Short, short story time! :) Dashed this one out in under 30 mins. It probably needs 'work' but hey? I just blog for the fun of it - not because I'm a perfecto editing freak. This is really just to ease me back into this space gently. If you enjoy it - good for you! If you reckon it's autobiographical...*smirk* ... maaaayyyyybbeeeeeee......but I'm not telling! :p
***
Judy was an affable and rather entertaining girl with a quirky grasp of English and a despotic attitude to all things prudish.
In the real world, she daily presented herself with a kind of equanimity that was at once baffling and intriguing because people got strange sensations and vague hunches that she was really a mess of chaotic undercurrents of troubling emotional genius under all the placid crust.
She beguiled people into thinking she was a sweet, vivacious and very contained soul. An easy laugh and a wicked sense of humour belied her rather straight-laced and kind of primmish posture.
In truth Judy lived a double life of sorts. Every bit her Self in both of them though. In one life she had all the hall-marks of the complex simplicity, we call Average, which all human beings are prone to displaying in society. She was both an individual and yet she '"belonged" to the groups she was aligned with, absorbing their customs, emotional energy and directive pace, easily in sync with anyone else in the group. She was simply an Average woman. Nothing more, nothing less.
In the other life, Judy was anything but Average! In her other life she was Extraordinary. She was beautiful - extraordinarily so. She was incredibly clever - extraordinarily so. She was wise and charming and witty - extraordinarily so. For Judy, there was no masks to be worn or persona's to adopt. She was intrinsically her Self in this world no less than she was her Self in the other world.
But the difference remained. In one life she was stymied by the faulty misappropriation of identity through absorptions of other people's expectations. In the other life she was utterly free to be everything she was - as she perceived herself to be. In one world she had to use voice and gesture and body to convey her nature and she was embarrassed by that, perpetually so.
You see, her body was not beautiful. Her face was neither beautiful but nor was it grossly ugly either. She was, if anything, merely plain and ergo invisible to most people. Just another person - no more - no less. No one knew her clever turn of phrase or her biting intelligence and her skill in pulling eclectic and unrelated data together into coherent concepts that actually made some kind of logical sense of the world.
The other world knew this about her and apportioned it; but in this world, there were also words and a characterised representation of her Soul, drawn like the wife of Roger Rabbit. Her avatar was in effect the very mirror of her Self as she aspired to be but could not for genetic and rather mundane earthly reasons (like food and exercise for instance!).
Nevertheless, Judy was simply incredible online. Masterful and confident. Assured and gracious. Warm, witty, lovely and very nearly darling. She was also completely and determinedly independent. She could date male avatar representations without ever having to pine for the smell of their skin on her own. She could fuck them without ever having to flush with utter embarrassment at the mere thought of nakedness in a real life man's presence. She could engage males and females in warm and intelligent conversations with nary a flicker of small talk - the usual dance of wary guarded anxiousness between strangers.
In that world, she was a queen of her own making. She could be free to be exactly her Self with no apprehensions on how that Self might be rejected, engaged with, entertained or absolved. She was everything and nothing and it didn't matter and that mattered a very great deal.
And all the while, Judy crept backwards from having to be courageous about engaging in one world and leaped forwards to being utterly poised and self-possessed when engaging in the other. One world had to have her... the other world was her choice.
No one else was the wiser as to the dichotomy of her being.
Thursday, December 03, 2009
Wednesday, December 02, 2009
Waves
I have Google Wave!!!
Woooo hooooo!
Thanks to my daughter who now has her own blog, I got an invite to the "beta" version before GW gets released into the wild some time in 2010.
I don't have very many contacts in there yet but the whole concept has appealed to me for a very long time anyway. I do think Google Wave and others of its type may well revolutionise how we go about email and how we learn and/or communicate as a collective community in a few short years.
Connectivism has never had such a timely and important addition to the practical application of theories about learning and collaboration.
Hmmmm!
Waves inside Clouds! The internet has become a little bit poetic :)
Woooo hooooo!
Thanks to my daughter who now has her own blog, I got an invite to the "beta" version before GW gets released into the wild some time in 2010.
I don't have very many contacts in there yet but the whole concept has appealed to me for a very long time anyway. I do think Google Wave and others of its type may well revolutionise how we go about email and how we learn and/or communicate as a collective community in a few short years.
Connectivism has never had such a timely and important addition to the practical application of theories about learning and collaboration.
Hmmmm!
Waves inside Clouds! The internet has become a little bit poetic :)
Monday, November 16, 2009
I will be back ... eventually
The tides of time and the phases of the moon have kept me from this space of late.
All is okay. I won't forget to keep musing and hoping and striving and creating.
Moving with the flow of things for now :)
I'll be back!
All is okay. I won't forget to keep musing and hoping and striving and creating.
Moving with the flow of things for now :)
I'll be back!
Friday, October 09, 2009
Zero to wine
Eating her sandwich she glanced desultorily at the bottle of coke zero in front of her and noted that the use-by date on it was the day before her next birthday.
She wondered if that meant she'd be "passed her useby date" too, once it had slipped on by.
Sighing she mused on the fact that beauty these days, seemed to be more like soft drink with its quick-to-consume use-by dates, instead of like wine where it was presumed to get better, the longer it stayed on the shelf.
She wanted to be wine.
Thing was... at least a Coke bottle knew it would eventually be taken from the shelf in the not-too-distant future. A wine bottle, on the other hand, had to accept that mouldy labels, rats, cobwebs and a fair amount of surface dust would be its lot for quite possibly a very long time. Even then, there were no guarantees that whoever took it from the shelf would discover an exquisite elixir inside or vinegar.
She so hoped she'd not turn into vinegar while waiting!
She wondered if that meant she'd be "passed her useby date" too, once it had slipped on by.
Sighing she mused on the fact that beauty these days, seemed to be more like soft drink with its quick-to-consume use-by dates, instead of like wine where it was presumed to get better, the longer it stayed on the shelf.
She wanted to be wine.
Thing was... at least a Coke bottle knew it would eventually be taken from the shelf in the not-too-distant future. A wine bottle, on the other hand, had to accept that mouldy labels, rats, cobwebs and a fair amount of surface dust would be its lot for quite possibly a very long time. Even then, there were no guarantees that whoever took it from the shelf would discover an exquisite elixir inside or vinegar.
She so hoped she'd not turn into vinegar while waiting!
Sunday, September 27, 2009
of inner bag ladies and screwy humanity
lessons are learned when we hit our metaphorical heads against the obvious, which hitherto has been invisible to us.
I'm learning lots of lessons in this microcosm of time called a "Weekend".
Lessons about the art of practising loneliness without letting the human will rise up to scream that "It's not my fault!".
What one feels is always, at the human core, one's "fault". Not a fault that is bad mind you - just a thing we own; a conscious muddle of reactive and proactive, miniscule decisions based in part on our history and in part on our natural inclinations in the processing of thought. The mush of messages we interpret through the miasma of feelings decipher for us what these feelings might mean - though we often get it wrong.
Emotions are neither good nor bad. Emotions just are. They're the responsive tendency of our nature to life within and without. Much of what we emote we choose, even if we're unaware at the time of our actual decision. Much of what we emote is based in part on our sense of ourselves; the way we view ourselves in relationship to others.
Many human beings have a strong sense of unworthiness or fear of that. I do believe that many of us - myself most of all - are incapable of seeing ourselves exactly as we are in perfect balance to the world and other people around us. I for instance, teeter and totter between the attitudes of exclusive "Above-ness" over others and mortified "Below-ness" under others. My moral compass has thus far been mostly, skewed to the latter and I am apt to measure myself, relative to others as below them, albeit not to be humble but rather out of some vain hope they will elevate me over them in gratitude for my humility. Screwy humanity indeed!
Loneliness is one of those emotions we like to ignore for as long as possible. I have recognised its crumpled hang-dog face this weekend and have been a bit shocked at how unkempt and ragged my self esteem has become. I've done this - no one else. I've fought valiantly for a long time to be super independent and so on but now the shuffling feet of my inner bag-lady - so alone and crazed with lack of social engagement must be made over.
What I've yet to work out is just how to do that without frightening the poor thing completely into total isolation from the world.
More lessons to come I guess. The "how-to-overcome-loneliness" journey begins.
I'm learning lots of lessons in this microcosm of time called a "Weekend".
Lessons about the art of practising loneliness without letting the human will rise up to scream that "It's not my fault!".
What one feels is always, at the human core, one's "fault". Not a fault that is bad mind you - just a thing we own; a conscious muddle of reactive and proactive, miniscule decisions based in part on our history and in part on our natural inclinations in the processing of thought. The mush of messages we interpret through the miasma of feelings decipher for us what these feelings might mean - though we often get it wrong.
Emotions are neither good nor bad. Emotions just are. They're the responsive tendency of our nature to life within and without. Much of what we emote we choose, even if we're unaware at the time of our actual decision. Much of what we emote is based in part on our sense of ourselves; the way we view ourselves in relationship to others.
Many human beings have a strong sense of unworthiness or fear of that. I do believe that many of us - myself most of all - are incapable of seeing ourselves exactly as we are in perfect balance to the world and other people around us. I for instance, teeter and totter between the attitudes of exclusive "Above-ness" over others and mortified "Below-ness" under others. My moral compass has thus far been mostly, skewed to the latter and I am apt to measure myself, relative to others as below them, albeit not to be humble but rather out of some vain hope they will elevate me over them in gratitude for my humility. Screwy humanity indeed!
Loneliness is one of those emotions we like to ignore for as long as possible. I have recognised its crumpled hang-dog face this weekend and have been a bit shocked at how unkempt and ragged my self esteem has become. I've done this - no one else. I've fought valiantly for a long time to be super independent and so on but now the shuffling feet of my inner bag-lady - so alone and crazed with lack of social engagement must be made over.
What I've yet to work out is just how to do that without frightening the poor thing completely into total isolation from the world.
More lessons to come I guess. The "how-to-overcome-loneliness" journey begins.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
back
It's been a strange thing not writing in this place of late.
The heart is definitely willing but the will has been left high and dry through the use - and misuse - of a multitude of other distractions. Right now, my life consists of the treadmill of work, family life and Second Life and little else.
But anyway... I have plenty...plenty...of people telling me that I need to "get out there" and "meet new people" but quite honestly, I just can't be bothered you know! I'm in recluse mode this year and quite frankly, I think that's perfectly fine. At least for now! I'm having fun being on my own actually, and not being beholden to anyone. Well, more or less, as I do miss the "man-I-can-cuddle" thing if I was really being honest about this. Still, I'm not sure what I genuinely want out of life yet. I'm still figuring it all out. I do know I am way too shy to even think about going out and meeting real life men in real life situations and places.
Solitude is apparently only good in small doses and if one takes on board all that stuff about no man (or woman) being an island etc. then solitude is something that most people expect a person to give up eventually. Some people are naturally more inclined towards solitude than others and I may well be one of these types. I'm not sure how long this extended bout of solitude - and real life isolation outside of work hours - will continue, but I suppose it will be for as long as it is necessary for me to make the internal shifts I probably need to make in order to desire a different kind of life. Who knows?
I will admit, that mine is a bizarre kind of solitude though. I am not given to solitude in isolation! *smirk* (gotta love that little conundrum of a sentence *wink*). I may well be 'alone' on weekends despite kids and cats, preferring to be relatively undisturbed by other flesh and blood personages; but my social calendar is full to brimming with personalities all vying for my personal attention with stories to tell and banter to ply and flirty fun to be had
Oh yes! I am very much partial to long distance relationships where the full bottle of human behaviours is nicely chilled in a bucket of virtual fantasy. Second Life is like a zoo where I can observe the social proclivities of my own species from a slightly detached perspective. I learn so much in there about people! It's a cornucopia of chemistry through, mostly, written language and its fascinating to engage with and indulge in.
My imagination can fill in the gaps in between words with an entire picture of the person I am talking to through the screen. I actually "see" the metaphysical "shape" of a person through a miry world of story pictures, created from the syntax and rhythms of their speech in text.
Whether this image is truth is barely relevant because it is most probable that I will never meet their real life self. Often, in my experience, the magical quality of mystery which surrounds a person, never met, but known intimately in an online context, is severely mitigated once the real life, in person, meet up has passed. Sadly, this seems to often mean almost zero re-connection when back online in the virtual world. It surprises me how the intensity of online intimacy changes into mere aquaintance territory after real life meetings. There is a sort of kinship yes, but it's definitely less intensive than before a real life meeting. I've never really figured out why that is but I suspect its something to do with disappointment. This is natural of course, given our tendency to imagine finer and more lovely pieces fitting into the mysterious jigsaw of a person's physical self than is warranted. Rare is the human that under imagines things!
The interesting thing is that I believe I am perfectly myself in Second Life. Even though in there, I am not fat, I do not have wrinkles, zits or tuck-shop-lady-arms, I am quintessentially the woman that I am in every day life! My persona is fully intact except that I can express vanity in much more attractive ways :) I do not have to wonder where my blind left eye is actually looking and I do not have to worry about body odor, smelly socks, gas or garlic breath! In Second Life, my avatar is my beautiful, shiny self that can instantly engage in conversational banter with strangers without all that nervous, jittery angst. I can be witty and confident, playful and intelligent in there.
I soooo don't feel like that out here! And, barely anyone in real life knows that I am these things anyway, because I rarely feel its possible to display these aspects of myself due to real life social conventions which constrain and restrain my quirky esprit. Besides, I speak better through the written word than I do in my voice so that makes it even harder to be what I want to be out here anyway!
I am also exceedingly scared to have to "perform" like a seal for prospective new friends and lovers in real life. There is too much at stake, from how I dress, to how much weight I've gained (or lost), to an almost limitless capacity for gaucheness and a paucity of actual practical intelligence on my part! I'm a ditz and a goldfish (as in 3 second memory) and so implausibly skittish around men it's a wonder I ever got married!
It's a freakishly more difficult concept to get my head around in being told to "put myself out there" in the real world to meet people, than explaining to my sceptical work colleagues how to shop for hair and feet in Second Life, I can tell you!
Meeting real life people requires from me an emotional investment in courage I'm not yet willing to explore. The process feels unnatural and contrived for me right now. I'm more inclined to feel comfortably at ease talking to men - and women - from the United States, the Ukraine, Greece, France, Holland, New Zealand, W. Australia or India in Second Life and for now, that's where I am... and shall be, happily ensconced in my solitude :)
For now Second Life and Solitude are my hand-in-glove partners in emotional healing. I have not abandoned real life - I just want to escape its vicissitudes for a little while. When the time is right I shall most likely change spots yet again, and do something completely different. It's what I do!
The heart is definitely willing but the will has been left high and dry through the use - and misuse - of a multitude of other distractions. Right now, my life consists of the treadmill of work, family life and Second Life and little else.
But anyway... I have plenty...plenty...of people telling me that I need to "get out there" and "meet new people" but quite honestly, I just can't be bothered you know! I'm in recluse mode this year and quite frankly, I think that's perfectly fine. At least for now! I'm having fun being on my own actually, and not being beholden to anyone. Well, more or less, as I do miss the "man-I-can-cuddle" thing if I was really being honest about this. Still, I'm not sure what I genuinely want out of life yet. I'm still figuring it all out. I do know I am way too shy to even think about going out and meeting real life men in real life situations and places.
Solitude is apparently only good in small doses and if one takes on board all that stuff about no man (or woman) being an island etc. then solitude is something that most people expect a person to give up eventually. Some people are naturally more inclined towards solitude than others and I may well be one of these types. I'm not sure how long this extended bout of solitude - and real life isolation outside of work hours - will continue, but I suppose it will be for as long as it is necessary for me to make the internal shifts I probably need to make in order to desire a different kind of life. Who knows?
I will admit, that mine is a bizarre kind of solitude though. I am not given to solitude in isolation! *smirk* (gotta love that little conundrum of a sentence *wink*). I may well be 'alone' on weekends despite kids and cats, preferring to be relatively undisturbed by other flesh and blood personages; but my social calendar is full to brimming with personalities all vying for my personal attention with stories to tell and banter to ply and flirty fun to be had
Oh yes! I am very much partial to long distance relationships where the full bottle of human behaviours is nicely chilled in a bucket of virtual fantasy. Second Life is like a zoo where I can observe the social proclivities of my own species from a slightly detached perspective. I learn so much in there about people! It's a cornucopia of chemistry through, mostly, written language and its fascinating to engage with and indulge in.
My imagination can fill in the gaps in between words with an entire picture of the person I am talking to through the screen. I actually "see" the metaphysical "shape" of a person through a miry world of story pictures, created from the syntax and rhythms of their speech in text.
Whether this image is truth is barely relevant because it is most probable that I will never meet their real life self. Often, in my experience, the magical quality of mystery which surrounds a person, never met, but known intimately in an online context, is severely mitigated once the real life, in person, meet up has passed. Sadly, this seems to often mean almost zero re-connection when back online in the virtual world. It surprises me how the intensity of online intimacy changes into mere aquaintance territory after real life meetings. There is a sort of kinship yes, but it's definitely less intensive than before a real life meeting. I've never really figured out why that is but I suspect its something to do with disappointment. This is natural of course, given our tendency to imagine finer and more lovely pieces fitting into the mysterious jigsaw of a person's physical self than is warranted. Rare is the human that under imagines things!
The interesting thing is that I believe I am perfectly myself in Second Life. Even though in there, I am not fat, I do not have wrinkles, zits or tuck-shop-lady-arms, I am quintessentially the woman that I am in every day life! My persona is fully intact except that I can express vanity in much more attractive ways :) I do not have to wonder where my blind left eye is actually looking and I do not have to worry about body odor, smelly socks, gas or garlic breath! In Second Life, my avatar is my beautiful, shiny self that can instantly engage in conversational banter with strangers without all that nervous, jittery angst. I can be witty and confident, playful and intelligent in there.
I soooo don't feel like that out here! And, barely anyone in real life knows that I am these things anyway, because I rarely feel its possible to display these aspects of myself due to real life social conventions which constrain and restrain my quirky esprit. Besides, I speak better through the written word than I do in my voice so that makes it even harder to be what I want to be out here anyway!
I am also exceedingly scared to have to "perform" like a seal for prospective new friends and lovers in real life. There is too much at stake, from how I dress, to how much weight I've gained (or lost), to an almost limitless capacity for gaucheness and a paucity of actual practical intelligence on my part! I'm a ditz and a goldfish (as in 3 second memory) and so implausibly skittish around men it's a wonder I ever got married!
It's a freakishly more difficult concept to get my head around in being told to "put myself out there" in the real world to meet people, than explaining to my sceptical work colleagues how to shop for hair and feet in Second Life, I can tell you!
Meeting real life people requires from me an emotional investment in courage I'm not yet willing to explore. The process feels unnatural and contrived for me right now. I'm more inclined to feel comfortably at ease talking to men - and women - from the United States, the Ukraine, Greece, France, Holland, New Zealand, W. Australia or India in Second Life and for now, that's where I am... and shall be, happily ensconced in my solitude :)
For now Second Life and Solitude are my hand-in-glove partners in emotional healing. I have not abandoned real life - I just want to escape its vicissitudes for a little while. When the time is right I shall most likely change spots yet again, and do something completely different. It's what I do!
Saturday, August 22, 2009
unsure of everything
There is a line from one of my favourite songs from the mid 70's by the Steve Miller Band that goes
Bemused can hardly describe the conflicted emotional state I've been in of late.
Perhaps it is my work that is consuming my focus that I find it so hard to express myself as freely as I once did.
I feel shy. Impossibly shy. It's hard to know why other than the depths of self-consciousness and horror at my inadequacies as a person are overwhelming some days.
Once upon a short while ago, I was able to write creatively in this blog without fear of retribution or rancour. Now, I find myself scared to write in here.
Blogging is a public domain gig. You are, in effect, playing karaoke to a room full of critics with the sum of your thoughts. One needs to wear the consequences of the occasional "flat note" and ride the waves of derision that come afterwards with good humour. Not as easy as that sounds. How can honesty prevail when cloaks and/or masks must be worn to protect the innocent?
This is flux time. A time when words are re-directed into other pursuits. It is a time of curtailing and a time for exorcising inner demons in other ways than through the power of writing a basic introspective self-important blog.
Perhaps aMusing is coming to an end?
Perhaps my genius... formerly named 'constructing coherence'... is re-baking its usefulness for other purposes?
It is a time to be aware that everything is unsure and uncertain and accept it is so.
As my dear friend bat always said, "We shall see".
Time keeps on slipping slipping slipping into the futureErgo the phrase is a little mundane given that time is such a difficult construct to pin down with any philosophical accuracy. Still...I need to go dig the track out and play it loud I think. It may actually soothe and answer where other balms have failed.
Bemused can hardly describe the conflicted emotional state I've been in of late.
Perhaps it is my work that is consuming my focus that I find it so hard to express myself as freely as I once did.
I feel shy. Impossibly shy. It's hard to know why other than the depths of self-consciousness and horror at my inadequacies as a person are overwhelming some days.
Once upon a short while ago, I was able to write creatively in this blog without fear of retribution or rancour. Now, I find myself scared to write in here.
Blogging is a public domain gig. You are, in effect, playing karaoke to a room full of critics with the sum of your thoughts. One needs to wear the consequences of the occasional "flat note" and ride the waves of derision that come afterwards with good humour. Not as easy as that sounds. How can honesty prevail when cloaks and/or masks must be worn to protect the innocent?
This is flux time. A time when words are re-directed into other pursuits. It is a time of curtailing and a time for exorcising inner demons in other ways than through the power of writing a basic introspective self-important blog.
Perhaps aMusing is coming to an end?
Perhaps my genius... formerly named 'constructing coherence'... is re-baking its usefulness for other purposes?
It is a time to be aware that everything is unsure and uncertain and accept it is so.
As my dear friend bat always said, "We shall see".
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
