Answering 8 Questions

The lovely ssdawna tagged me last month, and though I've answered some tags like these in the past, it's always fun to do it again! First because the questions vary; second because, even if the questions were the same, it doesn't follow I'd answer them the exact same way I did, say, 6 months ago. After all, we're never the same person from yesterday, right? 

I quote Plato: You could not step twice into the same river; for other waters are ever flowing on to you.  

AND Pocahontas, of course: You can't step in the same river twice; the water is always changing, always flowing.

(I have the feeling that quoting Plato makes me sound way more intelligent than quoting Pocahontas. Oh well.)

Anyway, I digress. Point is: here are my answers.

1. What book would you recommend we read ASAP?
Oh gods, there are just so many... I'll list a few: To Kill a Mockingbird (Harper Lee), The Catcher in the Rye (J. D. Salinger), 1984 (George Orwell), Demian (Hermann Hesse), One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest (Ken Kesey), Fahrenheit 451 (Ray Bradbury). I recommend these because they make you think. I also recomment The Three Musketeers because it's my favorite book of all time! And I recommend any Jane Austen at any time of the day - I'm an incorrigible romantic - as well as any Charles Dickens.

2. When is your favorite time of day on a typical Wednesday?
Bed time. My Wednesdays are more tiring than any other day of the week.

3. How do you feel about getting/being married?
I think it must be awesome, provided you marry the right person. Looking forward to it (though I have nobody at the moment)!

4. Who knows more of your secrets than anyone else?
My friends Nicolas and Mariana.

5. Where do you go to unwind?
I go to my bedroom and grab a book. I'm nobody without a book. =P

6. Why do you get up every morning?
Sometimes I wake up simply because I've got work. Sometimes, because I'm tired of being in bed (that only happens on Sundays). Sometimes because I remember I have dreams, ambitions and passions, and I won't accomplish anything if I don't get up. But mostly, I get up every day in the hope that I'll find something worth getting up for out there.

7. What are your plans for Thanksgiving (or November 25th if you don't celebrate)?

(This question was obviously asked before Thanksgiving, and I answered it back then, though I'm only publishing it now. But it still stands.)
Well, we don't celebrate Thanksgiving here in Brazil, so I guess it's gonna be a day just like any other. It's gonna be a Thursday, so I'll get up early, teach from 7 to 10am, go back home, have lunch, read and/or write, then go back to work at 5pm and teach till 9pm.
OK, that's boring.

(And that's EXACTLY what I did. The very definition of boring, huh?)

8. Whose face would you like to spit in tomorrow if you could without any bad consequences? :]
Hehe. Nice. Weeeeell... I'd spit on many people's faces! A co-worker of mine who's simply despicable and sneaky; another co-worker who's SO shallow and futile it makes me angry; my friend's Asian girlfriend - she's a bitch (pardon my French).
But then again, I usually just ignore those people's existence, so why would I spit on their faces anyway?...
Oh! I'd spit on all the drug dealers'faces. Bastards. Go wreak havoc in Hell.

And now I tag:

beanie

MeiBelle

Lupe

Bella

Nashe^

m.ulyssea

angel

fatima

I tag some of them because I'd like to know more about them; others because I already know and like them, and would like to see their answers to my questions. Which are:

1. What movies would you recommend watching around Xmas? It's a nostalgic, sentimental time of the year, after all! 

2. And speaking of which, what are your plans for the holidays - both Xmas and New Year's Eve?

3.  How do you feel about Xmas? Are you actually celebrating the birth of Christ, or are you just in it for the food and presents? =P

4. Enough of Xmas. What do you think about right before sleeping, with your head lying on the pillow?

5. And what's your first thought when you wake up?

6. If you killed somebody, where would you bury the body? =P

7.What song do you avoid listening to, and why? (If I'm not prying, of course)

8. Is there any song that inspires you to be a better person? To dare, go places, do things? Go the distance? (Mine is "Go the Distance", from the Disney movie Hercules, LOL! I always feel like I can do ANYTHING when I listen to it!)

Reading To Kill A Mockingbird

I happened to stumble upon a paperback of To Kill a Mockingbird at the beginning of the year; I'd heard of the book many times before, but had not read it. So, I decided to buy it.

Having focused my studies on Medieval English Lit., I'd never paid due attention to American Lit. You see, Am. Lit. studies are introduced, in my college, with the Puritans and Mrs. Rowlandson. If those are not enough to discourage any living thing on God's green Earth from studying American Lit, hell, I don't know what is, truly! I decided that if there was anything worth reading in their corpus, I'd eventually find it - or rather, it would find me. Good books have a way of finding you.

 

This vaguely pointless preamble is me trying to justify myself as to why I hadn't read such a basic book before. I just learnt the other day that any American teenager reads it in high-school. Not to mention it won Harper Lee a Pulitzer Prize. #bookwormmajorfail

This week I finally grabbed the book; I read it in a day. I just couldn't stop reading it.

I spent an entire day with my eyes glued to those pages; I laughed at the children, got mad at Maycomb County and the Ewells (and even cursed out loud), and found myself in love with Atticus Finch. And I cried - at "Jean Louise stand up, your father's passing", and when Boo petted Jem on the head. I cried my eyes off when Scout walked up to her father and said she understood: telling on Boo Radley would be like killing a mockingbird. I couldn't even go on with the reading after that.

But the whole Tom Robinson arc killed me.

Back in 2005, another teacher and I decided to show a movie to our students, since the topic of discussion that week was racism: A Time to Kill. I'd never watched it, but my colleague assured me it was really good.

The hell it was. When it was over, I was surrounded by my students, some of them offering me tissues, others petting me on the head and the shoulders; one of them brought me a glass of water. While I was still weeping like a baby, they gently led me back to our classroom. Damned movie.

Same thing happened when I read The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn: Huck was torn between helping his friend Jim or saving his own soul by denouncing the runaway Jim to the authorities. He'd even written a note to Jim's old owner.

I was a trembling, because I'd got to decide, forever, betwixt two things, and I knowed it. I studied a minute, sort of holding my breath, and then says to myself: 
"All right, then, I'll go to hell"- and tore it up.

A freaking river.

It always happens with The Hunchback of Notre-Dame as well ("Who is the monster and who is the man?"). And it happened again with The Diary of a Young Girl and The Pianist. And when I overheard our neighbor Gunther's father talking about the Nazi concentration camps.

Gunther's dad, a German Jew, had been in Auschwitz. It wasn't until then that I realized why he had only one leg, and why he had those numbers tatooed on his forearm. Later dad asked me if I had paid attention to the story, telling me to never forget it. I just nodded, wondering how the hell he'd known I was behind the door, eavesdropping and sobbing in silence.

And yes, I'm a major weeper. Let's move on.

(Recently added: I just remembered one of my favorite quotes ever - and I'm shocked it didn't occur to me while I was writing this post, since I've always prided myself in being a Shakespeare geek. Anyway: call me crazy, but I've always kinda sympathized with Shylock in The Merchant of Venice:

"Hath not a Jew eyes? Hath not a Jew hands, organs, dimensions, senses, affections, passions? Fed with the same food, hurt by the same weapons, subject to the same diseases, healed by the same means, warmed and cooled by the same summer and winter a Christian is? If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die?")

When I was about 6, I asked my mom why one of our neighbors had called Sol, our maid's daughter (who would become my nanny a few years later), "a black girl" with such contempt. Yeah, she was black, so? Mom explained it to me very carefully - not in a too complicated way, but not dumbing it down either. For the first time in my life I heard the word "prejudice"; in a nutshell, her message was: "Dumb people think black people are inferior to white people." Was there any reason for that kind of thinking? She told me there were historical reasons and even biological theories as to that - but all of those reasons were, for her, rather random, and I was not to buy any of that. I nodded, but then shrugged, saying that luckily that was not our problem. 

She looked at me, very serious. And asked me what color my friend Luciana's hair was. Baffled, I answered "blond". "Ok. Imagine a world dominated by blonde people, a world where blondes think brunettes like you and me are inferior to them. We'd be their maids, or slaves." I startled. "Why, that's ridiculous!" "Why so?" "Because... we're not inferior! We just have... a different hair color, what a stupid idea that would be!" "Agreed. Who's the tallest girl in your class?" "Luciana, or maybe Mariana S." "Who's the shortest?" "Me..." "What if all the tall people in the world woke up one day and thought short people were like animals?" I just looked at her, confusely glimpsing into what she meant. She continued, always gently: "Then, it would be your problem. And some tall girl like Sol would be saying 'that's her problem, not mine.' You see? Think from her point of view, and just how hurt she must've been when our neighbor offended her. You wouldn't like it if it happened to you. Your hair or your height do not make you inferior to anyone, just like Sol's skin doesn't make her your inferior. Only dumb people think so. And you're extremely intelligent, so you know better. And intelligent people don't ignore something like prejudice - they fight it, so that other people won't get hurt. Do you understand?" "I think so." "Good. Now let's watch the soap opera." 

Sometimes I think this was a silly way to put it - but at other times I think it was brilliant, given her audience was a 6-year-old girl. But regardless of the silliness or brilliancy of her words, they hit home. The gods know my mother was flawed to no end, but she was thoroughly good.

And as I recall her speech to mind I hear an ever so slight echo of Atticus Finch in it.

If you just learn a single trick, Scout, you'll get along a lot better with all kinds of folks. You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view... Until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it. 

If only more people.

Defining Home

You know that point in your life when you realize the house you grew up in isn't really your home anymore? All of a sudden even though you have some place where you put your shit, that idea of home is gone. (...) You feel like you can never get it back. It's like you feel homesick for a place that doesn't even exist.

(Zach Braff as Andrew Largeman in Garden State)

When I was a kid my parents moved around a lot. When I was born they lived in a certain neighborhood, but I took my first steps in a completely different location; I remember a Christmas party when I was 4, in a third place, and watching the Muppets when I was 5 in another.

When I was 6, we moved to a smaller town, Petrópolis. And though we lived in three different houses, they were all on the same street. And we stayed there for almost 10 years.

First we lived in this cute small house, with a front yard, and windows only one meter away from the floor - I spent a lot of time jumping in and out of them, pretending I was living big adventures! For one who had been raised in apartments, a house was a world full of wonders. And one fine day, grandma arrived with this tiny labrador puppy, white as snow and with a red ribbon around his neck. He had come inside a carton box, and he could barely poke his head out to look at me. I named him Rolf - because of Rolf of the Muppets.

Also, there was this really tall boldo stalk in the garden, with leaves that felt like velvet. I decided it was a she, and called her Gertrudes. And on my bed was Pimpa, the stuffed Panda bear my grandma had brought me from one of her trips.

A couple of years later we moved to a second house. It was huge, and it had the cutest porch ever! In the back, stairs that led to a terrace - Rolf's realm. I took Gertrudes in a vase with me, and she lived in my window. And though by that time there were shitloads of stuffed animals on my bed, Pimpa was still in the centre.

When I was 11, we moved to a third house. It was gorgeous, all in white and salmon. There was this huge yard around the whole house, with Rolf running everywhere; a garden, where Gertrudes could live, and a beautiful stained glass covering one of the living room walls. On the second floor, my bedroom with Pimpa on the bed, and my bathroom; there was an attic and two terraces with a pool.

There I discovered my dad's Beatles collection, and some of the best books I'll ever read. I learned how to do the dishes (well, kinda) and how to peel potatoes (and almost my hands); I almost peed in my pants out of terror, while watching I Know What You Did Last Summer with my friends in that living room; and when my first crush ever took me home after our first date, we spent hours talking on those front steps - with Rolf looking from afar, afraid of the stranger that engaged my attention so, and ready to have at him if he tried to do anything! Guess that boy was Rolf-approved.

It was also where Rolf died - the evil next door neighbor gave him lead to eat. I cried my head off, and my dad, in an attempt to cheer me up, rented Dr. Dolittle for us to watch.

What a doubly horrible night.

I moved to my grandma's, in Rio de Janeiro, when I was almost 16. And though I was leaving a lot of things behind (including Gertrudes), it was kinda fine: I was going to live in the house where my dad had been brought up, and where I had spent my every summer vacation, and most of my Christmas parties. It was, I guess, still home.

In 2004, however, she decided to sell the place, and move to the south of Brazil. She asked me to come along, and I said no. Instead, I went to a boardinghouse, where I lived for 4 years.

I hated everything about that place.

There was nobody there waiting for me, to hear about my day; I couldn't have a dog nor a plant. Just me and my stuffed Panda. It was just a place for me to crash at night. And I did whatever I could to spend the day out.

In the middle of 2008 I finally moved to where I live now, with Roomie. And it's a great place, I have no problems whatsoever with staying in - it's my house, it's where I feel comfortable.

But is it a home? I don't know. What makes a home after all? (And please don't say "A home is where your heart is", that's just cheesy). Is it the presence of your family? Maybe - maybe not.

When I think "home", I sometimes think of either my grandma's old place, or my white and salmon house, where Gertrudes might still be. Every now and then, I visualize my old college which felt like home to me for good 4 years - specially the library, and most specially the German Literature section.

And someday I'll probably think of a house where people wait for me - a man who wears a ring just like mine, a couple of children who will have my hair and his eyes, and this huge white labrador running everywhere.

But most of the time, the word "home" makes me think simply of a stuffed Panda bear called Pimpa, that still lies on my bed.

                                                           

Quoting Favorites V (or: on Silence)

Mia: Don't you hate that?
Vincent: What?
Mia: Uncomfortable silences. Why do we feel it's necessary to yak about bullshit in order to be comfortable?
Vincent: I don't know. That's a good question.
Mia: That's when you know you've found somebody special. When you can just shut the fuck up for a minute and comfortably enjoy the silence.

This is my favorite quote from one of my favorite movies ever: Pulp Fiction, directed by Tarantino in 94. (Not that Pulp Fiction needs any kind of introduction.)
It ocurred to me while I was spending the weekend with my dad; I dearly love talking to him, he's the reason why I'm so much of myself after all. But I also love sharing silences with him.
While he read his book, I wrote my dissertation; he listened to the radio, and I read my book; he read his book, and I watched tv. And throughout all of that, very few words were indeed exchanged. Always right next to each other, and mostly silent. Comfortably. Spending time together, both in his conception and in mine, does not mean doing the same goddamn thing together. We watched a couple of movies and a soccer match (our team lost, and we bonded in our pain...); we had our meals together, played around with the dog, discussed about some books and I taught him how to use the torrent system (my dad's a computer freak, so benig able to teach him anything at all is a victory).
But all of those activities were intertwined with blissful silence.

When people are comfortable with each other, they do not, I think, feel the need of yaking time away; there's no need to fill in the silences with empty words. 

A workmate of mine always starts talking when everybody else is quiet. Well, not talking: uttering words. Sometimes he tries to strike up a conversation about meaningless topics ("Did you see Brad and Angelina are splitting up?"). Sometimes, he'll actually go as far as saying "Oh guys just SAY something, I hate silence!". It used to bother me a little; then, I was secretly amused by it. Now I just feel sorry for him: it must be horrible not knowing how to shut up.

Hamlet's dying words: he begs his friend Horatio not to kill himself, but to live on and tell his story; announces Fortinbras as the heir to the crown of Denmark; and then, of course: 

The rest is silence.

(Hamlet, Act V, Scene II)

Though I'm aware of the traditional interpretations of this last line, I sometimes wonder just how tired the Dane prince was of all the action, and specially, of all the talking (I mean, have you read his "To be or not to be" monologue? He must've been really tired after that one). That being so, silence would've been a more than welcome rest to the poor guy. 'Tis the kind of rest that I, being a chatterbox myself, am very fond of.

Silence is special. Silence tells you just how strong your bonds with the other really are. Words lie, while silence never does.

Remembering II

What would I say if she could hear me?

I wacthed Remember Me, starring cutie Robert Pattinson. I was extremely curious to see how he'd fare in a movie playing the role of a normal person, instead of vampire Edward Cullen or wizard Cedric Diggory. In fact, he did it quite well! I was duly impressed (I'm biased though, since I really like the guy). Thing is: when the movie ended, I was crying a freaking Amazon river in there.

While writing this, I worried that maybe I'd be spoiling the film for other people, by talking about my having cried - and I hate spoilers myself, so I'd feel awful. But honestly? The official poster for the movie is in grey, and the depressing background music that plays throughout the entire movie does not mislead anyone for long. Not saying the movie is predictable; I didn't think it was, but you know all the time some big shit is bound to happen. You can feel it in your bones. That didn't stop me from absolutely loving it, mind!

But I digress. Point is: Pattinson's character eventually asks himself what he'd say if a beloved one he'd lost long ago could hear him now. And I, too, wondered. (In all fairness, I gotta say I left the cinema in such a depressed mood, so hence this wondering). I wondered what I'd say to her if she could hear me. 

Well, it's not that she can't hear me: I can talk to her alright. She just won't have any recollection of my doing so 5 minutes later, rendering the whole process kinda pointless. Or not.

Cause according to Ghandi, quoted twice by Pattinson's character: 

Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it.

Is it really?

But I know what I'd say: I don't know if I forgive you, but I do wish I could've understood you better. Cause maybe then I would've loved you better.

But then again, what's the use in wondering?

Just watch the movie, it's freaking great.

Quoting Favorites IV (or: on Wharton, and Sameness, and Restlessness)

You see, Monsieur, it's worth everything, isn't it, to keep one's intellectual liberty, not to enslave one's powers of appreciation, one's critical independence? (...) Ah, good conversation - there's nothing like it, is there? The air of ideas is the only air worth breathing.

(The Age of Innocence, Book 2, chapter 20)

I avoided The Age of Innocence at college. It just sounded so tedious... (I chose to read The Great Gatsby for my American Literature class instead.)

However, on my weekly quest for new books, I stumbled across this simple edition of The Age of Innocence at a bookstore last year; I grabbed it, coldly and only slightly interested. But I'd already read all the books I had at home, and was basically on withdrawal - I just had to read anything. (Anything, obviously, did not include Marley and I, you gotta draw the line somewhere.)
I started reading it over lunch - and found it completely unputdownable. I took it with me wherever I went for two days, two much too short days. It was an enticing, exceedingly well-written story; but there was more than that. I felt Newland Archer.

Opening your eyes. You can always choose not to open them; but once you're able to see, you can never close them back again. The good old "red pill, blue pill" thing.
One of the worst parst of opening your eyes (getting a brain?) is realizing that you are probably alone in this. In a world of blindness, seeing creates this unfathomable abyss between you and those among whom you must live.But one cannot set himself apart fom society as a whole. So you stay exactly where you are, with the poor satisfaction of being free from those shackles that seem to bond everybody else. But every second of your stay comes at a high price: the stillness of ideas around you just makes you realize the stillness of life you've forced yourself into. 

He was out of spirits and slightly out of temper, and a haunting horror of doing the same thing every day at the same hour besieged his brain.
"Sameness - sameness!" he muttered, the word running through his head like a persecuting tune (...).

(The Age of Innocence, Book 1, chapter 10)

What do you do when you feel restless in a world where Sameness is sovereign?

You crave for fresh air. You try to open the windows in the room - what if those around you just simply don't see the point in that? 

"Newland! Do shut the window. You'll catch your death!"
He pulled the sash down and turned back. "Catch my death!" he echoed; and he felt like adding: "But I've caught it already. I am dead - I've been dead for months and months." (...)
"Poor May!" he said
"Poor? Why poor?" she echoed with a strained laugh.
"Because I shall never be able to open a window without worrying you" he rejoined, laughing also.
For a moment she was silent; then she said very low, her head bowed over her work: "I shall never worry if you're hapy."
"Ah my dear; and I shall never be happy unless I can open the windows!"
"In this weather?" she remonstrated; and with a sigh he buried his head in his book.
(The Age of Innocence, Book 2, chapter 29)

Finally, you come to the sad realization that you'll have to adapt. Smooth around the rough edges. 

...the first six months were always the most difficult in marriage. "After that I suppose we shall have pretty nearly finished rubbing off each other's angles" he reflected; but the worst of it was that May's pressure was already bearing on the very angles whose sharpness he most wanted to keep.

(The Age of Innocence, Book 2, chapter 20)

And once these edges are smoothed right out of you, your hopeful desires are gone. That tingling in your belly. (Mass, if you ever get around to reading this, that last sentence was definitely for you! =P) 

Life's all about not being smoothed out of yourself.

Asking the Wizard For a Brain

Scarecrow: I haven't got a brain... only straw.
Dorothy: How can you talk if you haven't got a brain?
Scarecrow: I don't know... But some people without brains do an awful lot of talking... don't they?
Dorothy: Yes, I guess you're right.

Funny, now, that the most intelligent character in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz is actually the one who wants a brain. The more you know, the more you realize you don't know that much. I don't remember exactly who said this, but they can sure say that again!

But his wanting a brain is even more touching than Tinman's wanting a heart.

Brains are so underrated, and yet so overrated. Thinking, you'd think, is extremely important. Right? No.
Who actually cares about brains? Why having them?

Brains do not bring you happiness:
"All the same," said the Scarecrow, "I shall ask for brains instead of a heart; for a fool would not know what to do with a heart if he had one."
"I shall take the heart," returned the Tin Woodman; "for brains do not make one happy, and happiness is the best thing in the world."
It's quite the contrary, actually, Scarecrow: the more you think, the more miserable you become. Besides, the heart works on instinct, rather than on thought. Any fool knows what to do with a heart.

"It must be inconvenient to be made of flesh," said the Scarecrow thoughtfully, "for you must sleep, and eat and drink. However, you have brains, and it is worth a lot of bother to be able to think properly."
It isn't, really - the biggest bother of all is to be able to think properly.

Brains make you overthink. Overanalyse, overworry, overestimate them.
When I was a child, I loved the fact that the Scarecrow valued brains above it all; but now that I actually have got a heart, am quite brave and have a home, I wonder whether he was happy afterwards. What will happen to him, once he finds out the burden of thinking? The discomfort and complexities that come with the territory?

Tinman was brave to ask for a heart. Scarecrow is deluded. And I don't blame him.

Asking the Wizard For a Heart

A friend of mine once refered to the heart as "that little muscle that could". Brilliant, I say. What is it that makes it so resilient, and yet so fragile?
From a pragmatic point of view, it's not even useful - aside, of course, from pumping blood. But that's not the heart I'm talking about.

Wizard of Oz (to the Tin Woodman): As for you, my galvanized friend, you want a heart. You don't know how lucky you are not to have one. Hearts will never be practical until they can be made unbreakable.
Tin Woodsman: But I still want one. 

The heart announces itself most poignantly only when it's about to break. And being the generous little thing it is, it takes no one down with it: it falls in utter loneliness. And all of those other parts of your body just sit back and watch while the most breakable part of you... breaks away.

Dorothy: Goodbye, Tinman. Oh, don't cry! You'll rust so dreadfully. Here's your oil can.

Tin Woodsman: Now I know I've got a heart, 'cause it's breaking... 

But also, nothing else in your body is capable of bouncing back like the heart does. Indeed the muscle that could. It hardens with time, and before you even notice it, it's back right into shape. You realize then that the muscle you so wished away is your only foul-weather companion, that no one will ever push you forward like the heart does, even though it's just as down on the floor as you are.

I've always loved The Wonderful Wizard of Oz; and though Dorothy is somewhat annoying, the other main characters are simply adorable. My favorite's always been the Scarecrow, and I've always pitied the Lion. But the one I admire the most is by far the Tin Woodman (or simply Tinman, in the 1939 movie). The guy just wanted a simple flimsy heart. 

"All the same," said the Scarecrow, "I shall ask for brains instead of a heart; for a fool would not know what to do with a heart if he had one."
"I shall take the heart," returned the Tin Woodman; "for brains do not make one happy, and happiness is the best thing in the world."

I pity and admire the Tin Woodman - and I pity and admire the heart. Such a heartbreaking little thing.

Quoting Favorites III (or: on Bukowski)

I've just finished reading Hollywood. As a friend of mine well put it: we never forget our first Bukowski. Indeed.

People tend to put him and beatnicks Kerouac and Ginsberg in the same basket. Nu-uh. Good old Charlie's got nothing to do with them beats. Even though they're all marginalized, flipping the bird to society as a whole, Bukowski, he's a gang all by himself. Alcoholic, misanthropist, chauvinist, politically incorrect and an awesome writer, the dirty old man. Above all, he despised the human race, because he saw it for what it really is: a huge pathetic lot.

Humanity, you never had it from the beginning.

(Mockingbird Wish Me Luck, "Those Sons of Bitches")

The only ones he might have had sympathy for were the so-called low lives, the rejected children of America:

They buy my books - the defeated, the demented and the damned - and I am proud of it.

(in an interview to High Times http://hightimes.com/entertainment/ht_admin/499)

Once you feel the discomfort, once you fall, there's no way back up. You're defeated. You're damned. You know there's nowhere to go back to, because it's all the same and it's all a big blur. That's where your backbone, your moxie, swoops in:

Moxie means carrying on when everything feels terrible. It means carrying on when everything seems so terrible there is no use to go on, and you don't go to a god, you don't go to a church. You face the wall and just work it out alone.
(ibidem)

You work it out alone, just trying to get to the other side of that bridge. And if you wanna get to the other side, if you wanna carry on, whatever you do, don't think. One simple, basic rule.

Not that everybody feels the need of it, of course.

THE ALIENS
from The Last Night Of The Earth Poems
by Bukowski

you may not believe it
but there are people
who go through life with
very little
friction of distress.
they dress well, sleep well.
they are contented with
their family
life.
they are undisturbed
and often feel
very good.
and when they die
it is an easy death, usually in their
sleep.

you may not believe
it
but such people do
exist.

but I am not one of
them.
oh no, I am not one of them,
I am not even near
to being
one of
them.
but they
are there

and I am
here.

I envy and despise the aliens.

Thinking

"I'm not like them/ But I can pretend (...) I think I'm dumb/ Or maybe just happy."
(Dumb, In Utero, Nirvana)

One of my best friends - my brother, actually - is one of the most intelligent people I've ever met. And I know some darn smart people, mind. And yet, he accepts things as they come, doesn't ask himself or anybody else any kind of questions, and that's that. I'd come down to the conclusion that it was out of sheer laziness.
But I found out the true reason the other day, over lunch:
"Man is the only animal that needs to think. All the other animals simply... are. And they're utterly happy. We're not. We keep looking for happiness here and there, never truly finding it. And the more we think about it, the more miserable we become. You know what I really want? To live like an animal. I just wanna fuck, sleep, eat and fuck some more. When we think, we raise questions. Unbearable questions. Why thinking, then? It's just unpleasant."

Yeah, "lazy" is not the word. "Coward"? I don't think so either. I just had to agree. How could I not? Thinking, true thinking, IS unplesant, it IS unbearable, more often than not. How many times haven't I wished that I could just stop?

House M. D. We're in the 6th season, and I see it every goddamn week. A couple of weeks ago, the episode revolved around this guy, Jimmy Sidas, a genius with an I.Q. of 178 - but  who abused his cough medicine, along with booze, to lower his intelligence. He got married to this dumb woman, and worked as a courier. Why?

Jimmy: I work as a courier because I want to. It's easy, I don't have to think.
Dr. Taub [ironic]: It's too hard to think.
Jimmy: No, just unpleasant.

Jimmy: When my brain was on low, everything didn't seem so miserable anymore. Life was bearable.

Jimmy: It's lonely, isn't it?
Dr. House: It's not that bad.
Jimmy: Then you're not that smart. You ever tried to kill yourself?
Dr. House: Not quickly.
Jimmy: I did. 12 years ago I jumped off the top of my eight-story building into a dumpster bin the day before pick up. I broke my collarbone, my leg, and three ribs. When I was in the hospital they put me on narcotics, and suddenly everything was just better. I didn't feel isolated or lonely. That's where I met my wife. She was so happy. And dumb. And I was... smart... and miserable. You tell me who the genius is. I fell in love with her, buzzed out of my head, and I knew I wanted to stay that way forever.
(Esteban Powell as James Sida in Ignorance is bliss, House M. D., 6th season)

It is not for the faint-hearted, indeed.

Quoting Favorites II (or: on Laughter)

"Because he knows you have to laugh at the things that hurt you just to keep yourself in balance, just to keep the world from running you plumb crazy”
(One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest, by Ken Kesey)

"He knew you can’t really be strong until you can see a funny side to things."
(Ibidem)

Again, top 3 books.

That laughter, that was exactly what Chief Bromden needed. He was entrapped in the fog of his creation, where everything was heavy and mostrous - where he was small and weak himself.
It took this laughter - this laughter that filled up the silences and voids and shook the room with it - to get him out of there. To make him realize he was actually one of the biggest and strongest guys around. To make him be able to run again.

"If you can't laugh at yourself, life's gonna seem a whole lot longer than you like." 
(Natalie Portman as Sam in Garden State)

Raining

We're always learning. Ooops, cliché alert!

Well, what I've learnt this week is that I need to learn (wow, isn't that repetitive?!) how not to give a crap.

Why?

Raindrops are falling on my head/ But that doesn't mean my eyes will soon be turning red/ crying is not for me/ Cause/ I'm never gonna stop the rain by complaining/ Because I'm free/ Nothing's worrying me.
(Raindrops Keep Falling On My Head, B. J. Thomas)

Right on the money.

The rain always, always falls -  how we face it depends entirely on us.
(Credits to M. H., for a great metaphor.)

Somedays we're just not in the mood - we're all dressed up, our hair nicely done, and we don't wanna get wet. We do, and then we get pissed.

Somedays we're in the right mood for that - we see the first raindrops battering agaisnt the windowpane, and we rush out the door, parched for some rain. Gettting wet is all we wanna do then (no pun intended, please).

Somedays we're neither here nor there - and then we think "screw this, I'm already wet, I'm gonna fuck" (pun intended). If life gives you a lemon... you know how the chorus goes. Getting wet, whether we like it or not, that's life. However, we seek shelter from it nonetheless. And that's what relationships are: a shelter from the rain, when it's pouring down.
But shelters are built by human hands, are they not? Just like everything that is human, they're weak. They, too, leak; and we get wet.
At such a time we have two options ahead of us: we can either get pissed all over again, and not forgive our shelter for having failed us so - or we can remind ourselves that, had we built it, it might've been just as weak, and allow others to make mistakes as well. And not give a crap about being wet.
Not giving a crap makes us much, much lighter. Being soaked - to your very bones - and not giving a tiny little rat's ass... talk about freeing.

Quoting favorites I (or: On Missing)

"Don't ever tell anybody anything. If you do, you start missing everybody"
(The Catcher in the Rye, J.D. Salinger)

Top 3 ending, for sure. And obviously, top 3 book.

And so very true.

It also led me to my Emptying post. "I wonder where all those people have gone"
We stop wondering a while, don't we? We have to let people fade away from our lives. We stop wondering, and we stop missing them. It's necessary.
How sad.

Belonging (or: On Fairy-Tales)

A new point of view, a fight, a casual conversation and BANG! There you have it, your idea.

I'd run out of ideas, hence my not writing here for a little while. Hard to be a genius 24/7, after all. But here it is, a new egg has finally hatched.
Speaking of hatching eggs... I assume everyone knows the story of the ugly duckling? It's always been my favorite fairy-tale. I pretty much learnt how to read because of it.
So let's skip the whole narration. My point is: the morale of it all can be well summed up as "never judge a book by its cover", "for beauty is found within". But I also look at it as "birds of the same feather flock together". Literally.
But it's really hard to find your flock, ain't it?...
We never know what we'll grow up to be. And then, not knowing we do not fit in, we try to hang out with whomever's around, and in our not wanting to be alone, we mind not the huge differences between them and us. Heck, we even try to live among those who are drastically different from us, like day and... a sandwich. But their powers of observation do not fail them, they notice it. And they mock you out of their lives. (Ok, that sounds a little like bullying...). They scorn you, and you decide to leave. Henceforth, you'll be alone, for being in society has obviously not worked out well for you.
But you can't help envying the ones who have their pack. Or flock. Or covey, herd, cohort, whichever collective noun comes to your mind. Point is, you ask yourself why everyone seems to have a group where they belong, but not you.


Every other fairy-tale has already approached the subject: when The Beauty and the Beast starts (the Disney version, I mean, let's not get into the original Brother Grimm's tales, they can get rather gruesome...), Belle sings about finding a place where people understand her; in Hercules, the hero sings about a place "where a great, warm welcome will be waiting" for him, where "a voice keeps saying 'this is where I'm meant to be'." And finishes: "I will go most anywhere to feel like I belong". In Mulan, the heroine sings (hell, do they all sing?! Can't they just... I don't know, say it?), about not being able to play the perfect chinese daughter and bride. Not to mention Quasimodo, Victor Hugo's creation, distorted (a huge understatement!) by Disney almost 15 years ago - the hunchback hunted by the entire city of Paris just for being ugly, taking the ugly duckling complex to levels never dreamt before. And Esmeralda, hunted for an even lesser evil, if such a thing is possible: being a gipsy.
But Belle eventually finds ampler horizons; Hercules finally finds out about his olympic origins; Mulan joins the army (!), and gets a bow from the emperor himself. Quasimodo and Esmeralda are finally accepted by the parisian population (do NOT get me started on the humongous distortion here!).
And the ugly duckling, the one who made me all big-eyed and teary as a 5 year-old child, he too gets his happy ending: he gets to be in a flock of swans.


But before finding his flock, he had to adjust to the idea of being alone, and grow comfortable in his own skin.
Well, that sounds about right, given that all fable and fairy-tale animals resemble humans enormously.

Wanting (to be)

OneRepublic: not the greatest band in the world - for me, their songs are pretty much all alike; not to mention the stuff frontman Ryan Tedder writes for all those female singers. And they're all alike too, no matter what he says about the whole "Halo x Already Gone" saga (and YES, the songs DO sound the same...). But I gotta say: I love Leona's Bleeding Love.
Anyway: OneRepublic's not the greatest band, nor the most original (And let's face it: Apologize has just been too overtly played on the radio for anyone to even bear the sound of it ever again...); it doesn't matter, I still like their songs - particularly Stop and Stare. The song's catchy, specially the chorus, and I truly enjoy the lyrics. And there's this verse, "You start to wonder why you're here not there", that got me thinking.
So true, isn't it?
We do it everyday: we wonder why this and not that, here and not there, she and not me, there and not here... we're never satisfied with where we are, what we do and who we are. We always want more.
Now that's not so bad! I think one's gotta have ambitions, gotta want to go places, see people and do stuff. I'm right there with ya! Not so keen on the idea on wanting to BE something else, though. Don't ever aim at being someone else. Aim at being a better you, at being good. At least, the best you can be. That's what life is, or should be, all about.

"I want to be good" (Billy Crudup as Fielding Pierce in Waking the dead)

"I want to be a good person" (Johnny Depp as Gibert in What’s eating Gilbert Grape)

(Credits to Iris H. who wrote a wonderful post on that: http://www.hirideyo.com/journal/iris/2009/08/25/good)

Some people say As Good As It Gets is overrated; I don't think so, I think that's a kick-ass movie. And Nicholson's got this line which is downright perfect - and anyone who's ever watched it will know which one it is before even reading it, cus it's just so obvious:
"You make me want to be a better man" (Jack Nicholson as Melvin Udall)
Man, that's great! Cheesy? Yeah, totally - so what? Let's not underrate cheesy... still works everytime!
And he who's never had someone that made him wanna be a better man is just a sad person.
I have. I still do. Some have grown apart, some have gone away, some were like a summer breeze, never meant to last, whereas others have come to stay.

I've got this Tuesdays and Thursdays best friend, M.H. (he's my best friend everyday, but he's only available on these specific days, and some lucky Wednesdays, lol). I wish I was as intelligent and sharp as him. While he's a master, I'm still a young padawan with a long way to go...
I wish I was as responsible, intelligent and talented as Tri. Talk about an inspiration.
I wish I was as outgoing and just plain NICE as Na. What a freakingly nice girl! Something hard to come by nowadays, let alone be. She's the real thing.
As sensible and clear-sighted as Ma. Hope it rubs off!
As studious and responsible as Ch.
As calm and collected as G.
As silent, good and firm in his convictions as Canadian M.
As detached from the shallow as these last two.
As perceptive and gentle as Jo.

I just wanna be good.
And most of all, I wanna stop wanting to be and just... be.

Remembering

My favorite book of all time: The Three Musketeers, by Alexander Dumas. My favorite character: Athos, the oldest and most circumspect out of the four. My favorite quote, at the very end of the novel:

"I shall then have no more friends," said the young man. "Alas! nothing but bitter recollections." And he let his head sink upon his hands, while two large tears rolled down his cheeks. "You are young," replied Athos; "and your bitter recollections have time to change themselves into sweet remembrances."

D'Artagnan is the youngest among them, and the most inexperienced in the ways of love, politics and war - that is, life itself. Entangled in his youth, he's mourning everything he's come to lose, category that 2 of his 3 friends are soon to join in - Aramis is going to a monastery (finally), and Porthos is getting married.
And then Athos jumps in with all his wisdom, granted by the gods and enhanced by life, and imparts a little of it. This is a great line, in my opinion; I've always loved it - even when I was too young to understand it to a fuller extent.
Now: even though I've always had to coexist with bitter recollections (just like everyone else, I should say), I think this is the first time that I'm actually coming to realize how true these words are.
For I couldn't remember G.'s face or voice without being either angry or unhappy. And I couldn't remember M.R.'s face or voice without being depressed and feeling like crap.
But today I thought of both - and I smiled.
They're gone, true; but I'm the lucky one who got to have them at all.
It's not bitter anymore, just... bittersweet. Not far from just sweet, is it?

Thank u - to both of u.

I'll sleep tighter tonight.

http://extremosdoassunto.blogspot.com/2009/09/dont-worry.html

Coloring

The sun rises, and I with him everyday. As the Sun's sister Dawn, the one with rosy fingers, golden arms and saffron-colored robe, opens the gates to let her brother out and herself in, I move toward the bus stop. And every morning, as the bus slowly speeds up, I can spot the deep blue of the ocean, the delicate blue and white of the sky, and the golden white of the sand on the beach. It's a vision. One thing that ruins it for me, though, is seeing a bunch of pidgeons scattered around the beach, pecking after the remains of food left behind by callous bathers. And that morning was no exception.

Until it was, of course.

Amongst all those black and grey city pidgeons, I spotted all of a sudden a smaller, very white, one. And the bus, as if it were acceding to my silent request, stopped. (Ok, it was picking up more passengers, but still...). I could take a longer look at the birds - the white one in the very center of the confusing, ever-moving, circle. They co-existed peacefully, none seeming to care that one of their own didn't quite fit in, as far as color went, in an extremely "I have a dream" fashion. I was marvelled. Yes, one could always argue that birds don't really care about colors, but that's not the point anymore. And I thought to myself that pidgeons, too, had black sheep. Only, theirs was white.
And the image of the white black sheep tormented me for the rest of the day.

And then, there are the doves. They're supposedly white and that doesn't seem to bother anyone. But why would a white pidgeon bother me so? Doves can be white, but not pidgeons? Would that be it? Why? They're practically the same bird!
Easy one: pidgeons are dirty birds - hence, cannot be white, the cleanest of the colors. Whereas doves, just as white, symbolize peace. It all falls back into place now.

Or does it?

Why does white have to necessarily symbolize cleanness and peace? What if I wanna use it to show anger? Or love? Or rotteness? Where do these frozen-in-time symbols come from? Many are obvious: red goes for blood cus blood IS red (until is starts getting maroon, than brown-ish...); green goes for ecology cus the color of "healthy" leaves is green - a priori, it depends on the plant. Yellow is for the sun - I agree in part with that one... the sun is much brighter than yellow per se. But others... there is no explanation whatsoever for some of them! Who was the first person who said: "Hmmm... I'm gonna use red to show passion!" or "Oh yeah, blue's DEFINITELY for sadness!"?

Green's always been the color of jealousy. Though this notion is as old as time itself, the first print there is on it is Shakespare's:
Iago: "O, beware, my lord, of jealousy; It is the green-ey'd monster, which doth mock The meat it feeds on." (Othello, Act III, Scene III)
Jealousy: a monster? Yeah. Green? Apparently, yeah, but why? It could be any other color! Besides, jealousy can be said to be a way to show passion or love - both unanimously represented by red. Than why green, I repeat? Also: green may show envy as well.

I love colors; but they're all wrong! Yellow and orange depress me, too much pink leaves me in a bad mood, my anger is much whiter than red, my jealousy's red and blue's the one I think of when I'm happy.

Give a coloring book to a 6 year-old child. He/she will paint the trees green, sometimes they'll bother to paint the trunk brown and the leaves green, but many will paint the whole thing green and move on. The sky and the sea will be blue, the clouds white, and the sun yellow. Good.
Now give the same coloring bok to a 3, 4 year-old child. What a freaking mess that'll be! The sky might turn out pink, the trees could totally be yellow, the sun blue, the sky purple and so on. Some helping, understanding, know-it-all adult will eventually correct the child, gently pointing out that the "right" colors are not those he/she used. So much for creativity. And we still wonder why people are so mediocre nowadays.

You know what I love? Seeing those stupid stereotypes tumbling down. Red is the color of anger. Yeah, ok, try telling that to The Hulk!

This guy transforms into THIS when he's angry! He's not jealous, envious or particularly prone to defending the environment. Just plain angry.
Yellow is the color of happiness. But there was this Dutch guy in the 19th century that could paint his ear off; one day, he decided to paint some sunflowers. Cool, you think, sunflowers are so cheerful! Specially because they're yellow! Now, the painting's called "Still life in a vase with 12 sunflowers".

Happy, aye? Talk about cheerful and lively.

Shy people get really red when they're in the spotlight. Either red or pink. And for those people, we have the expression "as red as beet". Ok, except for one tiny little teensy weeny detail. Wee really... beets are purple!


And though some people take this "color stereotype breaking" thing too far...

...it's usually a relief!

People generally don't like grey, they think it's either too sad or serious. What about the grey area, where nothing's ever black nor white? My favorite place in life, there's nowhere I'd rather be.
One of my greatest friends only wears dark colors. Black, brown, dark blue and grey. It's not her creed, she's not gothic or anything, she just doesn't like light colors, end of story. But the other day, as we strolled around the shopping mall, she laid eyes on this gorgeous dress on a window shop. It was her style, through and through, it was meant to be hers! They only had it in two colors: pink and grey. I was like, yay, great, her color alright! She immediately bought the grey one. And yet... she couldn't take her mind off the pink one. She asked me about it, then she asked some other people about it, thought it over and over again in her head... in a nutshell: she came back and proudly purchased the pink dress. And u know what? It looked great! For me, she looked better in pink than in grey. She still felt awkward in it, but I was happy inside: another never-changing thing tumbling down right in front of me eyes.

In the end of the day, the world's just a huge coloring book. Life's all about being a 4 year-old.

Traveling

"The more things change, the more they stay the same. I'm not sure who the first person was who said that. Probably Shakespeare, or maybe Sting. But at the moment, it's the sentence that best explains my tragic flaw: my inability to change.

I don't think I'm alone in this. The more I get to know other people, the more I realize it's kind of everyone's flaw. Staying exactly the same for as long as possible, standing perfectly still. It feels better somehow. And if you are suffering, at least the pain is familiar. Because if you took that leap of faith, went outside the box, did something unexpected...who knows what other pain might be waiting out there? Chances are it could be even worse. So you maintain the status quo, choose the road already traveled, and it doesn't seem that bad, not as far as flaws go. You're not a drug addict, you're not killing anyone... Except maybe yourself a little.

When we finally do change, I don't think it happens like an earthquake or an explosion, where all of a sudden we're like this different person. I think it's smaller than that. The kind of thing most people wouldn't even notice unless they looked really, really close. Which, thank God, they never do. But you notice it. Inside you, that change feels like a world of difference, and you hope that it is... That this is the person you get to be forever. That you'll never have to change again."

(Everwood, season 2, episode 4, "East Meets West")

Saying that changes are never welcome is not entirely true. Some people go as far as actually seeking it. But I firmly believe that change-seeking people are not that common - in fact, they're extremely rare merchandise. They're rare because/therefore they're not sought after. Change-seeking people do not fit into this world, do not correspond to our idea of security. But isn't changing one of the things life's all about?

How many times does one stand at the fork in the road and, for much of Robert Frost's disappointment, ends up taking the road most traveled by? We tend to take the road that leads to a destination known beforehand. It might not be the most exciting or the shortest way - but it's always better than the very much feared Unknown.

The French have a perfect expression for what I'm about to say. I'll share with u a "secret de Polichinelle" - an open secret, that is, a secret known to be true by anyone, but never openly admitted to be. So, what I want to mention is that this road, the one widely prefered, has a name. It's called Mediocrity. Like I said: who doesn't know that? But the real thing here is that not many will actually go through the trouble of saying it, let alone endorsing it.

Mediocrity Road goes smoothly. It's often either sunny or cloudy - and when it does rain, those on it worry not, for they know what always comes after the storm. There are not many holes or anything - it's really well-kept - nor cliffs of any sort. It's also well signalized, with the traffic lights always working like a Swiss clock. And it's never a deserted place, u'r never alone there. Wow. When I put it like that, it does sound like a cool place! Who wouldn't wanna go down this civilized Roman road?

Whereas the Non-Ordinary Road is really not that cracked up to be, is it? I mean, the weather's unpredictable, there are no traffic lights - u never know when to cross the street -, it's full of holes and stones on ur way, making u trip incessantly. And u may not encounter anybody else for a long time; it's really, really lonely down there. Yeah, come to think about it, who'd ever choose it? Too much work; besides, u've no idea where it leads to.

But then... see, the thing with the unpredictable is that (sometimes) it grants u delights beyond ur imagination. It's not to be counted on, mind, but when it happens... not many people have the pleasure, I'll tell u that.

U'r there. It's been raining for quite a while, with nowhere to shelter u. A fast car passed u by, and not only did it ruthlessly ignore ur thumb raised in that universal gesture of need, but also splashed mud on ya. U'r soaked to the bones, and sulking about it - cus, let's face it, u'r not a good sport. But then, all of a sudden, the sun comes out. It's warm once again; but u, still cranky, think to urself "great, now the mud will definitely never go away...". And the gods, seeming to have taken a liking to u, decide that by the side of the road there'll be a river with a waterfall, surrounded by a whole bunch of natural beauties. Leading to it, there's a yellow leaf-covered path. Talk about getting a break, uh? U still have no idea where u'll end up after that - maybe there's another downpour comin' to let ur spirits back down. But who cares? U've just had a delightful afternoon.

Another "secret de Polichinelle": neither road takes u anywhere. Only, Mediocrity gives u the impression of doing so - it makes u think that Safety awaits u at the end of it. Wake up and smell the roses: it does not. Mediocrity's a hypocrite bastard, really, luring us with empty promises. And trust me on this one: sooner or later, it becomes a maze, and u find urself utterly lost. At least, Non-Ordinary's honest; it goes like "look, I've no idea where I'm taking u, and I do suck every now and then. But I may also surprise u from time to time. Take it or leave it".

At the end of the day, both roads are not that different. It doesn't matter which one u choose - what matters is what u believe in. If u believe u'r headed towards Safety, then every road will be Mediocrity for u. But upon realizing there's no final destination, anywhere's Extraordinary. And for that, u gotta take some road - any road. Gotta keep ur swagger, keep on diving, dancing and taking nothing for granted.

"Our destinies sweep us along. We're just here for the ride. Fate takes what she wants from us and there's nothing we can do about it."

(Everwood, season 1, episode 11, "A Thanksgiving Tale")

Diving II

Addendum made by a person whose words actually matter:

"U can always dive without knowing how to swim, as long as you're not afraid of water."

Bull's eye.

Forgetting

"Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders". Nietzsche, Beyond Good and Evil. Well, I know it's Nietzsche and all, but I beg to differ.

Milan Kundera wrote a book called The Book of Laughter and Forgetting, where the characters are always trying to either erase their memories or desperately get them back. You can do neither, that's the thing. Human Memory's a scient being, you cannot erase it simply because it displeases you - or go after it because it's warm and cozy.

"Memory, it can't be understood without a mathematic approach either. The fundamental data is the numeric relation between lifetime already lived and lifetime stored in the memory. It has never been attempted to calculate this relation and there is no technical way to do it; however, with no great chance of a mistake, I may suppose that memory does not store more than a millionth or billionth part, in a nutshell, a measly fraction of life lived. This too belongs to human essence. (...) What is this poor little thing capable of? It can only retain a small part of the past, without anyone knowing why this one and not that one, for this choice, each one of us does it misteriously, without our free will." (Kundera, Ignorance - my own translation, forgive me.)

Forgetting should be the eighth sin. There's only so much memory can do by itself, one should not hinder its already too hard work. It does work at random, I agree - but then again, don't we all? Memory's only human, after all.
Voluntarily Forgetting is nothing more than the act of raping: you're forcing your fragile memory into something she does not desire to do, something she can barely defend herself against, in a lonely deserted place where she's the only living thing around.
And Recapturing lost memories is just like chasing Amy - no use. Once gone, forever it shall be. If Forgetting is raping, Recapturing is trying to bring back one's virginity. It's simply out of reach - if you insist on it, you'll look as ludicrous as those women who actually go as far as undergoing hymen reconstruction surgery.
If you feel like something you cherish is slipping away from you, don't do anything to hold it back: the more you hold on to it, the more it'll struggle to set itself free - and make no mistake, it will manage to.
And if you realize you've forgotten some unpleasant memory, something you actually wished to be rid of, feel blessed. Do not incur the danger of getting used to it.

Cus it's such a blessing when it does happen, isn't it?

Waking up one day and realizing, with that self-satisfied smirk on your face, that the long despised memory looks smaller and smaller as the days go by. Try to top that!
This only happens when your memory is in a whore mood - she's just trying to please you, thus selling out. But most days she's a modest and homely catholic virgin - you'll get nothing from her.

Forgetting is sadder than all.

It hurts, and you struggle. Then, at last, it vanishes from inside of you. The memory's gone. That face, those words, the laughter, a certain day, whatever. A phone number, if you will. It just doesn't hurt anymore, and you're thankful.
All of that loses its meaning. And you just took away the meaning of this hugely important piece of you - cus if something hurts you, how could it ever be petty and unimportant? How could a piece of you be worth forgetting? How can one let go of even a fraction of oneself?

Besides, it's sadly easy to live after forgetting. It's comfortable, light, it feels like you've been granted a new start. That's just an illusion, cus after a certain point, life does not grant new starts. You gotta make do with what you already have in hand. So don't go down this road, cus it takes you nowhere. Forgetting is deliciously misleading.

Forgetting is for the weaker ones, too.

Now: try to live alongside those burning and painful outlive-everything-else memories. That'll demand much more from you, won't it? Traveling becomes way more difficult, your backpack is much too heavy for ya now.

You can look at it in two ways:
a) your backpack is too much for you, it's more than you can take.
b) you're just not used to it; after some time, it'll have the weight of a feather - all you need is the exercise.

In the Odissey, Homer leads his hero Ulisses to the land of the dead - the Hades. And there, the dead are bound to eternal forgetting.
Instead of trying to follow Tartaro's path, the living should come to terms with Memory. That's what life's all about.

I wouldn't travel in any other way.


Click on the link below to read my friend Iris’ views on Forgetting:
http://www.hirideyo.com/journal/iris/2007/08/19/remembering_and_forgetting