what are you doing with the time and gifts given to you

its a finite existence, a privilege and a miracle

how are you spending it all, and how often do you think of it in these terms

this isnt a moping thread

if your predilection is to start listing all the time and gifts you havent got, im sure youve listed that on all the other threads

in case ye thought i was gone all cuddly just because of the topic

Skiing

Posting on a message board (oh no)

I try to think in these terms often. Best case it's practically helpful. Worst case it's psychologically helpful. very very worst case it's psychologically harmful, normally for just a minute or so

good answer xp

taking a worklife which, when i watch myself, takes up no more of my time and should take up no more of my energy and attention that is very acceptable, and provides well for me besides (a gift), and even at work, i am spending my time, attention and energy in less focused conversations and listening more in those all the time

i more and more these days try to spend the rest of my time in company that eases me or that i feel natural in, because my greatest joy is ease in good company

i am outside in all weathers more than i used to be and this is also good

linked: i spend more time than i ever have with an animal, this is very good for me both as a distraction from my own head and to observe and ponder the animal mode of being

i spend as much time as is wise chasing a football in company of other of like mind and ability, this is extremely good head space and vital for the rest of my week

i spend more time that i was playing and practicing songs and singing, this is very good

goals might be to spend (yes) less time on message board x and the phone generally and to genuinely break from linking any of my mood to a football club in london, but we are all on a journey to peace

'Its a finite existence, a privilege and a miracle'

It's one of those thoughts that feels like it should lead to some sort of realisation and therefore a different quality of life...but all too often results in a kind of paralysis, worry and inaction.

One of the problems is that the desire to 'make the most of life/ get everything sorted/live your best life' sounds simple but is beset with problems and frustrations, because it's inherently not under our control and it's imperfect and messy. Oliver Burkeman is very good on this.

i will take that as a fine recommendation and thank you, i recognise the pause and sometimes pressure the headspace brings

its a finite existence, a privilege and a miracle

when/if i think about this i mostly feel bad that what i want to do is play golf, watch golf, watch football, watch tv, sleep and read. preferably by myself. but this is the stuff that brings me happiness so i've decided to not care about the waste of privelege or miracle and dont have the imagination to contemplate the finiteness. should look into cutting my hours at work so i can enjoy more of nothing for real tho.

i have thought of ‘it’ (being ‘life’) in these terms for a while now, but whether i have actually been able to act appropriately upon this belief is another story.

in the past year, i quit most social media, went sober-ish, and started spending a lot more time working on myself, both body and mind.

i am happier and healthier than i have ever been, and i think the only thing missing is that i didn’t spend as much time with loved ones as i would have wanted,
mostly due to work.
i am trying to resolve that this year.

Such as they are? Squandering, gan dabht (ar bith, ar bith).
HOWEVER I’ve gone through times when getting up in the morning was an achievement. Trying to strive for some sort of personhood. Hope to achieve it some day.

Withdrawing more and more from life, as I get deeper and deeper into my yoga practice and study of this subject.

No time to waste.

Xppppp geez deems if you wanted to make this a brag thread there was much less wanky things to name it

I enjoyed a marvelous 2024 and hope to ride a similar groove: new friends, the occasional new lover, still getting a kick out of good books and films.

(Being outside and off-line + playing muisc very good and this is a good reminder of it yes yes) 👍🏻👍🏻

Also cosign Alfred (cept the one lovers good for me (to each their own, with love))

:)

spending a lot of money on beer, chicks, and music. The rest I just squander

I have more than a few amaro cocktails to mix in me.

no brag thread this is not about - i think- what you do or able to do "the gifts we are given is i think a humble presentation of the interface with existence)

for instance and this is not a chide thread nor a guide thread but for oscar bravo i appeal to ponder the community with the physical level of existence that striking a ball two hundred yards on a given visual line provides and the unknown aspects of where we materially and spiritually play a part into the rhythms of the universe that such efforts and acts invoke

towards peace and joy, friends, peace and joy

gyac a stór any step in any direction that seems a good step is a step mhaith in this house

Sorry immature sarcasm on my part. I enjoy your positive posting

If i were to make a thread it would be what you want to do less with your finite time on this earth and point 1. Worthless sarcasm

Every day I get nowadays is one I was not expected to see, 10 months ago, so yeah each is a gift.

In my musical life I feel like I myself am doing fine, so I am turning my attention to other people, and helping _them_ do their thing. Like pulling people up on stage to play with me, playing on people's recordings, arranging and hosting jams, that sort of thing.

xp níl aon cúlú inár gcairdeas ❤️

That was at mar dhea mac, of course

Awh i was just gonna blow a kiss

kúlúsezshi

Currently in the Dolomites and loving every second of the privilege of being here. What an amazing corner of the world, both naturally and culturally

oh what a lovely thread!

i'm excited but a little anxious to be getting the entry-level qualification needed to start working at a gym as a personal trainer. the logistics make me nervous but the main thing is i feel drawn to it. i've been into fitness and body culture since my teens and i can't do without my regular exercise practice so it feels like a natural fit, as natural as fits get. to feel more satisfied by work is a goal i had given up on. just to have a direction and to be taking little steps in it is bracing.

other than that i visit god (meditate) in the morning and evening and love two very special men. our sweet and surly orange tabby spends time next to me on the couch on wfh days. the only thing that is a waste in my life rn is the full time job, i strongly dislike it but i strive to maintain some level of equilibrium with it as it keeps the bills paid. this does not keep me from indirectly calling my manager's ideas idiotic from time to time, which she is usually too idiotic to pick up on.

darraghmac i'm happy to read that you spend more time outside! at this point for me it's as much of a requirement as getting a good night's sleep. if i go more than two days without some outside time i suffer. and i need "special" outdoors time every month or so. wilderness time. every time i take a trip to my beloved colorado plateau deserts i wonder why i shouldn't be there more often.

finally buying some expensive records I have wanted for decades, and luxuriating in how good they sound on my stereo

going out to eat insanely great foodie food as often as we can, our town is good for this

doing four (four!) different methods/angles of therapy/recovery simultaneously

starting to sell some shit off, just got rid of a bunch of books I will never re-read, got $100

giving love to the dog, walking with her and seeing how the landscape changes through the seasons

giving love to animals could be all we ever need to do

map i was hoping youd be a contributor, ive enjoyed all of the posts ive seen from you recently on this kind of thing and i always think of you as a seeking/connecting type of person which...i mean is kind of where i think the thread idea is, in terms of situating the question (its a big question adn we all ask it differently at different times)

it's video games and friends in the pub mostly i guess but freely chosen and that's fine

whatcha playing these days NV?

This thread has a nice glow about it.

I had to take some steps backward in 2024 and I'm unsatisfied and in the middle of a change phase...who knows what the outcome will be? I think there's hard work ahead and I'm trying to make myself face it and dig in. I also would like to have more loved ones and more time at ease with chosen company than I have now; we're all too "busy" and tired (me included). I spend WAY less time outside, that's something I gave up along with proximity to nature and my garden. It was necessary but there's a garden-shaped hole in my heart now. I need that back and have to figure out how to re-run my life to get it.

I got a working bike a while back and it's a pleasure to ride even in bad weather, which I'll do later today to get to a food distribution where I help give out rescued food to people. It's not perfect but it's worthy work, I think. I also do a version of this for my job, so while I "do not dream of labor," I also don't regret how I spend my days. I'm responsible for a younger person whose growth I hope I've contributed to in the last two years; she's moving on now and I'll have to find a new charge. I'm excited to meet them and grateful to give them a healthy work environment where their leadership is nurtured, something I never had.

This thread also made me order some books I've been meaning to read, I have a non-fic TBR list for 2025 that I hope will be part of my growth in this season.

To answer the thread question: not enough. I'm working on that but still troubled by it.

xpp ashamed to admit i'm playing Persona 3 Reload at the moment cos i haven't sunk enough hours into P3 already

As many here know, two years ago my wife and I moved from urban New Jersey to rural Montana, so now I spend a lot of my time looking out the window at the mountains, or walking by the lakeshore when the weather's warmer. Honestly, that has brought me so much baseline pleasure that I feel like it's shifted my whole existence into a different gear.

My day job (and the other stuff I do) generates enough money that I can afford to put other people's art out into the world. I'm gonna be releasing four albums on my label this year, the first time since 2021 I've been able to do that. (We did two a year in 2022-24.)

I write a lot. It doesn't seem like a lot until I tally it up at the end of each year, but I write a lot. 12 monthly columns, 50-100 newsletters, 2-3 standalone record reviews every month, the occasional feature-length article, a book when I have a book-sized idea... I hope that all those things bring some people pleasure and get them to listen to music they might not otherwise have heard.

In response to the second half of the opening post, "how often do you think of it in these terms" ... fairly often, honestly. I'm 53 and diabetic. I am not "middle-aged" — I am likely in the final third of my life. I have no kids, so when my wife and I go, that's the end of the story. And the only idea worse than her dying first is me dying first. So yeah, I do think about trying to make every day pleasurable in some way. Eat something really nice. Look out the window at the mountains. Take a really deep breath of extremely cold air (it's 10 degrees outside today). Read something that makes me feel good (as opposed to, say, a New York Times interview with a right-wing crank who talks like his breath stinks). It is a finite lifespan, and you don't know how finite.

map i was hoping youd be a contributor, ive enjoyed all of the posts ive seen from you recently on this kind of thing and i always think of you as a seeking/connecting type of person which...i mean is kind of where i think the thread idea is, in terms of situating the question (its a big question adn we all ask it differently at different times)

― tuah dé danann (darraghmac), Saturday, January 18, 2025 4:22 PM (fifty-four minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

:) :) much love to you!

io i'm wowed by how you're still your beautiful self in such a challenging place. may the things you need come your way!

Bless you, map. I seem to be stubbornly myself, for better and for worse. Your experiences inspire me too!

I definitely have a sense that my time is finite, something that seemed inconceivable not that long ago. I think because my goals have gotten larger in scope--I want to grow things that take YEARS and that means I have to get started, I've wasted so much time already. I want to be someone who has done things, has been doing things for a long time, long enough to build habits and structures and bring about change, and I might not have a long time left to put in when I think in, like, decades.

it has been a long long long long long process but i finally enjoy writing again, and am doing a lot of it in my free time, for probably the first time since college. nearly two decades of feeling hatred and resentment for my work, pretty much evaporated! i think i had to transition and be happy with myself to get there. but i know that when i engage in the practice these days i feel endeared to my own voice, and am willing to let her become what she longs to be, which sometimes i don't even know about before it happens, and it makes me feel so delirious and delighted

i am also spending a lot of time being in love. it has changed everything around me and is changing everything within me. i feel the need to put it in everything i do

i'm also learning how to dj, it's hard but feels connected to everything else i do (storytelling, drumming)

love reading this thread btw y'all

i sort of resent my 9-5 sometimes but not nearly as much as when i was going into the office every day. and there are things happening around/within work (for one, i'm co-leading the queer employee resource group there, which is actually completely fucking awesome) that i feel really fortunate to have in my life

i am also spending a lot of time being in love. it has changed everything around me and is changing everything within me. i feel the need to put it in everything i do

<3

i guess i didn’t get into the “gifts” part in my post, far above, but really, I am trying to climb gracefully and powerfully while being gentle with myself, and the gym just confirmed that i will be joining the setting team, so that means i will be spending a lot of time thinking and feeling through movement and the body in a way that has given me a new perspective on life.

onethread, sort of, but on the WAYR thread I have noted that I am reading a lot of YA fiction, and am beginning the process of writing my first YA book— which feels more exciting and interesting to me than poetry has for the past few years. i am very grateful that i have been able to find a way to move forward after feeling a little lost in my writing life for a while.

That "What did you achieve in 2024" thread made me realise I spend most of my life essentially running on the spot. But at the same time, my kids grow up and I keep putting off things til 'when we have the money' and 'when we have the time'.

Also, we got a Switch at Christmas and I haven't even played the damn thing, which is how I know I need to get back to the simple things, sometimes.

I'd like to thank deems for this thread, both a gift in itself (which I'll contribute to once the dishes are done and something is watched with Jen) and a gift to Thread Connections.

as noted almost immediately in that thread tbf

I finished a novel in November and the first revision four days ago and am quite happy.

christ i only *read* my first book of 2024 the week between Christmas and NYE so that's definitely an entry and a half

Having just passed the threshold of 70 years of tenure on this earth, I am currently resting and recuperating from slightly more than half a lifetime of pouring myself into the care of our daughter and being the mainstay emotional support for my wife. As for life being a privilege and a miracle, I am in profound agreement. I feel it most when I can see past the clutter of our human-built environment, with its insistent projection of our confused fears and desires. For me that means walking deeper into the unbuilt world every chance I get.

As for the gifts I've been given, I try not to be wasteful of them or the world's resources by keeping my life as simple as I possibly can. For me that comes far more easily than active, outgoing generosity, but I've known that about myself for a long time. It's the darker side of introversion and I'm an introvert from tip to toe. I'm never going to save the world, but I can love it and I intend to manifest that love as best I can for as long as I can. And, if possible, show others how to do the same.

I feel like the “best” gift i have is my brain, which also came with various curses … but, I do learn quickly and understand complex technical stuff and I try to help people with things where that knowledge/skill is useful and do so compassionately and affordably.

I also am having good sex and improving my wardrobe, because I like clothes and fashion.

The positivity itt is positively suffocating

don't worry, you'll survive it

thread title clatters around my head like a moth.

The positivity itt is positively suffocating

I also am having good sex and improving my wardrobe, because I like clothes and fashion.

― sarahell,

needed to be posted, otm

This thread title echoes a lot of my thinking in recent years. I’m 55, which is a good time to weigh and think seriously about how much time is left and how best to use it. From observation of and reports from many older people I know, including my parents, it seems to me that if you’re in reasonable health with no major looming risk factors — conditions that are true for me right now, knock wood — that absent accidents or surprise heart attacks or other bad bits of luck, you can expect to be fairly able and energetic to about the age of 75. Everything past that is much more of a crap shoot. So I’m trying to think deliberately about the next 20 years, because if the last 20 are an indication they’ll go by fast.

To actually answer the post question, I am:

— Making time for people I love, starting with my wonderful spouse and children (and our delightful cat). One impetus for changing my job this year is that the news site I’ve been co-publishing for the last six years has required very long work days with a lot of evening work. I’m reclaiming my time for other priorities.

— Buf speaking of work (and “gifts,” I suppose), the new job I’m creating for myself is built around using what I know how to do (report, write, edit, aggregate) for positive ends. I want it to be work I enjoy, and also work that will be useful for other people trying to do good things.

— Physically I’m doing more to take care of my body, going to the gym 4-5 times a week, hiking in the mountains that I’m lucky to live near, moderating drinking, all the good stuff. I know it will break down and fail eventually, but I want to give it a good long run.

— Watching movies! Listening to music! Reading books! The latter of which I have not done so much of in the last decade, but started incorporating into my daily routine again last year. Already read two books since New Year’s. (Short ones, but still.)

— Traveling. Maybe the most controversial item on the list, I know there are good arguments against it, but I only have one life on this planet as far as I know, and I can’t help wanting to see much more of it than I have. (I have thought about starting a thread on the ethics of travel, if there isn’t one already.)

— And cliche that it’s become since Warren Zevon said it, I really do enjoy every sandwich.

xp i don't always maximize the time and gifts given to me, but when i do, it's by having good sex and improving my wardrobe.

xp i don't always maximize the time and gifts given to me, but when i do, it's by having good sex and improving my wardrobe.

I don’t 100% understand the question tbh

Working among the recent dead for the past 3 years has grounded me in the finiteness of our individual existence, for sure. But also the infiniteness of experience. I use the WeCroak app to remind myself randomly each day that I'm going to die. It focuses me. Reading the book 4000 Weeks also - that's about what we get, barring accident and early illness. I stop more often and think - is this useful, what I'm doing right now? Is it adding something positive?

I try to immerse more in the physical elements. I spent a lot of life ignoring how I felt, physically, emotionally. I'm more contented to sit with things, comfortable or not. Meditation practice has enabled that. I think a lot about zooming out so far that in 3d space I'm less that a point, and zooming out in time, my existence is nothing. But zooming in, each of us is everything and all, immense. There is so much to wonder at.

great post

i do similar! but in time- the existence of *life itself* is going to be less than a blink in the overall span of this universe.

my time here is not significant, and could not be so even if i ordered nations.

performing the same exercise you describe - zoom out, then zoom back in- allows me to hit send on many emails

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uD4izuDMUQA

watching this a few years back and absorbing as much of it as i was intellectually capable of helped me to start to situate myself as described above in a way i dont think sny other effort, advice or example has done before or sonce

i sure hope nobody knowledgeable declares it bunkum now

including informing my belief of the first line in the OP here

amazing post jaq

My gentle resolution to myself is to spark up the reading more — been slack lately — and maybe working more with photography. Also, bringing more folks together as I enjoy doing. I will add all that to what I enjoy in this world, and there’s a lot of it.

I wanna know more about this WeCroak app

its a finite existence, a privilege and a miracle

how are you spending it all, and how often do you think of it in these terms

very consciously thinking about it in these terms, particularly keenly post turning 50 last year

honestly this post is essentially what all my journal entries are tying to do rn

like many in this thread the biggest challenge to some sort of transcendently fulfilled approach to it all is full-time work - last year I had the experience of finishing a big project and then taking a week off, within two days I was absolutely lost in the beautiful landscape of the south coast of NSW - absolutely conscious of the width and wild beauty of the world and the insignificance of my self - and someone called to ask a work question (and I foolishly took the call) and it was ABSURD, I was actually physically unable to bring my mind into the right state whereby I could look at a spreadsheet and check details, doing so was a laughable prospect

which, I guess was a particularly salient illustration of something I kinda knew... that work (or my work? perhaps all work?) involves forcing my mind into shapes it would rather not assume - and creates a distortion of my ideal reality, whereby things that don't really matter are imbued with undue significance by the rules & values of the group you're a part of

having said that!!! my general philosophy is to try and feel interested and engaged and learning and busy - at least for now? It was only in my 40s that I got a sense that life could be as fulfilling or rewarding as I had always suspected it might be

and my job is actually a very privileged one which allows me to meet and work with fascinating people who I respect and admire - plus it is ethically defensible! I feel aligned to what I do - and am also learning like crazy

I work in an industry which is in poor health (spoiler, it is broadcast TV) - and I feel like while I am here I need to absolutely pour everything I have into the job - partly for self-preservation reasons, but also because I don't have time to fuck around, I came late to doing this kind of work and there is no room or time to coast

one day I will be shot out of my organisation's airlock and I think I will be both pleased to feel like I made the most of my opportunities, and glad to be off a pretty intense treadmill

I know I also want/need creativity in my life - which I do get a bit from my work but mainly from making music - the band project I am in is really bogged down with other members' life stuff at the moment and that is frustrating as hell for me - I have this very urgent sense of ONLY SO MANY MORE YEARS I CAN DO THIS especially the playing intense gigs bit - working out a way to keep this part of my life active is a big unresolved problem right now

agree with everyone who has spoken of time in the natural world being where it is increasingly at - I am lucky enough to be able to easily get to some pretty incredible beaches and every time I get to swim in the ocean - even if it is multiple times a week - I always feel deep gratitude, like I am tapping into an inexhaustible source of pleasure and nourishment - and a feeling I can only clumsily describe as "that was the correct - in fact, best possible use of my time because when I die there is no way I will regret having done this and it is impossible to do it too much"

my kids are getting older at a rate of knots and I am conscious that opportunities to hang out are dwindling - I look back on pictures of them as little ones and wonder if I appreciated those days enough when they were happening? I know I definitely did appreciate them, but it feels like it could always have been more I guess

I am not a very altruistic person - like not in an abstracted sense, beyond donating & doing the odd bit of charity work - I think it is possible to, through your conduct and through a generous outlook, make better the lives of the people you come into contact with directly - I wonder sometimes if this orientation is a result of having rickety mental health, this feeling that self-care is crucial if you're to be any use to others - but perhaps this is just a rationale to justify selfishness

someone mentioned travel above and I am ready to see more of the world for sure - in fact have been engaged with a project of selling off various accumulated possessions to start an EXPERIENTIAL FUND, on the grounds that I would probably rather die having hung out on a Greek Island or something than die owning those Mink Deville records that I played once

I do want to reclaim a sense of adventure - or life as adventure - a lot of listening to teenage favourite music trying to unlock that feeling of potentiality & bedroom dreaming, finding continuity with the idea that life is POSSIBILITY and expansive - and yes, a gift and a miracle - in the face of mortgages and minor traffic frustrations - it feels maybe harder to access recently? but I keep trying

also I recently found a barber who has made me feel excited about having a good haircut in a way I haven't for about 15 years so I'm stoked about that

I can honestly say I don't find myself thinking about wasting time or whatever, in the context of a finite existence. Not much anyway. If I did I think it would cause me to worry or feel anxious. It is fine to spend time doing nothing, or relaxing, or watching TV or whatever. I guess nobody is saying it isn't here, but sometimes the whole sense of living every moment can drift into more modern self-improvement discourse, and then before we know it we're speed-reading or something.

That said, I fear death quite a lot, and spend too much time irrationally worrying about something sudden and random happening to end my life. I've been trying to get to the bottom of why that is and avoid the consequences of it, which perversely can be to do things which diminish my health or procrastinate things which make me more healthy or financially secure.

In terms of my daily life, I try to live a fairly repeatable existence, without going too overboard. As someone trying to write fiction, and with my first novel nearly finished and a good opportunity to get it signed approaching, I think a lot of my choices are about protecting my creativity and routines for that. So on weekdays I tend to have v similar days, I get up and exercise, I work, I cook something and watch TV or a film, then I write. I read an article a few years ago about the repeated routines practised by monks, lol, and it stayed with me. Not a tech bro one, it was in Harpers I think. The writer said they gravitate towards seeking happiness via routine but every now and again their partner reminds them to change it up a little, and that's good too. I related to that a lot. It is bad to never deviate but it is good to have some structures. I have chronic illness which can flare up sometimes also so it is good for me in that way too, just a sense of how to reset or calmly control some bits of my life.

At the same time, I have been trying to move away from a totally controlled existence which I kinda developed even more during COVID, and since working from home all the time. So I sort of make a special effort to see people I haven't seen or go to places I haven't been before. I can't change my personality entirely but I try to be more open.

I am lucky to have a job which I very deeply believe in, working to make digital government services easier for the public to use and understand, but I think sometimes, especially lately, I care a bit too much and it can be stressful as a result. I am in my most senior role to date, and I am enjoying leading a small team to fix some important stuff to do with families and children. A lot of my job is protecting and defending that team and stopping large overspending projects from fucking up that work or from doing other stupid things that won't help the public or aren't based on any real people's needs, and it can be unpredictable, stressful, thankless sometimes.

I watch a lot of user research at the moment and it makes the work very real for me, again this is very motivating and rewarding but also can be hard as the people interviewed are talking about very difficult parts of their lives, domestic abuse or coercive control sometimes, or more general difficulties with money. I think a lot of my work has that reward and risk, the sense of doing something really technical and specific that I feel good at and care about, but as I get a little older I have been feeling the need to protect myself from getting too emotionally involved and burning out. I put my whole personality into the work and I lately have wondered if I need to protect myself more. I am lucky to have a job I can ethically stand over though, I know that. And I feel good at it and I particularly love the novelty (for me) of leading the work but not doing it, and trying to empower my little team and give them belief.

Sometimes we hit little setbacks or something we design doesn't test as well as we hoped and I have been really enjoying using my experience to be able to say 'this is why we test stuff' or even 'I know from what you've all done so far that we'll find something that works, you've proven that you can do that already'. It feels nice to see that landing and to be positive for others.

Reading everyone else's posts makes me realise I would also like a bit more of the natural world in my life. I think I've sacrificed a lot, more than maybe I even realise, to write fiction and pursue that. It feels like the actual writing time is only a small part of it as you also need thinking time, and solitude, and maybe writing for an hour or two every day needs a whole life built around that. But I have seen some signs of success lately with some encouragement from prizes and stuff so it feels worth it. It is fun to work hard at something and see improvement.

Another positive thing I notice as I get older is my relationships with family and close friends seem to grow even stronger. I was thinking after Xmas how there was no conflict or difficulty being around family and I saw so many friends also, and I know that isn't something to take for granted.

Smaller things - cooking and food and restaurants are core to my existence and happiness. Exercise is something I have managed to build into my life and it helps me to have a less oppositional relationship with my body, which can be a problem when you have chronic health issues. This must be classic ageing but I find myself more and more into history, going to see old churches or places of interest in London, as well as reading or listening to podcasts. Also I've always liked long walks and have got back into this as a hobby in London also, something so freeing and calming about walking until you get into a rhythm of breathing and movement.

If this gives a sense of some rounded existence, in truth I have so many bad habits, plus issues with depression and my health, but I can honestly say I get a lot of joy from small things. I don't think about my existence in a cosmic sense so often, contra others in this thread, but I don't judge that or criticise it, it's just interesting to note the difference.

I also am having good sex and improving my wardrobe, because I like clothes and fashion.

― sarahell, Saturday, January 18, 2025 8:02 PM (yesterday) bookmarkflaglink

GIRL. Get it.

time: every day i have to re-learn everything from the day before. like an amnesia victim. how to best use my time. how to interact with people. how to communicate and have relationships. what to do and what not to do. how to deal with how i feel and what i'm thinking about. how to avoid bad habits. how to eat. how to do things that i don't want to do and think about things that i need to think about but don't want to think about. its frustrating/exasperating. for the first time in my life i have a calendar on the wall in my little office cubbyhole and i write things down that i have to do in a week or a month. appointments. reminders. i have never once written anything like that down. a to-do list. a grocery list. anything. i have always kept my life as simple as humanly possible because i felt like anything more was too much for me. so most of my adult life has been nothing but work and home. 95% of it. i have been able to walk to every job i have ever had from the time that i had a paper route. this made things easier for me. but i have always dreaded anything that deviated from that routine or that simpleness. now i'm trying to get out of that mindset via medicine. i say simple...as simple as being married to someone with their own challenges, having two kids, a business, and taking care of an elderly parent who lives with me while dealing with my own mental stuff.
gifts: i try to keep my store as interesting as possible on very little money. i never wanted to have one of those stores that is sad because the person who owns it obviously doesn't have the money or eye to make it fun. i wanted it to be a place where people came in and if they had my sensibilities and interest in odd records/books they would find it a cool place to dig. but also a place that normal people could find a billy joel album. curated but not snobby. it takes a lot of work to do but i feel like i have done it for 16 years now. people compliment the place. normal people and weirdos. so, mission accomplished. its a never-ending process. i stopped writing to focus on that. completely. i don't even remember when i stopped. 12 years ago? whenever i stopped writing for Decibel Magazine. i haven't written a word for myself since then. last year i decided i needed to do something to get myself out of the situation i was in. i was miserable. i have been pretty miserable/depressed for the last 7 years. whenever i quit smoking. smoking was my lifeline. my medicine. nothing helped. i thought maybe i could write my way out it and finally get some medical help. i just needed to do SOMETHING. covid. my mom dying. my dad moving in. my own sadness. my desire to make sure that my kids and maria were safe and good. all these things were becoming too much for me. so i got something going. cobbled together in part from old things that i had written. old ilx posts! i showed it to someone who shall remain anonymously Nabisco. they liked it. it gave me the confidence to go public. Yeti Mike liked it. he published it. i want to start my fourth piece today! eventually, i want to help others more. volunteer. every time i see Jose Andres on t.v. from the fires i think: i was really good at washing dishes at a restaurant. with the world on fire, maybe in my retirement the country will need an old dishwasher to help out where needed. something like that. but i need to get my act together more. maybe this year. maybe the next. go local. a soup kitchen. we shall see. i think that covers my gifts. running a used record store. writing. washing dishes. and stealing from myself. if you see any of this post in a future issue of Maggot Brain Magazine, lift a glass in my honor.

Is this like “defend your life”? I really don’t understand what is being asked here. It seems like everyone else gets it but I can’t say I do!

I took it as "how are you trying to live your best life?"

I think it’s implicitly (explicitly?) in the context of awareness of our limited time and gratitude for the time we have.

Or in Socratic terms, how are you living your examined life?

I am supposed to write about how I am living my life? I literally have no idea what to say.

I’m doing the best I can, how about that. I spend time with animals, enjoy the company of and working with young people, take care of my loved ones. I enjoy creative expression. What else could I say? I have no idea. I guess that’s my answer.

(Also thank you for explaining— I’m not sure why this question is difficult for me to understand)

I read it as "most of you are all middle aged now, so what are you focusing on in this stage of your life", but that was my reading.

I’m doing the best I can, how about that. I spend time with animals, enjoy the company of and working with young people, take care of my loved ones. I enjoy creative expression. What else could I say? I have no idea. I guess that’s my answer.

― Piggy Lepton (La Lechera)

This is it. Lovely post.

yup. it really is.

I’m doing the best I can

otm - that's as much as anyone can do

id like to double down on what i said about the football team from london

I am lucky enough to be able to easily get to some pretty incredible beaches and every time I get to swim in the ocean - even if it is multiple times a week - I always feel deep gratitude, like I am tapping into an inexhaustible source of pleasure and nourishment - and a feeling I can only clumsily describe as "that was the correct - in fact, best possible use of my time because when I die there is no way I will regret having done this and it is impossible to do it too much"

wonderful stuff this

Xp irl lol + condolences

Learning how to make animated storyboards (aka “animatics”) after a friend working in animation suggested I have what it takes to get work in that world. Got nothing to lose at this point. And I’m enjoying the learning process.
Also just did a nice full page illustration commission for a pretty well known magazine here in Netherlands - hope that gets me more illustration gigs!
And always working on my painting. I get tons of enjoyment from that.

every day i have to re-learn everything from the day before

I am not a regular journal guy but when I do write stuff down these days it is in the order of BIG PICTURE STUFF - like trying to do significant calibrations about how I spend my time, battle my bad habits & develop better ones

and so many times I have flicked open this book in a state of some kinda need or distress - and found that the last entry was a pretty spot-on analysis of exactly what was plaguing me that I had totally failed to heed - like a drab suburban version of Memento

I feel like I have the opposite of a simple life - it is often really complicated! and it is the complexity that freaks me out and knocks my mental health sideways, my brain jams and I feel like a creep / loser for even pretending to be a competent person in the adult world

LocalGarda I also vibed with what you were saying about self-improvement vibes & pressure to max out every moment - I am actually pretty good at being indolent - and also generally OK with the idea of trying to cram a lot of experiences into my finite life while I have the physical ability to do so

but conscious also that there is some kind of deep-seated capitalist productivity thinking going on here too - and not totally comfortable about that - find myself really nostalgic or curious about pre-internet mind states, boredom even

I wanted Cyrus and Maria to see the movie The Eight Mountains and we watched it last night and that movie has that insane mix of people working too hard and becoming miserable and then the utter beauty and perfection of just sitting by a lake. in the Italian Alps. That movie says a lot about life and family and the choices people make. Plus, its just so beautiful to look at.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ak4yBWxJDj8

I can honestly say I get a lot of joy from small things. I don't think about my existence in a cosmic sense so often, contra others in this thread, but I don't judge that or criticise it, it's just interesting to note the difference.

― LocalGarda

nobody gets to set the scale itt afaic, the joy in small things is probably as important a mover as trying to quell anxiety by setting it against the cosmic, right? i don't think we would need to consider even the aporoach as opposite, really, its all of a piece to me.

ito everyone interpreting the thread

ye are all wrong

ye are all right

it us the same thing

many have answered and it seemed bar one or two to be an easy thing to engage with positively enough, although that wasnt any standard i set

now i did forbid moping and alas we had some mopers but i dont own the thread or anything, i was only wondering

LocalGarda I also vibed with what you were saying about self-improvement vibes & pressure to max out every moment - I am actually pretty good at being indolent - and also generally OK with the idea of trying to cram a lot of experiences into my finite life while I have the physical ability to do so

it's a balance i guess? i find also for all the talk of life being short, there actually is enough time to fit a lot of stuff in. some things i guess also demand time at the beginning more to sort of set yourself up for efficient half-hours here and there, psychologically or technically. i was going to say that's most true for creative stuff ime, but i bet i would be better at the stuff i procrastinate if i treated it the same way, it's that sticky bit at the beginning that can feel like a forcefield i have to move through, lol.

i am listening to Tiny Tim's version of "Rebel Yell" in its entirety
i can't do that very often. it's an ordeal. ordeal by rock.
it's a form of... exorcism. emetic. music can be that way for me.
i just started a thread on ilx, i don't do that very often
i started a support group earlier this year, the second meeting is tomorrow night
the first one went pretty well, i'm hopeful for the second one

i'm trying to do a bunch of things at once and when i look back at 2024 i didn't get any of them done
a friend of mine was telling me that in 2024, she started getting out and building social ties
and when i look at what i tried to do last year, it was a lot
i tried to re-connect with community, i tried to find a job that didn't kill my soul while keeping the job i had, i tried to build skills to take care of myself in a functional sense, i worked on trying to take care of my body

and right now i don't really feel like i have a lot to show for that
the world around me has gotten worse and harder in ways that i didn't expect
i spent all last year trying to, literally, stop the bleeding
i worked pretty hard to take care of my body so that i'd stop bleeding
and it keeps getting worse
that's not a metaphor
i mean it is, but it's also literally true
all of the things i've done and i know that i have to do more
i know there are things i can do
and it takes me a very, very long time, a great deal of effort, to do anything

i talk to my friends about how i genuinely love myself and rely on myself unconditionally
and i guess not everybody does. that's something it took me a long time to learn. i know that there is this amazing person who loves me totally and will always be there for me, always care about me, no matter what
after a lifetime of not trusting that person, of thinking that person is, like, bad, or deficient, or a failure, after trusting everyone _but_ that person
i now recognize that person has always been there for me, always worked to take care of me
and she hasn't been able to get me everything i deserve, everything i need
and honestly she's still not quite able to do it, no matter how hard she tries

and the thing is, i don't judge her, because i believe with all my heart that if she can't take care of me, nobody can. she's the only person i trust and love unconditionally, absolutely
that's what i'm doing. opening myself up to her. allowing myself to cry around her. trusting her.

i'm not ever going to be able to do all the things i want to do. i've been trying all week to write an essay about this anime i just watched, and i was telling my friend yesterday that when i write, i feel like Father McKenzie, writing the words to a sermon that no-one will hear
i have this issue, i've had this issue all my life, and the words i have learned to use for it right now - because words are important, because i am the story i tell myself - is that i am a highly sensitive person. that i feel certain sorts of pain more easily and more deeply than other people. and that limits what i'm capable of. and other people don't necessarily take that pain seriously, and sometimes it's hard for me to take that pain seriously, to accept it as real. sometimes i feel like there's something wrong with me, something deficient about me, for not being as resilient as other people. i'm not deficient.

i am extraordinarily... gifted, in some ways. i was a gifted kid. and i grew up being taught that with great power, comes great responsibility. i grew up being taught that it was up to me to carry the White Man's Burden.

the hard part for me isn't carrying a burden
it's allowing myself to stop carrying it
to recognize that i don't need to carry it, that it's not _for_ anybody, that it doesn't _benefit_ me or anybody else for me to carry it

i guess that's all i have to say right now about that

My driving obsession appears to be making records. I'm a late bloomer and after nearly 30 years of playing drums and nearly 20 years of recording, I have only very recently felt like I'm able to hit a drum properly and to produce/mix 'real' records.

Yes, of course I try to appreciate all the good moments of each day, enjoy food, stay healthy, be a good partner, stay in touch with friends, etc. But even though it's fairly isolated from the rest of my daily life, making records still feels like "the real work" and what I think about the most.

i missed this thread until now! i think it's a good one. when i read "what are you doing with the time and gifts given to you" i think of how that question means so much more to me than it would have a few years ago, before my father's death. a big part of the aftermath was a sort of burst of creative energy and confidence and self-drive that i hadn't felt in many years. i think in retrospect that my experience was common among those who have lost someone. but anyway, throwing that in there as context for my...life, and also a sort of add-on to the discussion upthread about the meaning of the question. to me it's a broad thread, or at least it can encompass how i feel about what's important to me and how it relates to what i really DO, not just think about, but spend time doing.

i have been busy playing music and finally getting to do a bunch of stuff i dreamed about for a long time, even if it was just basic stuff most local musicians got bored of in their 20s. it's fresh to me and i love it. i get to play in a variety of groups that play really different kinds of music, and in widely different contexts, from fully improvised "new music" to punk bands and electronic and acoustic and experimental and everything else. i get to book shows now, and host some of them in my own basement. i have a space for visual artists to show their work, as an act along with poets and performance artists, bands, lectures. it's so much fun! i feel very creatively fulfilled, even as i make $0 on it (with all money going to touring acts, generally being the status quo practice in stl diy circles).

i think often about how i am spending my time, and how precious it is. it drove me to leave me job and live off of my savings until those ran out, just to have as much time as i can working on things and working with others, helping people do shows and being at their performances, being the only one sometimes. one of the best feelings in the entire world is when you get to be there to see someone's "first" _____ (something really important). but often, in my case, to see someone talk about finally getting some songs together and recording them, or even better, getting them together and inviting a few people to try to play it live, for the first time, your "first show". like a fine wine, the more time passes before a "first show", the better it is. putting apart the music or the "output" or whatever - that's secondary. it's more like getting to bear witness to a big, big moment in someone's life (whether they think it is or not). i don't know, i love that stuff, and i find a lot of really good heartwarming things in my life come from spending time in that world. and i only have time do that because i quit my job and drained everything, lost everything. most people aren't in a position to start from scratch, for one reason or another (often they're not single, or have a family or someone depending on them, for example).

i also think there are many other ways that drive people to focus on gratitude for the time we've been given, and certainly know that many people get there in other ways besides having no money and just focusing on art as much as possible. but my father's death drove me to really think about my remaining time more intensely than I ever had before, and more importantly, it drove me to DO SOMETHING different, instead of just thinking about it

I think I actually disagree with the framing of the question. It seems to imply we should be doing stuff and perhaps even that our doing stuff makes a difference. I’m more of a free will skeptic who recognizes that Bartleby The Scrivener and Sisyphus are functionally identical and if you take the long view we are all somewhere on the spectrum between those two, depending on weather/moods/etc

In the long run the universe is a cold and disinterested place that we happen to inhabit by pure accident and our activities are fundamentally meaningless noise - everybody probably should find something to give their life meaning and that they enjoy doing, I certainly have more or less, but I would never demand someone “do something with the time and gifts you’ve been given!”

TL;DR LL otm but in the end nothing matters so if you feel like doing a bunch of nothing with your life that is perfectly acceptable. Most importantly don’t contribute to the suffering of others.

I would never demand someone “do something with the time and gifts you’ve been given!”

Nor would I. But I didn't read the question that way. I read it more as a reminder that we are only able to think breath and act by virtue of a life and a world that we emerged into and that our ability to do anything at all is a time-limited gift. For me, that reminder is not about some obligation to accomplish great things for the world, but that we are allowed to find that which we value in the time we are given and embrace it.

loved your post z_tbd

In the long run the universe is a cold and disinterested place that we happen to inhabit by pure accident and our activities are fundamentally meaningless noise

I’m sorry, I couldn’t help hearing this in Werner Herzog’s voice. (Herzog otm obviously)

I am with Aimless here, and frankly find tomboto’s reading of the question bizarre.

Most importantly don’t contribute to the suffering of others.

this is pretty key, I think

https://ih1.redbubble.net/image.4580537954.6591/bg,f8f8f8-flat,750x,075,f-pad,750x1000,f8f8f8.u2.jpg

reading this thread and then arguing that what we do doesn't matter contributes to the suffering of others tbqh.

well that was the point of the caveat as I read it?

can't help thinking of the Good Place point system, lol

"What are you doing?" is not necessarily a normative / prescriptive / judgmental question in my view. The answer can be "jack shit, because fuck you that's why."

Though I can see why ilx0rz may take it as "what are you doing (about injustice)" or "what are you doing (that is positive)" or "what are you doing (that is praiseworthy)."

Because I think about lot of us think there is an inherent duty to be doing something positive - positive for our health, positive for others, positive for vulnerable people, positive for the planet. Or at least not be a person who is making things worse or ignoring the downtrodden. This reflects a particular consensus ethic.

Looking further at deems's original post though it's got several moving parts:

"its a finite existence," pretty much universally agreed upon

"a privilege and a miracle," almost certainly not agreed upon. Plenty of room to disagree if you think existence is a burden and a curse.

"how are you spending it all," I think this part is morally neutral (see above). An honest answer can be "as little as possible," and need not invoke the superego.

If you have an overactive superego you will interpret "what are you doing with your life" as a challenge that must be answered because you feel you _should_ be doing something with it. I think deems is not requiring that, we are imposing that on ourselves.

Lastly "and how often do you think of it in these terms"?

Well, an honest answer can be "never," as in "I do not think of it in those terms." Or you can acknowledge that you _do_ think of it in those terms (as a gift, a privilege, and as an opportunity to do good instead of evil).

life can totally be a privilege and a miracle AND a burden and a curse.

A quick glance at the thread titles in Site New Answers is enough to confirm this. A large part of which category it falls into depends on the frame you are currently emphasizing.

i was about to get quite cranky but YMP has very elegantly and uncrankily done the work i was about to do

if you bridle at the question

i. i didnt even make you read it

ii. I certainly didnt make you answer it

iii. fuck off

im kidding about iii x

but look the actual iii is "stop wondering why darragh has asked you a question that has made you defensive" because theres two things you are doing there, not me imo this is a thread about you and is not a test*

*no moping

But, hypothetically, if it was a test, how would you grade us? Individual ilxmail me my results please.

im quickly discerning mopers and not reading their posts from there, everyone else gets an A

I've changed to teaching post-secondary (16+) this academic year and it's been a good shift. I'm less emotionally exhausted and have a *bit* more time for what animates me. I battle with how much my job takes from me but I do fundamentally *care* about it and the impact I can have.

I've been meditating for about 2 1/2 years now and attending a local Buddhist centre. My initial reason for going was to learn how to meditate but something keeps drawing me back there. The Pali word for community is 'sangha' and there are some lovely, humble people at the centre. I'm learning a huge amount from them. The wisdom goes that you should look outside of meditation for its true effects - how you are in your relationships, with friends, and community - and I'd like to think I was more open and available for what matters. Though I was intrigued by xxxxyyzzz's comment about 'withdrawing'. I recognise this and am conscious of my slight withdrawal in the last few years and what it signifies.

I had a dream a year or so ago, that felt like a 'before and after' dream. I was in my mother-in-law's lounge. Everyone significant in my life was there and they'd all decided, joyously, to 'take the pill' and let go (I don't want to use the 's' word, it wasn't that, really) and I was the one, bewildered and frantic, saying 'no, no - there's too much to do!'. What I remember most of all was the devastating feeling that I wouldn't be able to sit with my wife for an hour each evening, watching something ridiculous on the television. The simple warmth of her. Give me that, the knowledge that my children are content and the huge lift of summer evenings and I'll be good.

I *think* I'm getting closer to an answer about what I want, even if I consider it an unanswerable question but if I was honest with myself, I'd like to write something of substance. I am no nearer to making this happen.

To be fair defensiveness can be understood in light of world events and particularly yesterday in the US, yadda yadda

"What are you doing?" can have implied followups like "are you doing _enough_?" And "why aren't you doing _more_?"

The bumper stickers are in our heads: if you're not part of the solution you're part of the problem. If you're not outraged you're not paying attention. If not now, when? If not us, who?

Two days ago at the dinner table, my trans child answered something like the thread question by saying "existing." So.

re: withdrawing - I have really found my yoga practice intensifying and the process I am going through has been changing some of my habits, and it feels -- more and more -- like a withdrawal from the world in general. But that's to do with age, and learning things in depth at my age feels (like many things) harder, so they need more work and concentration.

But its not like I am going to live in a cave or anything (I will probably qualify as a introductory level yoga teacher later in the year, and may get a gig covering a class for a teacher I know at a Buddhist centre. Though I will end up teaching in gyms, mostly) (The training is probably intensifying so that I am ready for what is to come) xp

i don't know, i love that stuff, and i find a lot of really good heartwarming things in my life come from spending time in that world. and i only have time do that because i quit my job and drained everything, lost everything. most people aren't in a position to start from scratch, for one reason or another (often they're not single, or have a family or someone depending on them, for example).

This is beautiful and admirable, but I am much more risk-averse and this is giving me near parental levels of concern. Hope you have health insurance and don't need it!

working with younger people and passing on what I've learned, or failed to learn, over the years has been rewarding in a way that feels more long-term. I have to admit, I've been grasping for direction in my career for a little while, having decided to ramp up my skills and knowledge around 2018-2019ish, and then I got a little derailed and ended up learning even more. it's nice to be able to pass on what I can

xp i appreciate that jordan, and trust me i feel that concern for myself, too.

slightly going off-topic (but then veering back on topic at the end and doing a wheelie with sparklers), everyone else feel free to ignore:

i'm on medicaid, but i live in missouri and i'm already on the edge of the income threshold, so i expect that soon i will be one of those people in the "gap" who work part-time and don't get health insurance but also make too much to get medicaid, so instead have to go to the affordable care exchange and choose the cheapest Bronze Minus Minus Savey Thrifters insurance for $300 a month (which i can't afford).

it sucks. same with my car. i'm one accident away from being completely fucked. i'm paycheck to paycheck, etc.

honestly i'll say that living the way that i want to live, spending my (precious, PRECIOUS) time the way that i want to do it - it's worth the continual risk, to me. i would never wish it on anyone else or recommend it for anyone else. but for, it makes sense and it's made all the difference, and one reason i know that's true is that, if you gave me a dream-like choice to go back to how i was living, with all my savings, but no community, 4 years ago, and do it all over again, losing all the money and gaining all the people, i would do it again.

i don't think that being money-less and asset-less (and generally, to the world i live in, which is so capitalist that it's nearly invisible, like being in a deep ocean) is not necessary for happiness or community, for most people. but for me, honestly, i think it is. i'm not a christian but i've read the gospels repeatedly and have noted that jesus, who seems like a good guy, is constantly telling everyone to get rid of their possessions and instead travel and learn with gang of smelly disciples, always staying at people's houses and eating their food, sleeping on their couches. there is something to that. i think the people who have turned to meditation (upthread) are maybe after something similar. anyway, i don't recommend my life to anyone else, but i highly recommend it for me! :)

i don't think that being money-less and asset-less (and generally, to the world i live in, which is so capitalist that it's nearly invisible, like being in a deep ocean

(i neglected to throw in the sad word "worthless" here, as in "worthless to the greater world i live in, which is so capitalist...")

actually there are typos within typos embedded in that sentence, along with triple double negatives and some innovative language errors that cannot be fully understood. but i trust ilxors can mostly understand so i'll leave it there :)

xps thank you map <3

"so i expect that soon i will be one of those people in the "gap" who work part-time"

careful. i hear people poop in the changing rooms there.

#laughyfaceemoji

"for the last time, that is NOT what the gap is for"

oh, one last thing, about something that i "currently believe" - i think that one of the main roles of an artist (not 100% necessary all the time, but very common and needed) is to stand in opposition to the society they live in, or to offer a better way, or to criticize it, or to embrace absurdity in order to get outside of it for even momentary glimpses of another way of living. my actual art rarely gets at those things, but i think that when i live like an artist - like a starving artist - i embody those ideals, and that makes me feel good

otm and right on

Z_ I got what you are saying and best to you.

Yeah the smelly disciples sleeping on couches thing is interesting but, as you say, not for everyone. Because someone has to own the couch, have a place to put it, have enough food to spare, etc.

i always wanted to get a Pekar job so that i wouldn't have to worry so much about money/insurance and i had that when i got the job as a custodian at the hospital at MVI and when i worked there at night i would get writing done on my breaks and when it was slow but then i saw my co-worker who had been there forever and he was like a pack mule all beaten down and i was already a little miserable there and i also knew if i stayed and my union benefits got better and better i would never leave and i would never really do some things that i wanted to do. so, i'm glad i took the leap and started my own thing when we moved here even if it did lead to me not writing for more than a decade. i got to provide other artists with a place to perform and i got to express myself with my store even if i have never made much money.
when we first thought about coming here maria said "maybe you can get a job at the hospital there" and i thought AHHH! No! and that's when i committed to the idea of my own store. yesterday, maria was talking to our next door neighbor and they talked about how he went to art school and cyrus our kid was going to art school and our neighbor is an excellent illustrator in a comic book style and she asked if art was his full-time gig and he said........no, he's a custodian at the hospital here! i thought that was funny.

(my first EMP music conference paper that ended up in Yeti Magazine and then included in the EMP book put out by Duke was written almost entirely at night at my custodian job.)

everyone doing their own thing on a shoestring and making human-sized differences in people's lives every day, you are a big inspiration to me.

I have a full time job which involves up to 4 hours commuting per day, also two kids and a dog, so my time is pretty well used up before I get to the stuff I want to do, but I still try to eke out time, on the train etc., for projects.

First one is Centuries of Sound, feel like I've talked about that enough, ok. That also has a monthly radio show which I think is sometimes good but has taken a bit of a backseat TBH.

The other thing I do with my time is Texture & Artefact, I have a clear idea of what it's supposed to be, it's a creative nonfiction autobiography, but I'm mixing my own writing with interviews with family / friends, stuff from old cassettes, other found sound (next episode is largely made up of a load of wechat audio messages from a friend who died), field recordings I make with my tascam (I recorded a load of protests for example, and a few football matches) and occasional bits of drama and music. You might be familiar with the episode I made about having undiagnosed ADHD at high school, posted it on here a couple of times and some people were very nice about it. The problem I have with this project is that it's hard to get anyone interested because it's hard to sum up what it is, I managed to get a clip on BBC East last week and hearing the cheesy DJ reading out my blurb about "personal monologues knitted into narrative soundscapes" it sounded ridiculously pretentious and self-indulgent, and I did for a brief moment think "what the fuck am I doing with this?" but shook it off immediately as I no longer give a shit if I sound (or am) pretentious, I'm stretching myself to make something I feel like is my thing and I am lucky enough to be able to find some time to do it and if I overreach and make myself look ridiculous then so what? But if anyone has any ideas about how to make this look a bit more coherent then yes, please tell me.

it sucks. same with my car. i'm one accident away from being completely fucked. i'm paycheck to paycheck, etc.

honestly i'll say that living the way that i want to live, spending my (precious, PRECIOUS) time the way that i want to do it - it's worth the continual risk, to me. i would never wish it on anyone else or recommend it for anyone else. but for, it makes sense and it's made all the difference, and one reason i know that's true is that, if you gave me a dream-like choice to go back to how i was living, with all my savings, but no community, 4 years ago, and do it all over again, losing all the money and gaining all the people, i would do it again.

― z_tbd

Precariat. Yeah. I understand precariat life. I understand being considered worthless to capitalism - that's at the center of disability politics, of how disability is defined.

I'm disabled, in a functional sense. The things capitalism expects of me in order to be worthwhile human being - I'm not performing them to the level capitalism expects me to. I'm surviving. I'm not out on the street, just yet. Something has to give, and what I have the most of, what's draining fastest, is my bank balance. I've thought about going through the process, going through the enormous time and effort it would take to be classified as a second-class citizen, to officially be marked as a burden rather than an asset. That's what my dad did. It helped us. I'm not sure it benefited him. I don't think taking that path would benefit me. I'd still have to find meaning, to find purpose, in a world that insists I have none.

I still have to get what I need, and right now, well. I'm not like Scott, not in a place to take another leap from the lion's head. No moping, yeah. I get accused a lot of self-pity, and it makes me angry. I have a lot of anger, a lot of bitterness, a lot of resentment. No blame. No blame for myself or for anyone else, but a lot of anger. I deserve better. We all deserve better.

Maybe when I get rid of the last of the money, maybe then, when I have nothing else but the people, I'll trust the people. The ones who are more fucked up than I am. The "hurt people hurting people". Maybe then I'll learn to embrace the things I see in my friends, the suicide attempts, the desperation, the screaming, the people who vanish when you need them most. Maybe that's the inevitable consequence of what I did, not transition per se but leaving my partner, leaving my caretaker. At some point I'll hit bottom. Perhaps at some point I'll ... let go of the idea that it's "bottom", let go of the idea that it's somewhere I need to run from, a dangerous place filled with people who can't help me, who can only hurt me. At some point I'll maybe I'll stop flinching at every outstretched hand. I'm not moping by saying that. I'm not self-pitying. It's not good news, bad news, or any news. It's just the truth: Better save yourself while you can.

Two days ago at the dinner table, my trans child answered something like the thread question by saying "existing." So.

― slouching towards bethesda (Ye Mad Puffin)

"Existence is resistance." That's one of the things we say. It's true. For me, for your child, existing in a world that would really rather prefer we didn't is... it's the ultimate act of resistance. I went into transition wanting a cause to die for, and I found that the world didn't need anymore dead t-slurs. I found that what the world needs of me is to live, and I've had to learn to do that, and to love, and I'm learning to do that. I'm still not at "trust". I'm still working on that. Once I get there... I know I'm called to more than mere existence. I know I'm called to joy. I also know I can't get there without trusting, not just trusting myself, which I do, but trusting other people, which I don't.

YMP, I'm glad your child isn't alone. It helps a lot. I know I'm not alone either.

my life coach:

https://thequietus.com/interviews/kristin-hersh-throwing-muses-moonlight-concessions-interview/

this cracked me up but its also instructive! and what comes after it is humbling:

Does the album title, Moonlight Concessions, have any specific meaning, or do you want to keep it mysterious?

KH: At Moonlight Beach in Encinitas California, there’s a concession stand.

KH: It can be really, really difficult here and when you live that difficulty, you align. It can be wonderful here too but you need to parse the elements of wonder in that case. Is it because you’re safe? Is it because you’re lucky? Shift your definition of wonder and be here with all of us.

ill add, at 43- a genuine and committed effort in my role at work, which now seems to be something i believe might do some good, in charge of some very good people, however the fuck that happened

I did have a gratifying conversation with someone this morning about managing people, and he told me I seemed like a good boss.

My role right now during the transition to a new administration is to keep my employees doing good work for the people and trying to reduce their anxiety about the changes that are afoot. Somebody has to keep the lights on.

Tom -- I just want to recognize that I think staying in place and doing your best to stop/slow/blunt the damage and protect people is valuable and needed.

Another pathway is “Defending Civic Institutions.” This group may or may not be conscious that current institutions don’t serve us all, but they are united in understanding that Trump wants them to crumble so he can exert greater control over our lives. Each bureaucracy will put up its own fight to defend itself.

Insider groups will play a central battle against Trump fascism. You may recall government scientists dumping copious climate data onto external servers, bracing for Trump’s orders. This time, many more insiders understand it’s code red. Hopefully, many will bravely refuse to quit — and instead choose to stay inside as long as possible.

Institutional pillars understand a Trump presidency is a dire threat. The military, for one, is well aware that Trump’s potential orders to use them to crack down on civilian protesters would politicize them permanently.

These insiders will need external support. Sometimes it’s just folks showing compassion that some of our best allies will be inside, silently resisting. A culture of celebrating people getting fired for the right reasons would help (then offering them practical help with life’s next steps). Other moments will need open support and public activation.

https://wagingnonviolence.org/2024/11/10-things-to-do-if-trump-wins/

I've been thinking about this a lot recently, due to numbers: my birthday's the 2nd of January, so I get one large "in summary" vibe rather than, say, one then and one in July. And this year's was the 50th, and I'd faced the previous year thinking about I should try and get myself in shape, mentally and physically, thinking of this coming as my Last Effective Decade (also, the one my father didn't see the other side of).

And it didn't work to that extent - I started the year with an ADHD diagnosis and it took until October to actually get to a dosage that mostly works. And Jen's long Covid from 2023 cleared up late that year, but something came back (or forward) in the middle of last year, a ball of things that we're calling burnout, and that she's on sabbatical now for to try and get a handle on what that is and what it means. And that's part of an answer to the question too - I have a lot of potential and a lot of ways to thwart that, but any day that I make her laugh 10 times is a day I can get to sleep happy.

Like Kate I had a history as a gifted kid and it seemed to push me through a life that can be written with less agency: (cut for historical interest and/or modesty) out of school at 7 because they wouldn't keep me; off to college at 13 because they'd take me (and I was running out of other things to learn (and possibly picking up on my parents running out of money for me to learn them)); staying in college 8 years for the fear of leaving; jumping into a job with my best friend at the same time as the Celtic Tiger / DotCom happened; leaving after he left; coming over to London just because I turned 30 and didn't want to start looking at buying a house without having lived somewhere else; getting engaged to the first serious relationship; getting engaged again to Jen, the person I met on Tinder on a rebound from the first engagement; moving to Scotland because she was determined to - it's not much of an exaggeration to say that I was facing 50 with "Well, what do I want to do? What am I for?"

(I went through with the joke even if I didn't get my shit together as much as I wanted - the day after my birthday I posted "Okay, (elided: so that's me fixed,) what state is the world in? Hmm. Hmm." and as a first comment the Thanos "Fine. I'll do it myself" gif)

in orbit!
so while I "do not dream of labor," I also don't regret how I spend my days.
This is a really lovely sentiment, it reminds me of an article you might like (if you've not already read it), and which is one person's unknowing answer to the question of the thread: https://phirephoenix.com/blog/2022-10-18/work - I know we're not close but it's always been good to be reminded that you're out there being a force for good in the world - I was sorry to hear of the bumps in the road this year.

dmac!
as noted almost immediately in that thread tbf
You are of course correct and in many ways a better use of my remaining time would be considering who I am dealing with and his diligence for the bit.

I could probably find something to say to nearly every post, even if it were in spirit or in fact just the heart emoji, but one thing I need to do to improve my chances on everything is get to bed earlier, so...

i think it's a natural human impulse to think that one is never quite doing enough, or what one should, or what one really ought to be, or at least it's become one. similar to how you always find yourself wanting that taco that's just a little more expensive. i don't know if it's always been a natural human impulse - probably not, so maybe not actually "natural" - but it feels endemic to much of the world now.

i am currently invested in trying to be a good dad and husband, and to add whatever bits i can contribute to the ever-dwindling pile of social justice in my city and my world. my own artistic ambitions are in a bit of a deep freeze. i think longingly about that from time to time.

i have a plan to travel with my oldest best friend this year. don't know the place, don't know the time, but it's just going to be me and him. i'm really looking forward to that.

im now into week five of stress leave from work and due back next week, so chalk that up for a quick turnaround for those that (imo incorrectly!) read this thread as a humblebraggart's charter.

but this week and last I've been working on some things that are adjacent to my return to work, and what that is going to mean, look like, require, and my plans to change whatever courses or whatever rivers I'm on to ensure that this episode is taken for the signal that it should and must be, which beings it right around again to the contemplative heart of this question for me.

good questions, open thoughts, work to be done on priorities and capabilities and place

Seeing the thread title again I think I isolated what it is that set me off to seeing it as a quasi religious question — given to me? By whom?

That said, I fear death quite a lot, and spend too much time irrationally worrying about something sudden and random happening to end my life. I've been trying to get to the bottom of why that is and avoid the consequences of it, which perversely can be to do things which diminish my health or procrastinate things which make me more healthy or financially secure.

I didn't post on this thread previously, but I am sort of similar. I know why it is - I have young kids and we walk daily along a main road with a narrow pavement, where cars/massive lorries approach at terrifying (to me) speed, and where there have been crashes. I keep the kids as far away from the road side as possible but I can't help the thought that someone's hands being a few degrees off could end my life. I'm not in actual anxious fear of it - it's just a bit of a reminder. That coupled with the fact that a LOT of people my age have died in my non-immediate circle in the last few years - parents at my kids' schools, ex-colleagues, etc - I feel incredibly lucky to have what I have, and simultaneously at a total loss as to what I can actually do to make the most of "things".

Work-wise - I am beginning to feel like a coward for being happy with work-life-balance that doesn't push me out of my comfort zone (actually, there are a lot of things I stress about but that's entirely on me being a bag of anxiety and objectively it's totally unnecessary).

I have a volunteer role which in some ways annoys me but I'm quite good at - but there isn't really any future in using those skills. And I'm happily giving it up this year due to circumstances.

I always thought I'd go back and study/train in something else but I am sort of realising I might not be up to it. But my oddness has given me some other useful skills that others don't always have.

The only thing I know is that time is passing faster and faster. It is absolutely mind-blowing watching your kid grow up.

but I can honestly say I get a lot of joy from small things

How are you actually feeling, deems?

ive had five weeks off work, i feel great ty!

that is in itself an input into some of my thinking tbf

seeing it as a quasi religious question — given to me? By whom?/

as someone who is finding more 'quasi religious' connection in his life, that's probably why i enjoyed posting to it.

i'm a little baffled by your questions though. looking at what darraghmac has shared so far the thread seems to be inspired by a bit of a crisis on his part, existential or otherwise. it doesn't seem to be directed at you in any way.

as far as the thread title goes, what i'm doing with my time and gifts - life and meditation are sort of relentlessly teaching me right now that i need to let go of expectation and desire and find fulfillment in the present. and i'm doing it a little bit! more than i used to. even a little bit creates a sense of wealth i've never had before.

Quasi-religious? OMG! My heavens, how could that be?

I didn't post on this thread previously, but I am sort of similar. I know why it is - I have young kids and we walk daily along a main road with a narrow pavement, where cars/massive lorries approach at terrifying (to me) speed, and where there have been crashes. I keep the kids as far away from the road side as possible but I can't help the thought that someone's hands being a few degrees off could end my life. I'm not in actual anxious fear of it - it's just a bit of a reminder. That coupled with the fact that a LOT of people my age have died in my non-immediate circle in the last few years - parents at my kids' schools, ex-colleagues, etc - I feel incredibly lucky to have what I have, and simultaneously at a total loss as to what I can actually do to make the most of "things".

I can only imagine what it must be like when you have kids. I have been working quite hard to get around these feelings but they are prob with me for good, idk why, albeit can manage them better.

I didn’t grasp that anything was fueled by a crisis — I apologize for being dense?

Cryptic posting aside, I’m allowed to find quasi religious language mildly off-putting if I want to.

Yes of course, LL.

Interesting point - I don't have religion, me, but I have no problem with the linguistic conceit of speaking as if the universe has "given" me something when I experience it.

I amight say nature has given me a nice day, even though there's no conscious entity that decided to do so. If I find money on the sidewalk I can thank a generic fate or circumstances. Even a jocular notion like "the gods" or "the thousand little gods" as a figure of speech, not an assertion that there's really a "whom" behind the curtain.

Even things I know I did myself, I might say I'd been given/gifted, as a means of enforcing humility.

Cryptic posting aside, I’m allowed to find quasi religious language mildly off-putting if I want to.

The almighty amight

I'm with LL on this. Thinking on the time I have and the aspects by dint of being vs. that "gifted" to me. Like there's an obligation to not waste the "gift" so to not disappoint the giver. To simply have these things to use however is more compatible to how I view it.

Its cool to have a bit of god talk here now and then.

Don't wanna put any words in anyone's mouth there but I suspect there might be a bit of a disconnect because in America, we all too frequently hear "God given" (rights, talents, skills, etc etc) used to describe nebulous things like this. So while I did not read the OP in that way, I can also see how someone might have had that take on it.

i'm a little baffled by your questions though. looking at what darraghmac has shared so far the thread seems to be inspired by a bit of a crisis on his part, existential or otherwise

thanks map but just ftr, not the case at the time!

things took a southern turn since but the question was a straight one

i think outside being within the four walls of a church most reasonable people understand this kind of language to mean "how does knowing your mortality influence your actions and perspective" vs "what are you doing with the gifts you've been given (by CHRIST THE LORD from whom all blessings flow)"

xp ok whoops and thanks for setting the record straight

i see how the "given to you" part could be upsetting now. totally missed it at first.

Having mastered the art of organised religion, we Irish sometimes forget it didn't go as well in other countries

I didn't take it in a religious way at all, but I also lived in California for long enough to be thoroughly washed into hippie language of "the blessings given to me by the earth spirit" etc. (I am only being slightly sarcastic, fwiw).

np at all map! tbf it was a fuckin whiplash turnaround and i know you were only coming from a good place in seeking to set it as a possibility

ive addressed quibbles about the wording/framing/intent throughout the thread until i stopped bothering but i also noted that a wide question left wide interpretation and i think most engagement has been really interesting to read, if people engaged with the question at all, i mean isnt it an interesting question? i thought so anyway.

i do think tbh some of the interpretations have been very contorted but id only note one thing as threadstarter- people *insisting* it has x, y or z built into it while totally projecting, are very presumptive and quite annoying tbh

but otherwise its obv proven quite the inkblot test, even if it wasnt meant to be

shrugemoji

no moping

It is an interesting question and worth visiting at various points along the journey - thanks for opening the can of worms

theres a wormhole joke in there somewhere

I think it's a great thread and I've really enjoyed reading so many of the thoughtful and earnest response! I'm so glad you started it, tbh.

I've attempted my own response a few times but, ultimately, I know I'm not doing as much as I should be and I'm trying to be cognizant of that and not tossing in a mopey response.

(or Diet of Worms)

I didn’t mean to come across as insistent with my assumptions about the nature of the question so my apologies for being presumptuous and quite annoying

Also very glad you took some time off and v jealous at this particular juncture in history

I was re-reading Seneca's Letters From A Stoic in the doctor's waiting room this morning (just a blood draw) and came upon #26, commonly subtitled On Old Age And Death:

'Rehearse death.' To say this is to tell a person to rehearse his freedom. A person who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave. He is above, or at any rate beyond the reach of, all political powers. What are prisons, warders, bars to him? He has an open door. There is but one chain holding us in fetters, and that is our love of life. There is no need to cast this love out altogether, but it does need to be lessened somewhat so that, in the event of circumstances ever demanding this, nothing may stand in the way of our being prepared to do at once what we must do at some time or other.

ty ty tombot - def i recognise im lucky to have options

i was however very tempted to put a thereheis sopranos gif under yer post there

for the record im not v annoyed but theres lots of posters who id wish could see their way to non-defensive answers because i know id like to hear from them in that vein

i bet nobody even watched that youtube i posted above above the eventual heat death of the universe etc but everyone should even tho bits are naff

maybe i should start a thread for "things you find really useful to centre yourself" - some good posts upthread on that too iirc and its maybe or maybe not related/tangential?

(or Diet of Worms)

― Jaq, 10 March 2025 22:17 (fifteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

I must acknowledge this, vg vg

i bet nobody even watched that youtube i posted above above the eventual heat death of the universe etc but everyone should even tho bits are naff

I just included a really interesting article in my newsletter on Friday about how finitude of time/existence affects us.

Only recently has the human collective begun accepting the fact it is itself mortal. We now appreciate that events unfolded for aeons before us and that our species can disappear, never to return. One day, the cosmos will persist without human witness, nor any inherent tendency to manifest things we cherish.

The anti-war campaigner Jonathan Schell called this realisation the ‘second death’. Growing up, each of us comes to terms, psychologically, with a ‘first death’ – our own – but, beyond this, lurks the realisation that humankind itself hasn’t always existed and won’t be around forever.

For most of history, such understanding was lacking. People could defang – or outright deny – the possibility of beginnings and ends greater than those of our own biographies by appealing to eternity. Before we found evidence to prove otherwise, it was permissible to presume that, beyond tangible scales, time has no true bounds. For millennia, people have found comfort in this, because nothing dies in eternity. Given eternal time, every possibility – no matter how wildly improbable – will repeat and recur limitlessly. Outside our island of perceptible time – within eternity’s boundless ocean – it remained plausible to assume that all deceased things will eventually resurrect.

It’s now clear humanity lacks the luxury of eternity. We know this because evidence has accumulated to show that there are greater, even more encompassing mortalities than our own. We now understand Earth and its life had their origins and, one day, they will be cremated by our ageing Sun. A ‘third death’, then. Beyond that, even the Universe itself has its bounds: it began with a bang, and the consensus view is that, in the distant future, it will likely have its end. Thus, a ‘fourth death’. Multiple grander mortalities, expanding concentrically outward.

yes all of this i love it

From my perspective, by the time one has accepted personal mortality, the certain death of everyone you love, the extinction of humanity, and the complete incineration of the Earth and all its life, the eventual heat death of the universe becomes no more than a mildly interesting hypothesis rather than an occasion for intense grief.

re thread title - I constantly have in my head " 'tis a gift to be simple, 'tis a gift to be free" because of it. my kid used to play it on the piano, just to really hammer it in.

i liked yr post earlier kinder i felt a lot of it

i bet nobody even watched that youtube i posted above above the eventual heat death of the universe etc but everyone should even tho bits are naff

Indeed, I haven't watched it - but have long admired this brief summary of the very end of the Universe that I came across in the Independent newspaper about 20 years ago:

The decay of protons heralds a final drawn-out phase of disintegration in the universe, as everything falls apart. After protons decay, there are no stable atoms, presenting a challenge for life. The curtain falls with the slow evaporation of black holes by a process called Hawking radiation. The largest black holes evaporate on the inconceivable time scale of 10^98 years. We imagine the last inhabitants of the universe huddled around the evaporative glow of gamma rays from the last black hole, telling timeless stories about time. It was fun while it lasted.

how we spend our days is how we spend our lives

Gortat: I'm a loner. Even when I used to live with my girlfriend I often wanted to be alone. Sometimes I cut myself off from my friends, too. They go together to a club or a restaurant and I stay at home, and I'm not answering any phone calls.

What do you do then?

Gortat: I look at the wall. I look at a white wall and contemplate.

took “gifts” to be tongue in cheek if necessary and kindly interpreted, like my attention span I cling to with a desperation

Every night, after I close my eyes, I always wonder if the next day is going to be the one I die in. I don't want to take days off to rest any more, I've done all of the slacking off that I want to do, decades worth of it. Now I just have to make up for and morn all of the time I've lost.

to pick out a question from that, if it's ok- what does "making up for" look like?

Going forward and accomplishing things.

I was re-reading Seneca's Letters From A Stoic in the doctor's waiting room this morning (just a blood draw) and came upon #26, commonly subtitled On Old Age And Death:

'Rehearse death.' To say this is to tell a person to rehearse his freedom. A person who has learned how to die has unlearned how to be a slave. He is above, or at any rate beyond the reach of, all political powers. What are prisons, warders, bars to him? He has an open door. There is but one chain holding us in fetters, and that is our love of life. There is no need to cast this love out altogether, but it does need to be lessened somewhat so that, in the event of circumstances ever demanding this, nothing may stand in the way of our being prepared to do at once what we must do at some time or other.

― Instead of create and send out, it pull back and consume (unperson)

it's interesting. in dbt terms i'd call it "coping ahead", which is something i believe a lot in, _and_...

the "d" stands for "dialectical", right? rehearse death and be alive in the moment. both/and.

cuz there's a difference between "coping ahead" and obsessing about or expecting death the way i did when i was younger. looking forward to death, that kind of thing. as far as... when he talks about the chain holding us in fetters (not in a good way), i think about also the concept of "attachment", which i understand mostly in a western context. it's recognizing the impermanence of all things, that nothing is forever.

it is strange... as i get older, death does seem closer, but it also, by dint of being who i am and where i am, also seems closer in some other ways. i wanted for a while to be a martyr, and i thought the changes i was making would give me that opportunity, only to realize that's not what's called for, that's not what's needed. dying for what i believe in, this comes a weak second to living for what i believe in. in fact in some ways i am farther from death than i have been in quite some time. the only control i thought i could have was the power to end my own life, and i contrived all sorts of tricks to deny myself that power. at last, having to confront that i did have the power, that was when i found that i did, in fact, want to live. sometimes my desire to die overtook my desire to live, but that desire to live was never itself effaced. it is always with me. when i die i hope it will be gently, as i don't want to bring unnecessary suffering upon myself or those i love, but it will not be willingly.

accomplishing things

hmmm, as it is generally defined within the framework of capitalism (e.g. imagining and completing 'important' tasks, leaving your mark on the world beyond your friends and family) is way overrated.

otoh, if it's defined in the framework of strengthening loving relationships, finding personal satisfaction in time spent, and acts of kindness and forgiveness -- then, yeah, fabulous! more power to you!

i didnt mean to pry CGLDI- i found it interesting

this month with the gifts given me im eating mindfully and adjusting to return to work and starting meds

it feels quite enough as far as accomplishing things goes, and to touch on what aimless says

today i think ill consider the controversial "gifts given" me to mean "the wherewithal to achieve what i can as far as i can understand it" it will change tomorrow probably

no letter writing about that please let's carry on (i heard melvyn bragg say this after making an error on a podcast and liked it)

clocking off at 4:30 on a Friday bank holiday weekend and taking two dogs for a long walk on a sunny racecourse

thats a good update hit send

clocking off at 4:30 on a Friday bank holiday weekend

*sounds of 'bad to the bone' are heard*

:) that's great, sounds very lovely. what kind of racecourse? like...for bikes?

park life

cooked a lamb and red lentil bhuna and knocked the mofo out of the park, restaurant standard!

horse racecourse!

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Curragh

renewing season ticket like a cunt

Who gave us this time and these gifts anyway

we covered this upthread as far as covering it goes

Yeah I came storming in about that and was appropriately reprimanded about how to properly interpret the question

just laying down for a little while

deadlift pr this morning. i took the day off just because, and i'm doing nothing and it's perfect. i might go smell some lilacs later.

tombot answer the question!

I am meeting a career counselor in an hour

I am stepping aside, allowing people to pass, helping where i can. I am trying to listen, trying to be in and of a place.

I'm hoping my gifts might be useful, I'm offering them cheaply, i'm working with people i look up to. I'm waiting. I'm lucky.

I have an agreement to work with an indigenous research and education unit. It is going slowly. I am learning.

Often i feel stupid. I am stupid. I make changes. I value guidance.

after a very nice weeklong sun vacation ive figured out that my next thing is going to be an attempt at resolving my propensity towards circular thoughts when i dont want to confront the core issues

but as far as the thread question goes i used the time and gifts given me to eat greek food and enjoy deep bone-healing sunheat

did the greeks gift you the food?

I turned 65 yesterday. There are times when I feel what's left to me draining away, hearing it gurgle like water down the drain. But there's also the steady influx of more. That expansiveness of life everywhere. It's quieter, likely because it's a broader stream.

I thought about stuff yesterday and decided on 3 things to focus on. Show up. Be kind. Stay curious.

wow, i love that.

'Show up' as the sense of playing a full and rewarding role? (Rather than for example 'Show Up at Work', I hope)

Drove to the river and dipped my hands in the water; it was just cool enough to be comfortable, and as clear as the water coming from my bathroom tap. Watched birds swoop and dive in search of bugs and/or small fish. Gazed at pine trees ten stories high, mountains still half capped with snow, and billowing white clouds the size of cathedrals.

The Odin Project

LOL Bob Six, sometimes showing up means exactly that for me. I have skipped out on too much stuff at the last minute too often. But I did mean it more in the sense of Be Present, Witness, Pay Attention. You know, more be there for others.

Unperson, that sounds tremendous.

hb jaq!

did the greeks gift you the food?

― LocalGarda, 24 May 2025 20:05 (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

i troy not to turn my nose up at hospitality

I wish this thread title would stop nagging me

did the greeks gift you the food?

― LocalGarda, 24 May 2025 20:05 (one hour ago) bookmarkflaglink

i troy not to turn my nose up at hospitality

I don't like greecey food

Is this just a general “what’’s up” thread couched in typical ilx needless obfuscation

hbd jaq!!

Thanks D and Z! It was good and now I get discounts!

yeah hb jaq! And thanks for posting about your inspiring professional journey, I appreciate your postings

Yeah, I read 'Show up' as just "Go to the thing you heard about' - a barrier I'm not hitting that often (but at least I'm still hearing about them)

trialling non-reactive pushback against work pressure

revelationary. i recommend.

walking dogs in woods before work, when wfh.

also recommend

non-reactive pushback against work pressure

please explain!

I’ve been thinking about this thread a lot since it was posed. Recently, it’s helped me realize I’m in what I think is a genuine midlife crisis.

To answer the question directly: I’m working a full time job that is very much good-enough while using my relatively ample free time to do sessional teaching work on the side (I don’t think I’ll continue teaching, though, as it’s become tedious). I’m also contemplating going back to school to become a psychotherapist, to do something that might be more fulfilling and better suited to my lifestyle. I go to yoga/pilates 4-5 times a week and am trying to improve my bad dietary habits, with the (realistic) aim of getting into the best shape of my life (nothing like losing your hair to make the mortality’s forward march tangible). I meet up with friends and family when I can but spend most of my time alone. Much of that time is spent wanting, but not knowing how, to connect with people and find community (e.g. unsuccessfully trying to meet people on the apps). I collect records and cds but want to slow down to focus on what I already own. I play these records on my own in my lovingly customized home-DJ setup. I routinely go to cafes to work and/or hang out. I listen to audiobooks (mostly contemporary fiction) and podcasts. I draw. I write to friends. I clean my apartment. I go to therapy. I sometimes volunteer but mostly ponder where and how I might volunteer. I bike to get places. I bike for fun. I travel as much as I reasonably can, preferably to new places, which is the most reliable way for me to feel alive. I try to stay nominally informed while keeping a lean media diet and minimal online presence. I make the rounds to major art exhibitions in the city, though with self-cajoling that I’d like. I try to find events to go to, but mostly grapple with the fact that going out dancing is no longer fun, and I’m not a big concert guy, so I stay in a lot more than I’d like.

Things are stable, but I’ve been coasting. The way of life I shaped for myself doesn’t seem to work anymore and it feels like there's very little meaning to it, so I’ve been lost. So, I’ve also been reflecting on what changes (career, social connection, spiritual fulfillment) I want to use my time and resources in a way that feel less like a distraction.

you say you draw, but do you give yourself like... art projects??? that's what keeps me going

I'm back in a place wher3 I'm more present, really happy with the work I do because I've learnt to worry less about the bad stuff they expect me to do - pretty free to ignore that, so far. Shrooms the last two weekends, haven't done hallucinogens for a long time and it's been gentle and joyous and enlightening. Suddenly got 2 children back in the city and enjoying their company. Always scared of hostages to fortune but right now feeling like I've got a solid handle on things

x-post

Really relate to your post - although mine’s technically a late-life crisis.

Even though things are stable and coasting, there’s something missing as I plough my solo furrow (probably views and perspectives from friends and others) and I worry I might self-sabotage and blow it up.

xp nv that's nice to hear

yeah glad to hear, nv <3

A tip on how to get more meaning into your life:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a-C9pUGszsw

That’s probably meant to be funny but I feel it’s genuinely insensitive to aromantic people.

If you say so. But if they are secure and happy in their identity as aromantic I don't see why they'd take it personally. It just wouldn't apply to them.

oh, and not all love is romantic love.

True

Good to hear, nv.

Thanks map, brim, xyzz, everybody. Weird and scary and confusing how arbitrary being in a good place can be

<3

me, today, I am cleaning out the fucking basement, which feels great

Re: ivy: I do periodically give myself creative projects (e.g. I took a silkscreening class this year, to turn my illustrations into prints) and that absolutely helps, but they feel fleeting and lonely: I get tired of doing things to just put into a drawer, unseen by anyone - this is why I stopped making music, it felt so solipsistic (plus my ears are sensitive so can’t do it for long, and I get more from DJing). I think a big part of my dissatisfaction is that I seldom ~share~ things I’m passionate about.

I am definitely not aromantic and someone to (reciprocally) love is basically goal #1. That’s what brought me to therapy, but then therapy showed me that that desire is wrapped up in a number of other ways I feel disengaged, and it’s like everything fell into question. The above post is an excerpt of a like 3000 word journal entry attempting to answer the original question, but the long and short of it is, my passion for life has been diminishing and feels like it’s just become flat, and I’m torn between finding ways to revive it or to transition to a somewhat different approach to life, starting a new chapter based on learning to use my time and gifts in new ways. I dunno, it’s been complicated.

best thread on this board

ed.b you mentioned "spiritual fulfillment" - i'm wondering if you have any thoughts / ideas about that?

i am gonna be alone forever and will only be showing my art to 2-3 people who care about it at all!!! i guess i’m fine with this. but. idk, if you feel like you can at any point, you *should* share what you’re passionate about. it’s a point of connection. people will respond it (eventually)

I liked your post v much ed, and again appreciate everyone who felt able to hear the question, which is one im going to keep wrestling with for some time I think (as you may tell from updates).

"
non-reactive pushback against work pressure

please explain!

― z_tbd,"

in work or uncertain contexts im realising that i have always tended to try to funnel conflict/potential conflict) towards agreement or the obvious path forward before it became bare opposition- its likewise always "my job" to make sure things have a route forward if resources or timelines or etc are proving a challenge, regardless of my actual role in team/group

I've recognized these traits as major contributors to my work stress and have started to eg prepare in advance to be just another input into whatever the shared problem is- just communicating my position same as everyone else, or if conflict seems to be coming to prepare a position to be repeated or held but without a defensive or tense mindset, and above all without an apologetic aspect

nb this is a thread for personal wrangling with the universe im sure these realisation are likely built in automatic to many adults but part of my new vibe is that conscious application of the obvious stuff can be as transformational as any stroke of actual brilliance, and has the benefit of predictability to boot

Predictability and practicality both, definitely

Re: spiritual fulfillment.

So glad you asked. My sense is that some of my dissatisfaction comes from having constructed my life on attachments to ideas about Who I Am and What I Do, only to realize those things are hardly solid and basically insular. When I think of spiritual fulfillment, what I imagine is feeling connected to something bigger than myself, even if that thing is literally just the outside world, to have an awareness that life doesn’t begin and end with me, nor all the awfulness in the news. In the past few years, the pattern I’ve noticed is that the ideas that really resonate for me come from a secular buddhist framework, and I’ve become very curious about that, and am thinking that might be something I start exploring more seriously (trying to meditate more, learn more about it, and attempting the challenging work of integrating that into life). This feels like it ~may~ be one of the “answers” to crossing to the other side of midlife. Also, psychedelics have helped a lot in this regard (add one to Jefferson Airplane’s scorecard)

these are very resonant posts!

In a sense little is given to you, but realizing that you can build new 'gifts' to yourself at any time in your life (obviously its harder the older you are because you have less time, nevertheless..) is good.

its likewise always "my job" to make sure things have a route forward if resources or timelines or etc are proving a challenge, regardless of my actual role in team/group

Sounds like what was called the 'Permanent Secretary profile' - aka ESTJ/ENTJ - in the Myers Briggs public sector leadership course I attended about 15 years ago.

hey ed.b i resonate a lot with what you're saying. i think buddhism would be a great thing to explore, its ideas certainly have helped me grow.. "out of myself", if that makes sense.

That’s probably meant to be funny but I feel it’s genuinely insensitive to aromantic people.

― trm (tombotomod)

sigh. ok. if we're gonna do Discourse on Aimless' shitpost... some aro people might find it offensive maybe? idk? if there's someone who's aro who finds it offensive (i'm not aro) i think that's totally valid

i was just gonna groan and point out that the joke had been done better before and move on

it was funny in "a serious man"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MncMCqdPMZ0

90% of humor is about the delivery

skip to 3:56 btw unless you want to watch the opening credits

Going to be completely honest and say that I don't understand aromantic people.

A friend of friends is asexual, aromantic, and agender, and they are the most confusing person to me. I just, like, don't get it. But I have also been a horny gay teenager for most of my life, and so I have my own hangups, obv.

I think I know multiple aromantic people who don’t make a big deal of it (because frankly why would you)

i am gonna be alone forever and will only be showing my art to 2-3 people who care about it at all!!! i guess i’m fine with this. but. idk, if you feel like you can at any point, you *should* share what you’re passionate about. it’s a point of connection. people will respond it (eventually)

― ivy

this is true

today i'm just thinking about the gifts given me and what i'm doing with them

-

gift 1: i'm a pretty good shitposter
what i'm doing with it: finally got a bsky account and am shitposting.

honestly i'm more scared of the idea that people will be passionate about my work. this week i wrote this pretty intense essay about the Philosophy Tube video "Men. Abuse. Trauma." that was really personally important to me. i shared it with a friend and it really triggered them. i worry that i'm being socially inappropriate by sharing stuff with other people.

i just have always valued saying shit that's "offensive", not for the sake of being offensive but because there's a lot of stuff i'm ashamed to say and sometimes i need to just say it and live with the cost.

-

gift 2: i care about other people
what i'm doing with it: this is something i'm good at - the institutions around us kind of undervalue it. there's not a lot of support for people when we do that. "carer fatigue". so i try to care for myself just as much as i care for other people. my next-door neighbor has a bumper sticker that says something like "the government doesn't care about us, we must care for each other", which is true. and also i must care for myself. i'm taking this gift and using it to build a skill i don't have naturally, a skill that's really difficult for me to learn. a friend told me this week that it's apparent in the way i talk that i value myself. that makes me happy, that validation. i've done a lot of work on that.

i've also learned a lot of it by watching people here. a lot of other folks here have also struggled, are struggling, with caring for themselves. i talk a lot and i also do listen to other people. i know it's hard to believe (in what you can't see) one's being listened to in the absence of direct validation. i wish it was easier to give that, not in the sense of heart emoji or hug emoji. something that feels more personal.

-

gift 3: i was born with a big beautiful cock
what i'm doing with it: the lesson here is that some gifts aren't actually things i can use. it's ok to not use them. it's ok to throw away one's gifts. there's this idea of "with great power comes great responsibility", which to me is indistinguishable from the "white man's burden". and i think both are rubbish.

me being born with a huge cock is an example of what tvtropes would call "blessed with suck". no, wait, i've got that backwards. "cursed with awesome". i am also blessed with suck. that gift also doesn't get much use. it gets some use, but not as much as it would if i wasn't a lesbian.

what i've learned is that it's ok to let some of my "gifts" go to waste. sometimes someone has a "gift" that isn't going to do them a lot of good.

-

i could probably say more but that's enough for now. there's a story about miles telling trane that his solos were too long. trane responds "i'm sorry miles, i don't know how to stop". miles shoots back with "try taking the fucking horn out of your mouth". again, i'm blessed with suck - that kind of thing is hard for me. i'm learning.

For years I've read the word as "aromatic" which, well.

The Stench Of Love

Incidentally, one of the ways I’ve decided I want to use my T & Gs is to spend minimal energy engaging with ~online discourse~ and/or getting offended (or offended by proxy) online, and to (at least try to) focus my energy on ways of productively acting within my circle of influence.

Still haven’t entirely figured that out, though.

psychedelics have helped a lot in this regard

I would like to reinforce brimstead's suggestion of your investigating buddhism.

for myself, psychedelics prepared me for the Tao Teh Ching, which in turn opened up a path for me into zen buddhism, which is the particular form of buddhism that has worked best for me. but to coin a phrase, in the end it all comes down to 'three chords and the four noble truths'.

just based on what you wrote, I feel certain you will succeed in finding your way into the kind of spiritual connection to life you are hoping to discover. once found, it should ease many of the sources of mental pain that tend to lead one into acedia and alienation.

And just cuz the topic came up… After not really caring for most of my life, I’ve recently become quite self-conscious about my unimpressive penis. It’s like I’ve emotionally matured in all other respects, but on this point have regressed to being 15. It’s frustrating, because I don’t need new ways to feel bad about my body.

Sex has always been a challenge for me, as in, I’ve been sexually inactive for most of my life. Exploring and experiencing my sexuality is one of the ways I ~want~ to be spending my life, but for the time being, I’m putting my time and resources toward getting there/working through the psychological obstacles that are holding me back.

one of the ways I’ve decided I want to use my T & Gs

Fun crossover between this thread, the alcohol thread, and the Billy Joel thread

thought for a second Ed B was talking about tonic & gin

And just cuz the topic came up… After not really caring for most of my life, I’ve recently become quite self-conscious about my unimpressive penis. It’s like I’ve emotionally matured in all other respects, but on this point have regressed to being 15. It’s frustrating, because I don’t need new ways to feel bad about my body.

Sex has always been a challenge for me, as in, I’ve been sexually inactive for most of my life. Exploring and experiencing my sexuality is one of the ways I ~want~ to be spending my life, but for the time being, I’m putting my time and resources toward getting there/working through the psychological obstacles that are holding me back.

― ed.b

honestly i think that's pretty positive... i've definitely got a lot of issues about my sexuality and as a result haven't had many sexual encounters outside of one, uh, suboptimal long term relationship... i think it's worth spending the time doing that, speaking as someone who's been doing that for a while. i'm glad you're doing that work and i'm glad you're able to talk about it!

i'm not doing too much with my time these days because i'm quite burnt out and really don't have a lot of energy. i'd like to take on more work but that's just too much right now, which sucks because i'd like to save more money.

trying to look after myself as best as i can - seeing friends for wee lowkey hangouts, getting out into the countryside for nature walks, playing football, reading, smoking a bit of weed, taking shrooms now and again. listening to quite a lot of coil, and also dub LPs

also sometimes i think i might be on the aromantic spectrum, because there's been some chat about that subject here. and i'm asexual too. just in case anyone was wondering

I have a nice dick but my oral skills are how I prefer to express my sexuality tbrr

re: secular buddhism and such, i also really lean that way. i will say that meditation completely came alive for me when i imagined 'oneness' or 'presence' as a person with good intention (god). like i know it isn't a person at all, but person-ness is a part of it. also when meditation stopped being a chore and more an opportunity to rest, relax and feel good, that was a breakthrough. not guarding against thought but relaxing mind, putting it in service of being. i've also started trying some loving-kindness techniques. you repeat a mantra to yourself i.e. "i wish you happiness, strength and peace." by speaking to yourself in the third person it's like you are splitting yourself into two people, the person who loves and the person who receives the love. and being the person who loves gives you the things that you're wishing for yourself. sort of like how petting a cat, like really giving them pure affection and love, heals you more than it heals the cat. it's very nice! and it can go really deep. all those things you don't like about yourself - you can learn how to love them. what they mean about you. kind of the first time i've understood self-love as not like "doing fun things" or consuming experiences or feeding your ego, but actually expressing love to yourself in a sustained manner.

its a finite existence, a privilege and a miracle

how are you spending it all, and how often do you think of it in these terms

― tuah dé danann (darraghmac)

i think of it in these terms very often, maybe every day
i don’t know how helpful that is, to the extent that it contributes to a burden of responsibility to “do more” - i’m sure this has been argued to death upthread.
but it’s very moving to think of everything you’re provided as a “gift”, as in an affirmation of love
those two things negate each other and it’s very difficult, maybe impossible, to stay attuned to one or the other all the time.

anyway, this has been the hardest year of my life that i can remember. depression and anxiety have become completely unmanageable and debilitating.
at the same time, i really like myself a lot for the first time in my life. that’s completely new.
there’s a lot of crosstalk between this thread and the Buddhism one atm, but i kind of attribute both of these developments to “spiritual growth” lol

im beatifically not dictating whether the phrasing implies a burden to do more or that viewing the "gifts" as having a literal giver, if it hotsbyou like that as a question ive no position on that

but i liked yr answer

im beatifically not dictating whether the phrasing implies a burden to do more or that viewing the "gifts" as having a literal giver

i appreciate that and agree that it’s not implied. the giver could be depersonalized, like "the universe”, of course
for the first thing, maybe “burden” is the wrong word. but it makes me *antsy* sometimes, the way i might feel if i went on a sightseeing vacation and spent half the day lounging around my hotel room.

good analogy!

I met a friend to go see a play a few weeks ago. They showed up dressed in a cute button-up and long pants. After the play was finished, we got poutine nearby. They unbuttoned their shirt and showed me the tee underneath, it was the I ♥️ NY design except it said I ♥️ TO (Toronto, that is).

Affirming love for a city that is oftentimes profoundly loveable felt at that moment like a low-key radical act. Like, as if asserting this love (even just by wearing a t-shirt), forcing this assertion, it would yield actual love for the city. I said “we should all be wearing this shirt! If we all pretend to believe it, maybe we’ll start to believe it.”

I started applying this idea to my own day-to-day— forcing my mind to love myself, my place of residence, my every activity, and it’s actually been having a noticeable effect. I ♥️ my body and my job and my boyfriend and my dog and every meal I eat and every time I get to sleep in my own bed, so there

lately, spending it on the toilet

1) Waiting for my DC condo to sell, then I'll really get started on what I want to do (assuming I ever identify that).
2) Brooding on the old photographs my phone memory periodically burps up--did I look that bad? I thought I was having a good time.
3) Wishing my backache would hurry up and heal; surely then I'll feel better about going out and doing things.

xposts: Funny, a few days ago I was reflecting on a memory of seeing someone wearing an “I ❤️ T.O.” shirt, when “T.O.” the branding was a new thing.

I’m waiting at the airport to return to Toronto, feeling less than thrilled. Time away tends to give me a lot of clarity on what I’m doing in life (hence all my sudden posts here), often framed around a heightened awareness of the discontent I feel with my life in Toronto and daydream about moving. So, not very tuned into what’s loveable about it rn, but also ready to enjoy the city, challenge myself to do things that make me feel alive in the way I do when I’m travelling.

hoping j.lu's condo has been in a bidding war ever since tbh

Enjoying my time. I'm enjoying my gifts, too. I'm currently trying to find a location within 300 miles where I can safely hike and camp without wildfires nearby or too much wildfire smoke to ruin both my lungs and my enjoyment. It's a bother, but I'm sure I'll turn up a few alternatives I can pursue.

i've been memorising audition monologues! :o

!

say more this is exactly the stuff

are you going to return to the stage, tracer hand? tower theatre or similar?

i have been building on my balcony garden lately. chard growing very well. just planted some chrysanthemums, sentences i thought i'd never say.

lol Ronan you nailed it in one. i wanted to go up for Festen 😬 but (perhaps luckily) I think I'm going to have too many trips on during the rehearsal time. so i am looking about a little. have you ever seen anything at Tower? i saw the musical version of Moby Dick there recently (!) and while it was a little uneven i was pretty blown away by a lot of it

oh shit, that's cool they're doing festen. i saw my friend john do a play with them, whom you've met, it was good and now they have their own theatre it's p great as a setup.

i joined for a while a few years ago, but i had to stop acting as chronic illness basically meant it was quite stressful to have set dates when you had to feel well, especially if working on a play with others. i feel grand a lot of the time but had a bad experience with a previous play where months of work was followed by a big flare-up of fatigue etc the nights of the show.

I met a tower theatre person at a wedding recently who was doing some stage managing for moby dick at that open-air theatre in cornwall, sounded interesting!

Haha jeez it's a small world?? The stage management was especially impressive I have to say - everybody moving and dancing and fighting and rolling barrels around, one second being part of a boat, the next second playing an accordion, just outstanding. Can't even imagine trying to translate that into such a different environment as an open-air seaside theatre

technical school

i've been running some new trails lately, when i have a weekend or a day off. today i ran a trail close to where i grew up, about 30 miles from the bigger city where i currently live. this area has exploded with tech firms in new multi-story office buildings with names like "spaces" and "etogy". housing has continued to expand into field after field. it's a very religious and conservative place with a stepford wives feel to it. i avoid visiting because it reminds me of my family, who still live there as far as i know, and who i've removed from my life.

the trail follows a little creek (still running in august!) up into the foothills of one of the highest mountains in the wasatch, lone peak. once i dodged a horde of tech mountain bike dads, i found the foot- and horse-traffic only trail, beautifully situated on the other side of the creek from the dirt road, pleasantly winding upward with numerous stream crossings. two miles up and down hollows and ridge lines without a soul or new construction development in sight.

the whole experience was beautiful and light overall. a little bit of heaviness being in a place where everyone is so rich and rule-bound. but the mountains are the mountains and i expanded out on the trail. i get so much joy out of traveling a few hours into the utah desert in order to run on rock in the wilderness, and i make it a point to run every day when i make those trips, but realistically i can only do them every couple of months. so i've decided to make running field trips to new places close by with as much of the enthusiasm as my trips to the desert as i can muster when i have a weekend morning or some extra time. it felt good to mainly treat a place that is historically bad for me as just a trail destination.

i love it!!!!

i was in Utah a year and a half ago with my family and was just stunned by it. even the flight, coming in to land at SLC, and you look around at the mountains, it's absurdly beautiful. there's something conforting about the idea that nature's grandeur and beauty - and brutality - will outlast any of us

i was down west last weekend but didnt get to the part of it that calls me home and i miss that feeling , im going to schedule another trip soon thats going to be mainly about that

there's something conforting about the idea that nature's grandeur and beauty - and brutality - will outlast any of us

I've leaned into this more and more and feel very relaxed about it.

getting ready for a hellish week of work during which I will actually be on leave for two days but extremely doubtful I will get to fully relax and chill. The Sunday Scaries literally started last night during the NFL season kickoff game.

there's something conforting about the idea that nature's grandeur and beauty - and brutality - will outlast any of us

I've leaned into this more and more and feel very relaxed about it.

― Ned Raggett, Friday, September 5, 2025 9:56 PM (fourteen minutes ago) bookmarkflaglink

yeah absolutely! it's comforting. my roommate when i lived in moab called it "being held by the rock." the lifespan of the earth stretches into the unimaginable past and continues into the incomprehensible future. and we're a part of it for a split second here and now. and maybe that split second is more connected to the whole of it than our ego leads us to believe...

i was in Utah a year and a half ago with my family and was just stunned by it. even the flight, coming in to land at SLC, and you look around at the mountains, it's absurdly beautiful

that's cool! did you make it to any national parks? it is absurdly beautiful, i agree. even the west desert / great basin area. but more and more, as far as the people here go, i find this recent onion headline gets it: "Salt Lake City Hoping to Boost Tourism By Reminding Visitors They're Free to Leave at Any Time". it's a hard place to fit in if you're an authentic human.

I was in San Francisco for a few days a couple of weeks ago, and my flight back to Montana was mostly populated by tourists coming to Glacier National Park for the weekend. I could hear people gasping "oh my god" as they looked out the window as the plane was descending, and my wife and I looked at each other and laughed, because that was exactly our reaction when we first got here almost three years ago. Like, we didn't realize that the word "breathtaking" was a literal thing until we got here and looked around.

I could hear people gasping "oh my god" as they looked out the window

I had a similar experience flying from Frankfurt>San Francisco in July, and this teenage German girl at the window next to me was just absolutely mesmerized by the San Francisco Bay upon descent.. people were leaning over to see the Golden Gate Bridge and even that stupid circular Apple building

Sometimes we forget our surroundings

last weekend with the time given me, i got on very well with my in laws (notable, this)

this week with the gifts given me, ive kept a very even keel through a tough but rewarding work week and now i get to walk dogs and cook chilli and meet college friends and play some football before i need to think about it again

small but worthy things

In the last two months (i.e. since I last posted here, reflecting on being in a midlife crisis), I’ve done a lot to advance my Time ‘n Gifts life-plan. I did a lot of cycling this summer, knowing it’s one of the few things I can do here that still makes me feel “alive” in a very present way. I’m sitting in on an undergrad course on Buddhism and Psychology that just started, and am planning to take a meditation/“exploring buddhism” class that starts next week. And I’m preparing my applications to therapy school. And I booked a vacation to East Asia because fuck it, I have the time and resources to go on an ambitious trip over the xmas holidays, and that’s what I want to do for myself when I’m not letting fear talk me down. Dunno if I’m on the ~right~ path, but feels a lot more like I’m on ~a~ path, which I’m hoping works out. Granted (given my bad tendency to always present my life as being on the upswing), I still feel lonely and alienated and empty much of the time, am as lost as ever as to how to find partners, and am tired all the time, but that’s felt less intense than it did earlier this year.

last week i experienced a really perfect moment swimming in a marsh at high tide, just a stunningly beautiful place where i’ve been a million times. i made myself a little dizzy thinking of all the things that had to align for me to experience this, starting small and getting more and more ridiculous, up to ’the earth had to be a certain distance from the sun’

all that’s really great, ed.b!!

(given my bad tendency to always present my life as being on the upswing)

ime throwing myself into doing in order to get out of a rut has been frustratingly slow medicine and the hardest thing is to be patient

last week i experienced a really perfect moment swimming in a marsh at high tide, just a stunningly beautiful place where i’ve been a million times

oh i love this. i've had a few moments like this on one of my regular running trails over the last few months, which i've been on hundreds of times at this point. the trail is perched on the edge of a big gully. just roll up on a random weekday (20 minute drive through the suburbs). start running the same run as always and slip into paradise. the sun, the sagebrush, the birds, the woodchips, the golden grass, the breath and the sweat, the music, the mountain in front of me, even the horse shit. paradise! on a weekday before work. the drive back through the burbs to my inbox which i'll be tied to for the rest of the day is a little more challenging lol. very much the definition of 'liminal' i realized today.

ed.b your update sounds more excited and energetic than some of your earlier posts. it's inspiring to see your tenacity in action.

The other day I went out of my way to drive to the giant lake near my house just so I could walk down to the shore and stick my hands in the water, and on my way back to my car a puppy (12 weeks old - I asked) came running up to smell me and chew on my fingers. All told it was a half hour out of my day, on my way to pick up lunch, but it made the whole week better.

Sailing the Sydney harbour with new friends
Learning Arabic
Being more intentional about staying away from the screens (yes, hypocritical!)

Smoking and drinking

ive ctrl f'd your posts itt

the only person keeping you the other side of that line that makes you a shithead about this thread is you

go forth and think about that, by which i do mean fuck off and stay fucked off until you're prepared not to be a cunt

there's a use for your time and gifts, whoever gave them to you

the deflatormouse thing about getting almost a high/rush from moment of "being" in the right place is something im more receptive to all the time, and definitely being outdoors with my senses open more often is key

I managed to save my son from drowning with my gifts the other week. He had an epileptic seizure while he was in an 8ft garden pool. That might sound like a joke but honestly an 8ft pool can be an absolute death zone for an epileptic and there is always the question can you get someone out of harm mid-seizure, are you strong enough to pull them out. A 6ft heavy person having a seizure, in the rigid tonic phase of the fit in a few feet of water is a heck of a dangerous situation if you don't act fast and decisively. I had prepared for this moment for a decade and have strict pool rules, most importantly always be there, in an active life guard state of mind.

It was pretty simple, I just yanked him straight out sideways onto the grass. Was never sure I had the upper body strength to do this. There is always an emergency knife to cut the pool open in the dread contingency that I'm no good at pulling him out and he's gone under the water. I look back with horror that if I hadn't stuck to my rules and gone and made a brew at that moment, then he'd likely be dead. But also I feel kind of happy and vindicated that sticking to my pool rules and being mentally and physically prepared for this moment absolutely paid off and what could have been a catastrophe was just a slightly stressful afternoon.

fuck knows if just shoehorning this shit onto the wrong thread, because I'm not entirely sure if I get the spirit and intentions of this thread. Just scroll on if I'm doing it wrong!

its 100% right for this thread calz!

would agree, that is a good use of time and gifts

D-Mac’s aggression and anger towards me is confounding. Calling me a shithead, telling me to F off, and I’ve never even engaged with them
?

i set out the context in my post, im happy enough with the feedback provided tbh.

Why are you calling me a cunt ?

It’s really confusing why ilx continues to tolerate the presence of this aggressive drunk. Is there a mod out there that can explain why this is tolerated, or is it just out of your hands until enough people bother to fp?

fuck knows if just shoehorning this shit onto the wrong thread, because I'm not entirely sure if I get the spirit and intentions of this thread. Just scroll on if I'm doing it wrong!

You’re not and you’re not joking either about the amount of water; anyone can drown in the smallest amount of water if they’re incapacitated enough. Are you both ok now?

Perhaps calstars was drinking and smoking 'mindfully' tbf

It’s really consuming why gyac and d mac have this vendetta against me

Because I posted “smoking and drinking?”

Calstars, we've never interacted but dude, I'm going to take your bafflement with good faith and say that you have a habit of wandering into threads when you're drunk and saying stuff that is either off-topically jarring or straight-up offensive. I don't pay too much attention to be 100% sure, but you never seem to acknowledge it or atone for it. It's historical and cumulative, which explains why the reaction seems outsized to you and why there aren't a slew of supportive posts when you reach out for them.

Feel free to ignore this if it sounds condescending.

Calz, you continue to amaze me and you did an awesome thing; I hope you guys are OK.

🩷 calz

oh he's fine (and thanks for asking, gyac), I doubt he even remembers it. His frequency of full tonic-clonic seizures are just not that often, sometimes a few in a year and sometimes he'll go 18 months without having one. Which is why I don't really get used to it like carers for epileptics who can have multiple fits a day do. Most frequently he has minor focal seizures, which are a hazard, but not a lot to deal with. The tonic-clonic seizures are enough to make anyone dealing with the situation to feel more than a bit queasy, panicky and generally sad. The purple complexion, the bleeding from the mouth can look scarily dramatic, but it's just caused by a bitten tongue. I have learned to be calmer and get over them quicker than I used to. And some people have a hell of a lot more to contend than I do.

Sure they do, but that doesn’t mean it’s not still a lot for you. Regardless I’m really glad that worked out for you as it did. We should all be so lucky to be so loved as your son is.

most ppl have a lot less to deal with calz. you do brilliantly

calstars, you wide-eyed innocent, did you notice that you couldn't post between Aug. 27th and Sept. 3rd? That's because you got FPs from 20 different ilxors within a month, so you got the banhammer. You're not far from getting 51 FPs within 6 months, which means you'll get a one-month posting ban, if not a perma-perma. Your shit doesn't play, and you know it, and you know why.

wow calz, well done and shit that must've been scary.
I remember not even noticing my own kid, in a pool of 3 kids, slide off an inflatable and go under - I must've been watching the other one for about 2 seconds. Takes no time at all.

Oh yes. I have had eyes in the back of my head for 23 years now!

Calzino, I know you know this, but you are a fucking awesome dad.

Salut to calz indeed. That's the business right there.

calz YES this is what we are HERE FOR

calzino is a champ.

today’s answer from me is 1,667 NYT crosswords in a row, with help from my stalwart best friend and partner in life

I think I created a new rattle in my driver's side door listening to Cat Power's first record at obscene volume while driving home in the rain yesterday.

That's awesone, calz. Glad you are all ok.

glad your son has you, calz

good on you calzino, i'm glad you're both ok

i've been trying to cope with mild to moderate autism burnout as best as i can. gonna reduce the amount of work i do, go to therapy more often, avoid big group socialising, stay at home listening to folk music, get out in nature, avoid checking the news. that kind of thing

am also learning how to deal with some chronic health issues i've developed this year (knee pain, back pain, arthritis, tinnitus). it's going not too bad so far

- woods walks

- football in the late summer rain is the new feature

- signed up to mubi and committing to phone-down immersive watching of what is on offer there going into the autumn

- handling work ever more suitably in the right rhythm and levels, keeping it stowed firmly in the 9-5 headtime

calzino, you're my ILX hero.

I'll be reading Stanley Elkin and drinking coffee at my local bookstore in about an hour. Then I'll go home to cook turkey picadillo, sip a martini, and watch Nanny.

Small steps forward till you look back and find you’ve travelled further than you thought - doing it a lot for me this year. Simple pleasures. Still thinking about the 99 I had a couple of weeks back that was straight out of childhood and an incredible part of summer. Spending money on certain small luxuries. Trying to do better with saving. Trying to see the people I love more. Knowing where my red lines are.

calzino, you legend! being a fantastic carer to your son is an amazing use of your time and gifts. the tonic-clonic seizures sound absolutely horrifying, you must have developed nerves of steel to be able to find calm in a situation like that.

the deflatormouse thing about getting almost a high/rush from moment of "being" in the right place is something im more receptive to all the time, and definitely being outdoors with my senses open more often is key

Exaclty, nature draws me out into my body, my extremities and by breath where otherwise I would tend to withdraw all the awareness back into my head and get caught up in the loop of converting my experience into words.

i've had a few moments like this on one of my regular running trails over the last few months, which i've been on hundreds of times at this point. the trail is perched on the edge of a big gully. just roll up on a random weekday (20 minute drive through the suburbs). start running the same run as always and slip into paradise. the sun, the sagebrush, the birds, the woodchips, the golden grass, the breath and the sweat, the music, the mountain in front of me, even the horse shit. paradise! on a weekday before work. the drive back through the burbs to my inbox which i'll be tied to for the rest of the day is a little more challenging lol. very much the definition of 'liminal' i realized today.

Yeah more than just ‘general nature’ I feel there’s a very strong connection to one’s own local ecoregion, a deep reaffirmation of your roots that occurs- for me it’s parts of Long Island where my cousins grew up. Rocky shores on bays and marshy outlets, gnarly driftwood everywhere. A rainbow of 600 million year old clays oozing out of the sand under the pressure of eroding bluffs, erratic boulders in the water and etc. Ice age shit. The bids! Yeah, I mean when I look up and there’s a fucking hawk, it’s like a portal to the ancient world.

It’s a grueling 5 hour round trip on the train for me, which is not a complaint tbc. If the particular crappy rail line was more effective, all of the nature would be gone. Most of it is gone anyway.

This has been a really important part of my life that’s got me through some dark times. In the last year I’ve been losing that connection, it’s very painful, there are moments where it comes through, I’m like sitting by the radio listening to a distant broadcast, picking up little bits of music through the static.

love your description of long island

i mean, the huge majority of it is cookie cutter suburbia at this point.

today I am using my time and gifts to clean and cook

I ate a plum today.

Hey I was saving that for breakfast

I'm sorry

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold

Now I’m spending my time & gifts getting the joke for the third time, thanks

a fine use tbh

i am turning the mother in laws laptop from a gasping end of life windows 11 hp with an i3 3rd gen and 4gb ddr3 ram into a beast of a chromebook good for another decade with an i3 3rd gen and 8gb ddr3 ram there won't be a cow milked in central mayo the night i bring this sparkler home lads

actual weekend at home without visits or guests

so i am tackling a project to collate, deduplicate, organise, tag and host twenty years or more of digital photos across every camera, drive, sd card, phone, laptop and online hosting app i was able to remember and pull together

nice chill cup of tea activity across a few hours each day

I reorganized my spice cabinet yesterday!

what powershell or exif code snippets can you share to assist in this task for other pls

i woke up at 6 and went to the gym. i make a shift to gym mornings and running/yoga afternoons when the weather is cool enough. which means 6 months of driving in the predawn and seeing the usual group of morning gym rats. it's much less crowded than later in the day and generally kind of quiet and mellow.

i have been scheming about how to get to the desert soon. i have to get new car tires before the winter gets here, and i thought i'd do that first before i make it down to the desert again. that and high lodging prices pushed me back to a late october trip. but i'm buckling. i found a cheap motel somewhere a little off the beaten path and i've reserved for the first weekend in october. partner might come along on this one. we have a friend in the area too.

live band karaoke, I might have made a fool of myself but it felt really good to get a couple of songs out

Do you have a “set list” in your head or otherwise recorded somewhere that you maintain for karaoke nights? I have a short list of songs in my phone for exactly this purpose

This band has a (lengthy) list of songs they do posted online, and I picked out a few that I thought I could do so I could practice/make sure I can still hit the notes. Did a Radiohead song and an Alice In Chains song (struggled a bit there, my voice wasn’t 100% after the first one). I’ve got a couple more in my back pocket in case I go again.

My brother showed up at my house on Friday morning with a cooler full of vegetables from his garden. I turned the artichokes into spread right away and then made a week’s supply of “creamed kale”. Zucchini bread today and bf is gonna do something with the eggplants

Since I got to Vancouver it’s just been hiking and exercise and work and friends and I have been very happy. Until this past week. I fell into a depression, more like a PTSD spiral, really. That lasted a few days, exacerbated by a “you have to sit at your computer for twelve hours a day this week” project that needed finishing.

Today I can take half the day off, work wise, and I’m lying in bed thinking “what should I do to break through this spiral?” I think I’m gonna swim in the motherfucking ocean is what I’m gonna do

I have a floating repertoire of about 15 songs when I tire of something new. xxpost

Oddly they have It’s a Shame About Ray in their list, so I picked that the first time I went, a few months ago. They seemed happy someone picked it.

Did a couple more live band karaoke songs tonight and then I met Wade Boggs. It was a good evening.

whoa, nice! what was wade boggs like?

He was very kind, and really focused on me while we were talking. Shook my hand a couple of times, asked me my name. Pretty sure he was wearing his WS ring.

hoping j.lu's condo has been in a bidding war ever since tbh

― tuah dé danann (darraghmac), Sunday, August 31, 2025 6:55 PM (two weeks ago) bookmarkflaglink

Thank you. Unfortunately there is no news. (I would have thought proximity to the Russian Embassy would be desirable under the current administration?)

I want to take some of my current thoughts to a 77 Board thread, but here I'll list some things I am anticipating:

1) Shudder to Think at the Black Cat
2) Noir City, Silent Cinema Showcase, and Classic Film Weekend at AFI Silver
3) Oscar bait trickling into local theaters

Right now, wasting it listening to David Bowie’s …hours in a misguided attempt to have an informed opinion

And getting the title rong

J. Lu, see you at Shudder to Think!

I thought about a recurring problem that has been bothering many people for years, and had a good idea for how to fix it, just the other day

preparation h has already been invented

tomboto you can't just leave us hanging like that

A perpetual motion machine

he shot yerman kirk

I’m on the program committee for an annual conference where we have three main types of sessions that run throughout the day - about 75 or so prepared talks and panels that are selected from hundreds of submissions, a dozen or two working group meetings with formal agendas and chairpersons and such, and another dozen or so “birds of a feather” (BoF) sessions that are more ad hoc. It’s important to note that the working group and BoF sessions are interactive and never recorded, while most (but not ALL) of the panels and presentations ARE recorded and slides put up online.

For several years it’s been a challenge trying to schedule the parallel sessions so that attendees can optimize their time each day between the different sessions based on their various interests. This is also complicated by the fact that the paid conference organizers generally handle the scheduling of the BoFs and working groups while the volunteers in the program committee arrange the schedule for the presentations and panels.

So my idea was simply this: the program committee should schedule all of the not-to-be-recorded presentations alongside each other, and all of the to-be-recorded presentations alongside each other (think stripes, not checkerboards) and the conference organizers should ONLY schedule the BoFs and working groups during the times when recorded presentations are happening. This way, attendees can go to more interactive sessions without missing out on unrecorded presentations, and then catch up later by watching anything they missed once the recordings are posted on line.

I mean, it’s bog stupid simple. And I’ll acknowledge it puts attendees in a tough spot when it comes time to pick which unrecorded presentations they want to go to during those “stripes” of programming. But it’s better than the mess it’s been in the past.

somehow gotten through a 6 month run of crazy understaffing and a massive workload to a place where i clocked off for two weeks leave yesterday with everything in shape and zero items left on to-do....and no unread mails

feels like a lot of progress in my own sense of what i can handle and how i do or dont let stress in, feels great

Just used the phrase "...the best use of my time and gifts" on an application statement. Hoping ILXors are on the admissions committee.

i am gonna be alone forever and will only be showing my art to 2-3 people who care about it at all!!! i guess i’m fine with this. but. idk, if you feel like you can at any point, you *should* share what you’re passionate about. it’s a point of connection. people will respond it (eventually)

― ivy., Saturday, July 5, 2025 3:05 PM (two months ago) bookmarkflaglink

Don't know if this comment planted the seed in my head, but I had the insight to make a DJ mix record it to cassette, design and print my own cover art for it, and just give out copies as a gift. I hadn't made a proper mix in many years, because it felt pointless to put energy into dumping another un-listened to mix in an oversaturated sea of online mixes. But instead, I'm decidedly approaching it with the same love and care I'd put into it if it were released by a real label, just cuz. I realized the work is important because I've invested importance into it, not because people decided it was good, which feels very freeing. Also, knowing most people don't have cassette players, it's not about the mix but the gift.

Anyways, 6 weeks later, I'm 98% done the digital version (cassettes will have to wait until I get access to a silkscreening studio), for which I created my own website, with my own design and anecdotes about how I got each record and what it means to me. It does feel like I've made something meaningful, because it's independent, and because it emphasizes context, personality, and history over the hyper-convenience of streaming platforms, algorithmic distribution, and the pressure of standing out in the slop-feed. Sometimes that meaningfulness feels tenuous, or even absent; in any case, this has been a fun project. No plans to make more mixes, but highlights that I need creative projects I can put my whole self into.

that sounds great!!

yes

setting clearer boundaries at work

tough for me but feels very rewarding to even take control of the attempt

Important, that.

i am turning the mother in laws laptop from a gasping end of life windows 11 hp with an i3 3rd gen and 4gb ddr3 ram into a beast of a chromebook good for another decade with an i3 3rd gen and 8gb ddr3 ram there won't be a cow milked in central mayo the night i bring this sparkler home lads

― tuah dé danann (darraghmac), 07 September 2025 22:09 (two months ago) bookmarkflaglink

swapping out the bloody ram was 7/8 the work

under top case under keyboard under second case under hard drive under the fucking *motherboard*

Small steps forward till you look back and find you’ve travelled further than you thought - doing it a lot for me this year. Simple pleasures. Still thinking about the 99 I had a couple of weeks back that was straight out of childhood and an incredible part of summer. Spending money on certain small luxuries. Trying to do better with saving. Trying to see the people I love more. Knowing where my red lines are.

― Marsee playground (gyac), 07 September 2025 17:20 (three months ago) bookmarkflaglink

this was a very good update, reading back

it was tbf also a very good 99

i broke a lot of things down this year (after breaking down a lot right at the start of it) and, mid december looking back at this thread, i can see the small steps i have taken throughout, and it starts to feel like a lot of progress.

a lot of payoff conversations this month, from prompts and starts that weren't comfortable or natural to me to push for (nor to follow up on with) what i wanted as a focus, and its not going to be a post about "the secret" lads- but what i did with the time and gifts given me this year was, in the end, to put them to my own service and in small step, as nicely described in the quoted post above, to get used to doing that and thinking like that.

from there to here across most measures that i would have prioritised it feels like transformative results, but we wont declare any victories just yet.

also, worked out a killer solo acoustic road to hell parts 1 & 2 throughout the year, so write that down

Now that's all good stuff.

Did a couple of good healthy diet switchups in recent months, rather appreciating it.

I try to immerse more in the physical elements. I spent a lot of life ignoring how I felt, physically, emotionally. I'm more contented to sit with things, comfortable or not. Meditation practice has enabled that. I think a lot about zooming out so far that in 3d space I'm less that a point, and zooming out in time, my existence is nothing. But zooming in, each of us is everything and all, immense. There is so much to wonder at.

― Jaq

this post. i should print it and tape it to the fridge door

xp good to hear!

yeah that jaq post is an all-timer. i credit meditation with just about everything at this point. i started november 2024. it's been the best year of my life.

i had a heavy chest last night and called a doctor this morning

this is radical self care lads

genuine congratulations at this! I usually wait a month or more to decide if the pain/ache/symptom goes away by itself or not by which time I've got used to a slight limp or whatever and don't bother with any further action.

oh

well

i was short of breath at football a month ago and a bad back turned into a thrown hip over four weeks since so.....small steps (literally)

I'm wandering downtown Palm Springs in a slight gummy-induced haze. This is the stuff.

what temperature is it?

signed, jealous Oregonian

Heavy winds over the last week-plus near me took out our electricity on Wednesday, which happened to be my birthday, so I got to spend my birthday almost entirely offline. My wife and I walked down to the shore of the giant lake near our house, and watched huge waves smash into the docks. I saw a bald eagle flying over the trees. My hat blew off three, maybe four times and I had to chase it into the woods like Miller's Crossing, except it was a black Kompakt baseball cap instead of a fedora.

yes to these updates

i like reading unperson's montana updates. bald eagles obviously have a lot of symbolic weight attached to them but when you see one irl.. they are just really breathtaking birds.

i've been through montana twice i think? once tagging along with a friend's band - they played in helena and missoula. i thought missoula was pretty cool. one of the band members eventually moved there a few years later and we all went up to visit him. we drove up toward lola across the continental divide into idaho where there's a nice hot spring next to a riverbank. it was the middle of winter. a few feet of snow in the ground but the path in was well-packed. several hours and miller high lifes later we trucked it out of there. that trip is when i learned you can have an open container in your car in montana. idk if that's still true.

i've always wanted to go back to missoula and also make it up to kalispell and glacier. one of these days.

i hope alfred has a bangin time in palm springs!

i am watching the waves roll by so to speak. sometimes when the weather is interesting it feels good just to tag along with it - go outside just to experience it, the clouds and the changes. we've had a record-smashingly warm december here. mercifully only a few inversion days. we're in a storm pattern right now so it's gray and dramatic out. but also crazy warm - highs in the upper 50s. we had a 67 degree reading at slc international airport a few days ago - unheard of. wild times but i'm enjoying the strangeness.

we had an inversion here this week and it was weird, bad AQI throughout the city. the combo of warm temps + big gusts of wind is unsettling, especially with the january fires still fresh in mind

dmac's post plus my partner's not-entirely-welcome reminder to me at a party last night that i don't have a PCP whom i routinely visit prompted me to search for a new PCP, so that is what i did with my time and gifts today

bald eagles obviously have a lot of symbolic weight attached to them but when you see one irl.. they are just really breathtaking birds.

One day the first year we moved here we were driving back from Target and we saw four bald eagles eating a deer in a field. I almost drove off the road. They're absolutely huge birds, like, the size of vultures.

i used an online gp service when my own wasn't available!

lads the progress is real

there’s a bisexual throuple of bald eagles that live in the wildlife refuge near our house. in march 2020, when things were particularly grim, i watched one swoop out of a tree and skim the marsh and successfully grab a fish and i burst into tears, it was so beautiful.

I drove 15 hours across the country almost casually! This long distance thing is a lark, I want to go on a lot of road trips where I can stop if anything looks intresting. There's a Museum of Labor and Industry (iirc) somewhere in Ohio (iirc) that I always wish I could check out. And an aquarium on Belle Isle in Detroit that was opened in 1904 and still has the same vaulted ceiling tilework that looks breathtaking and wonderfully weird. (It's "underwater green" colored.) And I got into a solidarity economy leadership intensive so I hope I learn some things in 2026.

otm road trips are the best

gonna take one in half an hour! 13-hour drive down I5 to LA, split into 2 days

there’s a bisexual throuple of bald eagles that live in the wildlife refuge near our house. in march 2020, when things were particularly grim, i watched one swoop out of a tree and skim the marsh and successfully grab a fish and i burst into tears, it was so beautiful.

Bi throubledom, time in nature, fresh food. Bald eagles have seriously figured out life.

for real

The average lifespan of bald eagles in the wild is around 20 years, with the oldest confirmed one having been 38 years of age.[174] In captivity, they often live somewhat longer. In one instance, a captive individual in New York lived for nearly 50 years.

some confirmation from wikipedia

with the gift i got yesterday, i’m wearing it and it feels great!

valid use of the thread imo

Drove up to ski on Christmas Day and it was a historically terrific sunny snowy one— apparently, as I ended up being too exhausted to wake up in time and slept off the week of pre-Christmas work/shop/cook stress and I’m not even a tiny bit sad about missing it

am in full 2025 clearout mode with both work and personal stuff that had dogged me all year and without writing any blank cheques i think ive many reasons to expect 2026 to be a lot better (not least the behaviours i started in 2025 to make it so)

i have also used the gifts and time given to me to eat all around me in december despite carrying an old person injury that has kept me off the football pitch so i will be using early 2026 momentum to take myself to physio and start back into watching my diet

ill be back to confirm an 8kg loss by end march or my name shall be mud

I got around to looking up American Express. I've always associated AmEx with Cary Grant. That's not a bad role model, so I finally decided to work out what the heck it's all about. Given that it's 2026 and a whole new year. Perhaps an AmEx card might help my credit score. When I go abroad people see me as a normal person, but when I pull out my American Express card I am John F Kennedy. I am Oscar Niemeyer. I am San Francisco International Airport. I am mid-century-modern man. Tool-assisted Quake speedruns are bewildering.

It's hard to think of AmEx without thinking of Pamela Stephenson from Not The Nine O'Clock News. Which pleases me. The punchline to that sketch - no-one remembers the punchline - is that AmEx is useless outside a narrow range of contexts, and I came to the conclusion that nothing much has changed since 1981. The classic card is a charge card that you have to clear by the end of the month, which is I suppose sensible if you buy a car every month from someone shady every month and you want a bit of protection, but it doesn't make sense for normal people.

They also do a pair of ordinary credit cards that have rewards! Except that the free card only gives you rewards if you spend over £3000 on it. And every transaction is rounded down, so e.g. £35.46 is £35. And £3000 worth of rewards is only worth £15. Alternatively there's a paid-for card with a fee of £25 that pays rewards without a price cap. But in order to cover the £25 fee you'd need to earn even more than £3000 worth of rewards. And that only breaks even.

So, it's a card that's only accepted in a minority of places, where you earn rewards but only if you spend several thousand pounds per year on it, and the reward is so small you could have the same effect by just going without a couple of Big Mac meals or one Amazon order over the course of a year. I just don't spend enough on a credit card to justify owning an American Express.

So I guess AmEx is missing out on the lucrative "poor person" market. They just want customers who spend lots and lots of money. Imaging building a business model that targets wealthy people! Imagine that.

the more you spend, the more you earn!

if you don’t sign up you’re basically throwing money in the trash and spitting on it

not an awful approach tbh

When I worked in customer services for credit cards, Amex was "the one where you have to pay a monthly fee and hardly anyone accepts it"

You gotta spin it to win it

When I worked retail, Amex was always the dominion of exceptionally wealthy customers. An Amex Black meant business— only handled a few of those, but one was from the founder and CEO of one of the largest telecom companies in China. He bought $1700 worth of skincare products. (I worked at Aesop, back when it was still a more exclusive brand and not owned by Lauder)

I get offers for a corporate Amex card for my tiny record label all the time. It never ceases to amaze me how once you have a little bit of money (and believe me, I have a little money, but a very good credit score) these fuckers will just keep offering to give you more and more like offering perks at a casino. I get emails from my bank telling me I could have a half million dollar home loan if I wanted one, too. The shit is mind-boggling. And on my bad days, when I reflect that we live in a totally lawless era where our mad king is a multiply bankrupt real estate scam artist, it can be tempting to play the game, to throw in and say, "Sure! You wanna gimme free money? Shovel it this way, just don't ever expect to get it back, ha ha!"

Ashley I refer you to the scene in Charade (1963) where Cary Grant goes to the Paris branch office of American Express. It was among my parents' favorite movies and as a child I could not figure out what American Express meant in that context. The assumption appeared to be that an American in Paris could use American Express as a sort of club where you get your mail and whatnot.

My understanding was further muddled because we also watched Casablanca a lot, and the plot of Casablanca (alert readers will remember) revolves around exit visas. As a result, Visa (the credit card) seemed somehow tied up with international travel diplomacy.

When I discovered that my parents had a Visa card. I wondered how they had managed to get one. Presumably from an embassy.

Discover is my shit

AMEX Blue Cash Preferred is nice! 6% back on groceries, up to 6k a year.

I've got a couple friends with AmEx cards who swear by its rewards system.

In November I qualified for the American Airlines Citibank card. A yearly fee, yeah, but I get priority seating, Admirals Club axis, and more miles to accumulate.

*access

I just spent some of my limited time on this earth this very evening from 5:30 to 7:30 PM eating the best sushi I have ever had in my life, and I put it on my AmEx card #onethread

After a bit of a slump, I am in Japan and eating a lot of Japanese food, which truly makes me feel like I’ve made good choices in life if it got me here. Gonna try to break my personal “best sushi I’ve had” record. I’m using a prepaid mastercard that doesn’t have the usual 2.5% fees for international credit card transactions. Ahead of this trip, I also upgraded my regular mastercard, for the travel insurance, but lounge access at the airport was nice. I don’t really know about credit cards, sometimes wonder who uses AmEx, since it seems like every other business I’ve been to doesn’t accept it.

Sounds a fun trip, enjoy it!

dream trip