Is this how nihilists are made?
If you distill things down to their most basic bits, everything is a load of rubbish, isn't it?
Watching the Wimbledon finals a few weeks ago, a teenager said to me, "This is stupid. All they do is hit a ball back and forth until someone misses." And that's technically true enough, I guess. But as I explained to him, by those standards, every sport is utterly ridiculous.
Baseball: You hit a ball with a stick and then run 'round in a circle as fast as you can.
Football: Try to get a ball to the end of a field. You have four tries to do so.
Boxing: Punch someone repeatedly as hard as you can. Do your best to avoid being punched.
And it's not just sports. It's everything. My mother is a big fan of the "if you don't do this, will it kill you?" tactic. "If you don't see that band live, will it kill you?" "If you don't go there on vacation, will it kill you?" "If the restaurant is out of the soup you like, will it kill you?" And on and on.
And the fact is, no, it will not. Not doing any of an infinite number of things will not literally kill me.
Breathing is really the only thing I can think of that NOT doing will kill me straight away.
But it seems pretty silly to wake up every morning and set about a busy day of breathing, simply because it's the only thing that will kill me if I don't do it.
Once you've made everything seem stupid and pointless in your head though, you find that the reasons for getting out of bed in the morning start to dwindle.
But there's an obvious part of the equation missing here, isn't there? Emotion. Feeling. Sensation. Etc.
No matter how stupidly simple the basic bits of any given situation are, there are always those lovely, delicious, complex and inexplicable feelings that go along with it.
Peace Train by Cat Stevens is kind of a stupid song, and I'll be the first to admit it. But that doesn't change the fact that I get goosebumps every time I hear it.
No amount of distilling can explain why I have spent hours of my life, too numerous to count, staring at this Doug Argue painting of a bunch of chickens.
And there is no simplistic reasoning behind that unparalleled sublimely happy feeling I get when I slip my feet into the perfect pair of flip-flops.
I guess those are the sort of reasons I get out of bed in the morning. (or to be fair, early afternoon)
Well, those AND the breathing bit, I suppose.
Watching the Wimbledon finals a few weeks ago, a teenager said to me, "This is stupid. All they do is hit a ball back and forth until someone misses." And that's technically true enough, I guess. But as I explained to him, by those standards, every sport is utterly ridiculous.
Baseball: You hit a ball with a stick and then run 'round in a circle as fast as you can.
Football: Try to get a ball to the end of a field. You have four tries to do so.
Boxing: Punch someone repeatedly as hard as you can. Do your best to avoid being punched.
And it's not just sports. It's everything. My mother is a big fan of the "if you don't do this, will it kill you?" tactic. "If you don't see that band live, will it kill you?" "If you don't go there on vacation, will it kill you?" "If the restaurant is out of the soup you like, will it kill you?" And on and on.
And the fact is, no, it will not. Not doing any of an infinite number of things will not literally kill me.
Breathing is really the only thing I can think of that NOT doing will kill me straight away.
But it seems pretty silly to wake up every morning and set about a busy day of breathing, simply because it's the only thing that will kill me if I don't do it.
Once you've made everything seem stupid and pointless in your head though, you find that the reasons for getting out of bed in the morning start to dwindle.
But there's an obvious part of the equation missing here, isn't there? Emotion. Feeling. Sensation. Etc.
No matter how stupidly simple the basic bits of any given situation are, there are always those lovely, delicious, complex and inexplicable feelings that go along with it.
Peace Train by Cat Stevens is kind of a stupid song, and I'll be the first to admit it. But that doesn't change the fact that I get goosebumps every time I hear it.
No amount of distilling can explain why I have spent hours of my life, too numerous to count, staring at this Doug Argue painting of a bunch of chickens.
And there is no simplistic reasoning behind that unparalleled sublimely happy feeling I get when I slip my feet into the perfect pair of flip-flops.
I guess those are the sort of reasons I get out of bed in the morning. (or to be fair, early afternoon)
Well, those AND the breathing bit, I suppose.
posted by Flamingo Jones at 7/14/2005 12:10:00 AM
7 Comments:
it's always amusing to describe sports in those terms for sports lovers. some even get violent. it's great :) but i must say i try to do what your mom does, cos how on earth do you find energy or money to do everything if you don't? i get exhausted just thinking about it.
I once read something that described sex as "two things rubbing against each other." That doesn't change the fact that there's so much more to it.
Wobbleboard, no. Flamingo hates that line. Trust me. I know from experience.
Ian's just got a one-track mind.
Whereas I have an 8-track mind.
Or a 12-track mind, if I'm really lucky.
Judging by the news, I'd say Kucinich has had some success with that line.
the devil's in the details they say. most of it is pointless, it's all about personal preference and what elicits a reaction from you.
Those paintings look like Colonel Sanders during an LSD-induced wetdream. I don't even want to guess what your flip-flops look like.
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