Squinting through a glass darkly to see the alarm clock in my shower
It's another late night, and I'm having trouble getting to bed. It was a late morning earlier today, as I managed to drag my butt out of bed around noon. Seeing as the robotic alarm clock that runs away from you when you hit the snooze alarm isn't coming out for a while longer, I decided to try a drastic measure: I have moved my alarm clock in to my shower.
No, seriously.
It's sitting in my shower right now. When the alarm goes off in the morning, I will stagger in there to shut it off. Hopefully, I will be awake enough to shut the blasted thing off and get in the shower and start to wake up. If not, then one of two things will happen:
1. I will just stagger back to bed
2. I will turn the shower on without moving the alarm clock
Neither would be a good thing, but at least the second option would zap me enough to be awake.
Aside from that, I spent the night hanging out with my friend Eddy, who showed me the mockumentary I helped him create. As he was preparing to leave, a Hobo Spider scuttled in through the door and Eddy nearly jumped out of his shoes. After killing the aggressive little critter - I swear, the freaking thing tried to fake right and dodge left - he informed me that the blasted things had a bite that resulted in skin deterioration. Oh, and they were super-aggressive due to their ultra-poor eyesight. Oh, and they're super-fast on carpet. And I have their webs behind my couch and in a few corners in my house that I didn't even notice until Eddy pointed them out to me.
So, we spent the next few minutes chatting about specialized spider strips used to kill these little suckers while glancing around my apartment nervously.
That was fun. Now I'm scared to go to bed.
Freaking spiders. I'm going to get some of those strips tomorrow. See how they like that. Hobo Spiders. Geez. Creepy.
I've been listening to a lot of hard rock lately. A lot more than normal... and a lot harder than usual. I don't really know what it is. I've only listened to a handful of CD's that haven't had mostly screaming/cookie monster/death metal vocals in the past few months. I haven't exactly missed the lighter music, either. I just want something that hard right now.
It could be that I just need a sort of release from all the changes that have been happening. My sister is getting married. Two of my best friends just moved out to Seattle. We're getting ready to join a new Church. My studies are shifting more towards the self-driven research phase and more away from basic classroom work.
Or perhaps it's a culmination of all of the changes that have happened over the past year? The move, Grad school, JJ's new job, my family being so far away, making so many new friends, learning a lot about myself, and all that kind of stuff.
Or perhaps its just because that's really the type of music I enjoy the most, and I'm finding a lot of great heavy bands that I like to listen to?
I don't know. I really hate trying to peg a reason on the things that I do sometimes. Most of the time, I just want to... be.
I can already hear the Squirrel perk up her ears as she reads this in Juarez and compare my comments to Buddhism in one way or another. But the transcendence of Labels is an idea, I believe, that far predates any shred of Buddhist thought. Sometimes, things just are the way they are. No analysis of their qualities can yield any deeper insight in to their presence (or absence, in some cases) in the world around us.
In my case, I try to avoid labels simply because it means I have to spend time thinking about myself. And I hate doing that. I really, really resent it when I catch myself swimming in thoughts completely centered around me. Hell, I'm doing it right now. Why is it so much trouble to dissolve yourself from your own perception of the world so that you may simply be allowed to perceive a thing without the taint of yourself forever warping the perception? Damn this sin-soaked mind and its inadequate information-gathering organs! My desire is to genuinely see the truth, and not simply to perceive a representation of an aspect of it. I want to know in full, even as I am fully known, but until then I have to be content to see through a glass darkly.
I am continually aggravated when truth is occluded. I desperately want it to be made clear that I may know it.
And, of course, this occlusion is due to more than the limitations of our sensory organs or our brain's ability to translate the signals it receives from them. It has to do with our own desire to see and know the truth. It is not a perfect desire that we hold. It, too, like our senses, is bent by sin. In fact, many of us outright flee from the truth as if it were an enemy come to slay us. Perhaps it is. Perhaps what I have is a death wish. Perhaps I want to be run through.
Oh, bother. I've gone off and become all abstract again, haven't I? No matter. If these words make no sense, don't worry too much about it. If they do make sense, then be troubled, as I am troubled, and continue to squint your eyes to try to see through the glass more clearly.
Until we can see more clearly, I will go to bed hoping that I remember to shut off my alarm clock before I turn the water on in the shower and have nightmares about Hobo spiders sneaking in to my bed at night and biting me.
No, seriously.
It's sitting in my shower right now. When the alarm goes off in the morning, I will stagger in there to shut it off. Hopefully, I will be awake enough to shut the blasted thing off and get in the shower and start to wake up. If not, then one of two things will happen:
1. I will just stagger back to bed
2. I will turn the shower on without moving the alarm clock
Neither would be a good thing, but at least the second option would zap me enough to be awake.
Aside from that, I spent the night hanging out with my friend Eddy, who showed me the mockumentary I helped him create. As he was preparing to leave, a Hobo Spider scuttled in through the door and Eddy nearly jumped out of his shoes. After killing the aggressive little critter - I swear, the freaking thing tried to fake right and dodge left - he informed me that the blasted things had a bite that resulted in skin deterioration. Oh, and they were super-aggressive due to their ultra-poor eyesight. Oh, and they're super-fast on carpet. And I have their webs behind my couch and in a few corners in my house that I didn't even notice until Eddy pointed them out to me.
So, we spent the next few minutes chatting about specialized spider strips used to kill these little suckers while glancing around my apartment nervously.
That was fun. Now I'm scared to go to bed.
Freaking spiders. I'm going to get some of those strips tomorrow. See how they like that. Hobo Spiders. Geez. Creepy.
I've been listening to a lot of hard rock lately. A lot more than normal... and a lot harder than usual. I don't really know what it is. I've only listened to a handful of CD's that haven't had mostly screaming/cookie monster/death metal vocals in the past few months. I haven't exactly missed the lighter music, either. I just want something that hard right now.
It could be that I just need a sort of release from all the changes that have been happening. My sister is getting married. Two of my best friends just moved out to Seattle. We're getting ready to join a new Church. My studies are shifting more towards the self-driven research phase and more away from basic classroom work.
Or perhaps it's a culmination of all of the changes that have happened over the past year? The move, Grad school, JJ's new job, my family being so far away, making so many new friends, learning a lot about myself, and all that kind of stuff.
Or perhaps its just because that's really the type of music I enjoy the most, and I'm finding a lot of great heavy bands that I like to listen to?
I don't know. I really hate trying to peg a reason on the things that I do sometimes. Most of the time, I just want to... be.
I can already hear the Squirrel perk up her ears as she reads this in Juarez and compare my comments to Buddhism in one way or another. But the transcendence of Labels is an idea, I believe, that far predates any shred of Buddhist thought. Sometimes, things just are the way they are. No analysis of their qualities can yield any deeper insight in to their presence (or absence, in some cases) in the world around us.
In my case, I try to avoid labels simply because it means I have to spend time thinking about myself. And I hate doing that. I really, really resent it when I catch myself swimming in thoughts completely centered around me. Hell, I'm doing it right now. Why is it so much trouble to dissolve yourself from your own perception of the world so that you may simply be allowed to perceive a thing without the taint of yourself forever warping the perception? Damn this sin-soaked mind and its inadequate information-gathering organs! My desire is to genuinely see the truth, and not simply to perceive a representation of an aspect of it. I want to know in full, even as I am fully known, but until then I have to be content to see through a glass darkly.
I am continually aggravated when truth is occluded. I desperately want it to be made clear that I may know it.
And, of course, this occlusion is due to more than the limitations of our sensory organs or our brain's ability to translate the signals it receives from them. It has to do with our own desire to see and know the truth. It is not a perfect desire that we hold. It, too, like our senses, is bent by sin. In fact, many of us outright flee from the truth as if it were an enemy come to slay us. Perhaps it is. Perhaps what I have is a death wish. Perhaps I want to be run through.
Oh, bother. I've gone off and become all abstract again, haven't I? No matter. If these words make no sense, don't worry too much about it. If they do make sense, then be troubled, as I am troubled, and continue to squint your eyes to try to see through the glass more clearly.
Until we can see more clearly, I will go to bed hoping that I remember to shut off my alarm clock before I turn the water on in the shower and have nightmares about Hobo spiders sneaking in to my bed at night and biting me.
posted by Raoul The Destroyer at 1:46 AM
2 Comments:
Sorry about the genetics that gave you all this unresolved speculation.
Your mother & I just wanted to create another self tortured generation
of cynics that just might accomplish something...though I have to wonder
about exhaustion created by a night of "cartooning sans drawing" and
the resultant sleepless nights from arachnaphobia, which I always thought
was Toodle's territory. Tell me,how many of your average undergraduates,
inclusive of your honors kids ever spent a day worrying about whether
perception or imagination weighed more heavily on the Richter scale of
reality than otherwise. Shutting it off is hard, even when you play. Would
you really want it any other way? D,or in your words, the eugenecist.P.S.
you've been a good brother.
Thanks, Dad. That was some much needed encouragement. :)
And yeah, I honestly wouldn't have it any other way.
As for the spider thing: Duuude... Hobo Spiders are worth freaking out about - especially since they're more agressive than a brown recluse and their bites result in flesh deterioration!
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