Some of my Recent Thoughts (Immediately Post-Graduation Edition)

To me, getting back into my Bible after a period of drought is very similar to starting to put my retainers in regularly again after a period of time without them. This is especially true since I usually read before I sleep. When I don't, something feels wrong, but I don't always correct it. "It will be OK for just one night", I think to myself.

I usually try to save the best thoughts for last in these posts, but I think I will intersperse them randomly throughout from now on.

When it is too warm in my house even for just a t-shirt and shorts, I should just not wear them. I never had this train of thought until recently.

Recently I've noticed far more frequently my choices in favor of selfishness over morality. Have I become this way, or has my perception become sharper? (Morality might be too strong a word here.)

Also today, I met a student coming out of high school and asked him where he was going to college, to which he replied, "Drexel". I did not feel old, as one might expect, but happy. In fact, towards the end of this past semester I felt often that I thought about things differently than many of my peers, or at least from those whose complaints I often heard. I did not feel very old, and only exclaimed so because it seemed the appropriate thing to say, and I did not feel apprehension at leaving school. I did not feel the need to know what everybody else was doing after graduation, and I did not really need to say my last goodbyes to everybody. Yet I still said these things and went through these actions as if it was a strange ritual; I didn't know how else to act, since I didn't really see others acting as I felt.

I write fewer and fewer creative writings because I have raised my standards, and they are contradicting. I cannot accept abstract writings because I want my audience to understand, but I cannot accept textbook writings because I want my audience to guess. Sentences must be very carefully constructed, yet they ought to flow from my mind naturally, as when I once wrote in stream of consciousness style. I do not like to include characters, but I do want to speak to people by having them relate to characters. I want everybody to love my writing, but I want it to still be private and strange to everybody. One day I want to write about octopi and jungles and physics, and the next day I want to write about people's hearts and symbolism. I want to write often when I am not at a location where I can write, or there are more pressing matters at hand.

But I still want one day to sit at home and write novels or books or something. I no longer feel that music is a stronger medium. A medium is just a medium; words may carry meaning, just as sound may carry meaning.

I went and read a few Calvin and Hobbes comics, since this year I had more than once engaged in a conversation about how there is more to discover after reaching different levels of maturity, and since the last time I read was likely in middle school. (I like to think I have matured since then.) I was disappointed, but perhaps because of hype; there was a gem here and there, and multitudes of clever word plays and jokes.

I've been trying the whole wake-up-early-and-run-before-even-taking-a-shower-or-whatever-it-is-that-you-do-first-after-waking-up thing. I get no sense of refreshment or clean start or whatever. The only good effect that I've detected is the satisfaction of knowing that I woke up early and ran, and that perhaps I can lose some flab if I keep it up. Vain.

I've thought about this, and concluded that the main source of my "contrary-ness" is in my desire for things to be right, or efficient, or effective. A less noble source is my desire for attention.

When driving back, there was a period in Pennsylvania where there was a terrible thunderstorm, and visibility was reduced to about 40 feet, and hydroplaning was occurring for me about 20% of the time. I reduced my speed from 80 mph to 65 mph, which is still too absurdly fast for those conditions, and I thought about how life is similar to how people drive in the rain. There were people pulled over on the side of the road, people driving at 40 mph (a reasonable speed), some with their blinkers on, people who drove until they reached a rest stop, people weaving in and out at 70 mph, and me, who stubbornly cruised down the left lane tailgating drivers too afraid to switch lanes while hydroplaning. At one point a truck passed me on the right and splashed water on my windshield so that I could not see anything for a good three seconds. My response was to hit the gas to get out of the spray.

On the other hand, there has been a single gnat trapped in my room each night, and I have a strong suspicion that it is the same gnat each night. I could have simply killed the gnat the first night and been done with it, but instead I turned on the ceiling fan to force it to land somewhere. I wonder why these two approaches are so inconsistent.

Perhaps a sacrifice is doing something for somebody and not telling anybody about it in any way. Keeping things between you and God. How often do I do that? I can't tell you, or else it wouldn't be a sacrifice... assuming there was one, of course.

I told my mother to not buy a frame for my diploma, but she did anyway. Later she told me that if I would eventually need it so that I could hang it in my office at work. And to think that I often feel that I've outgrown my need for my mother.

Today I was told that it seems in my nature to speak of love in a professional way.

What exactly does it mean to "give up"? I don't feel as if I've ever really given up, so to speak, on anything that I wanted to continue putting effort into. Each thing that I've declared myself to have given up on is merely something that I don't feel is worth putting effort into anymore, and so I have no desire to continue. Does giving up actually mean putting aside a still-existing desire to put effort down?

I have always only followed what desire is in my heart; how else can a man act, if not to follow what course of action he feels is appropriate? Duress is merely a stronger set of urging circumstances. Being held at gunpoint is a more concise version of being in great debt. How can I possibly do something that I don't want to do? Options that are not available to me are simply not available to me, as is the case for any person. While human will cannot definitely affect anything, fulfillment of desire depends on nothing except will. If I want to buy a certain product, and if I am able to transport myself to the venue and provide adequate money to make the purchase, and if my sensibilities do not override my want for the product, then I will buy it. If the store has no more of the product in stock, then I do not buy it, because there are no more in stock. I have not done what is against the desire in my heart, because that desire is limited by my knowledge of reality. My will is not great enough to exceed my perception of reality, and so my desire to buy the product shrinks because I know that it is impossible. I will never really desire to fly unassisted by any tools, because I know that it is impossible. I may dream or fantasize about doing so, but I will never actually desire to do so, because I have no perceivable way of doing something that is impossible. If I were to believe that it was possible, I might try to do so, but soon I would learn that it is in fact impossible, and my desire to fly would vanish.

The previous argument is very flawed, but the basic concept I believe is true. A person acts only upon what the person wants to do based upon his or her knowledge of reality. There is no such occurrence as a person doing something against what the person wants to do.

People felt and continue to feel that alcohol warms the body, yet the sensation of warmth related to alcohol is due to dilated blood vessels in the skin which allow warm blood from the core of the body to transfer heat to heat-sensing nerves in the skin. Yet people feel that alcohol warms the body. It may be wrong to draw conclusions from this observation, as not all people who believe this about alcohol have been told the previous reasoning.

My observations tend to be about either myself or "people", as if all people are some conglomerate mass with the same opinions and state. I sometimes make observations about the physical world or theoretical math or language. I rarely make observations about history or politics or the future. I think most about how people think, and I am obsessed with understanding the way things are.

I probably think less often and less deeply than I believe myself to think.