Double exhumation

I was contemplating about the maximization of the ephemeral present--I might as well be given an Academy award for best actress in a delusional dramatic role--I 'back read' and saw my post on Hume's Concerning Human Understanding which I do not, for the life of me, remember reading: http://annaswhatnots.blogspot.ca/2010/03/to-ex-hume.html Isn't it surreal to be reading what actually came out of my head and not have a recollection about it? What I miss right now is my father's collection of great books. I learned a lot from those. That passage I quoted from Hume is still relevant. It's almost creepy how classic books are still timely.

the scarcity of synchronicity

The statement above was lifted from a statistics reference (accessible online--maybe I don't need to cite...no intention to infringe). Whereas it is difficult to fully communicate personal realities that start out as constructs inside one's mind, it is far more challenging to encounter a recipient who can grasp those constructs precisely. It's a rare feat--do not trivialize that. 

acceptance

It was in high school when I learned the prayer: "Lord, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and wisdom to know the difference." 

It is a timely thing to meditate on right now.

Tune Out

I retweeted the screenshot above about a somewhat mundane statement about Bill Gates and PM Justin Trudeau. I wonder why it had to be published unless the Telegraph would like to subliminally communicate that interactions with the PM have a tendency to be non-stimulating. 

Such a sad reality about human interaction. I try my best to make the most out of each interaction--I magnify each detail to maximize the moment. Of course, there's a tendency for me to tune out of the superficial (e.g. topic of conversation) and laser focus on a person's voice, smell, mannerisms, even whatever curious sensation I'm experiencing during the interaction. I wish I could record everything; as in capture each moment--everything about the moment/memory. Alas, every present moment immediately becomes the past in a second. 

There are occasions when I seem tuned out and that's been pointed out to me often. I'm still in the moment but maybe I felt a piece of whatnot stuck on my teeth and I felt the urge to look at the Apple sign (mirror) at the back of my phone to confirm--or maybe my attempt to focus on the person I'm talking to isn't translated well by my face. My expression could range from expressionless to wincing in pain. 

I wish I had eidetic memory and the capability to rewind each interaction. 

I also wish that the reason why Bill Gates would lug a microbiology book is because he's simply fascinated by the topic and not to blatantly insult a nation's leader. I like Bill Gates, he's cool. I don't think he's a rude snobby billionaire.

relativity

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I found myself conversing with this person whose demeanor reminded me so much of Tim Robbins on the movie I.Q. but reminded me, physically, of a hybrid between Harold Ramis (Egon Spengler on Ghostbusters, had to Google his name) and Rick Moranis. 

Harold Ramis

I could note the unassuming yet 'still waters run deep' aura of this person who was obviously highly intelligent yet honestly humble--and funny without meaning to be.  I always found very funny people to be the most profound. Funny = wit. It's very easy to gravitate towards that kind of down-to-Earth persona. I hope to be friends with this person--if this person enjoys the company of someone who is a combination of Hannibal Lecter/Wednesday Addams/Romy&Michele. 

Rick Moranis

atmospheric pressure, my lungs, and daft beings

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The scarcity of public transportation on this appropriately rainy morning was the impetus for hind leg activity from point A to point B. And since our lower extremities are voracious oxygen consumers--as a result of mitochondria-filled skeletal muscles--I found myself relying on my thoracic (intercostal) muscles to systematically expand my torso (to decrease pressure) and allow air to ventilate my lungs.  This sequence of realizations has led me to think about density. Density has various subject matter-specific definitions. I would sometimes just think of it as level of crowding. Too much stuff. Too many people. Too much particles.

People are occasionally described as dense. I think I can be dense. Filled with thoughts. Thoughts about how the strings of the universe are conspiring against me. The usual. And then there are other dense people who are so impenetrable--who just don't get it. Even Thor's Mjolnir wouldn't be able to crack their myopic and deafened state so as to turn on the light bulb of "there's something that needs to be done."

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Terrestrial Engine Travel

So here we are again at a train station waiting for a long haul trip to the west. I never knew that I had this ongoing platonic relationship with trains. 

I've occasionally taken the LRT or MRT in Manila---I remember typhoon Ondoy when I was stranded overnight at work because of waist-deep flood (add to that the horrid feeling that my family was at home trying to raise floor furniture and whatnot) and braved the rat urine-infested floodwaters to get to the nearest LRT or MRT to get home.

Flashback further in the past and I'm in Osaka riding the bullet train to go to Hiroshima on an exchange student program in Japan. I blended well physically--I looked legitimately Japanese--however, I was with a group. We were an entourage of 4 uniformed girls accompanying our Principal who was a nun. The bullet train was superb.

Fastforward to 2009 when I found myself trying to figure out the intricate web of train platforms in Copenhagen when, during winter at that time, for some reason--commuters smelled of beer. Probably Carlsberg. Which I grew to love. The trains too. And the whole adventure of reading station signs and street signs with a sequence of accented vowels.

Now here. At Union station in Toronto. Where it feels like an airport. That's the developed world for ya. I'm pretty sure that people who have not gone outside of the first world comforts may think of a litany of complaints about this station. 

Cynthia Alexander's song comes to mind: "I have seen, I have been to places far and deep in my mind only to find comfort in your strangeness."

cheesy peasy

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I finally succumbed to my son's nagging request to get Oka cheese--because he heard tht it was good and saw it on an ad. I initially didn't think that it was a practical idea to buy it since it was expensive so I'd tell him "no." It was the 3rd time when we were together at the local grocer that I finally said yes. At least it was cheese; not beer or aftershave or something. It was good. I hate the fact that I like it, because I now think it's perfect with wine. Meaning to say I may potentially buy it again. Oka is Québécois

and made from local milk in the traditional Trappist monk way. 

My stomach is feeling a little funny right now. I immediately thought of this Meg Ryan romantic flick called "French Kiss" where she tried all sorts of French cheeses and had diarrhea. Such a romantic film, I know. 

seek faith at the right place

"Faithless is he who says farewell when the road darkens." -Tolkien's LOTR

It is therefore wise to hold one's ground, wear an armor of courage, and expect a long journey ahead. Keep a forward gaze, allow company, trust a few. Don't stop and wonder why the day invites a crowd and at night you are alone. Tread on. Be relentless.

Source: http://farm5.static.flickr.com/4133/4992731852_888e48a615.jpg

My head is bloody, but unbowed

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on traveling, wandering, etc

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Whilst at a Thanksgiving party, I conversed with someone who just came back from a Eurotrip. She said that a two-week itinerary covering France, Italy, Spain, & London with mostly flights left her exhausted. I thought it was still worth it---she thought the same, of course.

My bucket list still has The Louvre in Paris and the Sistine Chapel in Rome as unchecked bullet points. Also, NASA, The Great Wall, Nepal, Antarctica, Alexandria, the International Space Station, Mars, the opposite edge of the Milky Way, seeing the Aurora Borealis...Dreams are free, lists are just lists.

Salt of the Earth people

Millet's Man with a Hoe source

Are we on a blog roll this month, it's like going back to 2006/7 when MySpace and Friendster still existed. This morning at work, I learned about a man who did a lot of gardening and other manually intensive activities. I think it's an admirable hobby and when someone is very hands on in terms of labor--I automatically put that person on an imaginary pedestal. I've met too many people who scoff at getting their hands dirty. People who prefer to pay other people to do what they obviously are capable of doing. Just because manual labor is too blue collar--doesn't go well with an Onesimus or Zara suit. I find that off-putting. Especially for a man. My husband doesn't like suits (unless he has no choice) and prefers to stubbornly tinker and do a lot of DIY projects. It doesn't always result to his planned outcome, but when he achieves whatever he wants to achieve--screened windows, bidet spray installation (LOL), extended extension cord--oh, that smug look on his face. Cracks me up; but I pat him on the back. I remember one of the first gifts he gave me was a paper weight he made in shop class--a chrome-plated dice (or die) where one of the corners was screwed on an x-shaped base so it looked like it was permanently tipped diagonally. Well he took it back and made it a reference model for all his students when he taught a machine class in university. But I thought it was a fantastic gift.

Going back to getting one's hands dirty as in gardening--I think it says a lot about a person. That there's a certain degree of humility and unassuming-ness. I like blue collar jobs; not to say that I want to shift careers and go into construction--but you know what I'm implying. I suppose being overexposed to a few persons in air-conditioned, hard-wood themed offices who can't be bothered to go get their own coffee made me "umay." When I had the fortunate opportunity to run an office with 2 administrative staff and a few student assistants, I made it a point to make my own coffee in the machine, clean the coffee maker myself, and get my own lunch. I remember at the beginning, one of the staff would ask what I wanted for lunch or what they could get me--I would respectfully decline just because lunch was across the street. I tried to avoid using the Intercom, because the walk towards the administrative offices was good exercise. I thought my office was excessively big. Too big. Look at me being all hypocritical when it was only last year when we moved to a different country that I started to do chores. I'm technically berating myself right now for letting other people do things at home in the past--things I could clearly do myself, sort of. Guilty. It was convenient. Feel free to judge me, I'm not proud of it trust me. But there's always a form of rebirth right? While I feel incessantly exhausted now, I feel more decent--more real.

My point is, we shouldn't succumb to the social norm of being impressed with superficiality. Wealth, stature, and power worn on one's sleeves don't necessarily equate to character and dignity. I'm not making a hasty generalization. And I'm not saying that blue collar is better than white collar. That all blue collar people nor all white collar people are decent. There are always exceptions. This morning's events simply triggered a reexamination of what makes an ordinary person extraordinary. Wouldn't it be great to aim for that?

To err is human--and it can be divine

It's humanae naturae to convince the universe that you're right. We feed our delicate egos with validation and vindication. But there are occasions when being wrong is beneficial--gratifying even. Occasions when you face the mirror and tell yourself "take that, you over-analyzing alien wannabe--you were wrong; go forth and be the human that other humans actually consider as human." 

I promise you that I'm not under medication nor under the influence of the smell of a used sock. I kid you not.

On teeth grinding, neural overdrive, and Socrates

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For the past few days, I've been waking up with an uncomfortable upper jaw (region of my incisors) and pressure on the bridge of my nose and forehead. My husband informed me that I had been grinding my teeth during sleep (bruxism) and I attribute it to a number of things. On one hand, I think that it's good to introspect since, like Socrates once said, "the unexamined life is not worth living." 

In honor of Socrates, too much discourse (internally, with myself), and teeth grinding, I will watch clips of Bill & Ted's Excellent adventure. 

On a side note, I don't recommend introspecting while in the middle of a meeting, class, or when walking down the street. Irreversible damage potential. Like blurting out Shakespeare soliloquys or something random like...I don't know--antidisestablishmentarianism (this word a Disney owl once said in a cartoon that I vaguely remember).

Vanity--all is vanity (caution: spiritual fixation post)

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"This is the highest wisdom: to despise the world and to aspire to the

kingdom of Heaven.

   It is vanity, therefore, to seek riches which must perish, and to trust

in them.

   It is vanity also to be ambitious of honors, and to raise oneself up to

a high station.

   It is vanity to follow the desires of the flesh, and to desire that for

which you must afterward be grievously punished.

   It is vanity to wish for a long life, and to take little care of

leading a good life.

   It is vanity also to attend only to this present life, and not to

look forward to those things which are to come.

And so on."

On the right side of this blog you will see that I highly recommend Thomas A Kempis's "The Inner Life." I have posted about this book a few times including this one from 2007 and this one from 2013.  Time and again I would realize my vanity. Vain anxiety. Argh. Think happy thoughts. Rainbows, butterflies, Sharpies, post-its, chocolate, refillable coffee, free pastries, strawberries and champagne---goodness, I seriously need a break from thinking. How do you do that? Assisted transcendental hypnosis? Ack.

Bachelor of Arts Major in Introspection

Raphael's "The School of Athens" general information

In undergrad, note-taking also involved a lot of drawing and coloring---I would occasionally joke about being under the program Bachelor of Science in Biology major in Coloring Book. Anyway, it was during my required liberal arts terms when I began to appreciate the arts & humanities. I remember my first humanities course where my prof flashed a slide of Raphael's frescoe (above) and was captured. It's a busy picture, that's for sure. But you can see that every character interaction was deliberate and not just background filler. Yes, Plato and Aristotle seem to be the foci (being right at the center beneath the arc), but everyone else matter as well. 

Imagine walking through the picture and attempting to interact with everyone; or at least eavesdropping on the conversations. Topics may be very specific---even jargon-infused. One could get lost in the minute details of specialized concepts. You move from one group to another and find your levels of confusion and self-doubt increasing almost exponentially. That's because you have allowed yourself to be consumed by the superficialities of knowledge. You then reach Plato and Aristotle and realize that all this was aimed at answering the basic questions of "Who am I?", "Why am I here?, or "Why am I self-aware

?" 

Ancient people go to school to understand one's place in this world; the modern purpose of education is to get a better job, earn, owe, earn to pay what you owe until you retire etc etc. It's not worse these days---just very different. Don't get me wrong, I'm okay with the role of education today. I don't really want to be a woman in ancient Athens---women were commodities and never regarded to have brains. Plato and Aristotle only liked their kind. I mean liked as in like.

Not going there. I ain't an ancient gossip monger.