Tuesday, November 29, 2011

Birthday!

It was my birthday on the 25th!

FOURTEEN people came out to the pub with me! That's an all time record!

It was a fantastic night: hanging out, having a few (eight) drinks, chatting with all sorts of people.

This past year has not been easy, but I realized it's been good. I've changed, as I so often do, and I've made friends! I think that 20 was one of my toughest years so far, but 21 will be easier. It can't really get harder, actually.

Things that happened since last birthday:
- Brother moved to BC
- Many good friendships nearly destroyed
- Few good friendships repaired-ish.
- Made friends at school! (Notes on these people to follow)
- Made friends at church
- Received two proposals of marriage
- Spent 6 months on brain drugs
- Went to Arizona all alonesies
- Set a table on fire
- Michael got married

Things that are still the same:
- Continuing struggle with existential nihilism
- Hope to move to Africa
- Those same guys from high school who have always been around for me and each other
- Scotch is delicious
- School is a soul-sucking abyss of misery
- Lack of emotional availability prevents romantic relationship
- Rubber boots!

The friends I've made at school are mostly from my Integrative Biology of Invertebrates class. They're all way smarter than me which is good because competition might motivate me to do things.

One thing I want to change about myself is my tendency to talk before I think. I've said a lot of really dumb/insensitive/foolish things and it bothers me. Wish to seem smart.

Friday, November 11, 2011

Remembrance Day

Dulce et Decorum Est

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned out backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame, all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.

Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!--An ecstasy of fumbling
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime.--
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin,
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs
Bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
-Wilfred Owen


Do Not Go Gentle

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rage at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

-Dylan Thomas


But now, for the first time, I see you are a man like me. I thought of your hand-grenades, of your bayonet, of your rifle; now I see your wife and your face and our fellowship. Forgive me, comrade. We always see it too late. Why do they never tell us that you are poor devils like us, that your mothers are just as anxious as ours, and that we have the same fear of death, and the same dying and the same agony--Forgive me, comrade; how could you be my enemy?

-Erich Maria Remarque


Dirge Without Music

I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.
So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:
Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely. Crowned
With lilies and with laurel they go; but I am not resigned.

Lovers and thinkers, into the earth with you.
Be one with the dull, the indiscriminate dust.
A fragment of what you felt, of what you knew,
A formula, a phrase remains,—but the best is lost.

The answers quick and keen, the honest look, the laughter, the
love,—
They are gone. They are gone to feed the roses. Elegant and curled
Is the blossom. Fragrant is the blossom. I know. But I do not
approve.
More precious was the light in your eyes than all the roses in the
world.

Down, down, down into the darkness of the grave
Gently they go, the beautiful, the tender, the kind;
Quietly they go, the intelligent, the witty, the brave.
I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.

-Edna St. Vincent Millay

Tuesday, November 8, 2011

Found out today that you need to pass an interview to get food from the food bank. It seems unnecessary.

Life's been many an irritating thing recently. School is getting me down, lack of happypills has allowed for the return to my naturally nihilistic state, there are more insects than food in my apartment (less irritating, more ridiculous).

Since quitting my jorb I've felt desperately poor and have avoided turning on the heat, eating, smoking, or doing anything other than my homework.

Basically my brain is in the sewer-like depths of the "everything sucks forever" thing and the things which I know would cheer me up are no good for me (smoking, burning things, manipulating people by lying to them).

I hate trying to put my life on track. I'm not going to say "back" on track because there's no convincing evidence that it has every been going anywhere. If you are remotely interested in what I spend my time thinking about on a nice Tuesday evening at home, go read the Wikipedia article on Existentialism, noting especially the bits on Angst and The Absurd.

BITS LOL

The main disagreement I have with existential philosophy is that I believe on some level that the universe or existence or life or whatever does make sense. There's purpose behind it somewhere. The right answer is the one which assumes the fewest ridiculous things.