spice up the food of life
First of all, to all my regular readers, you might have noticed that I have a new blog link down there in the lower right hand part of your screen. Well, my friend Chris Heinrich here at Gonzaga apparently has a blog of his own that you might find interesting- and he doesn't seem to get very many comments. Go check it out if you have a few minutes to spare. So let it be written, so let it be done.
I'm still looking forward to spring break in a week and a half. On the other hand, I still have the hardest stuff to do before then ahead of me still, so I feel like I'm on the part of the log ride when they've taken you through the forest with your canoe bouncing up and down and up against the sides, then taken you up to the top with the tip of the boat just peeking out before it tips over and you go screaming down towards the great splash. The splash is spring break, but I've still got a lot of screaming before I get there.
I have to go sign up for my dorm room for next year tonight. This is messing with my head a little bit because I can barely keep a plan for two weeks ahead, and they're asking me to be ready for next year before midterms this semester. And yet, though I seem incapable of planning for the future, I realized today that I had been doing the same routine out of sheer habit without realizing for the last month or so. Since my dorm next year is immediately next to the dorm I'm living in now, it seems that I will continue to do a similar routine next year.
By now, you may be thinking "What is Emmett doing? Is he copping out of his usual thought of the day in his post?" (Alternatively, I suppose you could be thinking, "thank goodness, he's finally not putting more of his insipid opinions up!) but, surprise! I have a thought. Here goes:
I have been considering people who play an instrument, or perhaps write poetry (those are the two best examples I have) without putting forth the effort to practice hard, revising their work and making sure that what they are putting forth is the best that they can do. I know I used to have that problem with poetry- I could write a bunch of poems a week because I would just scribble out what was in my head. As I kept doing this, the poems got better, but that method really didn't do much to help my poems. The same thing can be true of some people who attempt to play an instrument- my friend's roommate apparently only learns the beggining of a song and only plays that over and over again because he is unwilling to put forth the work needed to learn the whole song.
Common practice would tell us that we should define these people as a poet and a musician, respectively. I look through Poetry.com occasionally and I see people who obviously do the same thing I used to do with my poetry and it is painful to read. But they are there, anyway- and poets of their caliber get published. Have any of you listened to Nirvana? There is a band that obviously didn't know how to play their instruments, but they are still a 'must-hear' group of our era.
Most musicians, of course, can stick their noses down at Nirvana and other garage garbage sound bands; they have years of practice under their belts and can afford to be a little arrogant comparatively. As for poetry, Ezra Pound thought it would be a good idea if poets went throught the same kind of training as musicians did in order to get the same effect- to keep amateurs away.
A part of me sympathizes with the people who write poetry and play music like that, but for the most part I have to agree with Pound and the other 'elitists.' Partly because of all the work I put into orchestra, and am putting into my guitar now, I know the great pleasure and self-respect that comes with learning something difficult, and learning how to do it well. I know when it comes to poetry that I much prefer now getting out maybe one poem a month, but a poem that has been critiqued by people and worked over extensively by me to the stuff in my old notebooks that I now cringe at to read.
Wow, this has become long- but let me know what you think: is there any worth in having these kind of 'amateur' poets and musicians?
Who are the People?
So I was working on homework today and I decided that I was pretty much done- so I now have time to update! I'm sorry that I've been so bad about updating- it's been nearly two weeks, and that's just unacceptable to me. I'm going to try and be better about it, but since Spring Break is in less than three weeks, it shouldn't be too hard to pass the time before I can talk to you guys for real.
That's actually what I've been thinking about recently- the fact that people don't have to really interact anymore. I know people who often have IM discussions with each other while they are in the same room, and if that isn't an example of the deterioration of human interaction, I don't know what it is. I suppose they could argue that they had to discuss things that they wished to keep private, and they didn't want to be rude by publically announcing that they had something private to say. But isn't it just as rude to have a conversation in the middle of a group without including everyone?
It all comes down to the shrinking of time. People have become so caught up in the routine and society of technology that speeds up routines, so no one has to take the time anymore to cement human relations. We have something called "facebook" here at Gonzaga and other Universities, where people can keep in touch with people over the internet, and get to know new people based on their interests and similar 'groups' that they can create and join. It sounds great, but it cheapens the experience of actually getting to know real people. Like IM, E-mail, and unfortunately, even this blog, you are not interacting with a real person but with the words and pictures on the screen. It's the difference between being friends with a person and reading their biography- and which would you prefer to have, friends or a bunch of biographies? Something to think about.
Ode to a hacking Cough
Wow. I finally have time to check up on my blog when I realize that it has been far too long since I last posted. I was going to write some commentary about how I got around to writing those two positional statements but then I got caught up with twenty-one credit hours worth of work and suddenly the rest of my life just kind of fell by the wayside. In response to this unfair and biased treatment that it feels I have been giving it, my body all of sudden decided to stop working and get sick. Thus, I now have enough time on a friday afternoon to update, between hacking coughs, my blog.
Life is different when you are sick. Einstein showed how time is relative to the position and velocity of the observer, and though what I am experiencing is the slowing of psychological time, it is a nice confirmation of his physics. I can sit here for minutes and feel like time has the same consistency as molasses or honey. Going to class, like I did yesterday, makes the time go by faster but it seems to worsen whatever condition I have- a headache starts pounding, the coughing gets hoarser, and the sneezing becomes more frequent. Being sick is all about the realization of limited choice- I can go to class and be sick, but not have to make up what I miss, or I can stay, feel better and be behind by a quarter fortnight.
A little while ago, I postulated a new idea for the definition of freedom. Since there are obviously things that we are not 'free' to do in any situation (such as be two places at once, or fly by flapping our arms) we should look at freedom as the ability to make a choice between the options we have before us. Such a definition leads to an odd conundrum: a man in prison has more freedom than I do, because his options are limited enough that he has an easy chance of making his choice, whereas I have so many options that I am often stuck in making decisions. Think of going to a restaurant and seeing 50 things on the menu that you like. Now go to a different restaurant that has only 10 of the same things- where would you be more free in making a choice?
All this sounded good to me when I thought it up, a few months ago, but being sick and having only my intellect to keep me company (nice conversationalist, but he gets kind of repetitive) I was going over my old arguments and this one stuck out for me because while being sick directly and physically limits me from making some choices, the fact is that I am still free to keep those choices in mind and feel distraught for not choosing them. Being sick should have kept me from statistics and English this morning, but it didn't; though I shouldn't (by my definition) have been free to see the options I couldn't take, I still
tried to do those things that I was not free to do. This could only lead to negative consequences. I still think I'm right in using that definition of freedom- only problems come up because people can see beyond the freedom they have and attempt to do things that they are not free to do.
Yeah. Being sick sucks. I hope you guys are doing well!
