2023-02-09 Journal Entry

🍃 Season: ❄️ Winter 🔆 Weekday: Thursday 🗓 Date: February 9, 2023 📅 Week: Feb 6 – Feb 12, 2023

Another day, another day. I realize just how little time I’ve got these last few days, especially since I imagine someone will come on and chat for a while in about 45 minutes. That’s great and fine and lovely — but it means I don’t finish my morning pages. Fuck you, world, I need to finish my morning pages. These pages are kinda random garbage and mostly just me barfing on the page over and over again, but I can feel them changing a bit. They feel like a litmus test for how life is going. Some days they’re just the rantings and ravings of what’s going on in my head, some days they’re philosophical rants and nonsense. Some days they’re character sketches, some days they’re more and more ideas all totally unrelated.

I should probably think of some things to do in Chicago with my extra few days here.

Anywho, coffee shop people are always cool as shit. Them and bookstore workers. I mean, it’s clear I just love these places and have a strong attachment to them, but I also probably have that partially because the people are cool. Or, “cool” in the sense of them being people that I would like, although I’m not sure “cool” is my moniker.

Another thing on my mind — the weekend after next is a long weekend. I was thinking of just finding a cabin nearby and going off and spending some intensive novel-writing time. I want to actually dedicate some thinking time to it and get some words on paper. I’m struggling with that a bit.

Last night, I didn’t totally waste myself by staying up late and talking for forever about Sorbet with folks on the team, which I think was a good idea. I talked about drinking a lot over the last few days, and while I drank some yesterday, it wasn’t to the point where I was burning myself out. It was just a drink at whirlyball (!!) and a drink at dinner, and then I went to bed. Perfect.

There are three things all wise men fear: the sea in storm, a night with no moon, and the anger of a gentle man.

From A Wise Man’s Fear by Patrick Rothfuss.

I’m so into these novels. I’m about 40% through this one at the moment, and it did just take a bit of a weird turn that makes me a little worried (from a writer’s perspective) and confused (from a reader’s). You’ve got this whole ark going where Kvothe is doing really well financially, mildly in a pickle by taking a term off from university, and in high hopes with his romantic interest. But then seemingly out of nowhere, he gets called to trial and volun-told to leave the university, his love moves overseas for no apparent reason, and he goes to a far-off land (where the narrator literally goes “the contents of the journey aren’t important, except for the part where he loses everything he owns basically”). While previously I’ve really appreciated the clever economy of storytelling, I do think more than a half-page could have been spent there, because it currently feels like I got plucked out of this really engaging story and dropped into some sort of Arthurian legend where a knight is being tested for his piousness or whatever.

I think I like spaces where I can watch people. I feel a little terrible about this, mostly because I think it implies that the minutiae of human interactions are complex and messy, and I like being able to watch people awkwardly nudge forward and backwards, a stunted dance as they figure out their way in the world. Watching someone particularly fluid in this is impressive, especially since in that distinct moment you hardly even notice what they’re doing. Some people have done this dance a million times, and others (read: me) dance like a fawn learning how to walk. To be a critic of the art and a performer are two vastly different things, and I definitely feel like the former. I wonder whether that’s just my lot in life — even though I hate that framing. I don’t really wish to become a master socialite. I like to watch from afar, to take it all in, to see the many lives that all can be lived. There’s those who do it “well” and those who do it “poorly,” but often those who fall into the latter category have far more interesting lives. To live a life poorly means to go off the rails, but that’s also a life well-lived. Well trodden paths lead to well-trodden people.

The idea of living “well” vs “poorly” also probably falls into the category of things that highly-structured thinkers enjoy but that in practice isn’t a useful metric for basically anything. Life isn’t some thing where you get a “well-lived” meter that you need to fill up, and that certain actions raise the bar and others lower it. Lives are messy. Is someone whose life is weird and sad but more interesting better lived? Is being interesting a proxy metric, or is it happiness? Think of all the famous but incredibly depressed writers who killed themselves but who are now known as some of the greatest visionaries of our time; are they a model for a life well-lived? Probably not.

I remember talking to my therapist a while back about Anthony Bourdain, someone who by just about every metric had a life well-lived. Successful author and TV show host, literally just traveled the world, ate delicious food, and talked to interesting people. Many people still idolize him as a pinnacle of what living life could be like. But he killed himself and was clearly unhappy for much of his life. This isn’t an indictment of him as a person or anything, but the question remains: is a life well-lived really from the things we do in it?

There’s the opposite way, which I find somewhat lovely but difficult to really get a felt sense for. The opposite way is the suggestion that living in the abstract is a skill. I say “in the abstract,” what I really mean is just like there is the art of X, there is also just art. By extension, there’s the art of living, the understanding of every moment-to-moment that you experience. Living expansively, living with awareness, living with radiant love and joy, these are living well. And those simply aren’t easy; they require a lot of effort and skill to do continually. These might imply that you “live well” in a way that aligns with the broader culture, but they also might not. It’s a bit presumptuous to assume that seeing more of the world is in fact a desirable quality, not because the world is bad but because it’s putting a value judgement on the world over the self. The self is incredibly rich, and it’s the thing we’re always experiencing.

As I’m writing this, I’m very aware that I’m looking at this (comparatively) tiny screen instead of viewing all the other lovely people in this coffee shop, I’ve got headphones in to drown out the sounds despite them being beautiful. I’m perfectly happy to be writing at this moment and documenting all of this, but it also seems to me that writing doesn’t have to be in this stupid little screen. Writing by hand is too hard, and portability is actually quite nice, so I don’t know what I should do with this thought, but it’s a thought nonetheless.

I don’t really know what I should do with my remaining time in Chicago. I don’t have any specific events to go to, and I kinda just want to wander around, eat good food, see the lake, and people-watch. Maybe that’s all I’ll do, that sounds lovely. I’ve been to Chicago enough times before that I don’t really need to do much else. Maybe I’ll go to an art museum or something. Maybe I’ll buy a book.

As always happens, it seems like our time together is coming to a close for the day. I should likely get on to the work day, as sad as that is. This was a lovely hour of rumination and thoughts. None were particularly related to the stories I have going, but I’ll open up my notebook after this and at least touch them briefly to keep the juices going. That’s really all there is to it, I think. To just keep coming back, over and over again. That’s love. That’s a life well-lived, to keep coming back. Good night, I love you. You’re not inferior to anyone. I’ll see you in the morning.