Life for Rent

Gosh I haven’t done this in such a long time. But as has always been the case, no news here is certainly good news everywhere else. My professional life couldn’t be any better. And I feel utterly fulfilled. That truly wonderful, and deeply rewarding feeling. Pure awesome personified.  

Life feels like it has just begun. I’m slowly settling down and into my new skin; all that has been for the past six years —the financial, emotional, mental and social trauma— was to prepare for this: this and the entirety of the four decades to come.

My future unfolding before me, my academic preparation complete, my career at its first steps. A stark comparison to the aimless, impulsive and perhaps down-right and aptly stupid undertakings of youth. Days without a sliver of responsibility. Days without thought. Days without maturity. Oh goodness how could one live like that for so many years?

I have entered into a new phase of life, one where it is expected of me to perform and thus conduct myself in ways that I have never done so before. And for this I get paid a sum of cash at the end of every month, where in time that sum would grow in size and prove to be substantial enough that I will be able to horde a ton of dough to… to, well, spend on whatever that fancy finds me.  

And so it becomes tremendously easy thus to get sucked into consumerism and the pursuit of ever greater wealth. That there would be no end in sight. That the growth of companies and markets and national GDPs and consequently, the expansion of humankind itself as a whole, is inevitable and inexorable. That we as a race and as a civilisation can continue to flourish unabated for ever.

But no.

Our treasured home is dying.  

Before this century is over, our little blue speck of celestial rock and water will be irrevocably damaged . The tipping point is already upon us. Yet day in and day out, we trudge along: wasteful, improvident, without a care in the world. We dream, and we do so lavishly. We live, we spend and we consume, but the only thing that we consume is our home. We are neither great nor beautiful. We are nothing but a cancer to this planet.  

It disgusts me to live in this filth of fat and unnecessary excess, this sickness and perverted attitude that there is always more beyond the horizon. New opportunities to exploit. New resources to pillage. New lands to conquer. New worlds to rule.  

But there aren’t any.

There isn’t even enough to sustain all of us in our present state of continued excess, much less another few billion people who will soon flick the switch and join us in our so-called first world civilisation —one of mindless twenty-four-seven consumption of any and every resource imaginable.  

When will we wake up and make that change? Buy that one less little unnecessary item. Live without that one less frivolous object. Make that one less journey. Shower that one less minute. Set that one little Celsius hotter. 

Do it regardless, if only because long-term happiness isn’t that extra ten thousand a month, nor is it that fortune worth multiples of a lifetime. Joy isn’t a giant two-ton automobile, nor a house filled to the brim with shiny shit. We need to learn to live a smaller footprint. Learn to live with less. Learn to live on needs. Just as now is and has been a fitting time for us to “grow up” as persons and individuals, so too is now a fitting time for us to collectively grow up as a race, for are we really nothing more than perverse lumps of dividing cells all gone wrong?  

Tokens

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The silky smooth surface of tranquillity cloaks a torrent of discontent, pandemonium the stirring undercurrent that lies hidden beneath.

A breakdown marks the previous day, the very first of its kind in fifteen weeks.


So tired.

Just so, so damned tired. All the critique, the judgement, the criticism, the ensuing shits.


Tired sick of being alienated, have me and the things I love be put-down time and time again, as if to estrange as much as attempts to marginalise.


I have not come thus long, thus far, to be back at where I was one whole decade ago.

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Keys in hand, fuel in tank, the open roads beckon for solace. Peace. My goodness, when, why, have I grown so worldly?

Greed, corruption; these subtle and insidious monsters! Blast them. Damn their eyes.



Too comfortable a lifestyle. Too many luxuries a life.

Filth too dense to clean.

A living footprint too heavy to sustain.


Behind clouds the timid sun hides, painting this land a monochromatic hallucination. The sky darkens. The gauges light, crisp white on black. Rev counter, fuel counter, all systems are still go.


As they were two and a half years ago.

Those were simpler times. Simpler ways. Simpler wants. Simpler needs.


Times happier perhaps not, certainly more beautiful they must have been.

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Beautiful this world around me is still.

Great ideas, great pieces of work, great talent, great skill . . . trivialised and suppressed to the realm of gods and religions past, faded into insignificance by the very forcings of ignorant proles all wealthy of spirit, wealthy of cash, bereft of sense.

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Take this omen, for tomorrow would not be the same as yesterday, nor as it is today.

Ceilings and zeniths, they were certainly never to be surpassed.

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Closing Time

June is upon us, and my hands really feel as though they have been tied to… well, something. Something heavy, something cumbersome.

Time is unforgiving and indiscriminate in its advance.

Slashing and ripping through all that is, like a cruel menace time comes for me.




More so than ever before, I am closer to one end of my journey than the other. You know, beginnings are so much less fraught with baggage the way endings are.

The heavy burden of memory and experience is not something universally cherished or embraced.

But without endings, I tell myself, how then can new beginnings sprout?



It was about this time two years ago that I had looked to Australia for hope, escape and new leaves. Today though, escape seems only feasible within the confines of my grey, gooey gunk —which is arguably the very item I need escaping from in first place.


I have started to wonder if my life is one too sane. Is it one too calculated or one too proper? The temptation to flick the switch, run amok, pursue senseless and irrational excursions... and satisfy whims and desires of any and every sort... oh how tempting the proposition!

But then again, when all is said and done, who else would be there to clean up the mess if it was not for me, my own little self?



"A child no longer" voices in my head.

Responsibilities, the piggy account and relationships beckon...


And so, whatever little is left of my youth is being further robbed away from under my feet; time the termite sure loves its wood.


I feel opportunities dissolving into thin air. It is said that youth is wasted on the young, but somehow I have always sensed that I had never wasted my youth. The past decade was spent trying to be as grown-up and as sensible as I could…

But oh the irony!

I laugh now, thinking how these very actions were tantamount to my youth being laid to waste: I have little memory of joy and experience from my younger days. What of the crazy things you did as a child? What of the ridiculous things you said? What of the absurd suggestions you had made, or the outrages desires that you had expressed liking to, and even more shockingly, were granted with? Oh how exciting it must have been.

But if only that …I was there too.



So, with what little is left of my salad days, my time here in this city and the luxury of being “youngish", must I really walk away like this? Walk away on this path of continued arrogant, self-serving righteousness and the delusions of an unsullied life?

Must I really walk away from this one chance, guided by ever more sane and reasoned laser systems? Is the grass really always greener on the other side? Is Lord Dreamer sleeping again, or is it Lady Rationale moving on to greener pastures?

Time and the bubble of a world around me is just screaming at me to act …but if only the solutions were not lost in the very jungle of noise that they created.



But then again, none of this ever seemed to matter to me before. I wonder, must it really now?

Pages

     
For so many nights I have laid there under those sheets.

The cold, blissful silence of the wee morning hours have always been conducive for aimless contemplations of the mind. 

You know, life’s pretty surreal sometimes.


What’s all this for?

No, really, tell me what is all this for?

A fat pile of cash? A comfy, luxurious life to grow fat and complacent over? A lifetime of achievements that mean nothing to no one but yourself on the day you are forced to shut your eyelids for good?


I used to bubble with altruism. I used to think of “to make the world a better place” as the most noble, most utilitarian cause an individual could ever aim to live for.

Perhaps a truly significant contribution that will fundamentally change the way we live our lives for generations to come. Perhaps a one-inch equation of five variables that will permeate through humanity for millennia. Or perhaps ambitions less lofty; perhaps to just go, leaving behind a variety of chemicals that register as positive memories in the grey matter of family and friends.  


Laughable, isn’t it?

You grow up only to realise that so many things and so many people are already well beyond reprieve. So much is already cast in stone, so much is not worth trying for to begin with.

And what does it matter, when life as a whole means so little? Beneath delusions of an afterlife, beyond the corruptive lure of wealth, ego and power, after the passing of lust, sex and love, what else is there to life?

You think I’m the lone idiot who is paying the price for being a faithless, non-believing atheist, but I’ll tell you this: if all the things I said above weren’t true, none of us —not even the most religious fanatics— would fear death's call.

   

Cavities

I wake up to a sunny Sunday morning, somewhat warm, somewhat humid, but under a perfect blue sky.

It seemed just like one of those Sundays I used to have back home, back when I was still a teenager all those years ago.

The lunches with my parents, the air-conditioner, the blistering speed of my top-of-the-range computer, and Far Cry. And not to mention, the angst.

I suppose it happens to everyone. I suppose that as we grow, we learn that people will inevitably disappoint you, somehow.

Along the way, we learn that beyond people, many of the things you dreamed of too, once within your reach/possession, you will realise that they weren’t all that they were cracked up to be, and that they probably weren’t worth one bit of the time and effort you had put in.

Or perhaps not. Perhaps its just me. Perhaps people truly are happy with their dreams.

I suppose its obvious that its just me who finds just about everything a huge, giant, pathetic sham.

Surely, there has to be more to life than just prejudice and hype? More to our existence than just hearsay and uninformed gossip? More to us than just make-believes that don’t make sense? More to our skulls than just a runny gunk of grey matter?

Spheres

 
I find myself drowning in a sea of mediocrity.
 
An endless continuum of boring people.

Pathetic ones who cannot for the life of them stand up to their own judgements. Pathetic ones who cannot for a moment see beyond the facts and figures that lie before them. Pathetic ones who cannot overcome their ridiculous little prejudices that reside deep within themselves, even though it is ironic that, for the most part, these are the very same people who’s very existence has been the subject of such prejudice and discrimination.

In this huge chasm of differing values and idealism that separates me from everyone else, I feel the four walls closing in.

I feel alienated; trapped in a reality I cannot un-clutch myself from. 

Suffocating in these vile waters, I so hope and wish I could be home where love and warmth and material wealth and time run abundant.


Tonight I again write by the yellow lamp, not unlike how I did all those posts from this time last year.

Tonight I wished I had huge concentrations of alcohol gushing down my bloodstream.

Tonight, those two bottles of Budweiser left in the fridge from my past habits cannot seem more appealing.

But such is not to be.

My Fascist regiment of four-hourly meals of carefully choreographed pro:carb:fat amounts in perfect ratios and the weights and the jogs would all make alcohol the most blasphemous of things I could ingest.

Such then, is life.

Another Late Night

It's almost 5 in the morning and I am still awake, gripped by a dark sense of dismay.

Petroleum is running out. The climate is at a critical point. A little over a billion people will —in the very near future— join the developing/developed world in its voracious consumption of energy.

Fusion technology is still half a century away at the very least. Carbon capture sounds like a childish fantasy. Wind mill farms don't really cut it. Nuclear stations cost too much time and money.

The country has lost it's lead in every single field to the once inferior competitors from South Korean and Taiwan. But instead of teaming up to get our acts together and to stand up to the challenges of the world, we're a nation gripped by ridiculous religious drama and a sodomy trial. Add that to a population intent on seeing even patriotic and unifying attempts fail, you know that we're in deep shit.

Lowering the scale to a more personal level -and perhaps upping the significance- is 3300 that awaits me, and the towering exchange rate and the heavy financial burden it will incur. 

I get the sense somehow that the coming decades will see humanity go through an extremely difficult and trying period, with deep and overwhelming changes to our way of life, and the way we see ourselves.

I feel like a fool and an idiot to worry over the problems of the human race, not least when a course in dynamics is impossible enough in itself. But is it absolute wrong to fret and to worry over things one has no control over, especially if there are smarter, wealthier and more-abled people in the world to lead us out of this pit?

All I want to do is to wake up in the afternoon tomorrow, step into my chilly air-conditioned car, burn a few hundred mils of black gold —putting my share of humanity's CO2 burden into the atmosphere— to get to town and have a lovely glass of white coffee.  

And when the festivities of the Chinese New Year is over, all I yearn for is to go out and get my freezing cold beer and drink well into the mornings with the people most dear to me, then speed through the city streets to get home.

Encounters of the Silly Kind

As I walked towards the kitchen, I saw a man standing in front of my gate.

Almost wanted to say an [name of race] man but I just realised that, and I am beginning to refuse to identify people by race.

Anyways.

He carried with him a sling-type notebook bag, and was dressed in a collared long-sleeve white tee, holding a green-coloured leaflet with one of his hands.

The conversation goes roughly as follows:


Man at gate:
“Hello, can I have a few minutes of your time, sir?”

Me:
“Sure. What is it about?”

Man at gate:
“Can you please answer this questionnaire? It’s ‘Do you think the world will end…’”

Somewhat bewildered, and cautious, I immediately asked:

“Who is doing this questionnaire?”

Was it the BBC? Was it the WHO? Maybe some university-led study. Or maybe a polling agency wanting to know what the general opinion was; what with the amount of nonsense that is being spewed by the 2012 absurdity -the title of the movie notwithstanding. As these exciting thoughts raced through the neurons of the grey mass in my head, he answered:

“It is meant to be something for you to read”

Me:
“Who is it from?”

Man at gate:
“It is from a group sir.”

Me:
“What group?”

Man at gate:
“It is a Bible studies group tha…”

I cut his sentence short when halfway through, I shook my head and hands in a blatantly violent way, and started walking towards the kitchen again.

I’m pretty sure he clearly heard me yelling “We’re atheists” as I made my way to the kitchen.

I’m not too sure though, why I said “we”; it is only a matter of time before my dad joins the church, what with sickos like these.

And that he already believes an omnipresent, omnipotent being is sitting up there (where is up now that the world isn’t flat and that the atmosphere is of a finite height?) wielding all the powers in the universe[s] but still insists on punishing people for the little and large actions that he/she/it deems as a ‘sin’.

This is not entirely unlike an expert programmer having finished his magnum opus AI-enabled ‘child’, and punishing him/her/it to burn in hell for eternity, simply for making mistakes; mistakes that it was bound to make since it was entirely a programming fault by the said programmer.

It is almost impossible to appreciate the sheer elegant genius inherent in Darwin’s theory; a theory that explains not how things go down the ladder (as in the god-humanity a.k.a. master-slave relationship) but up.

You see, religionists and intelligent-creationists talk about how we/all other beings/animals are created by a higher-up intelligence ‘up there’. What they fail to realise is how this is just an intermediate postponement of the inevitable question: who created the creator?

An unending paradox that will never be solved, it is a question for which religionist have no need to care for. No, for theirs is a solution and an answer not for the minds who think along rational lines, and certainly not for minds for which reason still bears meaning.

I cite ‘all encompassing god was always/is/will always [be] there’ as example and digress.

But for the rest of us not so little folk who question, Darwin answers that question in ways no one else ever can.

Through the hundreds and thousands and millions of years, life goes up the ladder slowly, but surely. It takes time to grasp fully the idea, and to realise and understand how fundamentally important it is, and how mistakenly simple (and thus elegant) the solution sounds.


I wonder why that man at my gate had to be so reluctant at revealing his religious agenda. What a sneaky little bastard.

But then again, how else will religionists recruit people if it wasn’t by the projection of fear? Fear as you lie on your death bed in hospital. Fear as your entire career collapses before you. Fear as your loved one leaves you. Fear as you lose your way to the crises of your lives. Fear when you are thrown off balance by the mayhem of the world.

Fear, as you lose the last remnants of your sanity.

Fear as to how the world will end in twenty four months’ time, and that you’re going to hell for ‘eternity’ to burn till every last drop of matter in your body is no more, but still it will burn some more.