’t really specifics so the opinions as is aren’t especially convincing or interesting. And, sadly for me, some of my "Aww, Michael’s so darling!" feeling has faded after the parts I’ve been through. Being that it’s his diary, there is quite a fair bit of grousing, and reading so much of it at once makes him seem rather sour. I suppose I had had him up on a pedestal. Disappointing, but the truth is preferable to delusion.

Funnily enough, at least from the snatches he writes of Terry Jones, I am now quite fond of TJ! I’d always heard that he was the one arguing with Cleese about money vs. art, but it wasn’t until I read Diaries that I got that romantic artist hero vibe. Being that TJ and MP seem so close, though, I doubt MP would be shitting on his friend’s image, but still! I at least appreciate him better.

Despite Michael’s fall from idol object, I hope he keeps issuing his diaries. One, I want to see what alterations in temperament or whatever occur as he gets older. Two, there are projects I’d like to hear about—how shooting for Brazil went, for instance. I hope there is expansion on what is available in the books that go along with his travel shows, too. Right now I’m watching Around the World in Eighty Days and it’d be nice to see more personal information than what can be seen on screen or was left out of the book.

I feel a little bit like a stalker or gossip whore, being so interested in his intimate matters.