Monday, February 26, 2007

One of those hard lessons

When I was younger, girls would pass on dating me with distressing regularity. At the time, I felt like I was missing out on something and naturally assumed that there was something wrong with my approach, or with me as a person. My insecurities ran wild, and this, combined with some other issues I was struggling with at the time, combined to turn me into a deeply depressed mess. Of course, time has shone a light on the errors of my ways and experience has taught me that the problem was not entirely mine.

I understand now why my dating life was stillborn and take full responsibility for my part in that process. I'm a slow mover, which is to say I like to get to know someone before making an emotional investment. Unfortunately, at least where my sex life has been concerned, I have to make that emotional investment before I am anywhere near getting physical. That is to say, things almost never made it to the point of getting physical. Therefore, every girl eventually walked because they believed that I wasn't interested. Inevitably they would move on and I would be left wondering what I had done wrong. After all, I hadn't even tried to do all those things that girls supposedly hated guys trying to do! What the hell was the problem?

It would take years for me to realize that not doing those things was EXACTLY what was driving them away.

Here's the essential truth about women that escaped my young, poorly educated mind for years: Women complain that every guy is constantly trying to bed them, but assume you are not interested if you are NOT constantly trying to bed them. What women really want, what they seem to need on some level, is to have their attractiveness validated in the form of male interest, but the validating nature of that interest is usually dependent on who is expressing it. For most women I've hung out with/dated/been interested in, the only form of attraction they seem to understand is that which involves a guy trying to put-penis-in-vagina-to-make-happiness-explosion. Not having any real mentors growing up, no one explained this little tidbit to me and I suffered for it. Knowing what I know now, it's difficult not to physically slap my forehead in disbelief at my own ignorance, but what can I do, I just didn't know.

It's so obvious now, 10 years and many failed attempts later. And in some ways, the entire dynamic is totally understandable. After all, most women are taught, and choose to believe, that all guys are in relationships for is the banging. This might even be a generalization that's accurate, but like all rules, there are exceptions. We're all taught that guys are nothing more than dumb fuck-machines that answer to their penises first, their consciences second, if ever. If they have a heart, or listen to it at all, they are either gay, closeted gay, or spineless. That seems to be the societal standard. Subsequently, most women seem to believe that establishing a relationship is more about witholding sex "until they're sure he cares" than it is about establishing a mutually caring, healthy, intimate interralationship.

It's the age old fallacy that sex=love. Nothing could be further from the truth, but that doesn't matter. Some women embrace this fact and become the type that jump right into sex in an effort to get down to "what everyone really wants", but there's so much wrong with that approach, I don't know where to start. In my mind, it's the equivalent of settling for a hundred Kia Sephias when what you really dream of having is a Bentley Continental GT. You may never get the Bentley, but in pursuing it you will have at the very least put yourself in a position to have something more than a fucking Kia, but then Kias are enough for some people, so there you go.

In my experience, women's complaints aren't about guys trying to get in their pants, it's about guys they aren't attracted to trying to get in their pants. If a girl is into a guy, they want him in their pants and you most definitely won't hear them complaining if he's trying to get there. In this way, the inverse of my old fears became the real concern. If a girl is into you and you are not trying to get in her pants, she will inevitably put you in the friend zone and move on to seek that sort of attention elsewhere. For many women, this is one of the only forms of validation they perceive as being available to them. For most of the women I have met, a guy being attracted to them is part of validating their perception of themselves.

At the time, realizing that this was the way of the world, and believing the perception that my thinking doomed me to failure in a world that acts this way, drove me to bitterness. As I've grown older, I find myself more accepting of the phenomena. I'm less interested than ever in being a part of the manipulation involved in exploiting this particular part of the social dynamic, but being aware and accepting it as something beyond my power to change has helped me find some harmony with it.

I had no understanding of how things worked in the real world, because I was too lost in my ideals and childish musings on the subject of love in this world. Subsequently, I missed a number of opportunities because of it. Do I have regrets? No, at least not where my behavior was concerned, because the sort of girls I typically have been attracted to tend to be insecure and usually of the promiscuous/serial-monogamous persuasion. Looking back, none of them were really looking for what I'm after, and all of them would have eventually left me brokenhearted anyway, so what seemed like a loss then was really a net gain in the long run. Better things end before you're emotionally in, than come to a messy end after a deeper attachment has developed...definitely one lesson I learned firsthand, the hard way.

"Going without" while taking the time to really know some people that were actively "going with" taught me that what they had wasn't what I wanted, and that time has shown that it was they who were ultimately starving. People who use their physicality as a means of being validated typically end up on the outside of happiness looking in. They use and get used, pile up regrets and mistakes, and have to live with all of it as they grow old. Some come to terms and make a sort of peace with it, but most seem to remain stuck in the manipulative, "get what you can" cycle until they've emptied themselves of any chance of knowing love and used their bodies up in their pursuit of momentary validation. The problem in a life without love is that everything is temporary; temporary relationships, temporary happiness, temporary satisfactions.

And that's what I'll never understand about most people. All this doing wrong by their Self in pursuit of validation only works to hamper their ability to ever truly make any progress toward real understanding of themselves. It makes no sense to me, and women continue to mystify in this regard. The moral of the story, and the fundamental point behind this post, is that a willingness to accept less than what you are looking for is a guarantee that you will end up with exactly that. Most people do, when you get right down to it, but there's nothing desirable about being like most people.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/26/2007 10:39:00 AM :: (8) comments

Sunday, February 25, 2007

A few more pics of the twins

Ava Left, Evelyn Right. :)



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Posted by Erik @ 2/25/2007 07:47:00 PM :: (2) comments

Friday, February 23, 2007

What does Marcellus Wallace look like?

One of my favorite scenes from one of my favorite movies done entirely in typographic animation. Still all the cool, none of the sniveling white guy's contorted face. Good times! NSFW language. :)

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Posted by Erik @ 2/23/2007 07:42:00 PM :: (2) comments

It's official - I'm emo

I'm not sure how it happened, or when things started spiraling downward, but I found myself feeling totally defeated the other day. It started with work. My workload increased exponentially after we lost two of our most experienced people. We had another one take a 4-6 week leave because of foot surgery, so we were down to one of our newer additions, the new girl, and myself. Needless to say, things have been shitty and I am beginning to show signs of burnout. On top of everything else, the new girl has become something of a conundrum for me. She has been in a long-term relationship with an older guy who seems to be nothing short of a dickless jackass. The more I learn about the guy, the more I question his sexuality, but that's all fine and good. They were in a relationship, it's their business, and I keep my nose out of such things, unless asked for my opinion. The trouble started about a month ago. Apparently, the relationship has been going sour, even though they had recently gotten engaged. Long story short, new girl starts flirting, I fail to recognize it at first, start to wake up to what's going on, and subsequently get sucked in.

Before you jump to any conclusions, understand that I have not so much as hugged this girl. No inappropriate contact, no passionate rendezvous in a conference room, not anything even remotely in that ballpark. We did grab some drinks after a particularly awful day at work last week, but all we did was talk. I am fairly certain that I am in the friend zone and that's probably best. The bottom line is, anyone in a relationship is off limits, period. I have enough self discipline to leave it alone, even if it seems like there is something worth exploring there. It's difficult, and it's definitely something I didn't need right now, but there is no such thing as a "good time" for this sort of stuff to happen. The bigger issue is this: I am attracted to the girl, but recognize that there is some manipulatin going on. Here's where the emo really starts kicking in...

This girl and I are probably not going to happen for several reasons. First and foremost amongst them being the fact that she is still with this guy. They have apparently decided to sell the house they bought together, and one would assume that means she is parting ways with him, but experience tells me that assuming anything in such situations is a dangerous mistake to make. Even if she does leave, she is going to need some time alone to decompress, figure herself out, etc. And I'm not sure she really wants to leave him. My feeling is that she keeps hoping he'll come around and change. She strikes me as someone who is willing to wait and wait and wait, even if such a change is nearly unheard of in human beings. Maybe he will make that abrupt U-turn, but in my experience, such a change in direction is incredibly rare. Regardless, she reignited a yearning in me that I had more or less put away after the Motorcycle Girl episode last year. Now my mind is stuck in a loop of pathetic self-pity and lamentatin which has to stop.

I keep thinking about love and how much I would like to have experienced it at least once by now. With everthing going to shit at the office and my stress level going through the roof, I keep thinking about how nice it would have been to have had someone to lean on during times like these. My friends have always been around, but I rarely put anything like this on them, because I've always felt that it was my burden to carry. And I still feel that way, but a part of me wishes that things didn't HAVE to end up like this all of the time. Just because we can handle something on our own, does not mean we want to handle it alone every time, but that is some peoples' fate. At times it has been by choice, sometimes it has been the result of bad luck, and still other times it has been the result of some girl's decision. I guess I'm jealous, in a way, of the selfish, dysfunctional, and dishonest people who get to reap the benefits of that support system. It has to beat starving.

And it goes on and on like that, endlessly and without respite. I suppose it's pathetic, but I also know that it is something every healthy human being with a soul experiences at one point or another. Like everything else, this is temporary. Eventually I'll get my head right, get back on track, and work my through, but the transitions are always such a pain in the ass.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/23/2007 01:00:00 PM :: (4) comments

Wednesday, February 21, 2007

15 Minute Hello

Got bored, decided to do some speed scribbling. 15 minutes from start to upload. Photoshop washed it out badly, but that probably has more to do with Painter IX's issues saving into PSD formats...damned formats.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/21/2007 11:47:00 PM :: (0) comments

Oh Yahweh, where for art thou?

This is a prayer to the Old Testament God. The God I prefer, honestly. I like the God of consequences, fire, and proactivity. If nothing else, at least that version of the great being was involved! Don't get me wrong, I dig what Jesus had to say, but his version of Jehovah is too passive and disconnected for my tastes. I like a god who gets his hands dirty, one that we know is watching, and most of all, one who seems to give a shit about this little ball of rock He installed life on. The New Testament's Supreme Being seems too much like a modern, average dad; too busy with distractions, so he misses what the kiddies have going on after school. Besides all of that, what good is being a god if you're not going to bring mass destruction once in a while? I think it's time he got back to cleaning house every couple centuries, so with that in mind I wrote him this letter.

Dear Lord,

You and I have had a fairly distant relationship, to say the least. I may have prayed to you in the past, but I lost any faith I may have had as I grew older and learned more about this world you allegedly created. Once I came to a better understanding of Humanity, I began to question the idea that any being with good intentions would let such animals run wild without any active supervision, hence the purpose of this letter. I would like to ask that you put down the remote, get off the golf course, or stop whatever it is you might be doing and check in on your Earth ant farm. Things have been a mess here for millennia now, and I think a vast majority of us would appreciate a little intervention. I'm not talking about cataclysm or Armageddon, but there are a few segments of the ever expanding population that probably need to be addressed post haste.

First and foremost, can't you do us all the favor of eliminating the world's malicious souls? Would it be so bad if the wicked spirits were just wiped from the face of the planet? My gut says no, and I'm inclined to listen to it. How many murderers, rapists, child molesters, drug dealers, and the like do we need, really? Once you've got that handled, maybe it's time to consider snuffing out a large number of your supposed faithful. I mean, how many times can you let your own believers piss in your face before you make a move to slap them back in line? Surely even you have your limits, as I can't believe you would want people like Ted Haggard and Pat Robertson representing you to the unwashed masses. You have to be downright pissed about guys like Creflo Dollar and the Farting Preacher (whose real name you already know, so I won't bother to look it up). Can you really blame people like me for taking several large steps away from that brand of faith? Something tells me you would probably empathize.

Next, let's start replacing modern politicians with people who actually want to make a difference and while we're at it, let's make them the sort of people whose integrity isn't for sale to the highest bidder. If you've got the time, how about removing the world's she and he-whores? While they may seem to be little more than a nuisance, they are contributing quite a bit of hardship onto society in the form of STDs, illegitimate children, and broken homes. How are we supposed to get things straightened out when people incapable of keeping their genitals in check are reproducing like rabbits? The foundation of a society is in its families, and over half of America's families are splitting up. If you didn't intend for us to be married and monogamous, at least have the balls to come out and tell us so! Perhaps you are, through your continued inaction. If so, what the fuck was the point of all this anyway?

The rest I leave to your discretion. Considering the fact that you provide people like George W Bush the power to wage war, and people like Anna Nicole Smith fame and fortune, I find it highly unlikely that you will do anything in response to this request, but it never hurts to ask. If you should end up getting back to work, and I should end up being one of the people you decide to erase - because of my lack of faith, or the few sins on my tally, or just because I pissed you off - I want you to know that I will accept my fate with dignity. After all, it would be a relief to know you're back on the case, and your presence would be all the evidence I need of an after life, so that little question would be answered definitively. In The End, what's left to worry about anyway?

Thanks for your time!

Your Pal,
Erik

P.S. Is Anna Nicole with you? Apparently there are a lot of people here who would like to know.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/21/2007 12:46:00 PM :: (2) comments

Monday, February 19, 2007

CNN.com Suckles Dog Testicles

I've been a long-time CNN.com reader, primarily because other news outlets have historically been prone to sensationalism and lack of focus. There's no valid argument for reading Foxnews.com, unless you are white/male/Republican, or some combination thereof. The regulars nets rarely have anything interesting to share beyond AP articles, and I can't find an unbiased, informative print rag that suits my tastes. CNN has been sliding for a long time, but they have finally hit bottom and I just can't stand sifting through the shyte in search of something worth reading.

What finally put me over the edge? First, the Anna Nicole Smith story. Why ANYONE cares about the death of a drug addicted cumdumpster is beyond me. Anna Nicole was so promiscuous that half the males living in Texas and most of California could be put on the potential-baby-daddy list. This woman managed to play host to more male genitalia than Fruit of the Loom, and she was more into drugs than CVS, but we're supposed to care that she's dead? Apparently so, because CNN ran a frontpage article, which remained featured for days. Once it had lost feature cred, it was moved to a sidebar, where it remained for days (more than a week?), before becoming a sidebar in Entertainment section features, where it remains.

Making matters worse, Britney Spears' head shaving was front page material all week, including two video links, one to a report on the shaving itself, the other an interview with Spears' stylist, who apparently pleaded with everyone's favorite trailer queen to stop. Alas, Britney didn't listen, and the news item floated on CNN's homepage all weekend.

Maybe CNN is not to blame. After all, they are only giving the people what they want, right? I would be curious to see what the click-through numbers are on the aforementioned links, as I find it highly unlikely that Anna Nicole Smith and Britney Spears really are what America wants. No one I know cares about either of them. Everyone I know approached Anna Nicole Smith's death with either complete disinterest or some variation of "what took so long?". I am fairly confident that all of these people would regard Britney Spears passing in much the same light, so I can't imagine any of them give a single, solitary shit about her shaving her head! We're talking about a washed up pop star who only became famous because of her slutty-young-trash looks and mystifying, wholesome image, both of which completely abandoned her. Britney's only claim to fame these days is having divorced a white trash nobody who bilked her out of millions, after knocking her up twice, taking away her number one asset in the process.

Between Anna Nicole and Britney, I can't decide who is more irrelevant. According to CNN, they are priority news items and I can't think of more powerful evidence that the company has finally lost all sense of perspective. I can go elsewhere for AP articles and 24 hour news updates.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/19/2007 10:43:00 PM :: (0) comments

Sunday, February 18, 2007

It gave me a laugh

Just funny, not trying to start in on the Harley-Davidson fanboy thing.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/18/2007 02:07:00 AM :: (0) comments

Friday, February 16, 2007

So what did I do for Valentine's Day?

Well, I was most definitely not on a date. Haven't had a date since last April, when things with the ex imploded. Typing that, I find it simultaneously hard to believe, and altogether pathetic, but there it is. The why and why not could probably consume an entire post, but I'll save it for another day.

While I wasn't out spending time with a future ex, I did have an appointment on my calendar. Wednesday night, I met my BBBS little brother. I was furnished with some of his basic information, i.e. name, age, interests, etc. prior to the meeting as part of the match process. Given his interests, and the BBBS coordinator's input, it sounded like we would be a good match, so she scheduled a meet-up at the little's home.

Things went pretty well, even if D was a little bit aloof at first. His mom, the coordinator, and I did most of the talking initially, while he pretended to be absorbed in a PSP game. Soon enough, he was getting involved in the conversation, and eventually everyone was getting to know each other. My initial impressions are that D is a good kid with the usual interests and distractions tugging at his awareness. He's into basketball, video games, music, etc. Little man looks old for his age, and mom let me know that older girls are already calling with regularity. With cellphone and internet access at his fingertips, D has no trouble keeping in touch. Luckily, mom seems to be very vigilant. Little man is going to be a lady killer and they paired him with someone who hasn't been on a date in nearly a year...irony. lol

We went to the local rec center and shot around for a while, and I made an effort to keep the conversation rolling. These first outings are all about establishing a dialog, so I did my best to keep asking questions. I'd say things went well and I look forward to hanging out with D in the future.

I will admit that it was a bit strange to meet people I had never met before with the express purpose of becoming a mentor. It's a new thing for me, but D has been in the program for a couple of years, so they were more familiar with how things would go. I hope that I made a good impression and that I can be a good influence, if nothing else. Should be an interesting experience. As always, I hope it's good times...

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Posted by Erik @ 2/16/2007 10:33:00 PM :: (2) comments

Tuesday, February 13, 2007

Someone asked me how I would define "love" today

Never mind who was asking, I was just amazed that anyone would want to know my opinion on the matter! After all, I've never been in love. The closest I ever came was not a reciprocal thing, and it didn't last long, so I am by no measure an expert on the subject. That said, as is probably no surprise to anyone who knows me, I did have a response.

In my uneducated opinion, love as a word has no definition. It is far too abstract and subjective an experience. The dictionary says something to the effect of "strong affection for another arising out of kinship or personal ties" or "attraction based on sexual desire : affection and tenderness felt by lovers" or "affection based on admiration, benevolence, or common interests". For my money, love is defined by the experiences attached to it. Something like a blackhole would make an appropriate analogy, in that you cannot see it, but its astrophysical presence is born out by the effect its incredible mass has on everything around it.

For me, this is a relatively simple concept to grab hold of. In my limited experience, love is a pervasive sense of being 'at ease' when the object of your affections is in your presence. With the aforementioned ex, there was a brief period when simply seeing her made me want to smile. When she was nearby or on my mind, things were lighter. My mind is always racing with traffic, but when she and I were together, it settled into a steady rhythm and I felt completely relaxed. Definitely a rare experience for me in relation to another person.

In my life, that is more than enough. There's really nothing more to ask beyond what can be given freely, i.e. honesty, loyalty, affection, etc. Being content with those things would seem to indicate the presence of love, at least in my mind. For some, it is a monumental, insurmountably complex, and impossibly intricate thing. I picture their minds functioning like a tax audit procedure, with dozens of twists and turns strung together as a means of "proving" love's presence. Can that be what love is? Do we have to prove our love, like we prove some lifeless math calculation? Is real love a test we have to pass on a rotating basis? Not in my mind. In my eyes, that is the byproduct of insecurity and fear, not a love.

Love, as a feeling, should be inspiring, pleasing, and serve as a buttress against the onslaught of bullshit constantly spewing forth from the world at large. Is always having some sort of conflict or stress lingering over every conversation? Is it constantly being questioned, or having to question yourself? Not in my mind, but then my perpetual monk status should probably serve as a barometer of just how accurate my understanding of love is!

The greatest irony, or cruelest, is that something so incredibly simple is so impossibly hard to find in a world like ours. That's nothing new, of course, but then nothing is under this sun.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/13/2007 09:48:00 PM :: (0) comments

Your government

Administering anal rape sans lubricant since 1776.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/13/2007 07:47:00 PM :: (0) comments

Sunday, February 11, 2007

A quick conversation

The movie Seven is one of my all-time favorites. Great script, great acting (for the most part...is Brad Pitt ever really acting like anyone who is not Brad Pitt?), and great directing. Just before the Vanity murder, the main characters MILLS and SOMERSET are having a discussion over beers. It goes something like this:

SOMERSET: People don't want a champion. They want to eat cheeseburgers, play the lotto, and watch television.

MILLS Hey, how'd you get like this? I wanna know.

SOMERSET It wasn't one thing, I can tell you that

Go on

I just don't think that I can continue to live in a place that embraces and nurtures apathy as if it was a virtue.

MILLS You're no better, you're no different.

SOMERSET I didn't say I was any different or better, I'm not. Hell, I sympathize, I sympathize completely. Apathy is a solution. I mean, it's easier to lose yourself in drugs than it to cope with life. It's easier to steal what you want, than it is to earn it. It's easier to beat a child than it is to raise it. Hell, love costs, it takes effort and work.

MILLS We're talking about people who are mentally ill. We are talking about people who are fucking crazies.

SOMERSET No, no, no, no! We're talking about every day life here. You can't afford to be this naive!

MILLS Fuck off. See, you should listen to yourself. You say, "that the problem with people is they don't care, so I don't care about people." That makes no sense, you know why?

SOMERSET You care?

MILLS Damn right.

SOMERSET And you're gonna make a difference.

MILLS Whatever. The point is, I don't think you're quitting, because you believe these things you say. I don't. I think you want to believe them, because you're quitting. You want me to agree with you: "Yeah, you're right. It's all fucked up, it's a fuckin' mess, we should all go live in a fuckin' log cabin." But I won't tell you that. I don't agree with you, I do not. I can't. I'm gonna go home.

Mills throws some money on the table.

MILLS Thank you though.

This is one of my favorite spots in the movie, because I feel like all of us can identify with where Mills and Somerset are coming from. In fact, I'm having both sides of the conversation with myself on a daily basis these days. I feel more like Mills, but probably only because I'm younger than Somerset. Apathy is society's life blood, has been for decades now and it is a tragedy. That's not to say I'm going to go John Doe, as that really wouldn't change anything but the newspaper headlines, until the next celebrity stripper dies an undignified death in a casino somewhere. Real change takes time, effort, and vision, but nothing is going to shock a post-9/11 world into action. 9/11 wasn't enough to bring about sustained, real change, after all.

Anyway, I was watching the movie and this particular scene jumped off the screen at me. What sort of place is this and where are we going?

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Posted by Erik @ 2/11/2007 10:13:00 PM :: (0) comments

Saturday, February 10, 2007

Harmony

My drawing professor is an interesting guy. He's relatively young, 30-something, but is a combat veteran, long-time artist, and has competed in mixed martial arts competition. He is also a spiritualist, with strong feelings for the Eastern philosophical traditions. Needless to say, we have no problem finding interesting things to talk about. For instance, as class ended for the night this past Monday, the concept of peace came up. Art Prof proclaims that the idea of peace is ridiculous. Not only is it ridiculous, it is unnatural! Always being up for this sort of discussion, my curiosity was peaked, so I asked him to explain.

The gist of his idea was that peace, in and of itself, is an unnatural condition for any animal species. Nowhere in nature is there peace, as we perceive it. Ants are among natures simplest insects, but they are not ever at peace with one another. Ants, should they encounter a potential threat or food source, will almost certainly attack said threat or food source. This reaction is an instinctual act to better protect the ant's self-interest. After all, the fewer competitors he has to worry about, the better his chances of finding resources needed by the colony. His killing is motivated by a hard-coded instinct for self-preservation, which is ultimately serves to sustain his species. All through nature, similar violence and focus on self interest is present, from lion prides and hyena packs to lone sharks and dolphin pods. Nature is not made of peace and understanding. On the contrary, nature is often cruel, merciless, and always indifferent. Nature just is, nothing more, nothing less.

So if peace is an illusion, what is real? Harmony, was his reply. Harmony, as in nature will find a natural balance, a state of harmony, if left to its own devices. The interrelation of its various elements will be anything but peaceful. However, they will naturally settle into a state of harmonious balance. One species will feed off another, but the natural push-pull of population density will limit greed and gluttony. If they consume too much, the predators will starve, eventually killing each other for sustenance. Should the prey grow too populace, the predators will up their reproduction and kill rates, to regain the balance. Typically, a natural biosphere finds a settling point where there is balance and harmony throughout the food chain. Nature does not know any other way.

I knew where he was going as soon as he started and agreed wholeheartedly. Peace is impossible, and I think we all know it on some level. Man will always find a reason to destroy Man. This has been the way since the dawn of humankind. We will not ever know peace, as we are products of nature, but the higher price of our intellect is that neither will we ever know harmony. Ours is a species that has been out of balance for thousands of years, if not longer. A vast majority of our species cares nothing for balance. For most, it is not even a consideration, as its importance does not register in their psyches on any conscious level. Eating, drug use, exercise, nearly anything can, and inevitably will, be taken out of balance by people. It is a side effect of our ability to reason and rationalize.

Which leads me to the idea that our discord with nature is a byproduct of rational contemplation. Where nature shows us the way, we reason a way to somewhere entirely different, losing sight of the essential beauty in the natural order, thereby surrendering any hope for harmony. This is why many Eastern philosophers have referred to typical Western philosophies as being too top heavy, which is to say all brains, no gut. That second center of consciousness, or dandien, is an ancient, spiritual counterbalance to the brain's constant push toward the illusion of control. In Eastern faiths like Buddhism and Taoism, the brain is a processor of illusions and half-truths that spends its entire existence trying to convince the spirit that this world, this reality we experience with our physical selves, is all that the universe has to offer. In making this claim, the mind finds solace in an illusion of understanding, which breeds a sense of control and mastery.

Our brains constantly remind us that life is temporary, that the gelatinous mass floating in our spinal-cerebral fluid is Us. The brain and its accomplice, the mind, conspire to betray our spirits, forcing us to fear the temporary nature of this existence, thereby making us their slave, as their finite existence is all that we have. That is where dandien serves to restore balance. Dandien is a conduit through which our spiritual energy influences and attempts to balance the motives of our mind. In this way, the physical and metaphysical components within each of us interact. Theoretically, they would find their own harmony, and we would be at ease with ourselves, but in practice, the two are constantly giving and gaining ground. The idea of competing influences is prevalent through nearly all faiths and philosophies. The Yin-Yang is a good illustration of this duplicitous swirling, which explains its prevalence in Eastern doctrine and symbology.

Where am I going with all this? Isn't it obvious? I am not in harmony. There is no denying that I am incredibly top heavy, and I am not certain there is much to be done about that, at least willfully. I have been confused by some things lately, and have tried to give a more attentive ear to my gut, but I've found that I struggle to find any satisfaction, because my head continually gets in the way. I find myself having a hard time reading peoples' true intentions, so I assume the worst until given a reason to believe otherwise. Some of that is a natural reaction to the inherent selfishness exhibited by all people as we pursue our own interests. In that context, caution seems utterly natural to me, neither right, nor just, but natural. Remember that nature doesn't care about abstract judgments like right, wrong, or the gray between. Nature has no use for things like righteousness, honor, and justice. Neither, for that matter, do most people. And in the end, none of us can be perfect...we can't even get close enough to have a shot at holding it in our hands.

So how do we find harmony? We seek the balance. How do we do that? That is the million dollar question and the answers are all contextual. At this point, I would be satisfied with a little quiet time away from people on an abandoned beach. I'm not talking Robinson Crusoe, but a little Blue Lagoon would work for me, sans any human beings. People are such a struggle for me right now that an empty island with plenty of edible food and drinkable water would be totally refreshing! No one to criticize, to manipulate, to make demands of, or to obstruct my way. It sounds like a dream, like paradise. Obviously, this sort of thinking is fueling things like my desire for a motorcycle, and my decision to join the BBBS. I want so badly to find some good in this world that I find myself longing to escape even as I am driven to dig deeper in hopes of contributing some good of my own.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/10/2007 11:42:00 PM :: (5) comments

Friday, February 09, 2007

This is why I want a Harley-Davidson

Click me for unadulterated Harley-Davidson Marketing Ploy

Forget the "Creed" advertising gimmick, forget the tattoos, and the alternative-conformity image conjurations, and look at the scenery, the negative space. I want an open road somewhere, away from people, away from all the nonsense, where I can just ride away and not have to see another human face for a while. Is it running away? No, because running away insinuates that you are scared. I'm not afraid, there's no reason to be afraid of this mass of sheep, and the few wolves we encounter rarely justify being afraid, when all is said and done. In the end, this is a world of common. Common people, common places, common occurences, ubiquitous commonality. Save a few special places, people, and things, it is a bland and monotonous background for what could be a wondrous journey through our invididual existences.

But we don't have to succumb. We don't have to fall. We don't have to be a piece of the background. I can't see any good reason to do so! Will owning a Harley make me a rebel? No, because in a few key ways, I like to think of myself as something of a revolutionary already. What it WILL do is give me an outlet. A motorized, exposed, dangerous, beautiful, spiritual outlet. After this last visit to a Harley dealership, one of many I've made in the past, I feel it calling me and I'm nervous and mesmerized at the same time. Scared I'll get myself killed, but mesmerized by the thought of open air, open roads, and zero humans around to interfere with my journey. Maybe it's the present circumstances of my existence, my longing for greater life experiences, or something beyond my understanding, but it seems very real to me. And in this commercialized world, Harley-Davidson, more than any other motorcycle, embodies that longing and it seems only natural that this would be my machine of choice.

Maybe I'm just a sucker falling prey to good marketing...I can't deny that's a possibility. Whatever the case may be, I'm sold.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/09/2007 08:22:00 AM :: (2) comments

Wednesday, February 07, 2007

Late virgins

Every morning I wake to the sounds of 97.1's Fisher and Boy, aka the 97X Morning Show, crackling from the tiny speaker in my alarm clock radio. Subsequently, I have an internal point-counterpoint session while I'm eating breakfast, getting dressed, and getting out the door. Today's topic interested me, because it was particularly poignant for me.

Apparently there is a TV show being cast which is looking for "late virgins", i.e. people who didn't get their scrump on by the age of 18 to 34. The morning show interviewed said reality show's producer and followed up with some commentary. The gist of the conversation was that a person who hasn't done the deed by 20 (when the show's Boy finally got over the hump, so to speak) was somehow socially impaired, aka a Social Retard. If that's the case, I am the Stephen Hawking of sexual socialization! LOL

At 20, I was still a long way from going there with anyone, despite having several opportunities to 'get it over with'. My main concern was making sure I went down that road with someone I genuinely cared about, so I held out. I'm no longer amongst the pristine, but I sometimes wish I could be. I've known some prolific manwhores, and I've known some not-until-marriage types, I'm neither, but my number is low, and by low I mean eyebrow raising "are you serious" low. Of course, according to the HIV prevention ads of the 80s and 90s, I have slept with everyone my partner(s) has slept with, which makes my virtual number currently unknown, and not a little unnerving, but what's done is done. That said, my physical number is ridiculously low and the count didn't start until I was ridiculously old, at least by 99.9% of the population's standards.

Do I feel like the more promiscuous or experienced people around me know something I don't? ==Warning, self-righteous rant to commence in T-minus 5...4...3..2...== Fuck no! You know why? Because 95% of them are in shitty relationships, if they are capable of being in real relationships at all. I could bang 100 women, not remember half their names or faces, pick up and pass on a few STDs, but what will have been the point? What will I have to show for all that time, effort and risk, beyond a Valtrex prescription (if I'm lucky), the same hole of insecurity I tried to fill with multiple vaginas, and and a few stories to share with my similarly insecure buddies? Fucking, and really, if you're just banging around that's all you're doing, is something the simplest mammals can do. It's emotionless and empty. Why not just buy a Fleshlight or a Sybian, if all you want to do is have your genitals stimulated?

It always amazes me how much power the idea that we should "fuck early, fuck often" has in modern society. Going all the way back to Egypt and beyond, the human animal has largely been a slave to its genitalia, like a dog or monkey...I picture the internet famous video of a chimp pissing in its own mouth as a fitting representation of most of modern humanity at this point. So a guy who hasn't crossed paths with the right girl by 20 is more socially retarded than a guy who has stuck his junk into 5, 10, or 15 women by that age, even if the guy doing all the sticking is a total fucktard narcissist incapable of caring about another human being? Ridiculous.

Fisher, the leader of the show, will periodically lament his history, whining about past relationships, his weight, etc, but I'm to believe he knows something I don't, because he stuck his cement chute into some girl's love canal at 15? Give me a break. When I start seeing promiscuous people having healthy, loving relationships, I'll get onboard with the "it's just banging 'til you find the one you love" boat, but that's not what I'm seeing in the real world, so I'm extending my long middle finger in the general direction of those who judge virgins to somehow be inferior. More often than not, I think those waiting until they're old enough to have some understanding of the world beyond MTV reality shows and high school binge drinking have got it right.

As evidence that the pro-promiscuity/we-all-just-need-get-laid simpletons are idiots, I hold up the ever-increasing STD infection rate, the on-the-rise-again teen pregnancy numbers, the rising number of bastard, i.e. abandoned or "fatherless" children, and the 60% divorce rate as proof that fucking isn't solving many, if any, of society's problems. For those that believe otherwise, keep it up and let me know how it works out for you. As the societal cookie continues to crumble, at least you'll be getting some benefit from the decline...somebody has to.

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Posted by Erik @ 2/07/2007 09:44:00 AM :: (6) comments

Monday, February 05, 2007

The Twins are one month old

See pictures below. What else is there to say? :)


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Posted by Erik @ 2/05/2007 10:39:00 PM :: (0) comments

Saturday, February 03, 2007

Lonely in the in crowd

How do I know that I'm feeling lonely? I start thinking about things I shouldn't be. Example: There's a cute girl at the gym, we'll call her Gym Hotty 07. GH07 has been coming into the gym for about a month. She's probably 20 years old...maybe. Her complexion is of the "naturally tan" variety, hair is dark and straight, and she's petite, pouty, and altogether very attractive. To say that she reminds me of someone I once knew, right down to the way she carries herself, would be an understatement. On top of all that, she makes eye contact and holds it in the "I'll look away when you do" fashion that sends all kinds of mysterious messages.

Anyway, I know just about all of the late-afternoon, pre-dinner regulars. Working out 4-5 days a week at the same place for 5 or 6 years makes this inevitable, so a large group of us talk and joke around without any regard to our surroundings. While we're there, the free weight area is effectively ours, with a few strangers meandering around to serve as background for the show. As a result, our crowd is ever growing, because newbies on the fringes find themselves being sucked in by the endless banter, goofing around, and generally friendly vibe going on.

So it is that GH07 gets caught chuckling at one of our conversations, which serves as Big Joe's crack-in-the-door to begin the indoctrination process. We XY chromosome slaves had all taken note of said GH previously, so it was only a matter of time. As the only single male under the age of 40 who is in the "in crowd", I am the first to get the "you should hook up with that girl" nod. It comes with the territory and it is never ending, despite the fact that all of my beliefs run contrary to the idea.

What does all of this have to do with being lonely? Well, despite the bad feeling in my gut, the "something has to be up" demeanor, and knowing better, I find myself tempted to strike up a conversation and begin the dance. I haven't, and I won't, but a part of me would like to. It was much easier not to when I was a kerosene-fueled 20 year old. I believed it was an absolute certainty that I would eventually find someone to have a real relationship with, sooner or later. There was no question that I would meet someone, we'd hit it off and the rest would be making-love-all-the-time-in-the-sunshine history. Ten years on, and that old faith is gone. There are no guarantees in this life, and any hopes I may have had to enjoy a lasting, healthy relationship in my youth are irretrievably lost to time. For someone like me, that's distressing stuff.

So GH07 reminds me that I've been alone for a vast majority of my life, and that I am no longer as fond of being absolutely alone as I once was. She reminds me that my commitment to finding something real in this land of falsehoods is not, and will never be, easy. For all I know, she's engaged or married or otherwise involved, which I hope she is, otherwise I'm going to be nagged endlessly by the "Erik, look at that girl...what the fuck are you thinking???" crowd. It's a shitty thing and thinking about it puts me in a shitty mood.

If pumping my DNA into as many women as possible had been a life goal, things would have been so much easier. I guess that's life in our enlightened age. Where's Doc and his Delorean when I need him?

A thought occurred to me after having scribbled this down last night. It's a single sentence that more or less sums up the entirety of the human journey for me.

At some point in a worthwhile life, we realize it is better to find lasting love in one beautiful soul, than to find momentary bliss in a hundred beautiful bodies.

I should have that tattooed somewhere...

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Posted by Erik @ 2/03/2007 07:17:00 PM :: (2) comments

Thursday, February 01, 2007

Giving it time

So I've enrolled in the Big Brothers, Big Sisters program. The reasons behind that are varied, but most of them come down to wanting to put as much good into this world as I can before my lights go out forever. With no kids of my own and my chances of going there becoming more remote every year, it seemed like the next best way to give back some of what this life has taught me. So much of what's wrong in this mess comes back to a lack of role models, mentors, and a willing ear. I feel like my life will have been a failure, if I were to sit back and watch the fabric continue unraveling without having tried to contribute something worthwhile.

My life has been a relatively easy one. I grew up in a stable household amidst middle class neighbors. Things weren't perfect and we were far from sheltered, but I did my best to do what I believed to be the right thing. That's not to say I was always successful, but I tried. So a little good karma to balance the few blemishes I put on my karmic tapestry can't be a bad thing. More than anything else, I feel compelled to volunteer some of my time doing something productive. Honestly, I couldn't give a simple explanation as to why I decided to join the BBBS organization, aside from a desire to do something positive. I've had people suggest that I would be a good fit, Flash always speaks reverently of her experience as a Big Sister, and I've had a desire to do more volunteering, so all signs seemed to be pointing toward mentoring and BBBS seemed the most logical choice.

Fitting this all into my schedule is going to be a challenge, but I think I'm up to it. BBBS asks that you commit for a year, so I had better find a away! Hopefully the experience is a positive one for all concerned. We shall soon see...

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Posted by Erik @ 2/01/2007 10:37:00 PM :: (4) comments