Inspired parenthtical title aside, why is it that every time period of joy is laced with an undercurrent of malice and contempt?
I'm not saying that I'm the Scrooge of the holidays, but it's always in the anticipation of joy that things always seem to... go wrong. What I'm referring to is of course, the relatively miniscule struggles of Being In High School that most teenagers struggle with. As of writing, it's 3-ish days before winter break officially begins and I have: 1) Two math tests (for a math class in which I am borderline failing), 2) An APES lab due, 3) A debate final, 4) A timed essay to preare for, 5) Another timed essay to prepare for, 6) A choir concert (tonight, in fact!), 7) An AP Euro final to prepare for, and, last but most stressful, 8) Everything I need to get ready for my forensics tournament in January. This is easier said than done, as I must aquire several different documents and smash them together under the guise of a theme, and actually... register... for the tournament.
All to say, I am burning valuable daylight by returning to this website, but I also don't really care because it's my active decision to do so. I have essentially given up on attempting to salvage my motivation for anything other than that which I find personally engaging. For example; yesterday I spent 15 minutes with my broke-ass printer trying to get it to print out sheet music for a song that is entirely unrelated to anything I'm doing in school, and then spent another 2 hours plucking away at my piano.
I can't wait until winter break.
I'm of the firm personal belief that obsession is actually extremely productive to a persons life. Now, that's not to say that obsessions are universally good, and can never pose a danger- an obsession with, say, nicotine is pretty bad. However, most people are, or have been, obsessed with one thing or another at some point in their life. I'm a great example (not to stroke my own ego). To be consumed by something entirely gives life it's greatest meaning in regards to said thing, and by extention the rest of your life, if that sounds anywhere near coherent. I have frequently been criticized in essays for my tendancy to "over explain," while I see it only as me being as accurate as possible.
In a way, obsession is muse at its most accessible and primal. Obsessions drive people to actually do things. This includes fan girling/boying and other forms of fan culture. Of course, you can't talk about fan culture without mentioning Star Trek, which is actually a really good example of collective productive obsession. The shared obsession with something gets and allows people to find community, create, and have genuine discussions around and analyze the the things they obsess over. Not just in media, which is how I approach most topics, but in actionable hobbies like knitting and hunting.
Devotion is a persons greatest asset, so why in surplus is it considered something justly alienable? Even more so, when everyone has had something they've lost a little bit of their mind to at one point or another?
So what even is thinking? Scientists and other academic big wigs will say something about neurons and electricity or whatever, but I think that's really, really boring. So instead I've invented an alternative; there's two invisible other-us's fighting for thinking dominance at all hours. One's normal, like thinking about taxes and work and the practical, unignorable and boring stuff that most people think about. The other one thinks about literally everything else, and thinks the first is a stuck up asshole who needs to shove off.
Where do the two come from? I don't know, why would you ask me? Maybe they're alternate universe us's? Like one is more managed and maybe doesn't have to suffer under the whims of capitalism and the feds, and the other one is you if there was more bad things. Or maybe they're an older and younger you, respectively, and now we don't have to worry about timeline oddities at all. Would definitely save a headache. Nevermind, that would still be silly.
All this to ask, what actually are thoughts? Because with the way I think I don't believe all of my complexities and feelings are just the product of some neurons getting freaky without my saying so.
My laptop is about to die. Hey, if brains are electricity, and laptops and phones and junk are also that, can laptops think?
At the time of writing this , I am preparing to make a post. The very first (and likely only post for a while) of a website that I, myself, have made and run (VERY) infrequently. It's weird. I'm planning on showing the most bare bones, possibly most excavted version of myself that I have ever made... because coding is hard, and makes my brain hurt. And at the same time, it is probably the version of myself that is most true to who I actually am. No one I know irl uses Neocities, or codes, or has any interest in website design or independent social media creation and operation. No one. It's just me, sat in class or at home looking at a screen on a laptop I've borrowed wondering "why does nothing work the way I want it to?" and then spending 4 hours googling solutions just to get sidetracked by a stupid GIF or an image thats been wrung through the process of screenshotting and reposting so many times that it's at least half its original resolution.
There's no expectation to present myself in the way that I've already esablished. It's weird. I could totally reinvent myself, on this corner of the net. I won't, though, 'cause that's lame. But I could make myself an entirely different person. I've never had that option before. I'm less true to myself in person than online, and the further I remove myself from an established internet/irl presence the more I feel like me. Of course, no version of myself is never NOT me, it's just a different me, and that different me may be more or less removed from what I'm actually feeling or thinking in the moment I'm acting.
I hope the 'truest me' isn't a pretentious pseudo-philosphical rambler with no real point or substance to anything they say, that'd be a real bummer.