The more things change

Social Forums Non-Philosophical Chat
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childhood: my dad would come home at 5:30, we’d eat hamburgers and corn and watch TV all night in the dark. afterwards, my dad would read, my mom would talk on phone, my brother would do homework, and i’d go fuck a pillow or mumble to myself. those were the best days of my life. the only way my life resembles that now, is that I still fuck pillows and mumble to myself. the rest has been replaced by structured time and stress. if i watched tv in the dark with my feet up and a plate of food in my lap at 5:30 pm even once, my wife would divorce me.

(I actually never fucked pillows. it just felt funny to write. obviously no one in their right mind would fuck pillows. I don’t even know how that would work, unless it was the crease between couch pillows, which would mean you’re fucking a couch, right? I will leave that distinction up to you philosophers. Anyway, I tried a couch ONCE but it burned. I had a friend who swore by it.)

my point is, the world has radically shifted. time isn’t what it used to be. it moves quickly and it’s all audited and accounted for. back in the 70s and 80s it was like we were lost in a sultry blend of nowhere and time stood still, we occupied the space around our bodies, it fit us like a silk blanket, it was so comforting. now we’re pod people – it’s terrifying. (Mental note: fuck a silk blanket)

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I entirely agree. We are all drowning in an ocean of accounts, forms, receipts, and everything else the beaurocrats can dream up to keep tabs on us. And of course this machine I am working on is a beaurocrat’s dream — all that lovely information they can now demand and all that monitoring they can now do! Our homes have been turned into offices.

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Of several topics that has been on my mind, this is one of them.

With age come changes and part of that change is in perspectives.
I viewed the world differently at 5, at 15, at 35 and now three days away from 55.
At 5, the world is still magical. You can believe in Santa Claus and the easter bunny
and whatever other shit you want because you don’t know any better. Stuff happens and
you don’t know why and you don’t care as long as you get something out of it.
At 15, you are aware of the world. Often this is the time for young people to read
shit like Nietzsche and ayn rand and you think that is you because you are so full of yourself
and ego driven and you are so clueless. It is impressive as to how clueless a 15 year can be.
at 35, it is a different landscape altogether. Schooling has crushed your soul and you don’t even realize it.
And work has crushed what is left of your soul and body and spirit. You are only aware of students debts and
making rent or the mortgage and you find out this whole being with someone is impossible and yet the
only thing keeping you from killing yourself.
At 55, you are closer to the end then the beginning and friend and family begin to leave you.
For the first time in your life, death has enter your perspective as people begin to die around you.
time has begun to rush by, days seem like minutes and weeks pass like hours and you wake up one day and
another year has passed and it went by so fast as to spin your head. Your knees hurt and your back hurts and
you wonder what the hell it is going to feel like in 10 years when you are really old. You are thinking retirement
but realize that is a longshot at best because your 401k has enough money to buy a burger and fries and
the soft drink is out of reach, maybe next year. For the first time in your life, time and your place in it is more
about the past then the future because face it, you have reached the point where time is no longer your ally.
As you get older the past becomes more important then the future because the past is more relevant because
your future at 55 is not much more then 20 years. As you age it becomes the simple things that become
worth it. it is no longer about the big promotion or writing the great American novel, it becomes about
sitting on the couch watching tv with your mate. Waking up with someone and going to sleep with someone.
Watching the cat channeling the lion in him and attacking a paper bag. The quiet, personal moments become
the most important moments. It is no longer about saving the world because you know you can’t save it and
it is no longer about ambition because you have achieved everything you are going to achieve, there is little left
to pretend is going to change. It is about acceptance. Accepting who you are, accepting the world as is, accepting
the fact the time in front of you is less then the time behind you. I often had wondered about old people who
sit on their couch watching tv and drinking vodka. I don’t wonder anymore. That sounds fine to me now.

Kropotkin

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I hear you. that’s all true and well said. but the fact remains, MY DAD came home and watched TV and ate dinner and fucking relaxed. Now me as a DAD, i come home and wash dishes, do homework w/kids, wash more dishes, do more homework w/kids, read bedtime stories, wrestle, talk, etc., and it’s not all bad, but it’s not like I’m truly decompressing like my dad did. what the fuck happened?

We are talking about different things. I’m 43, so i’m not dumb to what you’re saying. plus i’ve had a couple setbacks that ringed my skull enough to realize that lying on a couch looking at your wife and just being there, able to breathe, able to walk, able to feel, able to pass food through your esophagus, able to love, able to laugh, can be a kind of heaven if you care to notice it, heaven compared to the cold abyss that’s waiting, or the hell that sick, wounded or suffering/dying people live with every day. I get that.

But back then you have to admit there was plenty of down time, and lost time, meaning, feeling lost, off the grid, no cell phone, time was different, and this is NOT just perception, not just through the lens of a child, this is REAL. And it’s diff altogether, but what came your mind is fine, too.

(and just so you know, bullshit, you still can save the world, asshole. one post at a time, you’re already doing it)

and to Dragon: it’s bureaucrat. if you’re going to fight them, you ought to know how to spell the word, you’ll need to use it often going forward. i’m with you

5

Has your orthodox wife not heard of the Sabbath? You know, Shabbat? —What you’re talking about is exactly the spirit of that day.

Just checking.

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So they havent remained the same as the title might imply?!
I Think the World has changed a lot since I was a Little brat.

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Firstly, I can tell you from personal experience that life doesn’t have to be like this. For me, life is richer, better in every way including mental and physical health (OK, right now I’m suffering a bit from stiffness, but that’s just down to tension and will go soon, when I’ve finished the current task that I have set myself) and the future has more to offer than ever before now that I am at the beginnings of old age.

But even without having gone through the personal development that has taken me to where I am now ---- you mentioned writing a novel: many novelists don’t start until they have reached old age. Many more do not do their best work until they reach old age. Novel writing depends/benefits so much from life experience that you just get better as you get older.

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dragon, are you married? i feel like i need to ascertain that before i accept advice from you on this subject

rivers: yes shabbos is sort of like that, except it has its own set of restrictions, structure and rituals that i can’t really begin to comment on. it’s out of left field, and isn’t at all what i’m imagining when i say downtime.

i have learned to love it though, it’s chill, and it’s edges have softened over the years so i don’t feel like a prisoner. but you can’t kick back and just watch a movie or something, like the good old days of childhood.

9

Gamer,

Your nostalgia may be a little misplaced. True, as a child you didn’t see the complexity in the world. Your parents didn’t need to inform you of things you couldn’t understand. That waited for life experience. But Cleaver land was always a myth. Your dad may have sat on the couch and watched TV, but he didn’t talk to you about the possibility of a deranged “leader” pushing the button that would destroy his family and all the so-called civilization with it. At best, you were allowed to NOT know and that sugar coating was your blissful interlude. It isn’t easy now and it wasn’t easy then.

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No, not married, though I can’t really see what bearing that has on the matter.