M.etaphysical E.xistance

My thoughts, your mind, intertwined.

Posts Tagged Toothpaste

Still holding on

Mar 25

Posted by Andrew in Uncategorized | No Comments

Here we are, almost 4 months into my new life with Cisco and North Carolina.  Time is just flying right by.  The popular belief is this means I have been having fun.  I can’t think of a better, stronger word for it so I guess “fun” will have to do.

This time away from my previous world has brought things into a different focus.

Avid readers will know of my previous fixation on toothpaste.  I now have the means to get all the different kinds of toothpaste I want.  It feels good to have those options.

Along with the toothpaste we desired other qualities of life.  Some are even starting to fall into place.  In the past couple years I have kept my cosmic expectations fairly low.  I do this for practical reasons.  I know what I want, I know what my priorities are, and I plan to live a long life so there is no rush.  This has helped my general happiness too, as described in my previous post.

But things never work out as you plan.  That is something else I have always been aware of, but never really had to contend with.  Does this also apply to when things work out better then expected?  I have always accepted the things that happen to and around me which I have no direct control over.  (Because, I have no direct control over them.)  These days life has been such that I am just accepting all these wonderful things that happen to me just as I would some trouble or turmoil I would have to deal with.  My fail-safe for getting through anything is starting to catch false-positives.  (Just a little computer scientist reference there.)

What has this all caused?  Well, life still happens.  All these wonderful things still do and have happened.  The interesting part is that I don’t know how I feel about it all yet.  If I do know how I feel about it, I don’t know if that is how I should feel, or will end up feeling about it.  I am aware of the fact that once this c’est la vie attitude wears off I may feel something different.  Is that normal?  If there were hypothetically other people out there who reacted to good and bad fortune in the same way like this, would this all be normal?

The worst part about it all is that there is a delayed ultimate reaction to everything.  I can think about and mull over anything to my hearts content, but I am in the end stuck waiting on the sidelines for my heart to make up its final decision.

Again, no worries.  No rush.  What will happen will happen and I’ll deal with that too.  Eventually.

I would like to note to the bulk of the handful of readers out there that this is all meant to be somewhat vague.  The exact specifics are not mentioned in here as to not clutter up the rest of the discussion.  Also, they are not mentioned here because I haven’t decided yet how I ultimately feel about them.  Oh bother…

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The Sequence of Life

Jan 4

Posted by Andrew in Uncategorized | 2 Comments

I, like many people my age and/or being at this point in life, am thinking about what comes next.  I can look back and see the “sweet innocence” of childhood or the self-imposed stress and problems of adolescence.  I can look to people further along in life then I am and see careers, families, responsibilities, and all sorts of “exciting” things.  But what happens in-between?

I know how the game is supposed to end.  The main character (me, if you haven’t been following along) gets the girl in the end and they ride off into the (Martian) sunset together (in their hover car) to start a family together and live happily ever after.  (Some details filled in from personal fantasy.)  I look at myself and my peers, and I get the impression that I have a clearer picture of this then most.  Additionally, I seem to either be more worried, less concerned, or more sure of how I will achieve these life goals.  I have yet to come to a definitive conclusion on which of those three it is.

Popular belief is that I somehow acquire either (a) copious scholarships or (b) lots of debt to attend a college of my choice for several years, get a nice middle-class job afterwards with which I can manage any debt I may have, buy a house, car, wife, kids, and all the toothpaste I want.  But what if I can’t find all that on the store shelves?  What if, assuming for the moment that I manage to get to this fanciful point in life, I end up not finding the right car, or the right person, or the right brand of toothpaste.  Falling back to popular belief, I would “move on.”  Settle for the peppermint when what I really wanted was wintergreen.  (they never have wintergreen these days…)  Personally, I refuse to settle.  I am willing to “make due with what I have” or to “improvise”, but I will never settle.  I know what I want, and one way or another, I will have it.  (even if I have to cut down my own wintergreen tree…)

But remember, we have assumed that I will be given the honor of being presented the choice of toothpaste or woman or car.  I still have to get that job with which to buy her/it.  (Lets pretend I’m referring to the car as “her” and save the slavery/prostitution implications for the next post.)  To get this job, I either have to be the luckiest person I know, or have to jump through all sorts of high-strung hoops to prove my worth.  Even when it seems like you will never get the degree or job you want.  Even when the fiscal and logistical requirements to get the degree or the job seem impossible.

I just have to keep on going.  Never ending, never waivering.  Or else, no toothpaste.

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