Things That Don't Matter

So my last post got me thinking, (Death, not the stupid update one), if death isn’t so bad, why do we keep on with life? Life can get pretty bad sometimes, I don’t think anyone will disagree with that statement, so why do we still trudge on? The easiest answer is because it might get better, but that depends heavily on your definition of “better”, and even if your life does get “better” which I take to mean as having more stuff and not having to work very hard, whats the difference? This is the point where someone will invariably bring up god. They’ll say the reason we live is because god wants us to. So why does god want us to? Just because. That’s what religion always comes down to, “just because” which reminds me of being a little kid and getting annoyed at my parents whenever I had to do something I didn’t want to do and they said “just because”. But my rant against religion, (believe me, it’s coming), is not for right now. So that’s religion down, what else could there be? Now someone will say the point of life is love, soppy sap that they are. This I also disagree with. Now, I’m not one of those people who is all out against the concept of love, I believe that there is love, but that really it’s just another human emotion and stems either from a parents protective instincts over their children or one person’s sexual attraction to another, it’s not this all powerful force that’s holding the universe together, it’s just another thing, albeit a nice thing. So now we’ve also eliminated love as the driving force that keeps us going. Next on the list I guess is just plain science, my favorite of the explanations. Science would say that we are here because of all that sciency stuff that’s happened up until now and that we keep living just because it’s a part of our brains. We’re programmed to keep ourselves alive so that we can reproduce, no two ways about it. This is probably the most reasonable of all explanations but it’s still a little unsatisfying. Generally what people are looking for when they ask why we’re alive is some sort of instruction on how to fulfill this great purpose. I guess with science you could say the instruction is to go have a lot of sex, which is a pretty great instruction, but we unfortunately live in a world where you can’t just go around having sex with everyone. So we’re pretty much back to where we started, clueless. I guess the reason we live and keep on living can be different for everyone. Some people live for god, others will say they live for love, and others will say they’re alive because of chance and math. I say we live to do whatever the hell we want. The world is your playground, play in it.

Also, today is the one week anniversary of my blog, so hooray me!

Also also, I realize I have started to call this a blog, but that’s just because writing out online journal of whatever the hell I feel like writing about would get tiring. Whenever I say blog, online journal is what I mean, so every time you see me say blog, think to your self, online journal of whatever the hell I feel like writing about.

If you were given the option to know the exact date of your death, would you? Supposedly most people say no, and I don’t get that. I think that the people who say no are fooling themselves into a false reality in which there is the possibility of living forever, which there is not. You’re going to die someday, so why not know when? People fear death way more than I think it deserves to be feared. I actually find it comforting to know that I’m not going to be around forever, someday I’m gonna be dead and nothing I’ve ever done will matter. It might matter to people who are still alive, but what do I care? I’m dead. I don’t understand this feeling of responsibility people have leading up to their deaths, when you’re dead, you don’t care, it’s someone else’s problem, so why not spend your last moments not worrying about it? A big problem here is all this afterlife B.S., people who feel that if they don’t do well in life up till the last moment they’ll spend eternity feeling guilty about it. Religion is a huge topic I’ll get to some other time, but that is just total nonsense. I don’t want to be around forever, in any form. I want to live it up while I can, and then get the hell out, no heaven, no hell, just nothing. (Unless heaven has video games… and sex, which always seems mysteriously absent from everyone’s beliefs of what heaven is). Whenever I have something that’s weighing on my conscience, I often think to myself, oh well, I’ll be dead some day and this won’t matter at all, (works great with school assignments) I don’t want to be stuck in some afterlife with all those things still weighing on me. Now, don’t take this the wrong way, I’m not suicidal or anything, I’m not looking forward to death, I’m just not fearful to the point of giving up reason in the hopes that some “god” will take mercy on my everlasting “soul” so I may live forever in bliss, if it even would be bliss.

Update: Someone pointed out to me the other day (because this is all my friends and I ever talk about) that I negelected to consider the category of people who don’t fear death, but wouldn’t want to know when they want to die so they could live normally right up to the last minute, which I guess is a valid point. There probably are people who think that, and I can understand why, but it doesn’t change my position. If you know your death is coming, then it might motivate you to get out there and do all the stuff you’ve always wanted to do, where as if not, then you’ll just keep on living your daily life putting those things off right up until you’re dead and it’s too late.

So far I’ve only done posts that fall into the things that annoy me category. It’s time to write about something that’s awesome. It being December, I thought writing about one of my favorite bands, The Decemberists, would be appropriate. The Decemerists’ music falls into category often referred to as “indie”, but that doesn’t make much sense, because their latest album was released on Capitol Records, a subdivision of EMI, but I really don’t care. Yeah, EMI is a part of the big four and is in on all that RIAA stuff, but that doesn’t stop me liking the music. One of the things I love about The Decemberists is that while being modern, they don’t act like it at all. Their music is heavily influenced by bands like Pink Floyd and R.E.M.. The lyrics to their songs are inventive and most of the time actually form a narrative rather than some phrase repeated over and over again. Most of their music tends to have a very strong message. Take for instance, the music video to their song 16 Military Wives, which I find quite hilarious as well as very true:

Funny story about The Decemberists, they got into a fight with Stephen Colbert after he accused them of riding on his coat tails when they produced a music video in front of a green screen and asked people to fill it in. (Stephen had recently performed a similar act on his show). The feud culminated in a “shred off” in which Stephen “injured” himself and had Peter Frampton fill in for him. The winner was decided by audience applause which of course went to Frampton, but the closing statement came from Henry Kissinger who declared “Tonight, I think the American people won.” There’s alot that’s funny about the Decemberists, their bio says they met in a Turkish bath and a footnote claims that “The Decemberists travel exclusively by Dr. Herring’s Brand Dirigible Balloons.” The Decemberists clearly have a lot of fun with their music, and thus is it fun to listen to.

Up until recently I was of the opinion that most music released post 2000 is crap (Rap, hip hop, all that stuff). However, The Decemberists stand out from the rest, thus I am adding them as the first entry on my things that are awesome list.

People tell me that because I haven’t read the books or seen the movie, I have no right to criticize the Twilight franchise. To them I say, I can criticize whatever the hell I want. From people who’s opinions I respect (my younger sister) I have heard that it wasn’t that great. Way over hyped. From people who’s opinions I have little to no respect for (most of the rest of the people at my school) I have heard “Oh. my. god. It was so great. I saw it, like, 10 times on, like, the first day it was out.” While I don’t respect the author’s work, I respect their ability to milk culture fads and exploit the very easy target audience that is girls between the age of 12-18. They have made a lot of money off this whole thing, and for that I respect them. I could probably do the same thing, but I have morals. Here’s something I don’t get, where the hell has this vampire obsession come from? Now that Twilight is such a huge deal I’ve heard all these people talking about other vampire novels. What’s so exciting about vampires? And how did vampires go from being scary to the main characters of romance novels? I don’t know about anyone else, but if I were a girl I’d be more than a little uncomfortable making out with a vampire. That is one hickey, or “love bite” that is going to take a loooong time to wear off.

Maybe I’m just bitter for lack of having one, but high schoolers in relationships annoy the hell out of me. There’s a kid I know who about two weeks ago got a “girlfriend” and his Facebook status updates were all “I love her so much”. That lasted for a number of days I could count on one hand. Then it was “I made the right decision” and everybody was writing sympathetic things on his wall. Two to three days later they were back together again, and once again it lasted 4 days max, and once again everyone was saying “Oh, if you need to talk just call me”. Jesus Christ, they were together for a total of 10 days maximum, probably less. How attached can you get to someone in that period of time? I could maybe understand if it was something that had lasted a while, like 5-6 months maybe, but 10 days? Get over yourself.

I don’t get high school relationships. They all end when you go off to college, unless you’re one of those sad people who stays in your home town bagging groceries in which case your girlfriend will probably dump you and look for someone less pathetic. So all high school relationships end. So why do people bother? I guess maybe the reason people like it is that there’s no real commitment, it’s expected that you’re going to break up, there’s no two ways about it. I don’t know about anyone else but I don’t think I’d want to stay with my high school girlfriend, no matter who she was. I’d want to go off and try other things, no one wants to be tied down right at the starting gate. Now, all this criticism of people high school relationships is a bit hypocritical, because if given the chance with um, shall we say, the right person, I would totally have one. Until then though, I remain ever the critic.

Short story I wrote about all this:

The Beginning of the End

She lay on the bed, which was a mess, and he sat in the chair by the desk at the computer. The silence was penetrated every now and then by bursts of clicking from the mouse. She picked up one of his computer magazines from the floor and flipped through it.

“What do you find so interesting about all this?” she asked after a minute.

“I don’t know, what does anyone find interesting about anything?”

“Well this, it just seems like a bunch of numbers and names that don’t make any sense.”

“It makes sense to me,” he said, and then it went quiet again, the clicking resumed. But after a few minutes he stopped, and then he spoke.

“It’ll have to end someday,” he said.

“What do you mean?” she asked.

He swiveled around to face her.

“Our relationship, it can’t go on forever.”

“Why not?”

“Because we’re in high school. We’ll go off to different colleges, have different lives. Marry different people. That’s what happens. You don’t expect us to be together forever do you?”

“Oh, well thanks, it’s nice to know I mean so much to you.”

“Hey, don’t take it like that. That’s not what I meant. You mean the world to me.”

“Well how am I supposed to take it? You just said our relationship is doomed to fail.”

“Isn’t it?”

“I… I don’t know. I never thought about it much.”

“Well I do. You know me, I think about stuff, I think about us a lot, this comes up once in a while.”

“I wish it wouldn’t. Yes, all relationships end sometime, you’re just supposed to enjoy the ride. It isn’t any fun if you’re pointing out the end all the time.”

“Fine. I’m sorry I brought it up. I’ll never bother you with anything again.”

“Oh no, don’t be like that. You know I love how we talk about stuff. It’s just that there are some things better left unsaid. Things people don’t want to hear.”

“Then those people are avoiding the truth. I’m sorry but I’m always thinking about this stuff. I never stop, even when we… you know… get intimate. When others’ minds would go blank I’m still tossing it all around in my head.”

“Great, you have no faith in our relationship, and I’m bad in bed.”

“That’s not what I said at all. This is silly, we’re both just trying to one-up each other at misinterpretation. I love talking with you, I love being with you, I love you.”

There was a pause in the conversation, “I love you too,” she said. He turned back around to face the computer, but didn’t resume using it.

“How do you think it will end?” he asked.

“I honestly have no idea,” she replied.

“Do you think we’ll go quietly, or will it be one of those messy breakups?”

“I really don’t know, and I’d rather not talk about it. You act like you’re looking forward to this.”

“No, I’m not at all.”

“Then quit talking about it.”

“Fine,” he went back to the computer. “Wanna go out somewhere this weekend?”

“Can’t, I have stuff to do.”

“May I enquire as to what?”

“You may, but I may not answer you.”

“Oh.”

“I should go now,” she said. And she left.

The guy is actually mostly a self projection. I suggest that no one ever have this conversation with their girlfriend.

Yesterday on The Daily Show the guest was well known religious fanatic Mike Huckabee. Now, up until a little while ago I liked Mike Huckebee, he seemed nice, and when he lost the race he went on SNL and made jokes about it. But a few weeks ago I saw him on TV debating religion with Bill Maher (god on earth, as ironic as that may be) and I found Mike to be pretty obnoxious about his beliefs (Baptist). Then yesterday he was on The Daily Show and Jon Stewart cornered him on the issue of gay marriage, which Huckabee is very strongly against. It was quite the slaughtering, I recommend you watch it here. Now, let me clear something up here, whenever someone brings up the issue of gay marriage and there are people who support it, there’s always some idiot who says “Oh, you support gay marriage so you must be gay dur dur dur dur dur”. No, I’m not gay, I just don’t support the pointless oppression of a people by a bunch of single minded idiots. Supporting equality between blacks and whites doesn’t make you black does it? So why on earth would supporting gay marriage make you gay? Anyways, Huckabee proceeds to bring up the tried and failed argument that giving gays the right to marry somehow hurts the sanctity of marriage, which is total bullshit, I’m not even gonna abbreviate that for the sake of tastefulness, it’s bullshit. How does a gay couple getting married affect what you have with your wife? It doesn’t. Not at all. It doesn’t somehow decrease your love for each other, which is what marriage is supposed to be about, love, not legal contracts and definitions. Jon Stewart of course does an excellent job of bringing this up and all Huckabee can do is fumble and blurt out the same stupid arguments again and again. At some point, he loses his resolve and goes to the Bible for help, which if anything hurts his case. Religion has no place any where near this whole mess. What ever happened to separation of church and state? The arguments against gay marriage are almost all religious, so it should automatically be legalized based on constitutional grounds. Near the end of the debate Huckabee says something along the lines of “Well I’m not going to change your mind (because you’re right) and you’re not going to change mine (because I’m stubborn)” which is just about the biggest cop out ever. He’s essentially saying “Ok, I’m losing this, (at this point the audience is applauding Jon Stewart’s every word) so I’m gonna back out before this gets any worse for me. But I’m still right!” Let me clue you in on something Mike, when you can’t come up with a valid argument, and the crowd is on the verge of heaving rocks at you, you’re wrong.

I was very disappointed with California voters back on election day when they banned gay marriage. I was mostly mad at the mormon church, who funded xx millions to the cause. I’ve always had some respect for mormons as being one of the (slightly) less offensive sects of christianity. This totally changed that for me, mormons are now on my list as being just as bad as catholicism, the “holy grail” if you will, of offensive religions. I was, however, proud of my own state (Connecticut) for voting against a constitutional convention that could have led to the overturning of our supreme court’s recent decision to legalize gay marriage. There is hope. I normally like to think that America today is pretty accepting, but it’s issues like this that I think are still holding us back from being the great nation that we have the potential to be.

In my English class we had a project where we had to create our own artwork inspired by Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried. You could make whatever you wanted, painting, poem, short story whatever. Most people went for the obvious easy choice and did drawings, some of them were pretty good though. I, of course, chose to do a short story, and totally owned everyone at the gallery thing we did today where we displayed what we created. This was my story:

On The Porch

It was a bright sunny day in the heat of summer. The cicadas whirred, the trees swayed slightly in the occasional breath of breeze that distilled the otherwise heavy humid air. The children played in the street, running around, aiming at each other with their fingers.

“Bang! You’re dead!” cried one. He was tall and lanky, probably the eldest of the group, but not any older than nine or ten.

“Am not, you missed by a mile!” shouted back another, who was shorter and rounder, and probably a few years younger than the other.

“I hit you fair and square, you’re dead.”

“Am not!”

“Are to!”

“Am not!”

Mr. Harris sat on his front porch and watched them. Mr. Harris was getting on in years, mid fifties. He was a veteran of the Vietnam war, and had the scars to prove it. He’d gone off to war an energetic young man, and come back very different. He’d married his sweetheart, who subsequently divorced him. After the “incidents” at work he was no longer employed. He lived off the government in the small house on the suburban street.

He watched the children play. They ambushed, flanked, and took cover, it was funny really, to see all the moves he’d spent weeks in training learning, and then repeating out on the battlefield, mimicked here by small children. The familiar patterns elicited memories, bad memories, horrible memories, memories full of blood and death and fear. And here were these children, playing in the street.

“Bang! Bang! Bang! You’re dead!”

The gunshot split the air, it felt as though the atmosphere was glass that had been shattered, and should now fall down in tinkling shards around everyone’s feet. The child lay dead in the street. Mr. Harris smiled. It wasn’t any different than he’d remembered, killing. It was easy really. Aim, squeeze trigger, bright flash, deafening bang, sentient being becomes flesh and blood… lots of blood.

He fired again and again. The children screamed and ran. Leaving the dead lying in the street. Their blood spilling onto the ground. After a moment the street was clear, and Mr. Harris stood there with his gun. He surveyed the street, nothing moved. It was quiet. The cicadas had stopped. He sat back down in his chair. What a mess, he thought. It would make a great news story. He could see himself on TV, all the networks putting up his picture with all sorts of captions and people yelling at each other about why he’d done it and other such nonsense. The news trucks would probably get here before the ambulances. Everyone would call it a great tragedy. Humph, tragedy, what do they know about tragedy? The sirens sounded faintly in the distance. What a mess the trial would be. He would almost certainly be sentenced to death. And then he would rot for years in a cell while lawyers got rich off his case, and he waited to die. No, it would be easier just to aim, squeeze trigger, bright flash, deafening bang, sentient being becomes flesh and blood.

Awesome right?

Update: I got a 100.

My first post in my new blog! Except I’m not going to call it that, because the word ‘blog’ just sounds stupid, the type of word you’d expect someone with a Mac to use. This my online journal of whatever the hell I feel like writing about. That works pretty well.