I was thinking about how I don't believe in God, but I also thought about how I really don't care that others do. As I've said, "The lady doth protest too much, methinks," Gertrude's remark in Hamlet, really does hold true. & the old bus campaign belies the ethos of atheism. By adding flame to the fire of religious contention, raising a ruckus only draws attention to the conflagration, & thusly the luminescence attracts eyes while the core gets destroyed by unseen cancer under the skin, to mix metaphors.
Don't get me wrong--it used to piss me off royally. I attended not 12, but 13, years of Catholic school (I'm counting kindergarten. & my brother went to preschool there too, so add that up while we're using incredibly faulty logic.). As if almost daily Mass (this invaded my bloodstream like a virus, & thankfully was significantly stressed only during my elementary school days. My high school only had it like once a month, & everybody loved it because it meant an adjusted schedule with only half-hour classes. Thinking back on it, it was actually quite awesome.) weren't enough to poison the punch bowl, so to speak, there were incredibly short-sighted pro-life simplistic arguments & thinly-veiled right-wing propaganda meant to marginalize whole swaths of people under the guise of the infallibility of a charismatic but very dangerous leader (who does that sound like?).
Nevertheless, I have since learned not to devalue the inherent & undeniable beauty of certain imagery because of condescension & subsequent virulence. I mean--again, don't get me wrong: the entire premise is ludicrous, but as long as it's kept away from legislation, it really doesn't bother me. This has been & will be the ultimate downfall of religions that assert moral superiority, because the subsequent & inevitable hypocrisy then gets placed in high relief.
Catholicism offers an especially despicable example of officious entitlement hiding beneath the dubious dogma of psychological misanthropy. Molestation is not a simple aberration; it's horrendous criminal activity. Certain things are simply pragmatic, & should not be viewed as anything less than criminal. Child abuse is just always wrong, & ignoring the seriousness of it only makes the problem all the more conspicuous. If you ignore an asteroid, it may eventually take us down, especially if Jerry Bruckheimer is involved. I know it looks down on science, but the Church refuses to acknowledge that sometimes an infused rose is an infused rose, & no amount of justifification can validate how disgusting the behavior is.
That being said, it makes no sense to protest vociferously against a convention that is broadly accepted. It's better to temper certitude with a little elasticity. Being so staunchly pugilistic negates your point of view, even if it's supposedly meant to be beneficent.
R
Saturday, November 26, 2011
Friday, November 25, 2011
A Tale of Two Friends
I'm compelled to start this post with a predictable quote from Charles Dickens, like "It was the best of times, it was the worst of times," but it would seem hackneyed, so I'm much more willing to use easily-decipherable aliases, like, say, "Neil" & "LNE." Like the hilariously obvious "Lisa S.," & then, "L. Simpson," in The Simpsons, I chose pseudonyms that are similarly transparent. Anybody with a pulse can clearly make out who I'm talking about, so, since I won't be bad mouthing either of them, I'm content to let the paper-thin aliases stand. They know who I mean, anyways, so I'm fine with being lazy.
The first, "Neil," is someone I've known since high school. We took many of the same classes, & quickly became friends. We have similar senses of humor, so getting to know him was a slam dunk--effortless, in fact. What's truly incredible is that he's the one person that I remain in contact with from that period. Sure, we have many of the same friends, but, oddly, none of them went to the same high school that we did. You see, we attended a parochial school, because the public high school, at least in my hometown, was terrible.
We took many of the same classes, because we were both intelligent, & fell in the same advanced ones. Many a night in high school was spent renting (that's an obsolete option) & watching movies, old & new. We also had siblings that were the same age, so that made our friendship all the more easy. When I was first diagnosed with MS, I had no qualms about disclosing it. For one thing, it was a hard fact, so I never thought about hiding it; also, I didn't even consider concealing it, because the manifestations were not something I could deny. Hence, I was okay with disclosing it.
The same could be said about LNE. We shared an office at a large downtown law firm, so I was preternaturally inclined to tell her about the diagnosis as well. There's an old adage that says that "familiarity breeds contempt," but I had no issues with her at all. Plus, she was (& is) exceedingly nice, so telling her was not a big deal.
Quick digression: she's Greek. Very Greek, in fact. When I once inspected a book she was reading, the text looked alien. Greek characters resemble, well, Greek, & outside of physics, I refused to believe that the letters had meaning outside of that context. It's hard to believe that anyone, let alone someone my age, could see assembled words, & even sentences, amid that insanity. & not only does she read Greek; she speaks it fluently. When she spoke to her parents on the phone, it sounded like gibberish. It was like she was talking to them in an obsolete language; I'm pretty sure Nell would have thought she was just bat-shit crazy. Now, I took Spanish in college, but nothing seemed discernible to me. Even before college, my grandparents spoke Spanish to each other, so I had some familiarity with a language other than English, but this sounded as strange as African bushmen conversing in Swahili. I had nowhere to start, so it just sounded like nonsense. I half expected to hear a nondiscriminate series of clucks & whistles.
For about ten years, niceness seemed anathema to me, so seeing somebody act genial filled me with reactionary repulsion. I didn't actively seek out misanthropes, but being consistently agreeable seemed unnatural. I viewed affability as a cover for stupidity, but neither of these people were dumb. In fact, they were both incredibly smart, & no matter how contumacious I was, this was a stark fact.
I think that, over time, one finds that he need not attribute geniality to stupidity. In fact, I think that doing so in itself is stupid. Ironically, thinking so is, actually, quite stupid. Therefore, when I thought being mean was something of a badge of honor, I was thinking like an idiot.
R
The first, "Neil," is someone I've known since high school. We took many of the same classes, & quickly became friends. We have similar senses of humor, so getting to know him was a slam dunk--effortless, in fact. What's truly incredible is that he's the one person that I remain in contact with from that period. Sure, we have many of the same friends, but, oddly, none of them went to the same high school that we did. You see, we attended a parochial school, because the public high school, at least in my hometown, was terrible.
We took many of the same classes, because we were both intelligent, & fell in the same advanced ones. Many a night in high school was spent renting (that's an obsolete option) & watching movies, old & new. We also had siblings that were the same age, so that made our friendship all the more easy. When I was first diagnosed with MS, I had no qualms about disclosing it. For one thing, it was a hard fact, so I never thought about hiding it; also, I didn't even consider concealing it, because the manifestations were not something I could deny. Hence, I was okay with disclosing it.
The same could be said about LNE. We shared an office at a large downtown law firm, so I was preternaturally inclined to tell her about the diagnosis as well. There's an old adage that says that "familiarity breeds contempt," but I had no issues with her at all. Plus, she was (& is) exceedingly nice, so telling her was not a big deal.
Quick digression: she's Greek. Very Greek, in fact. When I once inspected a book she was reading, the text looked alien. Greek characters resemble, well, Greek, & outside of physics, I refused to believe that the letters had meaning outside of that context. It's hard to believe that anyone, let alone someone my age, could see assembled words, & even sentences, amid that insanity. & not only does she read Greek; she speaks it fluently. When she spoke to her parents on the phone, it sounded like gibberish. It was like she was talking to them in an obsolete language; I'm pretty sure Nell would have thought she was just bat-shit crazy. Now, I took Spanish in college, but nothing seemed discernible to me. Even before college, my grandparents spoke Spanish to each other, so I had some familiarity with a language other than English, but this sounded as strange as African bushmen conversing in Swahili. I had nowhere to start, so it just sounded like nonsense. I half expected to hear a nondiscriminate series of clucks & whistles.
For about ten years, niceness seemed anathema to me, so seeing somebody act genial filled me with reactionary repulsion. I didn't actively seek out misanthropes, but being consistently agreeable seemed unnatural. I viewed affability as a cover for stupidity, but neither of these people were dumb. In fact, they were both incredibly smart, & no matter how contumacious I was, this was a stark fact.
I think that, over time, one finds that he need not attribute geniality to stupidity. In fact, I think that doing so in itself is stupid. Ironically, thinking so is, actually, quite stupid. Therefore, when I thought being mean was something of a badge of honor, I was thinking like an idiot.
R
Return
Whew--it's been a while. Around two years ago (I think it was actually like a year & a half), I went on indefinite hiatus with this thing for a number of reasons. The first was that I felt like I was grasping at straws for material. Yes, not every day presents material that needs to be recorded, but I shouldn't simply have continued, because, as I've said before, I emphatically did not want to emulate Proust & write about sleep. Honestly, no one gives a shit about your dreams, unless they somehow involve the other person. (In my case, this would not make it more tolerable, because the odds are that I killed you in the dream.) I think enough material has sufficiently built up to prattle on about, but first I'd like to bring you up to speed on the current state of my union.
First of all, I have zero cognitive defects, & actually the physical difficulties belie the fortitude of my mental capacities. It's a strange inverse development: my physical symptoms have grown worse, but mentally I've never been sharper. For instance, I cannot sit at my computer for very long before my lightheadedness becomes intolerable. I've tried to describe this before, but I think it's still a bit unclear. You know how you feel lightheaded going down a small hill? It's like a prolonged sensation like that, but without the weird stomach feeling. It feels like all the blood is pouring from my head, like sand in an hourglass, & only by lying down am I restored to a state of equilibrium. This has made it very uncomfortable to do much of anything, because nearly everything involves sitting erect. Going to the movies, for instance, fills me with dread because I know that I'll have to sit up for at least 90 minutes. Same thing with restaurants: I generally eschew dessert (well, not really) because I just want to lie down quickly.
This is where the iPad is invaluable. I can lie down & write, like I'm doing now. & something else, too, about the iPad--it makes reading so much easier. Prose, at least. I figured out how to turn off the percentage thing next to the battery icon. It's nerve racking to see that number tick down a percentage point while you're in the middle of a page. Now, without it, I'm free to read without that peripheral icon judging me, & me constantly waiting for the number to tick down another percentage point.
I still have a problem when it comes to poetry, & you can see why: a few weeks ago, I downloaded a collection of verse by my favorite poet, Emily Dickinson. Now, I've read her poems innumerable times, & I was perusing some of her more popular ones when I came upon "Because I Could Not Stop for Death," when I immediately recognized that a stanza was missing:
Or rather-He passed Us-
The Dews drew quivering and chill-
For only Gossamer, my Gown-
My Tippet-only Tulle-
I knew instantaneously that it was conspicuously missing, because the "My Tippet--only Tulle" part has been etched into my brain for like 15 years. When I quote that poem, for instance, I almost always say, "My Tippet--only Tulle," because it's alliterative & contains references to abstruse, sartorial terms. I remember thinking, "What the hell is a 'tippet'? &, for that matter, 'tulle'?" So that I saw as an inexcusable transgression, & am resigned to stick to prose.
I have several dozen books now, & I've yet to find such a glaring omission in them. True, such an excision would be much less noticeable, but I've read "Hamlet," for instance, dozens of times, & my electronic version does not seem to be missing anything. (Yes, I know that Shakespeare used iambic pentameter primarily, but even in Sir John Falstaff's bits, which were written in prose, nothing seems to be missing.) Even in longer works, such as Blood Meridian (which I've also read multiple times), nothing is conspicuously missing.
Oh--I cannot tell you how crestfallen I was to find that stanza missing.
Anyways, so my iPad now continues to reveal more amazing innovations when it comes to reading. You know how you used to have to angle your body toward a light source in order to see text adequately? No more. The device's internal illumination means that you can, literally, read in the dark. Priceless.
These accommodations offered by improved technology do not negate the hard fact that my disease is, pardon the pun, progressing. My face, for instance, serves as a kind of barometer of the current status of the disease. In the beginning, there was minimal facial numbness. Then it spread to my right eye, & stayed relegated mostly there. Over the last few months, though, it has proliferated to the left side of my face. & I've moved from a cane, to a walker, & now, to a power chair. When I go outside, I mainly like to be pushed, so I don't have to worry about capsizing, or running into things, be they stationary (fire hydrants, parking meters, etc.) or not (people, animals, & the like).
The most prevalent form of MS is relapsing-remitting. It's now quite clear that I have never had a period where my symptoms, um, remitted. I remember sitting in the exam room when Dr. Burt, the immunologist at the helm of the stem cell study,made a stair-like gesture, & then an up-&-down flapping motion with an arm. Now, I may be an English major, but I knew that he was giving a representation of a chart that showed how I perceived that my disease was progressing. I knew that the stem cell transplant had no effect on primary-progressive, but I also knew that there was no treatment for it, so, in my mind, I had nothing to lose.
Which brings us pretty much up to date. So, even though I'm not as garrulous as I used to be, I'm also more deliberate in my choice of words, & my newfound avenues of expression allow me to communicate more effectively. I don't mean to be morbid, but if Roger Ebert can still write regularly, so can I.
R
First of all, I have zero cognitive defects, & actually the physical difficulties belie the fortitude of my mental capacities. It's a strange inverse development: my physical symptoms have grown worse, but mentally I've never been sharper. For instance, I cannot sit at my computer for very long before my lightheadedness becomes intolerable. I've tried to describe this before, but I think it's still a bit unclear. You know how you feel lightheaded going down a small hill? It's like a prolonged sensation like that, but without the weird stomach feeling. It feels like all the blood is pouring from my head, like sand in an hourglass, & only by lying down am I restored to a state of equilibrium. This has made it very uncomfortable to do much of anything, because nearly everything involves sitting erect. Going to the movies, for instance, fills me with dread because I know that I'll have to sit up for at least 90 minutes. Same thing with restaurants: I generally eschew dessert (well, not really) because I just want to lie down quickly.
This is where the iPad is invaluable. I can lie down & write, like I'm doing now. & something else, too, about the iPad--it makes reading so much easier. Prose, at least. I figured out how to turn off the percentage thing next to the battery icon. It's nerve racking to see that number tick down a percentage point while you're in the middle of a page. Now, without it, I'm free to read without that peripheral icon judging me, & me constantly waiting for the number to tick down another percentage point.
I still have a problem when it comes to poetry, & you can see why: a few weeks ago, I downloaded a collection of verse by my favorite poet, Emily Dickinson. Now, I've read her poems innumerable times, & I was perusing some of her more popular ones when I came upon "Because I Could Not Stop for Death," when I immediately recognized that a stanza was missing:
Or rather-He passed Us-
The Dews drew quivering and chill-
For only Gossamer, my Gown-
My Tippet-only Tulle-
I knew instantaneously that it was conspicuously missing, because the "My Tippet--only Tulle" part has been etched into my brain for like 15 years. When I quote that poem, for instance, I almost always say, "My Tippet--only Tulle," because it's alliterative & contains references to abstruse, sartorial terms. I remember thinking, "What the hell is a 'tippet'? &, for that matter, 'tulle'?" So that I saw as an inexcusable transgression, & am resigned to stick to prose.
I have several dozen books now, & I've yet to find such a glaring omission in them. True, such an excision would be much less noticeable, but I've read "Hamlet," for instance, dozens of times, & my electronic version does not seem to be missing anything. (Yes, I know that Shakespeare used iambic pentameter primarily, but even in Sir John Falstaff's bits, which were written in prose, nothing seems to be missing.) Even in longer works, such as Blood Meridian (which I've also read multiple times), nothing is conspicuously missing.
Oh--I cannot tell you how crestfallen I was to find that stanza missing.
Anyways, so my iPad now continues to reveal more amazing innovations when it comes to reading. You know how you used to have to angle your body toward a light source in order to see text adequately? No more. The device's internal illumination means that you can, literally, read in the dark. Priceless.
These accommodations offered by improved technology do not negate the hard fact that my disease is, pardon the pun, progressing. My face, for instance, serves as a kind of barometer of the current status of the disease. In the beginning, there was minimal facial numbness. Then it spread to my right eye, & stayed relegated mostly there. Over the last few months, though, it has proliferated to the left side of my face. & I've moved from a cane, to a walker, & now, to a power chair. When I go outside, I mainly like to be pushed, so I don't have to worry about capsizing, or running into things, be they stationary (fire hydrants, parking meters, etc.) or not (people, animals, & the like).
The most prevalent form of MS is relapsing-remitting. It's now quite clear that I have never had a period where my symptoms, um, remitted. I remember sitting in the exam room when Dr. Burt, the immunologist at the helm of the stem cell study,made a stair-like gesture, & then an up-&-down flapping motion with an arm. Now, I may be an English major, but I knew that he was giving a representation of a chart that showed how I perceived that my disease was progressing. I knew that the stem cell transplant had no effect on primary-progressive, but I also knew that there was no treatment for it, so, in my mind, I had nothing to lose.
Which brings us pretty much up to date. So, even though I'm not as garrulous as I used to be, I'm also more deliberate in my choice of words, & my newfound avenues of expression allow me to communicate more effectively. I don't mean to be morbid, but if Roger Ebert can still write regularly, so can I.
R
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