2005-03-05 - 11:47 a.m.
What I'm listening to: Ain't No Sunshine-Bill Withers.
I remember a colleague at that other University in town said once that 'everyone is basically lonely'. I find this difficult to understand. Is this an identity thing or just a lack of belonging? I do feel lonely a times, but it's never a general state. It's just a down, like being happy vs. sad. These states are always transitionary, so I don't take much stock in the downs.
An elder once told me to write a letter to myself, so at sadder points in the lifeline I can refer to it as an independent pick me up. At the time I thought that this exercise was futile, as if I were to write such a document, then it would be temporally and spatially specific, and hence have little relevance for future situations. Such reliance would assume a 'core' self, which I do find humanly impossible, as it leads to an idea of a human nature, which is absurd.
However on further reflection, this would be a good excerise. As a religious person, it would be like some kind of doctrinal literature on the self and identity: what defines one's own identity.
It would seem that religious texts, narratives, stories, myths, are indeed temporally and spatially specific, but are no means limited to that or absolutely defined by that. If that were the case, most religions would not have left their own immediate area.
I wouldn't say that religions have 'core' human values, but I do think that they do have commonly found human traits in them: the need to belong, the need to give, the need to receive, the need to love. As social systems, it would seem that most religions of my knowledge share these traits.
If you don't feel like you belong, don't feel like your own person or efforts have any value in a given membership group, then it would seem only natural for you to leave that group, or for the group to dissolve.
I do find it embarrasing how little I know about the religions around me. My knowledge of Christianity and Judaism in particular are mediocre at best, and that is shameful considering that we are like cousins. But, while lying in bed this morning staring at the ceiling, I kept on thinking about the idea that Eve was the one who tempted Adam to eat the forbidden fruit in Eden, and as such she has to go through the pain of chilbirth as a punishment.
This goes back to Lisa, and the encounter the other night. I've always liked children, but as I get older I fail to understand why someone would not want to have them, especially as I'm an uncle four times over. It's so nice to sing to them, talk to them, spend time with them, especially when I hang around grown-ups all the time, especially stuffy academics who can't let themselves go with reckless abandon and have a good time.
Lisa is really pushy, which is a turn off. And coming off as selfish, but then again she is young, emotionally as well as in terms of age. I think I'll wait it out and see what happens. I'm totally not in the headspace to do anything except work this month, then I'm in England for April then back in May, then possibly back home to work for the summer. I'm also not in the headspace to date somebody, with all these transitions.
