the fall and causality

I think we're obsessed with causality.

We see. We hear. We taste. We touch. We smell.

We experience.

Then we evaluate our experience; we judge.

Good or bad? Right or wrong? Happy or sad? Beneficial or detrimental? Useful or useless? Relevant or irrelevant? Classy or base? Accurate or inaccurate? Valuable or worthless? Intended or unintended?

After we're satisfied with our appraisal, we take our neatly quantified, rationalized, categorized, color-coded slips of paper and pin it onto a large, fabric-covered wall. It's the wall of "reactions," even if we don't realized its title.

Then comes the string.

The string is the fun part, at least for some. It links the individual experiences together. The good with the good. The bad with the bad. The good with the bad. Strings cross everywhere and weave in, out, over, and under themselves and each other.

We try to make sense of the tangled mess that we've created. We look for patterns and we rearrange strings. We move paper, and cross out words, and recategorize the words that remain, and add more slips and remove more slips, and broadcast our vague sense of the picture to everyone who will listen.

We convince ourselves of action leading to reaction, cause leading to effect, butterflies leading to tsunamis.

And while we continuously revise, rename, and re-edit our wall, it never fully comes together. Sometimes we start to trust it to lead us to where we think we want to go, this map we've designed. Sometimes we begin to rely on it to house and protect us, this blueprint we've sketched out.

Do we, also, sometimes, maybe, sorta, kinda force a version of reality to fit into our painting instead of striving for our painting to reflect reality instead?

Did we ever consider that, sometimes. there are no strings attached?

Could it be that some of this is the fault of a tree, in a garden, long ago?

wondering about art

I wonder what makes art. What makes it not?

I wonder if it birthed through form or function? Both? Neither? There are things that are beautiful that I would not consider art; there are things that are ugly, that I would.

I wonder if it requires intent. Need the artist be aware of the creation he creates? Can her accident be expressed through an expression lacking intended purpose?

I wonder if art requires truth. Perhaps some semblance of it? Perhaps the truth that exists to one person and not to another? The things we know and pretend to know and know are pretend? What of so-called art that obscures the truth and lies to our faces? Does our desire to be lied to hold the tight grip over the title of "art?"

I wonder if this thought counts as art. Would it count if it were worded better? Would it count if it were never read? Would it count if it were read by every last man, woman, and child?

I wonder if this all is as pretentious as it sounds.

the quota

I just got an idea. I hope it's good.

But if it's not, that's ok too.

Because as much as I'd like to think that all of my ideas are always good always, in reality they're not. Similarly, I tend to view my life in an overly idealistic fashion:

All details of my life are always in control always. All endeavors are always successful always. All facets of my life are always good always.

In reality they're not.

And I shouldn't expect them to be.

So maybe I should factor that in. Maybe there should be a quota for things going wrong. I'm not talking about a pessimistic outlook or bowing to the inevitability of problems. I'm just talking about gaining a little perspective. I'm talking about not sweating the small stuff (and it's all small stuff).

All in all, things are going pretty good. Things go wrong, but I'm far from my fair share of trouble. So today I resolve to remember that. And I think I will. Mostly.

It's funny how sometimes nights can be both great and terrible at the same time.

It reminds me of an process optimization problem where the variables are at odds.

The only way to optimize for variables at odds with each other is to make a value judgment.

I suppose that's what they pay me for.

Thank you for being you.

Not only do I really enjoy time spent with you, I also just enjoy the person that you are.

I'll see you soon.

I tend to sweat the small stuff.

But at this particular moment, despite the busyness and stress that is the same as it was last week, I feel pretty good.

Times like these are important to remember.

the seesaw of T and F

"how do you feel" sat on a seesaw with "what do you think."

I'm not sure why,
surprised was I,

that as one did rise, the other did sink.