Overheard at Trader Joe’s October 26, 2008
Posted by admin in : Discourse, Irrelevant, Lies, Narrative, Psycho/Spirit , 3commentsSo I’m in line at checkout. A vaguely foreign looking, fashionably dressed lady is checking out. Clerk is energetic, friendly, dutifully cheerful young man, making chit chat with the customers as he works. He notices her unusual blouse, and says, “I like your blouse.”
She says, “Thank you. It’s my design. I am fashion-designer.” Her accent confirms she’s foreign, but I could not identify it, perhaps Russian, but she’s dark, could be eastern European or Turkish, Iranian or something else. I look more closely at the blouse and it’s got silk-screened images of a photograph of the very woman’s own face, cut and arranged into an abstract geometric design.
Clerk continues admiring the design as he bags, and them says, “Well, it looks like you’re doing what you should be doing.”
To which the woman replies. “I am. Are you?”
The clerk is obviously taken aback, and continues bagging her groceries as he searches for a reply, which he eventually comes up with, a half-hearted, insincere-sounding, “I hope not.”
The woman offers a vague sounding inspirational message about keeping your dreams.
She leaves and the clerk greets me. I want to say, “Jeez, you try to give someone a compliment.” But I don’t say that and just say the minimum, “How are you?” “I’m fine”. “Thank you.” And I leave.
Does her reply sound as unkind to other people as it did to me? Would my offer of solidarity to the clerk have been welcome, or reinforced a message that he should feel bad about what he is doing? What kind of person takes a compliment like that and turns it around to insult the complimenter? Why should a fashion-designer feel like her accomplishments need to be recognized as greater than those of the shop clerk? A fashion-designer can be an awful, unhappy person, and a young grocery store clerk can be a happy, cool, spiritually evolved person. Why the need to define one’s self and others by their occupation? What other accomplishments has the clerk made in his young life that could easily be seem as remarkable that totally transcend his occupation?
I know there is a cultural aspect to this that I have not quite figured out. Maybe the woman is conscious of her class and was somehow offended by the person of lower social status presuming to be so forward and friendly (even though that’s typical of this culture, and especially characteristic of this store). Maybe her desire to encourage the young man was totally sincere if awkward, and only came across as an insult as a translation loss.
I recognized this pattern of conversational exchange. I have been on the wrong end of it before.
I remember once chatting with an old high-school friend who was enjoying some success in a local theatrical pursuit. I said how impressed I was, and how glad I was for her and congratulations and all that. Her response was, “What about you? Are you writing? Have you published? What’s stopping you? I am a success and so can you…” In other words, for her to be successful, it meant I had to be viewed as a failure. Words of encouragement which were rooted in one-upmanship. I had not said anything about feeling like a failure or that I was somehow in need of such encouragement. It was gloating.
I also remember another time when I was friendly with a group of born again Christians in college. They seemed so beautiful, happy. Their apartment was so warm and comfortable. They were smart and like to laugh, and they made me laugh which was why I liked them. I felt like was being all open minded. I was kind of a punk in those days — but even though my taste in music was the Clash I was open-minded enough to express appreciation for my hosts soft, easy, jazzy, Christian instrumental stuff (I think it was called “Fresh Air” but I’m having trouble finding info on it, maybe this). Point being I was trying to be a good guest by complimenting them on the stuff of their lives they were sharing with me. Which they immediately saw as an opportunity for some Christian evangelizing (what did I expect?): “We’re blessed. And so can you, if you accept Jesus… You can have all of this and more…” basically was their message. They immediately assumed that because I was being a cordial guest paying them a compliment, that meant I was somehow expressing regrets for my own sorry life. I was far too well behaved (some punk, I know) to do what I should have done, something like piss on the record collection.
But Jesus Christ, can’t people take a compliment?
This makes me realize a bias I have. To me, evidently, the only proper way to accept a compliment is with humility. To not express humility in the face of a compliment, and worse, to express pride in that which is being complimented on, seems to offend me enough to want to piss on people’s records, or at least blog about it. Maybe this is not the only or even best way to receive a compliment, but it’s where I come from. (Some Christians my hosts were.)
I’ve over-thought it, I know. But I would welcome any other aspects to this dynamic or this anecdote if anyone has anything to share. I’m sure I’m missing something, and I grant that this story reveals as much about my own prejudices and insecurities as it reveals about anyone else.
Anyway, that happened.
BTW, try the lemon crisp cookies from TJ’s!
Southern Accents June 21, 2008
Posted by admin in : Discourse, History, Irrelevant, Lies, Narrative , 1 comment so far
I moved to south Mississippi from Washington State in second grade, 1970. Hurricane Camille had blown through the previous year, wrecking the place. Hurricane Camille was just the most recent past thing that had happened here, whose memory was still so vividly felt, and whose reminders were still so visible. This was just an overlay on top of other past things still felt, still visible. It hadn’t happened to me, but it happened here, and shaped the world I grew up in to be this unique, unmistakable thing.
I was not aware of having a southern accent. I remember hearing southern accents in TV and movies and recognizing them as a stock stereotype, but not recognizing it as supposedly referencing my experience at all, not even enough to critique or reject it. It just meant a stupid man, or an old-fashioned person, or a sort of aristocrat from a bygone era, or a number of other stock southern stereotypes. It was no different to me than other types like the urban Italian American gumbah (Vinnie Barbarino), or the Jewish comic (Mr. Kotter). I actually said “Oy vey” sometimes — I learned Yiddish from Mad magazine and Mel Brooks, before I had any conception of what Jewishness was. I was half-Italian, but the stereotypical TV gumbah was so alien it did not occur to us to be offended.
A few years after we moved south, friends we knew from Washington State also moved down there. I remember them telling me I had a southern accent. I could not believe it — I could not hear it in myself. I was good with language, and could mimic accents. I spoke with good grammar, loved diagramming sentences. So being conscious of language on a level most of my peers were not made it all the more perplexing that I could possess an accent yet be unaware of it.
I traveled to Italy when I was 12. Later when I was 25 or so, returned to Italy and one of my uncles, Zio Lorenzo, produced an audio tape of me and my brothers teasing each other. I had this squeaky girly voice with the deepest south accent. “Qu-i-i-yut! Tony! Qu-i-i-yut!”. So it was confirmed: I really used to have a southern accent.
In college I know it started becoming less pronounced. When I traveled to non-Southern locales after college, I marveled at how fast people seemed to speak, and how sure they were of their assertions. Southern speech tends to be slower and less direct.
Today nobody would guess that I grew up in the south and people are usually really surprised when I tell them. I used to hate telling people this. You say “Mississippi” and this whole chain of associations is activated, and you don’t know exactly which ones, and then you have to stand there and account for it, reconcile yourself to it. In most places, that chain of associations is negative. Occasionally some people think of literature, which is better, although I am unprepared to discuss Eudora Welty or William Faulkner. Sometimes it’s a really positive association. In France, they are impressed because the south is the home of the blues and jazz and Elvis, and you are its honorary ambassador. In Italy, no matter where you say you are from, they reply, “Beau-tiful!” which is uninformed, but pleasant to hear.
But now I enjoy telling people. Rather than being threatened by their preconceptions, I am amused by them. It becomes their problem to reconcile what they think they know about the south with what they think they know about me.
Today watching films set in the south is often excruciating. Usually there’s the one actor who really nails it — he’s the best mimicker, had the best voice coach, practiced the most. Then there’s the rest of the cast, who basically just channel Foghorn Leghorn or Blanche Dubois.
Here’s a tip for actors doing southern roles: practice, dammit, people do care and can tell. You only have a dozen or so lines anyway, or a hundred, but it’s some finite number, just learn those lines with the right accent.
Here’s a tip for voice coaches and directors: guess what? Not every single individual in any particular southern locale is a born and bred native descended from slave-holders or slaves. In any locale you have a guy who move there from California, or Vietnam. You have someone from Georgia, and someone else from Jackson, and guess what, they speak with different southern dialects! They have TV and indie films and rock and roll, so you don’t just hear the blues all the time. Proud as we are of the blues, some people listen to Kraftwerk and Neutral Milk Hotel ( an excellent group from Louisiana).
The south is in flux. Echoes and memories of the past are always there, and certainly this is a motif of southern culture. But it’s constantly in flux. Every collection of personalities is every bit as diverse in the south as it is in the west or the north or the midwest.
When I watch British produced films set in Ireland or Scotland, I wonder if they treat those accents in the same way. Do they lay it on way too thick? Are the lapses in the actor’s performance obvious and grating to Irish or Scottish natives? I totally love hearing those accents.
I’m writing this on the June solstice in Northern California. It’s hot, and whenever it’s hot I start running around the house talking like Foghorn Leghorn wiping my forehead with a glass of iced tea, just to annoy my Cajun girlfriend.
In conclusion, the South will rise again! That’s a joke son, Ah say, ah say, that’s a joke.
What you know, and what you don’t know. April 1, 2008
Posted by admin in : Discourse, Lies, Psycho/Spirit , 1 comment so farThere’s what you know, and what you don’t know, and how you feel about it.
I feel pretty good about what I know. I know a lot of stuff. Tons of stuff I’ve learned or observed or memorized, almost all of it basically or potentially useful. Of course, it happens that something you think you know turns out to be wrong, or flawed or incomplete. Often the discovery that you were wrong about something sucks, or is embarrassing or whatever. But for me, most of the time, I’m pretty OK with revising my knowledge. It’s a pleasure to learn. And being open minded about correcting one’s errors makes you smarter and wiser and more confident in what you do know, or think you know. It’s been vetted, through this continual process of discovery and revision. Stubborn mindedness is a problem not only because it’s unpleasant for other people to deal with, but also because it means the compendium of knowledge you’ve acquired is highly suspect. It has not been vetted, so you’re likely to have incorrect, unchallenged propositions resting upon other incorrect propositions, resulting a really skewed and probably stupid world view.
So, hurray for the curious, and onions to the stubborn and stupid.
Then there’s what you don’t know. I feel really, really bad about what I don’t know. I hate feeling ignorant. I hate it when my ignorance is perceptible by others. I hate that struggling sensation when you try to understand something but it’s just beyond your ability. Like when you’re learning a new skill — a foreign language or a programming language or how to fix your plumbing. I hate when I find myself dependent on others to do something I feel I ought to be able to do myself (like hiring a plumber or asking a friend how to tune your computer). This problem is the bane of my career. I know a lot of shit, but no matter how much you know, there’s so much more to learn that other people already have. I spend a lot of time researching, preparing, planning so I will go to meetings ready. I can wing it a lot of the time because a lot of the time I’m in my area of expertise. But it often happens there’s overlap, and there’s all that stuff I know plus one thing I don’t that the other people do. I often feel like I didn’t get the memo. Frustrating.
I suppose it would probably be better to be more OK with what I don’t know, seeing as there’s a whole universe of stuff I don’t know and never will. Maybe other people are aware of what they don’t know and are OK with it. I could learn from them. But I’m suspicious of people who go too easy on themselves in this department.
Two Twins January 13, 2007
Posted by admin in : Discourse, Irrelevant, Psycho/Spirit , add a commentTwo Twins. Men. Joel and Jesse or something. Identical. Finish each other’s sentences, folks can’t tell ‘em apart. They’re bright, likable, from a well-bred upper class East Coast family. Excelled in English and art. Both marry similar women, have similar kids. They work, succeed, make contributions,etc.
Then one of them tragically dies — auto accident. His loss is felt, he is grieved, mourned, eulogized, judged affectionately by all who knew him. He dies at, say, 33. Let’s say it was Joel who died.
Now Jesse is wreck. His grief is powerful — it destroys his marriage. He begins to change. He begins to say and do things people would never expect, not least himself. He fails at his marriage, his family, his career. He is estranged from his former life. He wanders, forms new attachments, abandons those. He is not evil, exactly, or criminal. But neither is he easy to like or care for. He’s bitter, distant, slightly mean but never cruel. He lives 30 more years this way, then he dies of a stroke, heart attack, something health-related and sudden.
Anyone in a position to judge would not judge him kindly. He has left countless relationships in a sour, unresolved condition. A few people even take pleasure in Jesse’s demise, for all the pain and disappointment he has caused.
How is a man to be judged? Had Jesse not been as good a man as Joel, until the age of 33? Is a man to be judged by what he has become at the end of his life rather than by who he once was? Who is to be judged more harshly: the man who started off good and finished bad or the man who started off bad and finished good? Is it fair for the standard of judgement to be higher for those who live longer? Is it possible to live more than one life in a lifetime?
Does Jesse’s disgrace in any way taint Joel’s memory? For if Jesse is capable of such pain and misery, was Joel not also destined for such a fate?
Myth, Science and Faith November 16, 2006
Posted by admin in : Discourse, Irrelevant, Political/Editorial, Psycho/Spirit , 1 comment so farThe atheist and the fundamentalist share the belief that science and faith are incompatible.
The atheist claims that the burden of proof of the claim that God exists is on the believers, not the skeptics. The fundamentalist claims authority that a true skeptic can never accept. Both are in error. I do not feel that a believer need prove the existence of God any more than anyone need prove that a certain painting is beautiful. We can all accept the subjective nature of aesthetic judgment. If you find the painting beautiful, science cannot prove you wrong, and should not try. In the same way, atheistic antagonism of spiritual experience is misplaced. Conversely, a fundamentalist who insists that the myth of creation is any sort of fact that should be taught as science is hugely mistaken. This is like claiming that the protagonist of a novel is real in the same way the author is real. Of course this is a fallacy and a gross misreading of the myth.
The compatibility of science and religion is possible when these equally human realms of experience are understood in their proper context. The atheist is likely to be frustrated if she expects human civilization to evolve to a point where religion is unnecessary. As long as we are human, it will never be true that we will lack for myth or folklore or art or dance or ecstasy. They are here to stay, so peace should be made.
I am an atheist with many personal spiritual experiences that felt mystical. I am an atheist with respect for the value of myth, and the truth of myth. Myth is a process of discovery – not an authorized narrative. Issues of authority certainly foul the taste of religion. All the complaints about religion which have to do with authority and power and politics for me are not really challenges to the myth per se, and can be said of any act of authority, including secular authority. The complaints have to do with people fighting wars over religion; or pressure to conform or convert or display religiosity; Asserting their political power in absurd ways like forcing Creationism onto a school curriculum. These are valid charges, but again, all can be directed at secular authority as well, and reveal more about the nature of power than the nature of myth or the experience of faith.
There can be aspects of religious belief which are incompatible with science. Both myth and science evolve. Over time the usefulness of a myth may be superceded by the knowledge provided by science. We can see in the development of child psychology, or in the experience of personal growth in general that we are all limited. In spite of our limitations we need a theory of reality, a paradigm to help us manage the information we receive, and to provide a vocabulary for expressing and interacting with and influencing our reality. The theory might be provisional, and as the limitations of the theory become apparent, we adjust it or overturn it, replacing the old theory with a new one.
One way to apply this thinking to religion is to assert that a myth of creation is really just a provisional theory of the creation of the physical world. The theorists were limited since no science existed to explain fossils, the movements of the stars, DNA, etc. As modern scientific theories of biology and physics and geology emerged, the old myth of creation can be dispensed with as there is no further need to suffer its obvious limitations.
However, creation myths persist. That could be because of lot of people remain ignorant about physics and science. That is certainly the case. But that does not mean there is no further value in the myth, or even that explaining the physics of the world was the original intention of the myth. The book of Genesis was authored to illustrate man’s relationship with God, and every element of that myth always emphasized this. That some people used it provisionally as a theory of physics is their problem – it’s not necessarily inherent in the myth itself. And the practice of religion which involves retelling and reinterpreting the myth remains a viable and dynamic mode of spiritual experience.
Much about the world can be explained by the prevalence of inadequate theories. This is fundamentally an issue of education and literacy. The better educated we are the better leadership we will enjoy, the more research we can conduct, the more we can advance science, and the better able we will be to discern the true value of myth. These schizophrenic antagonisms among the various capacities of the mind will be diminished.
Mississippi History September 24, 2006
Posted by admin in : Art, Discourse , 1 comment so far
#131 (Mississippi History), 30″ W X 36″ H,graphite & acrylic on canvas
I’m the pleased owner of this incredible painting by my friend Ken Weathersby. Ken has produced a series of maze paintings for the last several years. This one had the unique feature of the Confederate Flag in the center of it, an unstable symbol in this vibrant optical field. There are so many things to say about this painting I hardly know where to start.
Consciousness April 14, 2005
Posted by admin in : Discourse, Drugs, Psycho/Spirit , add a commentHow it’s all about consciousness.
“god” is really just nature assigned a consciousness. Belief in the supernatural is all about the idea that consciousness pervades nature. How we as humans are set apart from the animals because of our supposed superior intellect, which is really just our consciousness.
I think of consciousness as a matter of degrees. The surprises that we may have in store for us, later in life, after death, are all about consciousness. What there is to know, to experience. I do not *believe* in anything in particular. I’m quite sure by any measure I am an atheist. On the other hand, I am entirely prepared to be wow-ed by a sudden, unexpected expansion of consciousness at any time. Let’s call the agent of this consciousness-expanding event “grace”. And let’s call the subject of this consciousness-expanding event “God”. But maybe let’s don’t. Cause that’s way too limiting. Such labels, perhaps useful and helpful in the past, are laden with external derivative associations. Maybe they are still useful and helpful in the present, for somebody.
I like to believe that I can arrive at a conventional notion by unconventional means. I can arrive at the notion of grace by way of my experiences with LSD, for example. It blows my mind to go, “Whoa, *thats* grace, man!” To have a meaning in search of a term, than arrive at the term.
So anyway, I don’t believe in Jesus. I just believe in LSD.
Thanks and god bless,
Boo.
All Creation Involves Destruction. March 17, 2005
Posted by admin in : Discourse, Political/Editorial , add a commentBarney:
All creation involves destruction.
Ted:
Yeah, man, for real!
Barney:
Art is therefore violent by definition. Art means making, and making means creating, which requires destruction, which is also the same as violence.
Ted:
Oh my god I never thought of that! Wow!
Barney:
Artists take risks, the best ones do anyways. And sometimes these risks fail. But what is at stake? The artist’s work, the painting or opera or whatever. The artist’s reputation. Lives rarely hang in the balance.
Ted:
Yeah, Um. Ok.
Barney:
Politicians also take risks. Whole governments are created by the political acts of men, and these are often the products of visionaries. They are like artists, and to create they must destroy. Revolutionaries are by definition violent, so they are like artists. They are in fact artists.
Ted.
Maybe.
Barney:
But so much more is at stake. Lives hang in the balance.
Ted:
Uh-oh.
Barney:
You don’t want these guys fooling around. You want them to be sure about what they are doing. You want facts and figures to back up their policies. You want politics to be pragmatic, scientific. You don’t want to think of it as iffy and tentative as art.
Ted:
I know I do. Don’t.
Barney:
But the reality is that politics is as much an art as a science, and no painting was ever made based on facts and figures. We have to take risks, and be prepared for failure. But failure is expensive. To have political conviction requires courage, and ego. It requires sacrifice. It requires being willing to find out you are a monster, a fascist.
Ted:
I guess that’s true.
Barney:
Artists, conversely, may be construed as revolutionaries, some more successful than others, and some more violent than others. But they are actively trying to change our world. And the world that results may be a better world or a worse one. Though lives may not hang in the balance, the difference is really a matter of what’s at stake.
Ted:
Hitler was an artist, they say. A failed one.
Barney:
Thanks, Ted, that’s helpful. Exactly, in fact. You fool around in one arena and you’re a failed artist, but in this other arena, a monster. Would Picasso have been as good a political leader as he was an artist if he applied his originality, vision, ego, and violence to the political world? He was political in that thru his art, and in his life he expressed strongly held and influential political opinions, but he was not a political man, not a politician, a leader.
Would Hitler’s evil nature have expressed itself, or even emerged in any form, had he remained an artist, and become a successful one?
Ted:
Guernica.
Barney:
Right.
Ted:
So are you saying that one can somehow judge an artist in political terms by imagining how they might perform politically?
Barney:
I am trying to expose the politics inherent in the act of creation of anything – art, ideas, and political innovations.
Ted:
So because I erase the chalkboard before I draw a caricature of the study hall teacher I am some kind of bloodthirsty revolutionary? Is every act of “destruction” really like every other? That difference being “what’s at stake” is not small, it’s not trivial – it makes for a qualitatively different kind of thing. If I hit a bad note while I try to strum “Stairway to heaven” am I really making the world a worse place?
What Works Depends Upon Conditions that Must Change March 16, 2005
Posted by admin in : Discourse, Psycho/Spirit , add a commentFred:
What works depends upon conditions that must change, therefore progress requires disruption of what works.
Progress is inherently anarchic, and anarchy is inherently progressive.
By “must” I mean both “should” for social/ethical/moral reasons, and also “will” in the sense that change is inevitable ultimately. Ethics can be seen both as a projection or imposition of social will, or as a disinterested perspective which seeks nothing more than harmony with natural forces. If result X is inevitable, acknowledgement of this fact is a good thing, and obfuscation of or denial of this fact is a bad thing. Regardless what the result is per se.
Conservative constraints on change are the enemy of this perspective. So are rational progressive forces, which seek to cause specific results. In either case, from the anarchic ethical perspective, the actors are obstructing the flow of history towards its inevitable fulfillment.
Al:
But why grant moral supremacy to so-called “natural” forces? Nature will seek its inexorable fulfillment without any help or hindrance from you or me. It’s neither ethical nor unethical to interfere, because said interference is just another pebble in the stream, really, just so much granite to wear down. And the interplay between man and nature merely produces a set of particularities characteristic of each historical moment. It need not be valued or lamented. It is what it is. Also, is it not natural and indeed moral for any system constituency to act according to its nature, as for an organism to seek to prolong its life in spite of the inevitable fact of its eventual death?
Fred:
Yes it is by definition natural for an organism to act according to its nature. Only acting against its nature qualifies as a repressive, obstinacy which hinders progress.
Al:
Is that even possible? And what is progress?
Fred:
Progress is the emergence of novelty in a system.
Al:
From what does it derive value? What’s so valuable about novelty?
Fred:
True, value is an assignment, not an intrinsic quality, so novelty is amoral, and so is progress.
Al:
No, progress is a value placed on novelty, by some system constituency which is favored by the novelty. Novelty can just as easily be lamented as valued. So while we might agree something is novel, we might not agree that something is progress. And if the novelty is favorable, then great, it’s progress. And if the novelty is favorable and therefore progress, how could you say that the previous conditions were “working”? From this point of view, change was necessary because something wasn’t working. But if it’s not favorable, then it’s not progress. Resisting that is reasonable. From this point of view, things are working, and novelty disrupts the order. How do you link progress as a beneficial form of novelty to the disruption of a satisfactory order, i.e. “what works”?
Fred:
“What works” is order, and order is just a state which may favor some and not others. Novelty disrupts this order, and yes, it’s true, the disruption is then more likely to favor those previously suffering from the prior order than those that order favored.
Al:
Why should this be the case? Is it not possible that some members of the state, let’s call them citizens, who are suffering from the current order, could suffer even more from the disorder some amoral novelty introduces? Couldn’t a catastrophe cause suffering across the board?
Fred:
Well yeah. But the disruption of the oppressive order is certain to create an opportunity for progressive change and reform.
Al:
And an opportunity for things to get much, much worse. Or not worse, just different. So different maybe that those who were either up or down previously are all fallen away, and new subjects inhabit the new order, complete with its unequal distribution of fortune.
Fred:
Do you really see no historical strands which connect such developments through time? History is always the backdrop for comprehending and evaluating the state of things. If things were just different, as though disconnected from their heritage, then sure, the idea of “value” is factored from the equation. Things don’t get better or worse, they just change. But this can never be the case. Any being with memory, with a social identity, can never experience a social order apart from a system of values.
Fear of Anything Was Fear of Death March 13, 2005
Posted by admin in : Discourse, Psycho/Spirit , add a commentI used to go around saying that fear of anything was fear of death, ultimately. Not many people listened to me. The few who did argued with me, saying things like “But some people are afraid of life.”
I don’t know if I still think that fear of anything is fear of death. But I am starting to think that fear of death is really a kind of harsh judgment about life. If you have lived a happy, fulfilling life, what is to fear or dread about death? It’s natural, after all, it gets us all eventually. Each person has to face death – it can be a terror or a kind of acceptance. It can be anything, who knows? But I think people who are preoccupied w/ death, fearing death, avoiding risks, obsessing about health or disease, or obsessing about terrorism or violence in the world, must have some kind of idea that if they die for any of the reasons they fear most it will be a “tragic” thing, an unjust thing, a condition to be raged against.
I also used to point out that the meaning of the word “tragic” has almost completely reversed from its original, Greek, literary meaning. In Greek tragedy, the death of the hero was tragic when it was overloaded with narrative or philosophical significance. Today we use tragic to mean meaningless –as when a child is killed by a stray bullet –the exact opposite of the literary meaning of the word.
Nobody listened to me then either.
But anyway.
So this raging against the unjustness of one’s death or the potential of that, speaks volumes about the person’s feelings about their life. I believe that is says that they feel their life will have been not worth living if they die now. If you feel your life has been worth living up to now, then every extra day is lagniappe, something to be thankful for. It may be hard to say that to someone dying in some horrible way, I admit. But that may have more to do with the manner of death than the fact of it. I’m sure, for example, that even the happiest soul most content and satisfied with their life would still fight to keep on living, given half a chance. Sometimes death is tragic, “tragic” when that effort is in vain. But even then there has to be a point at which that person realizes, “OK, this is it.” At that point are you at peace or are you raging?
Well, forget about what you might feel right then, because you don’t have to actually be facing it at the moment of death to face the inevitable fact of your mortality. That you can face now. Go ahead, think about it. Now does it make you feel outraged or sad, or do you just shrug it off? If you’re a shrugger, you’re either not trying hard enough, or you are one of those rare people who are content, satisfied, and believe that their life has been worth living. If you rage, you must feel on some level screwed, disappointed, miserable in life. This feeling then is not really even about death. It’s about your life.
To improve things, you could stand to work on your life. It’s not enough to live in a manner which dodges death – you have to live richly, fully, so that you can look back and love what you have lived. It may be that the more you dodge death, the less fully you have lived, which will amplify that feeling of injustice, making you dread death all the more, because you have lived so much less for fear of death.