Nothing Means Nothing Volume Two: the future is scary and that's why it's beautiful

8/8/2019 Nothing Means Nothing Volume Two: the future is scary and that's why it's beautiful

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for

Dwight, Taylor, Bobby and Easton

rip


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This is volume two of my collected writing that otherwise wouldn’t be published

It’s all either from my notebook,

things I’ve posted for tumblr,

or stray documents I found on my computer

most of it was written in 2014

Christian


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Table of Contents


5/24

when you read my poems,

I want it to feel like you’re reading a txt

where someone says ‘I love you’

for the first time because

they’re too afraid to say it irl

1


6/24

物の哀れ

part 1

There’s an emotional state I feel pretty often. I try to explain it to people, but I don’t know if there

are words for it. I also don’t know how to describe it well, because using language for privatemental states is pretty tricky

But, it feels like a beautiful sadness, like a scary but appealing emotional clarity. It feels like a

feeling from the world, not from me, and then it radiates through me, and I empathize with the

feeling in the world

part 2 (written later)

I found a Japanese phrase that represents this idea. It’s called ‘mono no aware,’ which is

literally the ‘pathos’ (aware) of ‘things’ (mono). It’s a dull sadness in knowing everything is

impermanent, while still feeling happiness in that moment despite the impermanence. A literary

example I found given a couple times to explain it is from the intro of ‘The Tale of the Heike

Clan’:

‘The sound of the Gion sh# ja bells echoes the impermanence of all things; the color of the s#la

flowers reveals the truth that the prosperous must decline. The proud do not endure, they are

like a dream on a spring night; the mighty fall at last, they are as dust before the wind.’

2


7/24

I’m watching Cheers and there’s a really thought provoking joke

Cliff is talking to Coach, and he’s like “if a tree falls in the woods, does it make a sound?”

and Coach is like “well how would you even know a tree fell?”

then Cliff is like “well say I went for a walk in the woods and saw a fallen tree”

then Coach is like, “well maybe a beaver gnawed it down”

really made me think…

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8/24

My favorite aspect of snow is that the street lights reflect off of the snow, making the city lights

shine a lot brighter into the sky, and then the lights reflect a lot brighter back off the clouds. I

went outside and it doesn’t even feel like night, but it also doesn’t feel like day. It feels like both,

like the synthetic and the natural are two parts of the same metaphor and complete each other

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9/24

I’ve been thinking about something that made me feel really bad

I think about it a lot, but especially lately

I’ve been having flashbacks probably once an hour on average these past few days

When I was a little kid, I was at my dad’s work

At the time, he worked for a non-profit organization

where he’d do community service with juvenile delinquents

I was with them in like a big grassy field

There were a lot of garter snakes in the field

A lot of the people caught and held them, for fun I guess

So I picked up a garter snake

My dad said the right way to hold a snake is under its head,

like its ‘neck’ area (I don’t think snakes technically have necks though)

I started liking the snake, I wanted to take it home,

but I knew that wouldn’t happen

I knew it was better off in the wild

So I was holding the snake by its neck

and was talking to my dad and showed him it

Then he was like “you should put that down soon,

holding it like that makes it hard for the snake to breathe”

I looked down and the snake’s face looked like it was in pure agony,

like it was gasping for breath, on the brink of death

So I set it down and felt guilty

I picture the snake’s face in agony,

with my fingers squeezing its neck, often,

and I get the feeling like you might cry

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10/24

Towards the end of my junior year in high school, I went on a date with a girl to see Star Trek . I

asked her out, then we met up, and went to the movie on a warm, late Spring evening. It was an

adult-seeming date, in contrast to a high school-seeming date—where you meet up with 8 kids

at Taco Bell and smuggle candy into the $2 theatre, then sit in the bed of a truck in a parking lot

Anyway, nothing romantic came from it. I think we hugged after, which seemed like a big

threshold then. Our legs touched in the theatre I think. But afterwards, we’d see each other at

school and say ‘hi’ and stuff like that and it was normal. I don’t really remember Star Trek that

well, but whenever I think of it, I think of her too

I think about her in a way like ‘I hope she’s having a good life’

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11/24

One time in 6th grade, we were learning about Greek and Egyptian mythology. The teacher was

like ‘do you know this God? do you know that God?’ and I knew the main ones

He asked how I knew them and I was like ‘uh, because of Age of Mythology’ and he was like

‘well, you know the right answers but for the wrong reasons’

what kind of bs is that? who tells that to a 6th grader? and most of all, what could be a more

practical use of mythology to a 6th grader, aside from a video game? it’s not like I’m trying to

write a dissertation lol

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12/24

This might sound weird, but do other people feel a spatial sensation when they think? When I

think about something, I ‘feel’ the thought in the way I experience a room, or a lawn, or the

woods. Usually the thought is heavily colorized too. But it’s not like I see space and colors when

I’m thinking something, but I feel the same way when I think about ideas, as I do when I

experience a color or type of spatial arrangement

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13/24

One time I took a class on writing comic books, taught by Brian Michael Bendis. We did some

exercise in class involving pages from Joss Whedon’s ‘Astonishing X-Men’. I don’t remember it

exactly, but just keep that in mind.

We also made a 22 page comic, and part of the assignment was to pitch the story to the class.

There was a very old woman who was auditing the class, and her pitch was one of the most

bizarre things I’d ever heard. I wrote her pitch in my notebook, and when I found it a year later, I

thought it was me trying to write some bizarro poem, until I remembered what it was. I wrote:

‘Essentially fanfic that is Joss Whedon’s Astonishing X-Men, but the X-Men are replaced by

Betty Boop, Laurence Fishburne, and Satan, as portrayed in Passion of the Christ ’

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14/24

I feel like philosophy noobs are into ‘existentialism’ because people have this idea that

philosophy is about ‘the meaning of life’. Existentialism (as explained by Sartre at least) is the

only branch of philosophy—I would say—that cares a lot about that question (even though the

answer is basically ‘meh, whatever you want’)

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15/24

I feel alone but not lonely. I feel alone, like I’m free, like my life is teetering on an open window

sill and my life might change, in smaller ways soon and bigger ways soon (but not as soon). I

don’t know what I’m trying to say but I have a clarity in my feelings, like the aftereffect from

mood swings. I still feel sad, but in the way I used to feel sad — when the world felt beautiful

while also sad, rather than just me feeling sad

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16/24

I like consumerism

how ppl make a distinction between ‘capitalism’ and ‘consumerism’ ——

first of all I think that distinction is bogus. ~that’s so capitalist~ to look for little technicalities so

they can split hairs

BUT MORE IMPORTANTLY!

I like consumerism but I don’t like capitalism

I think commercials are great, they are one of the few ways common ppl experience art. And

they’re made by ppl who wished they were artists, but are at the will of billionaires looking to

exploit common folk. I like this clash and thing it’s conducive to interesting art

tv shows are in the same situation

consumerist entertainment is a big sludge of bite-sized pieces of art that exist because of

multiple groups of ppl with different goals try to coerce the other groups in falling for their

intentions.

idk if I’m explaining my thoughts on it that well

but you get the idea

I love that style of art

I love consumerism

but I don’t like capitalism

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17/24

Dick Scobee Elementary School

The first elementary school I went to is called ‘Dick Scobee Elementary School.’ My mom went

there too, but then it was called ‘North Auburn Elementary School.’ Having the name Dick in an

elementary school is unfortunate, but not as bad as another elementary school in town called

‘Gildo Rey’ (which kids in middle school and sometimes high school called Dildo Gay :( )

Anyway, Dick Scobee (the astronaut) was from Auburn, WA, my hometown. He died in the

Challenger explosion. That’s why the school’s mascot was the Challengers. Dick Scobee

actually attended Washington Elementary which was another elementary school in town (14

elementary schools in Auburn total). However, from what I’ve been told, they couldn’t change

the name of Washington Elementary to Dick Scobee Elementary, because allegedly, you can’t

change the name of a public building that has been named after someone else. This seems like

bs because the school’s named after the state, and the state is named after the President

The best part is that Dick Scobee Elementary has an official song by John Denver in tribute to

the Challenger explosion that they play at every assembly. It’s called ‘Flying for Me’

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18/24

I feel addicted to coffee, but not in the way people typically mean they’re addicted to coffee

I can function without coffee rather well, considering how much I drink

I feel more addicted to the sensation of drinking something hot, that causes my body to have a

bit of a radiating feeling flowing through it

it makes my body feel real

I like how it’s passive, and let’s me feel emotions in my body

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19/24

Remember Flappy Bird? After playing Flappy Bird, I thought about games in a new way. There

are games that you get better at by developing skills, and games you get better at because the

game facilitates you getting better

For example, Flappy Bird (and chess, for example) facilitate your skill development. Also, I think

most card games work this way too, because I’m not factoring in luck. So aside from luck, you

can only get better at a card game, even though there’s a big margin for chance. Another good

example would be fighting video games. Or just irl fighting for that matter. Or sports lol. Most

things irl really

Then there are games like World of Warcraft, Animal Crossing, Runescape, Farmville, etc,

where the progression is artificial. Raiding in World of Warcraft isn’t necessarily harder than low

level instances like Wailing Caverns or Deadmines, you just have more abilities to maintain.

WoW is often harder at higher levels, but that isn’t the real challenge of it, the conceit of the

game is the time sink of progression

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20/24

something a Philosophy professor said in lecture, that I wrote down, without any context:

‘If a Rawlsian ever speaks to you, say ‘so?’

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21/24

In my Heidegger class I learned a lot about Kierkegaard by Heidegger extrapolating on

(sometimes stealing) Kierkegaard’s ideas

anyway, one of these ideas is about mood disorders. They both have a stoic view of mood, that

the distinction between ‘rational thinking’ and emotions is made up. To them, emotions are

rational reactions, based on how our mind is working at that time

But within the context of mood disorders, you have two choices at first glance.

1. you either have to see the stoic view as false, because a disordered mood revolves around

the internal, it’s not a reaction

2. or you look at mood disorders as a defect that should be corrected (psychiatry, for example)

BUT there’s a third idea, which Kierkegaard and Heidegger have. Basically, when you are

depressed (for example), you are not feeling depressed with a lack of external cause — which

typically, that’s what depression is thought to be, a bad feeling caused by internal chemical

reactions

Kierkegaard and Heidegger think depression is actually a reaction to EVERYTHING and/or

NOTHINGNESS (not nothing as the lack of thing, but nothingness as a thing

And the same is true for angst, anxiety, panic attacks, mania etc etc. It’s an anti-scientistic, and

very German philosophical position, but interesting to think about

Kierkegaard never wrote on mania because I don’t think he ever felt it, but it still applies. Healso never wrote on panic. But interestingly, if you read Heidegger’s description of dread/

anxiety, it’s a lot like a description of panic attacks rather than ‘anxiety’

Heidegger borrowed the terminology of ‘anxiety’ from Kierkegaard, even though Kierkegaard

used it in a more conventional way

An interesting footnote to that—Heidegger originally went to a Jesuit seminary, because his

family couldn’t afford university. He was kicked out for a psychosomatic heart condition. The

church then began funding Heidegger’s university education, as a consolation to being kicked

out. However, through contextual evidence, it seems his ‘heart condition’ was actually a panicdisorder

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22/24

The Wind Rises and Heidegger

I’m not going to spoil the movie, but I saw The Wind Rises while in a class on Heidegger, so I

noticed parallels. My prof lectured about inauthenticity. Heidegger juxtaposes ‘forgetting’ as

inauthentic, and ‘repetition’ as authentic. He borrows the idea of repetition from Kierkegaard but

changes it a lot (Kierkegaard juxtaposes repetition with recollection)

This idea shows Heidegger’s conservatism (fascism) maybe more than anything else in Being

and Time, because Heidegger claims you can either forget the cultural/social world you were

born in, or find a hero in that culture and repeat what they did. The more you apply this to the

real world, the more it becomes Nationalistic

But, it made me think of The Wind Rises, because they make it clear that Jiro has a

Heideggerian Hero. But it critiques Heidegger, because Jiro’s hero was Caproni—an Italian. His

sister even comments at the beginning on how non-Japanese he is

The big connection is they both aspire to make things fly and help people, but the implicit

connection, is actually they both built plans to kill the same people in the same war

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23/24

Graveyard (short fiction / not autobio)

An unmanageable burst of people enters at the same time. It would’ve been a manageableburst before midnight, or even 1:00AM, when two people are working

The first guy comes to the counter. He has a 6 pack of Bud Light. He is wearing an oldSeahawks hat and a Carhartt jacket. He looks like an unjaded, conservative, late 20s white boy.He has a well hidden (but not concealed) handgun on his waist, and one of those little walkietalkies strapped to a jacket pocket. I check his ID and scan it

I wait until that guy leaves. The next kid comes up and asks for Newport 100s. I tell the kid thatthe previous guy was an undercover cop. I don’t check the kid’s ID, to be internally rebellious,even though he’s clearly underage

As I get the kid’s change, a guy ran out with a 12 pack of Rainer. Right after that a woman walksin. I tell her she should chase that guy if she wants to, but she ignores me and she looks like a

junkie and she takes the largest pop cup we have, but fills it with coffee, which is ‘not allowed’

but the coffee is hours old and not warm so it doesn’t matter really

As I ring more people up, I see a kid in line with a Vitamin Water and Reese’s Fastbreak. An oldguy offers to buy his snacks with food stamps. The kid is like, ‘that’s generous but it could helpsomeone else more than me.’ The old guy starts yelling that the kid is on drugs. Then the oldguy tells the kid to take the food stamps and give him the equivalent cash. The kid says he’spaying with debit anyway

A woman comes up to buy a pack of Mentos, and that’s it. She drops her change. She bendsover to pick up the change. I see four unopened cranberry juices in her purse. I call her out on itand she says she brought the juices in. I ask her to let me feel if they are cold/covered incondensation. She leaves immediately, and I shout that I’d watch the security tapes, even

though I won’t because there’s nothing I can do now

Then I see the old, food stamps guy walking around with a fully open messenger bag turned infront of him. I tell him it’s store policy to not have bags like that, which is technically true, eventhough we never have to enforce that rule because no one ever looks that conspicuously like athief

The kid with the Vitamin Water and Fast Break walks up and I tell him I gave my two weeksbefore my shift started that day and he says ‘well that’s good’

I really want to go outside and smoke, which I can, usually, when it’s this late. The sun will risein a couple hours, but there’s still an unmanageable amount of dumbass people in here

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24/24

one time, I had 5 different dreams, 5 nights in a row, that all took place in futuristic cities,

except they were different cities in different biomes. Here are the descriptions I wrote of them:

1

an ancient building similar to Stonehenge, but less dilapidated—you could live in it. There’s an

opening that is empty and overrun with nature, in a soft grassy plain. The sun’s large and low in

the sky, but not hot. Shade from a large tree to the left of of the building. To the right is a large,

vertical cluster of buildings in the distance—mixture of old architecture, while looking modern in

terms of verticality and construction

2

In my dream, I go to Auburn High [the high school I went to], but it’s at night, and it looks

futuristic, kind of like The Citadel in Mass Effect , but more flora. The flora is artificially placed,

growing out of metallic planters. Ramps everywhere

My friends and I vandalize something, and for some reason Zimmerman [my old principal]

blames the school’s activity director. Zimmerman destroys the wall we vandalized, which also

happens to be the only brick wall at school now

To vindicate the activity director, I create a blow torch with a lighter and silly string. In the dream

world, if I shoot the silly string into the blow torch, it turns into brick. But it wasn’t forming and

splattered everywhere

3

a city that looked kind of like Hell, or the Nether in Minecraft. Everything is a brown cave anddimly lit. There are torches and lava falls. There are monitors, displays, and exposed wiring all

over in a very futuristic way

4

a highly industrialized city on a marshy swampland. It’s very green and lush, because the nature

has begun taking over the city. The city’s still very active/not abandoned, they just haven’t tried

to stop the overgrowth

5

a large city built on a puffy cloud with tall white skyscrapers. A lot of gold ornament and bigwindows

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Nothing Means Nothing Volume Two: the future is scary and that's why it's beautiful

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