Soap and the half-full glass that it is Not In

Right now I am not talking about the soap that we use to wash our hands, clothes and dishes with, but a metaphorical soap: the soap that cleanses our consciouses. The soap that enables us to use the phrase "washing our hands clean of a situation"-- Get me? 

Has it always been the case that we feel the need to disregard- to clean up- all the negativities of our lives? I thought the "Pleasantville" mannerisms had passed away a couple decades ago, but apparently I was wrong. I see it in myself and the people around me; we come across an ounce of depression in our lives and we feel the need to wash it out. 

We don't want to deal with sadness, personally. 

The people around us don't want to see us sad.

There may be more causes, but I think the above two statements are the main reasons we denounce grief. And the sad thing is that our attempts to live lives of near-constant happiness is impossible. And the sadder thing is that the expectation that our lives should consist of near-constant happiness only depresses us. Do you see how unproductive this is?! 

We see sorrow as a germ- an invader, and we cleanse our minds of it just as we cleanse our houses. Our minds become as superficially white as a suburban countertop, and when guests come to visit they're impressed with our cleanliness- they can eat off our windexed linoleum, but watch them get sick later (no really- my friend had a cat that died from licking their chemically "cleansed" kitchen floors). What I am trying to get across here is that a mind washed of sorrow is false, unsustainable and unhealthy: it is lying to itself and everyone around them. 

To add to the metaphore-- as society "progresses", we have invented new ways to avoid sorrow-- soaps of higher potencies. For instance, anti-bacterial soap. It's a nice idea; we can completely sterilize ourselves, at the same time we weaken our immune system and disable ourselves from naturally protecting ourselves from bacteria. What is an anti-depressant but a sort of acti-bacterial soap. It is supposed to psychologically sterilize us of depression, but we loose our natural ability to deal with life. Yes- life, of which depression is involved! 

I AM SO TIRED of simplifying existence to keep things light and positive. Of being so unambitious in understanding my emotions that I limit myself to believing that "happy"=good! and "sad"=baaaaad. How immature! I am sick of not expressing myself because when I start a sentence with "I'm depressed..." I am told to see a doctor. Why is the average emotion contentedness? I am never content. 

I felt terrible for a while- thinking that the everyone around me woke up in the morning and felt happy. And the more I attempted to be happy, the more depressing life got. 

My advice to (firstly) myself and (secondly) the world is: never tell yourself to think positively. I could say that life oscillates through emotions, but even that is superficial. The fact is that I feel what I feel. I don't attempt to alter the weather, so why alter my mind? 

Those Who Seem To Know (Me)

5 o'clock on friday night and the weatherman is making predictions.

Statements of, "You can count on a sunny day!", or, 

with a corny smile, "I'm sure everyone'll be out and about this weekend!" 

Are directed at me,

And I am... impressed- or even envious. 

Their conviction is convincing.

I dress in shorts on saturday morning.

While the sky is clear, and the sun is shining

I am freezing.

Was I fooled?

They had me believing that the world was packing a picnic today--

Setting up beach chairs, and swimming in the ocean.

I tested the water, and turned blue.

I feel so alone.

The fact is alienating-- that the 2% chance of rain chose to pour on my doorstep. 

Is there something wrong with me?

My circulation must be poor; I'm not pumping enough blood to stay warm,

So I take medication to keep my heart going--

Prescribed by doctors.

With their PHDs, they declare to understand me.

Then why do my symptoms persist?

Now I'm incompetent--

Unable to independently get my own organs to function!

Last night I left my bottle of pills outside.

You claimed it would be a starry-clear night,

But I woke to find the tablets dissolved in rain water.

Seems you- weatherman- can't predict the weather of my life any better than I can. 

MOBY DICK ESSAY

I apologize for this disclaimer, but I must say that the depth in the philosophies of Moby Dick are not done justice through this essay.

Still, I hope you can enjoy it:

Search for the Source

Moby Dick is Ishmael’s retold story of a variety of ways people around him seek in order to connect with and understand the source of existence. Ishmael is an ideal narrator, for he never attaches to or identifies with any of the opinions or philosophies that he describes throughout his story. He contains a “Catskill eagle in [his soul] that can alike dive down into the blackest gorges, and soar out of them again and become invisible in the sunny spaces” (543). This capability enables him to survive his journeys, to recognize multiple quests towards one goal, and to simultaneously experience indisputable truths that only appear when unsought. With similar detachment to Ishmael, I follow the journeys described in Moby Dick as an outsider, and question the value of the quests he describes. 

The Pequod, chasing after Moby Dick, is seeking the supernatural. Taking up the idea that “in landlessness alone resides the highest truth” (149), the ship isolates itself at sea. But rather than find truth, the journey takes the ship further away from it. The leader of the voyage, Captain Ahab, nails a doubloon to the mast of the ship. It is described as the “ship’s navel”, symbolizing a severed connection from the source of origin (556). This doubloon becomes the pursued goal of the voyage. Ahab states that “fate reserved the doubloon for [him]” (688), signifying that the actual conclusion to his journey would not be a connection to the source, but a disconnection. This detachment becomes increasingly relevant, for, as the voyage continues, Ahab and the crew are often described as mechanical. The dehumanization of the people on the Pequod is a direct portrayal of their disconnection from the source, and their human origins. Ahab is unable to find what he set out for, for the truth does not reside in the places he looks. The “strife of the chase” is a result of the inability to find what is sought after (684), and that strife is the fundamental doom of the Pequod. 

After escaping the wreckage of the Pequod, Ishmael is rescued by another ship: the Rachael. The Rachael contrasts the Pequod, for the ship’s voyage is a “retracing search after her missing children” (724), an attempt to retain, rather than loose, human connections. However this search, this attempt to reconnect child to parent– the source– is unsuccessful, for the ship “only [finds] another orphan” (724). The Captain of the Rachael’s name, Gardiner, is significant to the ship’s quest. Although Captain Gardiner cultivates relationships, they are not restoring the severed bonds of the natural source, for the “secret of [their] paternity lies in [their parent’s] grave, and [they] must there to learn it” (624). While Gardiner’s objective may provide comfort to lost souls, it does not relieve the aching questions that it intends to. 

Ishmael reveals an approach to the source that contrasts the frantic hunts of the Pequod and the Rachael. Being unattached to any of the monomaniacal voyages he describes, Ishmael is able to truly experience the sea without looking for anything. He discovers a connection to the source when simply observing the sea; his “spirit ebbs away to whence it came; becomes diffused through time and space” (214). During these experiences Ishmael unconsciously connects with the entirety of the universe, but when his consciousness returns “identity comes back in horror” (214). Although only for a fleeting moment, Ishmael is able to feel the powerful connection that people are searching for when he separates from his identity. Ishmael’s experience proves that the source can be apparent in everything when nothing particular is being sought. Those who seek a definable thing cannot appreciate the simplicity of where the source truly is, nor the complexity of what it is. 

When I began to read Moby Dick I simultaneously embarked on a voyage in search of definitions. However Moby Dick is a seven hundred paged description on why no book, person, or quest can provide answers. Although answers and definitions cease relentless curiosity and questioning, they do not provide the truth. The peace of mind that is desired by myself, and by many characters in Moby Dick, can only be experienced when searches are concluded, and identities are cast aside. Moby Dick offers no key to peace or happiness, for peace and happiness can only be attained momentarily. However, the book provided me with the realization that what I search for is unreachable, and so I may let go of the strife that accompanies my seeking. Realizing the wisdom that the less one seeks, the more one finds, I conclude my journey. 

The Grim Look May Grin

I'm sorry if you disagree, but I have come to a certain controversial conclusion that I contend to: Most of what we say is bullshit. This blog, for example-- although it is attempting to reach out and grasp something important, much of the time it gets no where, and, unfortunately i must confess, is only an excuse to make noise with large words and disagreeable whining. And no one else is any better. We are preoccupied with complaints about the way we are living our lives; complaints we only have because we have layered purpose onto our lives to keep us going, and the purpose doesn't actually exist so the complaints are not actually relevant. In essence we are preoccupied with nothing, but we can't let it go. We have conversations that are built up by these preoccupations. Well, they aren't actually conversations, for we only react to one another-- reactions that do not even speak to what the conversation is actually about, that speak only to our useless complaints. 

I realized that many of my conversations are formatted in this way, and I was overwhelmed with frustration that, even with my closest friends, often nothing is said. I then realized that what separates my close friends from all my acquaintances is a portion of time that we actually do say things. Although 95% of the time we spew crap from our mouths, attempt at humor, create inside jokes that are never funny but create a false sense of a close relationship, and hardly listen to one another; although so much time is taken up with us pretending to connect, there is still a portion of time that is truly meaningful. 5% of the time we have conversations that give us energy , we laugh-- not because we are trying to find something funny, but because we are both appreciating a natural humor, and we express ourselves in ways that don't make us depend on one another so that we have an ear to listen to our noise, but make us sincerely appreciate one another. 

You might take what I said above as cynical or depressing, but- actually- when I realized this I felt relieved. Because relationships are not pointless. Because it is possible to simply love someone without needing them or owning them. Because life sometimes feels enjoyable rather than productive, I am alright with it often being shallow. Maybe it is even necessary for us to not really get one another all the time, for friends to feel disconnected, and for individuals to feel alienated. Maybe we need the contrast in order to appreciate what we have. (that was not at all cliché)

I don't know if you have noticed what I have written about above in your life, or if you even agree, but I really think that every individual who makes up humanity need to step back at times and:

1.  question the importance of the aspects of their life that they obsess over.
   
2.  notice whether or not they actually know themselves
   
3.  notice whether or not the people close to them actually knows who they are (deeply) 
   
4.  attempt to create deeper relationships, and, for at least 5% of the time they spend with the people they consider to be close to, stop pretending. don't try to be funny, or interesting, or serious, or smart,and don't whine. Only be expressive, and intake what is expressed; get energy from this, this is psychological sustainment. Enjoy it! I really don't think there is anything more important in our lives then that. 
   

Introduction

Dear Reader,

This is my attempt to connect with you. If we were meeting face-to-face I would shake your hand, give you a hug, or kiss you (depending on who you are...). But, then again, if we were meeting face-to-face you would be saying a lot more, and I, obviously, would be saying a lot less. I would be feeling a lot less egocentric, and perhaps blogging just really isn't my thing because I have the constant insecurity that no one gives a fuck what I have to say... ok, and now i'm whining [sorry]. Anyway, I believe an important factor to this blog is that we are eliminating physicality-- simplifying speech, which often confuses the intent of the words spoken, and attempting to reach a higher form of expression through writing (and reading). 

I don't really know what I'll be doing with this blog. I guess I'll post some poems, analyze some literature and philosophies, attempt to sound intelligent, try to crack a few jokes here and there, and- hopefully- be able to reveal many things that make life bearable and beautiful. (This is supposed to be a letter, but so far it sounds like a syllabus.)

Now to pose a question: 

Yesterday- courtesy of my school's English department- I was able to take a trip to Kirby Cove with fellow Moby Dick-reading english classmates, and spend the evening finishing the final 4 chapters of that epic book. It was a surreal experience. All the discomforts that I would commonly expect from reality (i.e: cold weather, smoky air from the campfire, lack of light to read, etc.) were not applicable. It felt entirely dream-like; not only was I engulfed in the fiction of Moby Dick, but my life felt like something written in one of those obnoxiously optimistic teen fantasy novels. The surrealism led it to be a seemingly life-altering experience for me. I am curious to know if other's have had such an experience. Anyway- I raise this question: Is our perception of reality so negative that we cannot grasp that it can be magical? If we discarded the notion that perfection comes only in fiction and fantasy, [how] would we change? 

I don't know how relevant anything I say is to you, but as I said before: I am trying to connect. I have recently decided that relationships with humanity is a very valid step towards understanding one's self. I am testing that former notion with this blog, and I hope you are interested in helping me in this test. 

In conclusion; I think this poem fits the moment: 

Jam

  Our love is not the short

courtly kind but

upstream, down, 

long inside-- enjambed,

enjoined, conjoined, and 

jammed, it's you, enkindler, 

enlarger, jampacked man of many

stanzas, my enheartener-- love

runs on from line to

you, from line to me and me

to you, from river to sea and sea to 

land, hits a careless coast, meanders

way across the globe- land

ahoy! water ahoy!-- love

with no end, my waters go 

wherever you are, my stream

of consciousness. 

- by Karen Chase

Poem from the Open Mic

I had a dream that I woke up, and

in an oversized T-shirt 

jumped out my open window.

He told me the T-shirt was his. I replied:

it doesn't matter cause this dream is mine. 

I took notes at school on black paper, and wrote upside down

from right to left. 

It was exquisite nonsense--

nonsense (as it always was), but made exquisite by honesty 

never before revealed through note-taking. 

I had a dream that I could hum monotones, and you understood their meaning;

so we would hum endlessly, never loosing interest. 

I would tell you that I wrote five pages about

one sentence you spoke. 

That you are my muse, 

my poet, 

my musical genius who composes my monotones into symphonies. 

I had this dream, and we met in the back of a small room-- as storage space.

With complete understanding of what you wanted from me, 

and I from you,

we finally concluded what we wanted from one another.

For an endless moment we found breathless contentment;

literally holding each other's air in our own lungs. 

Holding each other just to let go. 

In this dream, among miscellaneous objects and unconventional lights

we did those things that I now cannot explain because

I am not dreaming when I tell you about this dream-- which I won't, 

but if I did-- you will frown... 

avert your gaze. 

You will not look at me the same way, and 

you will fear giving me the "wrong idea". 

In reality I don't hum monotones. 

I butcher thoughts with language; I extinguish truths with definitions. 

I write closet-essays about something you said once, but you will never know. 

In reality I write notes from left to right (on white paper),

and I read them from top to bottom,

and I take the test one question at a time-- in numerical order.