I’m trying to get back to normal posting, outdoor activities, and photography after two months of watching and shooting B play his junior season of (dystopian) high school soccer. I think the unintelligible, manic-like word vomit disguised as photo tips in my last post may have been my way of dealing with that, and the realization that there’s not much to look forward to over the next six to seven months that doesn’t have the word “tentative” attached to it.
I could easily let myself go down a dark, brain-eating Alaskan Bull Worm-sized hole of depression and existential ennui that involves spending mad amounts of time in bed with the curtains drawn and my waking hours numbing myself to the day’s headlines: my go-to life plan! And if there is one thing that the past 3+ years of fuck face Trump and last 7 months of Pandemic living have taught me, it is that this plan fucking works!!!! But I won’t, at least not during all of my waking hours. Mostly, because sooner later, that plan will catch up with me, and I will find myself in a position far worse than that in which I was trying to escape in the first place, thus becoming more miserable. This is what made my teen years so forgettably unforgettable.
As life rolls on into the late fall and coming winter, I am trying to channel Epictetus, Seneca, and Marcus Aurelius and focus on the things in life that I can control and learn to accept and laugh at the absurdities of life (more in the manner of professor and modern-day philosopher Thomas Nagel more than that of Albert Camus). Easier said than done, for someone who lived too much of his life being way too sensitive to the opinions, judgments, negativity, and insults of others and too at ease with depression, self-loathing, and a disgust for joy. The realization that not everyone carried around negative emotions, thoughts, and self-harm ideology was a genuine surprise to me, and I went through a phase of considering these people hopelessly naive or too stupid to see how shit life is. Now I work to emulate them.
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All of the text above was written on a dark, cold, rainy Monday morning. With the shop closed today and no real plan for my Monday, my gut reaction after my morning piss, wash up, and tooth brushing was to climb right back into bed. My unmade bed in all of its fart scented, stained with god-knows-what glory was pulling my lumpy ass towards it like a giant magnet in a Road Runner cartoon. But I didn’t let it. I got up, made up a giant mug of coffee, wrote this stuff, and after three days in a row of Zwift-ing, I am now planning an early lunch of carbtastic, Bohunk soul-soothing pierogies and shredded cabbage followed by a rainy photo walk, grocery shopping, errands, chores, and some late afternoon mind-numbing while watching the footy (#COYS!). Hopefully, there will be some photos to post along with all this. If there’s not, you know the images were shit.
AFTERNOON EDIT: My hike around the Sylvan Solace was just what I needed. Nothing like the cold, rainy woods, and a camera in your hand to help the brain ejaculate gobs of good vibes all over itself. Pics turned out pretty, not bad too.
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Later.