I mean, seriously.
Anyone who knows me probably knows that I'm a Christian. Anyone who read that statement and was shocked into no longer wanting to be my friend, please leave a comment or contact me, but before you do, hear this: I don't flaunt being a Christian for various reasons, most of which don't need to be explained.
But I feel as though the topic of religion needs to be discussed. I've often told people that I am "more spiritual than religious," and overall I'm one who doesn't like the idea of church. I do like the things Jesus said and did, like being kind to one another and such, but the idea of praying to God, suffice to say, doesn't bode well with me. I don't pay attention during the Hebrew lesson, but I ALWAYS turn to face whoever is reading from the Gospels, which are about people helping people and moral lessons, which brings be to the point of this paragraph: I go to church for its community, and that's it. But then again, therein lies the problem: you can have a community of friends who believe the same thing you do without having a place to do so.
Organized religion doesn't seem to have any perks. You are required to get up early and go to a service, to sit in uncomfortable pews where you aren't allowed to speak, clap, or do anything "out of order." Seriously: you can't clap after a performance you liked because that would take away the importance of the fact that the performer is doing something to worship God. And as for praising God, there's these weird rules about how you should do it profusely and often, but only in a certain way.
Which brings me to stuff about God. Yeah, I know, a lot of stuff has been said about God, and here's the thing: people are often catagorized in terms of their belief of God: you are, agnostic, atheist, Christian, etc. Myself? Well...
Last semester was my first semester at college. It was tough. Really tough. Eventually I decided that what I was doing was "not what God wanted" or "not what God had planned for me" and not something I was cut out for. My faith in God took serious blows as I failed a class, and became EXTREMELY depressed. To make matters worse, the semester culminated in the theft of my laptop, journal, and basically everything precious to me, save for the things I had saved online (like this journal).
This semester has been much better, but there's still something wrong. I'm forced into going to church since the handbell ringers at my college play there about once a month. But here's the thing: I walk in, and you know what the first thing they want you to do once you get there?
Pray for the forgiveness of your sins.
Excuse me, God, but there's something quite wrong with this action. If God wants to take away my life and happiness, well that's fine, but afterwards, please don't ask me to ask for forgiveness. I was completely unaware that suffering was in and of itself a sin. It's liked being slapped in the face for no apparent reason and then asked to apologize. That's absolutely ridiculous. No wonder people call us insane. Needless to say, God and I have some issues.
Perhaps at this point it's best to address "the miracle of faith." The miracle in all of this is that I still believe in God. That's right, you heard me correctly; I still believe in God. Most people, after having these experiences, would turn away from God and not believe in a higher power anymore. My thought process goes like this: God has been known to show neglect. I have not turned away from God, instead, God has turned away from me. People would become atheists, or at the very least agnostic. I am neither of those things, because I believe this: only God can wreak such havoc on man.
If you look at the book of Job, Job 1:22 states that Job did not sin by charging God with wrongdoing. Why is this a sin? Job also states later that we must accept both trouble and relief from God. I continued prayer through this semester of depression, and my prayers were not answered in kind. I feel like Job, and right now I'm telling "the lord" of what is right, and here it is:
God can't be both human and inhuman. Neglect is human, and so because of my suffering, I will rail against God not because he could prevent my suffering, but because of the injustice that I am supposed to ask for forgiveness from him after he has taken away the things that are precious to me. THAT is wrong. THAT is evil.
Are you listening?
Hey all!
So, I'm finding that after moving to college, it's best to start this blog back up again, since my last computer was stolen, and it's probably better for me to have some record of all my thoughts and ramblings. Anyway.
So look forward to more posts, about more interesting things.
And another thing--about the previous stuff: read it again. You may find you have missed something. Think about all possible interpretations of what I'm saying. There are things in here I wrote a WHILE ago, and since then I've stopped doing/thinking those things. These are simple observations, and, as I've learned in my psych class this year, correlation does not mean cause. These things can explain only what, not why.
Enjoy!
Right now, I'm in the middle of Rupert Thomson's Divided Kingdom. It's an absolutely fascinating book, as it combines a whole bunch of things I'm interested in--politics, psychology, and futuristic outlooks on our way of life. I had a really bad time trying to find it, and I was about to give up on it and order it online before I found it in Half Moon Bay.
In short, Divided Kingdom is set in future Great Britain, where the powers that be have decided to create a government and a law according to the four temperaments that describe the basic human condition. These four temperaments are associated with the biles, or four humours of the human body, and they are:
- Blood (of a sanguine nature)
- Yellow Bile (of a choleric nature)
- Black Bile (of a melancholy nature), and
- Phlegm (of a...well, phglematic nature--more on this in a minute)
Now, onto an explanation of these humours (if you are a psychologist, or a doctor, you can skip this section, as it is a simple, brief explanation to the general public):
A person with sanguine nature is granted upperclass status in Divided Kingdom, they are considered "normal" people. Sanguines generally are fun-loving, confident, cheerful, and optimistic. They are very easy to get along with.
A person with excessive choler is energetic. They are easily angered, but a choler tends to thrive on actions, an cholers also make great leaders or commanders. They are also dominant of other personalities.
A person with excessive black bile is melancholy...this isn't to say that they are lethargic, but it is to say that they are emotional--"melancholies" make great poets and artists, and while they aren't physically active, they experience moods and emotions on a greater scale than a person with excessive amounts of any other humour.
A phlegmatic is calm, and unemotional, pretty much everything that choler and "melancholer" are not. Associate phlegmatics with water. Like sanguines, they also have many friends, but they are instead more relaxed.
If you want a really dumbed-down way to look at the four humours, associate them with the seasons...sanguine for spring (think optimism, blossoming, happiness, etc.), choler for summer (heat, active, high temper) melancholy for fall (transition, emotion, experience) and phlegmatics with winter (stationary, dead, cold).
Divided Kingdom not only helps us understand the problems with people being catagorized, but also helps us understand what each of the four humours are. The people in the Yellow Quarter often hold riots against the new regime, whereas the people in the Green Quarter often commit suicide over it. Everyone tries to sneak into the Red Quarter, whereas the Blue Quarter holds a mysterious quality to it. The book itself tells the story of a young man who remembers (faintly) what life was like before the "Rearrangement" (the name they give to the process of divying everyone up) and his trials of fitting in to the new life. What's very strange, and interesting, is that so far, the main character has not protested this "Rearrangement" directly, but the book has a subtle way of pointing out that this system is in fact, flawed--people are spied upon, and it rests on upon the people to report any characteristics that are incompatible with the quarter that person may be living in (i.e., a person in the Red Quarter exhibits violence, they get reported and are deported to the Yellow Quarter).
Now, think of all the people you know, or at least the ones close to you. I'm almost positive that you can (and most likely will) begin to label them with each of these temperaments. You may even come to the point where you can label yourself as being red, yellow, green, or blue. But amidst all this labelling, you must realize that not all people exhibit characteristics that are completely consistent with one temperament, all the time.
Myself, I like to think of myself as white (It seems as there's a special class reserved for the government officials and the like). But don't read this the wrong way--it's not that I don't fit into any cateory, or that I protest categorization, it's that I fit equally into all categories. I am good natured, hotheaded, inspired, and completely cold in equal amounts. I'm a leader, an administrator, a friend, and I even write poetry, every day. It's an interesting psychological puzzle--how would you label yourself? How would you label others? How do you think that others would label you?
In reality, though, I'm probably just sanguine, blood red as the rest of them. Bo-ring.
Rupert Thomson's Divided Kingdom. Pick it up.
She spoke to me again today.
While I will never, ever let up on who exactly she is, as I know that would breach my commitment to never, ever make this journal personal, I will tell you that she is very beautiful, and that we deserve each other, etc. I was actually wondering how long it would take me to get to this particular entry.
Perhaps it is infatuation, perhaps it is something more. I've long been a supporter of not calling anything a relationship unless it is serious, that is, a relationship is only a relationship to a degree. I do believe that that loving multiple people is possible, which throws out a theory of there being a "one true love." Some might consider this notion sick and perverted, others may call it human nature. I personally believe that the love is like a plant--the amount of time you spend nurturing it and caring for it (or the other person for that matter) is directly proportional to the size of the love in question, that is, the more you practice at it, the more passionate the love will be. Love grows, and there is a basic love for every other person on this earth by every other person on this earth,
And of course, it becomes obvious from this entry that this may be the result of a hormonal, adolescent phase, and the problems with that theory include: a) I can actually diagnose myself, and admit that it might be just like an addiction, and as far as I know I've been able to control it, and b) I'm 18 and a half. So this theory might not be altogether true.
Often times seniors in high school will enter relationships with juniors or other "underclassmen." I believe this to be a lie: these are simply friendships with a high degree of infatuation for the other person. Both know, even if it is subconsciously, that the senior must move away, to college, and must make something of his/her self.
So in this sense, why bother entering into a "relationship" with someone until you are out of college, when you can support yourself and you probably aren't going anywhere for an amount of time? If you are a senior/junior who is involved with someone else, ask yourself this: what will you do when the other person must leave? Will you do everything in your power to be with him/her again? Will you wait it out in hopes that your love will be faithful? Or will you move on, admitting to yourself that my theory of love-growth is true, and that it is possible to love more than one person? And if it's a yes to that last question, am I really that insane, or outrageous with these theories?
I'm not trying to scorn love, because everyone who scorns love is criticized: those who have never been in love are criticized for not knowing what it's like, and those who have been in love many times are criticized for being jaded, for getting the short straw. Instead, I'm trying to point out some of the flaws of making "relationships"--things that aren't really what they are called, calling things that aren't really what they are.
So I encourage you to think before entering into a relationship. I don't want to debunk everything I just said by saying, "oh, well you can never really know for sure," but just be careful in choosing the person you want to work with at love. It may sound cold, describing love as mechanical work, requiring its participants to strive for the highest level of love, but I beg of you to think of it as something natural--think of your love as a flower, or better yet a tree. It is, after all, human nature to love.
I was walking home from work yesterday when I ran into an old black lady also waiting for the bus. At first I thought she was crazy, but after chatting with her for a while, I drew that she wasn't crazy, but mostly angry because she had missed the bus, after screaming at the driver who refused to slow down for her. I've had this happen to me a couple of times, and it IS infuriating.
We talked for a while, and eventually it started to rain, so I let her use part of my (huge) umbrella. Well, I thought, at least I will not stoop to the indecency of MUNI bus drivers. We talked from hair, to kids, to all sorts of things, and I actually listened to her. I'm normally afraid of people I meet on the street, but not, for some reason, in this case. This woman had a wisdom about her, and she had grown up in San Francisco near the Haight-Ashbury, where I live, during the summer of love.
She struck me with this statement: "Don't have kids until you don't have anything else to do."
Which to me, is weird. Looking at history we can say that there was a time in America where there was a push for women to churn out babies like a machine. Nowadays, it seems like the idea of having children is just a waste of time and resources. Having children? Are you insane? Of course, I'm not planning to have children at my age, that would be stupid, but I probably won't decide to have kids ever. Not when I'm 25, not when I'm 30, not when I'm any age at all.
There's also the global problem. We are running out of resources as it is. Pollution and global warming are just a few things that are damaging the earth we live on. So having kids? Probably not a good idea anyway. Who would want them to suffer? But this is simply unrealistic: we must procreate in order to create. We have a constant will to be remembered, or else we are nothing. Which simply means this: we need to start worrying about the place we live, right now.
Perhaps this is an extravagant response to a simple chat with an old lady, but it was certainly thought-provoking.
As much as I'd like to say that everyone was a celebrity, I would like to share with you a little piece that I came up with:
It's best if our imaginations were a product of ourselves, rather than ourselves being a product of our imaginations.
It's probably better to dream that you were such a celebrity rather than be one, but I wouldn't know.
Anyways, yes, I've actually had a couple of run-ins with Robin Williams--he lives in San Francisco with his daughter, and was at Herb Caen's funeral. He's actually a pretty nice guy, come to think of it. It's funny because I don't really remember exactly what we said, but thinking, "Wow, I'm talking with Robin Williams, and, wow, he's just like another guy."
What I mean is, I don't think any celebrity IS a celebrity. They're all just people, like us, only they get seen more often than we do. We, the silent, background people probably have just as much talent and just as much going on. It just never gets publicized.
Off I go, as of tomorrow. I'm gonna try updating this thing while I'm there, but what I'm gonna do (or what I've planned to do) is to write a short story or play while I'm there. I'll find some cafe where they'll like me and get to work. About a half-hour, each day, just writing something good.
It'll be good for me, I think. The only other thing I've written is a play (which I'm actually still in the process of writing) in my moleskine (which is where I'll be writing this new thing as well) that I haven't really told anyone about because it's a little disturbing and might not fit for an actual play--I'm not sure anyone could pull it off onstage. I might decide to show it to people in the near future, but now I'm not so sure, because people will think I'm creepy. In fact, some people probably already think so. I'd have to look deeper into my observations.
It'll be nice romping around the city. Give me some time to think and tinker with my own life. I hope I'll enjoy it, because it seems like, for a teenager, there is nothing to do in Paris except walk around.
I find that there are two types of parties: social gatherings, and free-for-alls. Social gatherings are typically smaller, like a picnic or a birthday party sleepover that you had with your friends in 5th grade. Free-for-alls are college parties at someone's house, with beer, or a dance that goes late into the night. They are larger in size and more dangerous in nature. The natural person wants an equal balance of both: they want to hob-nob and excercise their brains and just get to know people, but they also just want to have fun and party, even if it is at some risk, it will later make a good story.
The party I just got back from was a small social gathering for a young man's 16th birthday. I stopped having parties at about 12, and when I went to this one, it felt like that typical sleepover. I felt a little bit of nostalgia, but the people surrounding me were my age. It was a very surreal experience. It was all guys, although one woman showed for a while, but then left. I was surrounded by people my age and younger, and I could just tell: I'm too old for this. I'm literally eighteen and grown up. And I felt a pang of regret that I didn't have more fun.
What are you thankful for?
That's easy: my friends. Although they seem to be apologizing to me a lot lately. I mean, that's a good thing. I love it when people realize the fact that they screwed up. It's just a nice feeling. In their defense, though, I guess it's the stress getting to everyone, I mean it is our senior year, so. The one thing I don't like are those stupid conditional sorries. Like where have you heard this before: "I'm sorry, but..."
This isn't a real sorry. If you screwed up, you're gonna have to say something like "I'm sorry, PERIOD" or if you wanna be formal about it, "I apologize." Or even, "I screwed up, I'm sorry, I guess I just didn't know what was up" or WHATEVER. Come to accept the humility and then the healing can begin.
I'm thankful for our new government, too. I'm thankful for the fact that I like music so much and that my hearing is better. Come to think of it, I have a lot of things to be thankful for.
Hey all, just a quick update before I go to bed.
One of my hobbies, as many people may know, is music. I tend to like every type of music, ranging from classic, rock, classic rock, alternative, icelandic music, believe or not. So when I find another alternative artist, I say, well, they sound like every other alternative artist I know, so I'll just ignore them. But Keane, which I've tried to avoid for a long time now, is actually quite good. I'm thinking of actually buying an album of theirs.
Now, alternative for me is like my LOST of television: it's a guilty pleasure. Pop music is something looked down upon in my opinion, but really, his voice is just gorgeous. For me, someone who has extensive musical taste (and I say that with minimal snobbery) it's just sad that I listen to someone like Keane. Not that Keane is bad, mind you, but at least I don't listen to, say, Justin Timberlake. Now there's something to be ashamed of. But it's like, the Counting Crows aren't bad, and niether are the Red Hot Chili Peppers, so in terms of alternative, perhaps Keane is more towards the pop end of the spectrum, but I can't resist those piano + vocal songs with descending chromatic scales. That might just be me being a music geek, but there is a logical explanation to why I'm turned on by this particular artist. So laugh all you want. I may be a little more ashamed of the music I listen to, but it could be worse.
