Day 3 - Success as a function of emotional investment and fear of failure: this in light of Earworms, polyamory, and baldness.
Earworms. This morning, after returning to my office from foraging for coffee, I was somewhat startled, really alarmed, by the sound of a horse neighing. It was only a very brief moment, but enough to confirm that my atmosphere lite v5.5 had too effectively suspended my disbelief. I had suspicions yesterday, after feeling an even more powerful ennui than in days past. Under normal circumstances I would be inclined to blame this on what a colleague today called an "unfulfilling job." Considering that this colleague, let's call him "Reid," had earlier spent almost half an hour working with me to express, mathematically, success-in-school as a function of the relationship of emotional investment to fear of failure, the "unfulfilling job" had a definite ring of authenticity.
Parenthetically. I should explain before moving on, "Reid" and I had started with these assumptions: (1) we were/are decently bright; (2) we were/are underachievers; (3) although we believed/believe this, it's not true; and (4) no. 3 is true because we actually had no choice about how afraid of failure we were and thus could not have applied ourselves any more to our schoolwork than we did. What made this project just plain gorgeous is the very limited mathematical skills that we jointly possess. Thus, we could draw some graphs, write f(x,y) , etc., etc. on the board, exclaim "yes, yes, but..." while wiping away white chalk with our hands, even yell "right, right, my good man..." while slapping each other on the shoulder throwing all caution to the wind and leaving chalk marks on our sport coats. Truly thrilling when you consider that we had to admit complete failure in the end. Especially, when the whole thing started because we both casually expressed a disappointment in how little math we remembered from college.
Atmosphere Lite v5.5. My suspicion that v5.5 may be more than I could handle developed yesterday when it dawned on me that my laziness could actually be a result of a subconscious belief that I was actually sitting in a Herman Miller chair outside, brushing up against daisies and shooing ladybugs off my laptop. My personal mix that I created, entitled "Country Puppy with Soft Water," has soft running water, field crickets, birds, cows, sheep, horses, and the occasional puppy bark. Extremely realistic.
My inspiration to rid the world's loan contracts of language offensive to lawyers was even lower today than yesterday. And that horse brought it all home. I needed a change. So, today, I'm learning French. Jheshersinbanc apparently means, "I'm looking for a bank," in French. Earworms plays French phrases rhythmically to music softly in the background while you work, imprinting the language on your brain. It's perfect.
Breaking with reality. Baldness. Today's struggle against complacent disregard for reality was somewhat fueled by a very pleasant evening last night. I attended an event for my little law school scholars program. We're forming an alumni board, and the school was kind enough to buy food and drinks if we arranged for one of us, the aspiring alumni board president, to say a few official sounding words and suggest that we form committees. Another rule: hand out pens to mark the occasion. Although it wasn't said outloud, apparently distributing these pens, not so fancy, but with a holster, made the event official. Committees and pens. I'm not kidding.
The evening was a blast, we had a huge room in a Mexican restaurant named, "Place of the Handsome Ones" in Spanish, reserved for about twenty folks. Perfect party space. Lots of light, no loud music, no smoke, lots of space, and free drinks. And we could order "cualquier cosa," beer, margarita, you name it. The conversations I was privy to? Race relations in the country's liberal divinity schools, criminalization of deviant sexual desire (especially that directed at children), value/detriment of pornography in American culture, when is the appropriate time for a guy that's balding (that's me) to just shave it all off, the injustices of the banking system in the context of credit attainment from the perspective of socio-economic status, and Greek tragedy (a very short discussion (2-3 minutes), reflecting the sum total of the knowledge of everyone in the room on the subject). What was wonderful about all of that was how naturally the topics flowed from one to the other, effortlessly, with a certain sincere concern for the answers. It wasn't cocktail party talk.
I'd be remiss if I didn't add that two women proposed and another suggested that men who bald confidently are sexy. Although other interpretations are available, I choose to take the first two offers quite seriously and modestly affirm the observation on confident baldness.
Today's rule: I will display savoir-fair in my baldness, eventually.
Parenthetically. I should explain before moving on, "Reid" and I had started with these assumptions: (1) we were/are decently bright; (2) we were/are underachievers; (3) although we believed/believe this, it's not true; and (4) no. 3 is true because we actually had no choice about how afraid of failure we were and thus could not have applied ourselves any more to our schoolwork than we did. What made this project just plain gorgeous is the very limited mathematical skills that we jointly possess. Thus, we could draw some graphs, write f(x,y) , etc., etc. on the board, exclaim "yes, yes, but..." while wiping away white chalk with our hands, even yell "right, right, my good man..." while slapping each other on the shoulder throwing all caution to the wind and leaving chalk marks on our sport coats. Truly thrilling when you consider that we had to admit complete failure in the end. Especially, when the whole thing started because we both casually expressed a disappointment in how little math we remembered from college.
Atmosphere Lite v5.5. My suspicion that v5.5 may be more than I could handle developed yesterday when it dawned on me that my laziness could actually be a result of a subconscious belief that I was actually sitting in a Herman Miller chair outside, brushing up against daisies and shooing ladybugs off my laptop. My personal mix that I created, entitled "Country Puppy with Soft Water," has soft running water, field crickets, birds, cows, sheep, horses, and the occasional puppy bark. Extremely realistic.
My inspiration to rid the world's loan contracts of language offensive to lawyers was even lower today than yesterday. And that horse brought it all home. I needed a change. So, today, I'm learning French. Jheshersinbanc apparently means, "I'm looking for a bank," in French. Earworms plays French phrases rhythmically to music softly in the background while you work, imprinting the language on your brain. It's perfect.
Breaking with reality. Baldness. Today's struggle against complacent disregard for reality was somewhat fueled by a very pleasant evening last night. I attended an event for my little law school scholars program. We're forming an alumni board, and the school was kind enough to buy food and drinks if we arranged for one of us, the aspiring alumni board president, to say a few official sounding words and suggest that we form committees. Another rule: hand out pens to mark the occasion. Although it wasn't said outloud, apparently distributing these pens, not so fancy, but with a holster, made the event official. Committees and pens. I'm not kidding.
The evening was a blast, we had a huge room in a Mexican restaurant named, "Place of the Handsome Ones" in Spanish, reserved for about twenty folks. Perfect party space. Lots of light, no loud music, no smoke, lots of space, and free drinks. And we could order "cualquier cosa," beer, margarita, you name it. The conversations I was privy to? Race relations in the country's liberal divinity schools, criminalization of deviant sexual desire (especially that directed at children), value/detriment of pornography in American culture, when is the appropriate time for a guy that's balding (that's me) to just shave it all off, the injustices of the banking system in the context of credit attainment from the perspective of socio-economic status, and Greek tragedy (a very short discussion (2-3 minutes), reflecting the sum total of the knowledge of everyone in the room on the subject). What was wonderful about all of that was how naturally the topics flowed from one to the other, effortlessly, with a certain sincere concern for the answers. It wasn't cocktail party talk.
I'd be remiss if I didn't add that two women proposed and another suggested that men who bald confidently are sexy. Although other interpretations are available, I choose to take the first two offers quite seriously and modestly affirm the observation on confident baldness.
Today's rule: I will display savoir-fair in my baldness, eventually.
posted by Michael at
4:20 PM
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