untitled
Today was a peculiar day. Today was - worth writing. Today is different. If you had read my earlier post about Sisyphus, then this will seem, at first glance, rather contradictory. For, then, I had emphasised the repetitiveness of life, yet now, you see me saying today is 'peculiar'.
But it is precisely because of the monotone of everyday, that today stands out to be different. Like how a patch of blood on the shirt of white collar workers is deemed 'peculiar' - an eyeball magnet. In contrast, you wouldn't even really notice blood on a front-line infantry's uniform. Why? That office worker's life pretty much the same everyday, as dull as the colour of his shirt.
But you have never been a soldier, and perhaps that comparison fails. But I bet you had someone accidentally step on your toe before, or had, on an unfortunate account, a heavy object dropping on your toe. Well then, today is the day, where at a particular moment, a temporal lost of grip allowed the rock just enough time to roll backwards and flatten the toes of Sisyphus, before he recovered control of the rock.
So today was peculiar, and I am not overstepping my earlier point about my Sisyphean existence. But peculiar is a term devoid of judgment, peculiar means neither good nor bad, it only means different, unconventional. Today was neither good nor bad. It was eventful - not physically but emotionally. I did not step on a pin today, but my "self" grazed a pin. Um, put it like that: Today is when the Sisyphys-Me, for some nebulous reason, turned and looked behind. Yes I'd prefer to use this parallel - looking behind, we saw the absurdity of our actions. Nothing was felt by our toes, but something was felt in our minds (or if you be more poetic, then our souls). Sisyphus was probably shook aghast when he saw the absurd emptiness (lack of meaning/purpose/objective), the large vacuum of nothingness behind him sucked all the breath in his lungs.
You see, looking behind is just a very simple action, isn't it? But it created turmoil in Sisyphus' mind, sprouting dangerous questions like "why am I doing this?", "what is my purpose here?". Dangerous, because they threatened his happiness and sanity. To not think about those questions, and to merely be totally engaged in rolling the rock up the mountain, ensured his happiness.
For me, to put it simply, today was only a very short day. Short, as in, very few happenings. I couldn't really understand why, 7am to 5pm today passed quickly. That's uhh.. 10 hours? But it passed quickly, perhaps because for most of it I was away? Lost in thought. During lessons, during lectures, you are able to keep track of time, and therefore in feels a drag. But when lost in thought, we forget to keep track of time.
At this point, I feel the need to tell you that I am not comfortable with sharing my thoughts directly. They are mine, selfishly mine, only for my review. But I share my reflections about my thoughts. I pen down, not my thoughts, but my reflections of my thoughts here. So, I say "no!" and blows a raspberry at you, if you are reading this with the intention to discover what specifically happened to me today (or rather, what happened today, that is relevant to me).
It was nothing much actually, small and insignificant, but it is immense, and heart-rattling. You know about breaking glass right? A sound, when adjusted to a precise frequency that is equal to the natural frequency of the glass, will result in what is known as acoustic resonance, and consequently an amplification of the vibrations, finally shattering the glass. The sound, more often than not, can be very soft/small (low volume), or sometimes, it is out of our human hearing range. It is like waves on the ocean - or no, even better, it is like pushing a kid on a swing. If you are the sound (as in, "You" are the representation of "Sound"), and you apply force and push the swing forward (as in, your pushing action, represents the sound waves) at the very right moment, where it coincides with the swing's natural rhythm, the swing will move further and faster. Keep repeating this, synchronising your pushes with the moment of the swing, and the swing will go further and higher each time. So, when the pieces making up the glass don't stay still and move around too much, then the glass shatters! Therefore, it (the sound) is nothing much actually, but it is glass-shattering.
No, I still won't tell you what is it. It is not fair. Perhaps too sordid for your prying eyes.
By coincidence and nothing else (I'm atheistic), these lines stood out, as if they were mine, as I read Nausea ?
Title: La Nausée (Nausea)
Author: Jean-Paul Sartre
"A new translation of Sartre's celebrated first novel. Written in 1938, Nausea remains one of the peaks of Sartre's achievement. It is a novel of the alienation of personality and the mystery of being, and presents us with the first full length essay in the philosophy for which Sartre has since become famous. Nausea is a novel of brilliant observation, wit, and psychological penetration by one of the world's front-rank intellectuals."
[Fiction/Literature]
more info just now,
Yes what pain. Being caught up is all that ... Who am I writing for? - Well, obviously it depends on the kind of writing... But then all of then are subject to cruel judgement. Sure, I can think whatever I want because it is my mind. But can I write/type whatever I think? Who must I appeal to? That "absurd, pompous" assessment of his own statement was most likely not his own! It must be other's opinion of his writing. Not his! He felt that "it was like a band of soldiers" and so he had written that description in an earlier diary entry. The imagery probably appealed to him very well. Pompous? He felt that way at that moment, while walking down the street. What is wrong with that? Can he not express his own feelings?
The answer I realised, is no. He is a slave to the judgment of others.
He can't. Well, in practice he can, as it had just happened. But he can't do that without being shunned aside as a [I can't find a word], where people just see him as a weird, ignorant, pompous guy. But that is obviously undesirable. You can, in practice, run straight into the enemy's crosshairs. Just undesirable, you agree? But would you want to? And likewise, would he?
And he had just made another critical mistake "I must let my pen run on, without searching for words". No! He must lose himself. Displace his very own personality with the potential reader's mind. Then, he must see, and only see, as the hand that is not his anymore grips the pen and writes. Only like this, then he'll write well. Because he is doomed to only be a slave of other's judgement. His unique style and unconventional touch amounts to naught if the readers thinks it is utter "crap".
Alright alright, you wouldn't like reading this.
So anyway, today was eventful, 'thought'fully. It is peculiar, out of the ordinary. But it is not considered 'bad'. Because something neutralised it. Scorching me with acid, and cleaning up with base. I am okay now, at the moment of writing this. But it is the aftermath... the damaged skin tissue, the residual salt.
The base was something which I didn't appreciate for quite some time. A scientific certainty. Doing an experiment and doing it right. I am, after all, the judge of my own experiment. No pesky readers. Overall, it is like a reassuring scientific certainty. 1+1=1.
Catharsis.
No more bitter acrimony, but neither alkaline uplifted-ness. I'm just calmly spiteful. Neutral, but not untouched.
At least for now.
I usually scroll up, re-read, and tidy up my posts, correcting errors and tuning the flow... but, not for this. Time and mood forbid. Anyway so what if all that's above is just incoherent gibberish? I have learnt. it matters to me, as cathartic writing. Just not this time. Yes, comment please, hate, like, if you'd choose to, it is okay, but I beg you, judge not too harshly.
But it is precisely because of the monotone of everyday, that today stands out to be different. Like how a patch of blood on the shirt of white collar workers is deemed 'peculiar' - an eyeball magnet. In contrast, you wouldn't even really notice blood on a front-line infantry's uniform. Why? That office worker's life pretty much the same everyday, as dull as the colour of his shirt.
But you have never been a soldier, and perhaps that comparison fails. But I bet you had someone accidentally step on your toe before, or had, on an unfortunate account, a heavy object dropping on your toe. Well then, today is the day, where at a particular moment, a temporal lost of grip allowed the rock just enough time to roll backwards and flatten the toes of Sisyphus, before he recovered control of the rock.
So today was peculiar, and I am not overstepping my earlier point about my Sisyphean existence. But peculiar is a term devoid of judgment, peculiar means neither good nor bad, it only means different, unconventional. Today was neither good nor bad. It was eventful - not physically but emotionally. I did not step on a pin today, but my "self" grazed a pin. Um, put it like that: Today is when the Sisyphys-Me, for some nebulous reason, turned and looked behind. Yes I'd prefer to use this parallel - looking behind, we saw the absurdity of our actions. Nothing was felt by our toes, but something was felt in our minds (or if you be more poetic, then our souls). Sisyphus was probably shook aghast when he saw the absurd emptiness (lack of meaning/purpose/objective), the large vacuum of nothingness behind him sucked all the breath in his lungs.
You see, looking behind is just a very simple action, isn't it? But it created turmoil in Sisyphus' mind, sprouting dangerous questions like "why am I doing this?", "what is my purpose here?". Dangerous, because they threatened his happiness and sanity. To not think about those questions, and to merely be totally engaged in rolling the rock up the mountain, ensured his happiness.
For me, to put it simply, today was only a very short day. Short, as in, very few happenings. I couldn't really understand why, 7am to 5pm today passed quickly. That's uhh.. 10 hours? But it passed quickly, perhaps because for most of it I was away? Lost in thought. During lessons, during lectures, you are able to keep track of time, and therefore in feels a drag. But when lost in thought, we forget to keep track of time.
At this point, I feel the need to tell you that I am not comfortable with sharing my thoughts directly. They are mine, selfishly mine, only for my review. But I share my reflections about my thoughts. I pen down, not my thoughts, but my reflections of my thoughts here. So, I say "no!" and blows a raspberry at you, if you are reading this with the intention to discover what specifically happened to me today (or rather, what happened today, that is relevant to me).
It was nothing much actually, small and insignificant, but it is immense, and heart-rattling. You know about breaking glass right? A sound, when adjusted to a precise frequency that is equal to the natural frequency of the glass, will result in what is known as acoustic resonance, and consequently an amplification of the vibrations, finally shattering the glass. The sound, more often than not, can be very soft/small (low volume), or sometimes, it is out of our human hearing range. It is like waves on the ocean - or no, even better, it is like pushing a kid on a swing. If you are the sound (as in, "You" are the representation of "Sound"), and you apply force and push the swing forward (as in, your pushing action, represents the sound waves) at the very right moment, where it coincides with the swing's natural rhythm, the swing will move further and faster. Keep repeating this, synchronising your pushes with the moment of the swing, and the swing will go further and higher each time. So, when the pieces making up the glass don't stay still and move around too much, then the glass shatters! Therefore, it (the sound) is nothing much actually, but it is glass-shattering.
No, I still won't tell you what is it. It is not fair. Perhaps too sordid for your prying eyes.
By coincidence and nothing else (I'm atheistic), these lines stood out, as if they were mine, as I read Nausea ?
| Nausea: | (hide) |
Author: Jean-Paul Sartre
"A new translation of Sartre's celebrated first novel. Written in 1938, Nausea remains one of the peaks of Sartre's achievement. It is a novel of the alienation of personality and the mystery of being, and presents us with the first full length essay in the philosophy for which Sartre has since become famous. Nausea is a novel of brilliant observation, wit, and psychological penetration by one of the world's front-rank intellectuals."
[Fiction/Literature]
more info
- Monday -
How could I have written this absurd, pompous sentence yesterday:
'I was alone, but I walked like a band of soldiers descending on a town.'
I have no need to speak in flowery language. I am merely writing to understand certain circumstances. I must beware of literature. I must let my pen run on, without searching for words.
Yes what pain. Being caught up is all that ... Who am I writing for? - Well, obviously it depends on the kind of writing... But then all of then are subject to cruel judgement. Sure, I can think whatever I want because it is my mind. But can I write/type whatever I think? Who must I appeal to? That "absurd, pompous" assessment of his own statement was most likely not his own! It must be other's opinion of his writing. Not his! He felt that "it was like a band of soldiers" and so he had written that description in an earlier diary entry. The imagery probably appealed to him very well. Pompous? He felt that way at that moment, while walking down the street. What is wrong with that? Can he not express his own feelings?
The answer I realised, is no. He is a slave to the judgment of others.
He can't. Well, in practice he can, as it had just happened. But he can't do that without being shunned aside as a [I can't find a word], where people just see him as a weird, ignorant, pompous guy. But that is obviously undesirable. You can, in practice, run straight into the enemy's crosshairs. Just undesirable, you agree? But would you want to? And likewise, would he?
And he had just made another critical mistake "I must let my pen run on, without searching for words". No! He must lose himself. Displace his very own personality with the potential reader's mind. Then, he must see, and only see, as the hand that is not his anymore grips the pen and writes. Only like this, then he'll write well. Because he is doomed to only be a slave of other's judgement. His unique style and unconventional touch amounts to naught if the readers thinks it is utter "crap".
Alright alright, you wouldn't like reading this.
So anyway, today was eventful, 'thought'fully. It is peculiar, out of the ordinary. But it is not considered 'bad'. Because something neutralised it. Scorching me with acid, and cleaning up with base. I am okay now, at the moment of writing this. But it is the aftermath... the damaged skin tissue, the residual salt.
The base was something which I didn't appreciate for quite some time. A scientific certainty. Doing an experiment and doing it right. I am, after all, the judge of my own experiment. No pesky readers. Overall, it is like a reassuring scientific certainty. 1+1=1.
Catharsis.
No more bitter acrimony, but neither alkaline uplifted-ness. I'm just calmly spiteful. Neutral, but not untouched.
At least for now.
I usually scroll up, re-read, and tidy up my posts, correcting errors and tuning the flow... but, not for this. Time and mood forbid. Anyway so what if all that's above is just incoherent gibberish? I have learnt. it matters to me, as cathartic writing. Just not this time. Yes, comment please, hate, like, if you'd choose to, it is okay, but I beg you, judge not too harshly.
posted by hweiee at
9:57 PM
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