Why write?

I think I've told you that back during the COVID-19 lockdowns I wrote a book about the stuff that I used to do in my professional life, back before I more-or-less retired. And then I've never done anything with it because I'm paralyzed by trying to find the next step. The writing was the easy part, but what then? I talked to someone who was supposed to be an expert on marketing self-published books (this was about two years ago), and her first question was: What outcome do you want from this book? What do you want to achieve? The marketing strategy will be fundamentally different, depending on your answer.

And I froze. I had no idea how to answer the question.

She even made it easy by telling me there are only two choices for the answer: Money or Fame. (To be clear, she then explained that in practice saying you want Fame means that you want the book to advertise your consulting business. I read a great book by This Guy, and now we have to hire him to help us transform our company!) But I still couldn't answer. Neither of those options sounded right to me.

So there it sat. For two years.

Recently I realized I'd made no progress at all on publishing this book, even though it's something I need to do. So a couple of days ago I tried to think through the question, What do I want from this book? The results were inconclusive. Then this weekend I went on a meditation retreat. And today at lunch I suddenly saw the last step in the (hitherto-unfinished) chain of reasoning. So let me write it out for you here.

What do I want from this book: Money or Fame? Let's consider them one at a time.

Is a wedding an achievement?

Once again I'm posting something from Twitter, rather than taking the time to create original content. At least, it was original when I wrote it on Twitter. But now I guess it is just recycled.

To be fair, my wedding to Wife cost plenty but it did not go well. (She got into a fight with her mother, for example.) But it's also true that over the long haul of decades, the fact of being married was very important; but the day itself? Meh.

I took the line about "all downhill from there" from Miss Manners, who is far wittier than I am.

          

Echo chamber, 3, "Lines you can't ever cross"

No, we haven't had another conversation about this same topic again. I just can't let it go.

You know, when Marie says "there are certain lines you can't ever cross," maybe I shouldn't get irritated or feel judged. Maybe I should just feel grateful that she has led such a charmed and sheltered life. Of course she has had bad things happen to her, like we all have. What I mean by the words "charmed and sheltered" is that maybe, somehow, she has reached her sixties without ever having to face her own capacity for evil.

Seen by the side of the road

I was amused.

          

Meeting my Shadow, 2

Just a quick follow-up to this post from New Year's Day.

Ten minutes ago I was on the sidewalk out in front, stretching my legs for a few minutes, and I thought about this ongoing argument with Marie. And suddenly it occurred to me: one reason that Marie's moralism drives me so crazy is that I used to do the same thing. (Maybe I still do, but I try hard not to.)

At the moment that the thought struck me, there was an example to hand as well. Now, ten minutes later, I don't remember what it was. Oh wait, yes I do.

Echo chamber, 2

I just checked, and my last post on this topic was two weeks ago. Obviously I dropped a week in my memory. (Marie and I talk every Wednesday morning, you see.) I think we've reached a terminus on the discussion, but I wish I were happier about it.

I should probably just go to bed. I'm drowsy and droopy; and while the amount I drank with dinner isn't enough to put me away, it's enough to make me flabby and imprecise. On the other hand, I was thinking earlier this afternoon (admittedly, while completely sober) that it was about time to post a follow up to the earlier note. So here goes.

Medieval poetry for the win!

You find the damnedest stuff on Twitter. (Excuse me, X.)

Today, for example, I found a pair of medieval Welsh poems. One is by a male poet, addressing his cock with some exasperation. Then a century later (or so) there's one from a female poet, complaining that men don't compliment women's cunts nearly as often as they should.

You'll find the details below the fold. 

Echo chamber

This morning I had a Skype call with Marie. She had been out of contact for five days. When we started the call she was troubled. By the end of the call she said I had cheered her up. So far, so good, I guess.

But God in heaven, what an unsatisfactory call!

Am I become Death?

Back on New Year's Day, I did a Tarot reading for myself for the year. Much of what it told me was unexceptional. My immediate situation was pegged as waiting (8 Wands reversed), exacerbated by indecision (2 Swords). The basis of my situation is that I'm acting like a scholar (Page of Pentacles) by thinking and writing, both here and in my professional blog under my real name. And so on.

Now my Self card was Death. At the time, I read this as advice that I would see major changes in my Self this year, because I have always read that card as "major change." But I wonder if there might not be more going on?

Over on the Patio I just finished a pair of articles which propose that humans thrive best under conditions of adversity, scarcity, and conflict—not peace and plenty. (You can find the first one here, and the second one here.) And last night, after I finished writing and posting the second article, I started to think about it with respect to my own situation. I have enough to eat and drink, and a roof over my head, all without working. I live alone, so I don't have to fight with anyone over the breakfast table. For the most part, except for some writing once or twice a week, there's nothing special that I need to do.

When John B. Calhoun subjected a population of rats to those exact same conditions, the rats died.

And so I began to wonder, Does the Death card have a double meaning for me right now? Yes, of course it generally means "major change." And of course anyone learning the Tarot is always warned not to read it as death simply and straight-up, because that will terrify the person you are reading for. But I start to think that maybe it means something a little more complex, something like this:

What games did I play as a child? part 3

This post follows on from two that are nearly ten years old, here and here. There's no sense in which it is important. In fact, it would probably never have occurred to me to write it at all if I hadn't drunk an entire bottle of cheap wine with dinner.  But that can send your mind down interesting byways.

Ten years ago I explained that Dale and I used to make up pretend countries. In principle these were micronations, though I hadn't learned the term yet. It was silly, but fun. Back when I wrote about this before, I fit this game into an understanding of my adult life by saying "(Making up useless systems. Check.)"

But there was another side to it that was odd. Sometimes several of us would all join a single country, and then we would debate what its political structure ought to be. My experience of this is that usually I was outvoted. I'd have some idea that I thought was really cool, and I could never persuade other people that it was nearly as cool as I found it. So far, this is pretty consistent with my self-understanding later in life. (See all my discussions of Sister Failure, for example.)

The weird part—the part that contrasts with my adult self-understanding—is that even when I was totally incapable of convincing anyone else to vote for any of my ideas about how this or that micronation ought to be organized, I was usually elected President anyway. At the time, this seemed normal and I never thought about it. Today, in retrospect, it is a great puzzle.

Marie, after meeting Son 1 and Son 2, has started to talk about a phenomenon she calls "the Tanatu charisma." This is the same whatever-it-is phenomenon that makes it impossible for me to blend into the wallpaper even when I try my damnedest. Maybe that's what this game displayed … already at work, long before I was old enough even for college.  

                

Intoxicology

I woke up yesterday morning with a hangover, rolled over, and went back to sleep. Later in the morning I finally dragged myself out of bed and puttered through a whole list of errands all day. Because I was away from home until late afternoon, I managed to avoid my midday nap (which I seem to need most days). Finally had something to eat about 5pm. (Dinner? Breakfast? Both?) Dessert at 7:30. Read for a while, dithered on the Internet, and went to bed a little after 10:00. I drank no alcohol last night.

This morning? No hangover. (Well, duh.) And I was able to get up earlier. (Yeah, not staying up till after midnight will do that.) We'll see whether I need the midday nap, but so far the signs are hopeful.

I want to watch the nap, as a marker. I had gotten to the point where I pretty much had to have one every day, where my head would be foggy and in low-levels of dull pain until after my nap. This was regardless how much coffee I had in the morning. Not until yesterday did it occur to me that this might be connected to whatever I'd had to drink the night before. So it will be an interesting experiment to see if cutting out the alcohol for a few days also cuts out the need for a nap. If so, that would be a pretty clear indicator of causality.

On the other hand, I also notice that the amount I drank the night before last would have counted as a pretty normal amount for much of the last year. Normally I don't expect to reach for the Tylenol until I've had half again that much … or twice that much. Maybe I'm getting old. Or maybe the stuff is actually toxic. That's the root of the word intoxicate, after all.

Things to notice.

          

The unbearable weight of being Stagg R. Leigh

I guess I'm I glad I'll never hit the big time.

A couple nights ago, I went out to see "American Fiction." Incidentally, it's a great movie, and one that works on many levels. If you haven't seen it yet, go see it now.

But in particular, I was emailing with Marie earlier this evening. I mentioned the movie and told her I'd liked it. She went online and found a trailer, and said it looks like "The Producers." I replied that it is nothing at all like "The Producers." (Not to say anything against "The Producers"! It's the funniest movie ever made. But "American Fiction" breathes a whole different air.)

So I started to think to myself, What do I like about it so much?

Fair warning: In what follows there are likely to be SPOILERS! So don't read any farther unless you have already seen the movie or just don't care.

Freedom is overrated

Freedom is overrated.

I guess I've talked about this before, not always in those words. I find only two places where I have said literally this: here in 2010, and here in 2023. But my post here, arguing that freedom is failure, comes pretty close to saying the same thing.

I first figured it out by watching Father. Back when he owned our family business he had a terrible time of it: I talk about that some here and here, and probably in other places too. At the time, I thought he was being imprisoned by the business; and it was plainly killing him. When he finally sold it, I thought, Now at last he'll be able to do all those things he has wanted to do for so long!

But he didn't. He'd start one project, and then he'd start another, and then he'd email crazy conspiracy theories with his old Army buddies, and then he'd stay up to watch the Late Show, and then … on and on and on. [I have no idea how far he got on any of these projects, but Mother would like me to find out.] But he never got anything actually Done, because he didn't Have To. He was free—as free as anyone I've ever known.

It didn't make him happy. Not having to go out and see people on a regular basis just made him sour and solitary. (He died in 2015, but compare also this post, just for example.)

I worried that could happen to me when my job ended, if I didn't get a regular full-time job to replace it. And, … well, you know, … it's hard to say I was wrong. Just in the last year I talk about that here (after coming home from Scotland) and here (after coming home from France and then Thanksgiving).

Ironically, there's even an argument that this is true of political freedom as well. A few days ago, I posted this over on the Patio, explaining the argument that the best regimes in the world are places like Niger, Uganda, and Angola—none of them "free countries" by any normal metric. 

It's funny. We feel a natural irritation when someone tells us what to do. Who do they think they are? I'll decide what I want to do! But when we have that freedom—well, for some of us, at any rate, it doesn't make us happy. I bet that's true for many of us. It's probably true of me, not that I'm about to surrender my freedom. It's easier to surrender my happiness.

Freedom is overrated.   

          

Did I need to hear this?

It's late at night. I've been drinking too much. I should be in bed. So I clicked on a recent clip on YouTube from Bill Maher.

And this is me. It's totally me. So is this going to kill me? Do I need to worry about it? Was this just some random video, or do I need to take it seriously?

Inquiring minds want to know ….

                

Willing and wanting

Willpower is a funny thing. Ten years ago I wrote about how true self-discipline is not "violent self-mastery through an iron will," but rather a form of "informed, intelligent self-manipulation" that "understand[s] yourself well enough to know what you have to do to set up conditions so that you will naturally act in the way you need to act." I still think that's not far wrong.

When did you start ...? (A follow-up post)

Just about ten years ago, I posted a rumination about what age people lose their virginity, and what age they start regularly fucking. Among other things, I posed the question whether these things travel in families? If your parents lost their virginity early (or late), did you do the same? How about your kids?

Of course it's political!

Just saw this post on LinkedIn. Someone argues that gender fluidity is spreading across the globe and then cautions, "This is not a political matter."

Of course it's a political matter. If it's not being caused by politics, then what's causing it? Biology? Doesn't change that fast. Social attitudes, values, cultural preferences? Those are all just part of politics writ large.

She links to this video, where she talks about the rate at which these changes are taking place. Nothing else besides politics moves that fast.

          

Gender role test

Meanwhile, I found a "gender role test" online, courtesy of some outfit called IDR Labs. Guess how I scored? 

(Right away I remembered having once written this post here.)

Or maybe all these generalizations are just a little silly.

          

Was Tacitus talking about my marriage?

This morning I was reading this article by Charles Eisenstein (highly recommended!) and I stumbled across the following quote:

And … sure, I know he (Eisenstein, that is, not Tacitus) is talking about the relationship between the American government and the American people. But I can't help wondering whether these same principles also explain Wife's intense anger and animosity towards me for so many years? The idea would be consistent with this post, at any rate. Maybe there are others like it too, but I'm not going to hunt for them right now.

          

LinkedIn on tribalism

I saw this morning a post on LinkedIn about tribalism:

Right away it put me in mind of T. E. Lawrence, at least in the movie.

Maybe there are advantages (if only a few) to aligning with nobody. (Reference any number of my earlier posts.)

          

On the incommunicability of political conversion

Two years ago I got a phone call out of the blue from an old college friend Cassius, to tell me that K—a mutual friend back in the day, with whom I had absolutely not kept up any contact—had recently died. Cassius and I went on to have a long talk about a lot of things, catching up on 37 years of past history. (Besides this post, see also this one.) During this talk (among a lot of other topics) Cassius filled me in on what had happened in the interim with K and Mrs. K. 

K and Mrs. K had gotten together while I was still a student. K's previous girlfriend had been a good friend of mine (but never my girlfriend), and the woman who later became Mrs. K had been a radical political lesbian. (I remember one spring festival on campus where she wandered around topless; her overall frame was small and her breasts were proportionally sized, but they were beautifully formed.) But somehow she and K hit it off … and then fell into bed together … after which K ended things with his former girlfriend to focus on one woman at a time. Not long thereafter K and his new girlfriend moved in together, and in due course they married. That's how far my knowledge went before I talked with Cassius.

What I learned was that since then, K had found work in some lucrative corner of the computer industry, and was able to retire at around the age of 50 (so roughly a decade before I did) to a life of elegant leisure and collecting art. Also, some time during the intervening years the K's had migrated from the left-wing politics which had been conventional on campus (back when we were all undergraduates) to something that Cassius characterized as right-wing. He didn't go into a lot of detail, but I assume this meant that they voted Republican rather than Democratic.

Cassius did say that once—only once—he asked them about their political migration, but that the conversation was not informative:

Cassius: I don't get it. You used to be on the Left. What happened to you guys, anyway?

Mrs. K: We finally opened our eyes!

Meeting my Shadow

Last night during dinner I had an encounter with my Shadow. The Jungian kind. Perhaps I'd better start again.

I haven't read very much Jung, and I'm no expert in the tenets of Jungian psychology. Most of what I know about the Shadow archetype, I've learned from reading John Michael Greer—for example, in this essay here. See also this YouTube video as a quick summary:

But his description has always been a bit difficult for me to apply to myself. 

• Your Shadow consists of all the parts of yourself that you don't like. OK, so far, so good. 
• But specifically they are things you hate so much that you refuse to acknowledge that they are part of you. This makes it harder, because I freely acknowledge many of the unpleasant sides of my own character. I talk about them in this venue, not infrequently. Do I have to rule out all of those?
• Because you can't admit that your Shadow characteristics are part of you, you project them onto your enemies. Gosh, do I have enemies?
• And whenever you see someone else exhibit one of these behaviors, it makes you crazy.

I wasn't sure what that left me. But it turns out that's because I have a bad memory.