Friday, October 29, 2010
"Hurt" by Nine Inch Nails
In a class long, long ago we talked about decomposition. Sexson told us to look up Zed and Two Noughts to see videos of decomposition. This video shows both decomposition and "recomposition." This post is not about the song, but about the video. I do not have anything profound really to say about the video, but I thought it was a good example time-lapse decomposition photography. Enjoy.
Wednesday, October 27, 2010
Suffering and Bliss
The View
By Modest Mouse
Your gun went off.
Well you shot off your mouth and look where it got you.
My mouth runs on too.
Shouts from both sides,
"Well we've got the land but they've got the view!"
Well now here's the clue.
Life it rents us.
And yeah I hope it put plenty on you.
Well I hope mine did too.
As life gets longer, awful feels softer.
Well it feels pretty soft to me.
And if it takes shit to make bliss,
then I feel pretty blissfully.
Your gun went off.
Well you shot off your mouth and look where it got you.
My mouth runs on too.
Shouts from both sides,
"Well we've got the land but they've got the view!"
Well now here's the clue.
We are fixed right where we stand.
Life it rents us.
And yeah I hope it put plenty on you.
Well I hope mine did too.
We are fixed right where we are.
As life gets longer, awful feels softer.
Well it feels pretty soft to me.
And if it takes shit to make bliss,
well I feel pretty blissfully.
For every invention made how much time did we save?
We're not much farther than we were in the cave.
As life gets longer, awful feels softer,
and it feels pretty soft to me.
And if it takes shit to make bliss,
well I feel pretty blissfully.
If life's not beautiful without the pain,
well I'd just rather never ever even see beauty again.
Well as life gets longer, awful feels softer.
And it feels pretty soft to me.
For every good deed done there is a crime committed.
We are fixed.
For every step ahead we could have just been seated.
We are fixed.
As life gets longer, awful feels softer.
Well it feels pretty soft to me.
And if it takes shit to make bliss,
well I feel pretty blissfully.
We are fixed.
We are fixed.
We are fixed right where we stand.
One line of this song makes me think of Envy. "'Well we've got the land but they've got the view!'" This line demonstrates the propensity for humans never to be content. We always want what "they" have but we don't want to give up what we have to get that. In essence, we want everything. This discontented attitude leads to suffering, which in turn leads us to attempt to gain some level of contentment, which, according to this song, is pointless.
Although I may not fully agree with the points made in these lyrics, I do believe that it "takes shit to make bliss" and I also believe that "life's not beautiful without the pain." Without contrast between bad and good, every experience would be commonplace. No feeling would be exceptional. Thanks for the insight, Isaac Brock.
By Modest Mouse
Your gun went off.
Well you shot off your mouth and look where it got you.
My mouth runs on too.
Shouts from both sides,
"Well we've got the land but they've got the view!"
Well now here's the clue.
Life it rents us.
And yeah I hope it put plenty on you.
Well I hope mine did too.
As life gets longer, awful feels softer.
Well it feels pretty soft to me.
And if it takes shit to make bliss,
then I feel pretty blissfully.
Your gun went off.
Well you shot off your mouth and look where it got you.
My mouth runs on too.
Shouts from both sides,
"Well we've got the land but they've got the view!"
Well now here's the clue.
We are fixed right where we stand.
Life it rents us.
And yeah I hope it put plenty on you.
Well I hope mine did too.
We are fixed right where we are.
As life gets longer, awful feels softer.
Well it feels pretty soft to me.
And if it takes shit to make bliss,
well I feel pretty blissfully.
For every invention made how much time did we save?
We're not much farther than we were in the cave.
As life gets longer, awful feels softer,
and it feels pretty soft to me.
And if it takes shit to make bliss,
well I feel pretty blissfully.
If life's not beautiful without the pain,
well I'd just rather never ever even see beauty again.
Well as life gets longer, awful feels softer.
And it feels pretty soft to me.
For every good deed done there is a crime committed.
We are fixed.
For every step ahead we could have just been seated.
We are fixed.
As life gets longer, awful feels softer.
Well it feels pretty soft to me.
And if it takes shit to make bliss,
well I feel pretty blissfully.
We are fixed.
We are fixed.
We are fixed right where we stand.
The other day in Mythologies, we talked about the purpose of suffering. On the way to campus last night, I was listening the the song "The View" by Modest Mouse and the line "it takes shit to make bliss" caught my attention. Therefore, suffering shows us bliss. If it weren't for pain we would not know pleasure. However, the song goes on to state "if life's not beautiful without the pain/Well I'd rather never ever even see beauty again," which suggests that the suffering we must endure is not worth the beauty we see in contrast. Upon further revision of these lyrics, I believe this song to be rather cynical. It is basically saying that we are not going anywhere and all of this suffering we do to get ahead means nothing. As we move ahead in life, we just don't notice the suffering as much-"awful feels softer."
One line of this song makes me think of Envy. "'Well we've got the land but they've got the view!'" This line demonstrates the propensity for humans never to be content. We always want what "they" have but we don't want to give up what we have to get that. In essence, we want everything. This discontented attitude leads to suffering, which in turn leads us to attempt to gain some level of contentment, which, according to this song, is pointless.
Although I may not fully agree with the points made in these lyrics, I do believe that it "takes shit to make bliss" and I also believe that "life's not beautiful without the pain." Without contrast between bad and good, every experience would be commonplace. No feeling would be exceptional. Thanks for the insight, Isaac Brock.
Lament of the Flutes for Tammuz
"At his vanishing away she lifts up a lament,
'Oh my child!' at his vanishing away she lifts up a lament;
'My Damu!' at his vanishing away she lifts of a lament.
'My enchanter and priest!' at his vanishing away she lifts up a lament,
At the shining cedar, rooted in a spacious place,
In Eanna, above and below, she lifts up a lament.
Like the lament that a house lifts up for its master, lifts she up a lament,
Like the lament that a city lifts up for its lord, lifts she up a lament.
Her lament is the lament for a herb that grows not in the bed,
Her lament is the lament for the corn that grows not in the ear.
Her chamber is a possession that brings not forth a possession,
A weary woman, a weary child, forspent.
Her lament is for a great river, where no willows grow,
Her lament is for a field, where corn and herbs grow not.
Her lament is for a pool, where fishes grow not.
Her lament is for a thicket of reeds, where no reeds grow.
Her lament is for woods, where tamarisks grow not.
Her lament is for a wilderness where not cypresses (?) grow.
Her lament is for the depth of a garden of trees, where honey and wine grow not.
Her lament is for meadows, where no plants grow.
Her lament is for a palace, where length of life grows not."
-The Golden Bough, pg. 379-380
A while ago, I neglected to post this before class one day, hoping Dr. Sexson wouldn't mention it. He did but I decided to post it anyway because it is beautiful....and I found it but didn't take credit for it.
Monday, October 25, 2010
Sentences Book I & II
Book I
The Flood- There's no rainbow at the end of this particular flood.
Deucalion & Pyrrha- A rather loose interpretation of what the oracle said, but they clearly got the gist of it and managed to create the human race (2nd strain).
Python- Snakes always get a bad rap...no matter what.
Syrinx- Always copying Diana, she needed her own identity anyway.
Io & Jove- A happy ending...how novel.
Book II
Phaethon- I don't really understand how "In his fall he gained the death of one supremely brave"-apparently bravery is closely related to sheer stupidity and blatant obstinance.
The Raven- They look bad when they are "the opposite of black" anyway.
Arcas- Rape is always cool to Jove, matricide not so much.
Battus- Never trust someone who refers to themselves in the third person.
Mercury, Herse, Aglauros- We revel in others' sadness and despair in their happiness, thanks Envy...you bitch.
The Flood- There's no rainbow at the end of this particular flood.
Deucalion & Pyrrha- A rather loose interpretation of what the oracle said, but they clearly got the gist of it and managed to create the human race (2nd strain).
Python- Snakes always get a bad rap...no matter what.
Syrinx- Always copying Diana, she needed her own identity anyway.
Io & Jove- A happy ending...how novel.
Book II
Phaethon- I don't really understand how "In his fall he gained the death of one supremely brave"-apparently bravery is closely related to sheer stupidity and blatant obstinance.
The Raven- They look bad when they are "the opposite of black" anyway.
Arcas- Rape is always cool to Jove, matricide not so much.
Battus- Never trust someone who refers to themselves in the third person.
Mercury, Herse, Aglauros- We revel in others' sadness and despair in their happiness, thanks Envy...you bitch.
Thursday, October 21, 2010
The Crazy Relative
"[Bacchus's] ecstatic worship, characterised by wild dances, thrilling music, and tipsy excess, appears to have originated among the rude tribes of Thrace, who were notoriously addicted to drunkenness." The Golden Bough pg. 449
We wish we could have locked her in the attic. Well, I guess she did make it to prison now, but not before making the family awfully proud. To put into perspective what sort of cousin Andora is- whenever she does anything, everyone in my family looks at each other and says "Don't tell Grandma!" Perhaps crazy cousin Andora has been far too heavily influenced by Bacchus in her life. This influence manifested itself one fateful day in the summer of 2008.
This story takes place rather early in the day-2:30 in the afternoon to be exact. Cousin Andora had been imbibing quite a lot of alcohol at this point and was on her way home from the bar. She found herself stuck behind a line of cars that were stopped for construction. The delay simply wouldn't fly with Andora in her .26 Blood Alcohol Content state of mind, so she decided to take matters into her own hands. It is not clear whether she rammed two vehicles out of anger or drunkenness or both, but she still did it, and managed to flee the scene of the crime as well. In her attempt to bypass all of the construction traffic, Andora came upon a cop who was directing said traffic. When this unsuspecting stop attempted to stop her, he reportedly "heard the car's engine rev" and the vehicle came toward him. She hit his knee with the front bumper as he was jumping out of the way and got him on the shoulder with the driver's side rear-view mirror, causing him to spin around and fall to the ground. Someone wrote down the license plate number and my crazy cousin was hauled into jail. About a year ago, Andora was sentenced to four years in a New Jersey prison.
I wonder if Andora knew that she was being mythological in her drunken rampage. It takes an abstract sort of thinking to realize that, and I suppose her mind was in somewhat of an abstract state with the alcohol and all. I'm sure that cop would have a few choice words for the festive Bacchus had he known of his influence in my cousin's transgressions.
Tuesday, October 19, 2010
A bad day....
Yesterday I had a bad day. I was actually in the midst of writing this post when it got worse, so that is why I'm a bit late with it.
It all started Sunday night. My boyfriend, Simon, and I arrived in Bozeman at around 7:00 PM after a long and eventful weekend in Winifred. He had to start a paper for his writing class, so I decided to go to bed early, knowing he would be obsessing about his opening paragraph until the wee hours of the morning. I fell asleep at around 9:00 and Simon managed to wake me up about four times before he called it quits and went to sleep. On top of the fact that he had to do homework all night, Simon had also fallen ill sometime earlier that day and was feeling rather sorry for himself and surly toward his undeserving girlfriend. The first few times he woke me up were innocent enough, falling over me to get the power cord on my side of the bed, "accidentally" slamming the door to the bathroom door, sighing with frustration in an unnecessarily audible fashion, etc; but the fourth time really pissed me off-he woke me up so that I could kick my cat out of the room because she was annoying him. You may be wondering why in the hell he couldn't just kick the cat out himself, but I cannot answer that question because I have no idea. My suspicion is that he simply was feeling sorry for himself and in turn irritated with me for being able to sleep while he was toiling away on the rough draft of the opening paragraph for this 20 point paper for five hours. Once Simon came to bed at 2:00 AM, it was constant battle for the covers until I woke up to shower at 6:00 AM.
Yesterday started with me feeling tired and irritated. I was trying to hide my frustration and be a dutiful girlfriend because, as mentioned previously, poor Simon wasn't feeling well. My first mistake was trying to wake him up to shower...as it always is. He thought I was nagging at him when truthfully I just wanted to make it to school on time; how unreasonable of me. After the usual "get out of bed" fight, we were ready to go to school...or so I thought. Simon had to get his bag of animal crackers so I went out to the car and waited for him. He hadn't shown up after five minutes so I went back in looking for him (mistake number two) and ended up having to show him where the damn crackers were because Sarah had "hidden" them from him. He apparently thought I was a little short with him about the whole thing-being late for school does not warrant hurrying, and was mad at me the entire ride to school. Trying to lighten the mood, I made fun of him for not grabbing a sweatshirt because it was cold outside (mistake number three)and he was sick. I then tried to make nice again by offering him some Kleenexes to have in class so he wouldn't be sniffling all day. He replied to this offer by saying "I don't want your f***ing sweatshirt or your f***ing Kleenexes!" We parted ways without a goodbye kiss but still planned on meeting at noon for lunch.
Noon rolled around and we met. We managed to get along until about 12:20, at which time I learned that he had not finished an assignment that was due in his grammar class and I made the mistake of mentioning that he needs to work on time management. The comment didn't sit well with Simon and our conversation ended with me walking away and going to the bookstore. Some poor guy in the hallway by financial aid was afforded the pleasure of hearing the whole thing happen and it was extremely awkward.
After we parted ways this second time, I decided I wasn't going to fight with Simon any more. I called him when I got done with work because I knew that he was just getting out of class. I picked him up from school and we got along very well-we went to a movie at the procrastinator at 9:00 and enjoyed it immensely. After the movie, however, I expressed distaste at the idea of sitting on the computers in the sub and searching for a specific Youtube clip, which was an extremely bitchy thing to do to poor Simon. He didn't mention his displeasure at my opinions on what we should do for the night until we were in the parking lot outside our condo. He decided he needed to "inform" me that I had been being a bitch twenty minutes earlier and he just couldn't let it go.
After that comment, I was done trying not to fight with him and went into the house to work on my blog. As I was working on my blog, successfully ignoring the fractious redhead at the computer desk, I made the mistake of striking up a conversation with my cousin on Facebook. In talking to him, I found out that he had been addicted to heroin for the last three years and had been lying to me about it...but that is an entirely different story so I won't go into detail. After a slight row at bedtime, Simon and I managed to make nice and fall asleep without strangling each other.
Upon further reflection on my bad day, I realized that James the Rat might be right. Maybe we don't have bad days, but days that we can learn from. Yesterday sucked, for lack of a better word, but Simon feels better today and we have been pretty nice to each other all day. I guess I just need to learn how to deal with his over-sensitive nature and he needs to learn to deal with my overly-terse nature. Perhaps we can find a happy medium...or we can just continue to have days like yesterday every once in a while so we can be grateful for times we get along.
It all started Sunday night. My boyfriend, Simon, and I arrived in Bozeman at around 7:00 PM after a long and eventful weekend in Winifred. He had to start a paper for his writing class, so I decided to go to bed early, knowing he would be obsessing about his opening paragraph until the wee hours of the morning. I fell asleep at around 9:00 and Simon managed to wake me up about four times before he called it quits and went to sleep. On top of the fact that he had to do homework all night, Simon had also fallen ill sometime earlier that day and was feeling rather sorry for himself and surly toward his undeserving girlfriend. The first few times he woke me up were innocent enough, falling over me to get the power cord on my side of the bed, "accidentally" slamming the door to the bathroom door, sighing with frustration in an unnecessarily audible fashion, etc; but the fourth time really pissed me off-he woke me up so that I could kick my cat out of the room because she was annoying him. You may be wondering why in the hell he couldn't just kick the cat out himself, but I cannot answer that question because I have no idea. My suspicion is that he simply was feeling sorry for himself and in turn irritated with me for being able to sleep while he was toiling away on the rough draft of the opening paragraph for this 20 point paper for five hours. Once Simon came to bed at 2:00 AM, it was constant battle for the covers until I woke up to shower at 6:00 AM.
Yesterday started with me feeling tired and irritated. I was trying to hide my frustration and be a dutiful girlfriend because, as mentioned previously, poor Simon wasn't feeling well. My first mistake was trying to wake him up to shower...as it always is. He thought I was nagging at him when truthfully I just wanted to make it to school on time; how unreasonable of me. After the usual "get out of bed" fight, we were ready to go to school...or so I thought. Simon had to get his bag of animal crackers so I went out to the car and waited for him. He hadn't shown up after five minutes so I went back in looking for him (mistake number two) and ended up having to show him where the damn crackers were because Sarah had "hidden" them from him. He apparently thought I was a little short with him about the whole thing-being late for school does not warrant hurrying, and was mad at me the entire ride to school. Trying to lighten the mood, I made fun of him for not grabbing a sweatshirt because it was cold outside (mistake number three)and he was sick. I then tried to make nice again by offering him some Kleenexes to have in class so he wouldn't be sniffling all day. He replied to this offer by saying "I don't want your f***ing sweatshirt or your f***ing Kleenexes!" We parted ways without a goodbye kiss but still planned on meeting at noon for lunch.
Noon rolled around and we met. We managed to get along until about 12:20, at which time I learned that he had not finished an assignment that was due in his grammar class and I made the mistake of mentioning that he needs to work on time management. The comment didn't sit well with Simon and our conversation ended with me walking away and going to the bookstore. Some poor guy in the hallway by financial aid was afforded the pleasure of hearing the whole thing happen and it was extremely awkward.
After we parted ways this second time, I decided I wasn't going to fight with Simon any more. I called him when I got done with work because I knew that he was just getting out of class. I picked him up from school and we got along very well-we went to a movie at the procrastinator at 9:00 and enjoyed it immensely. After the movie, however, I expressed distaste at the idea of sitting on the computers in the sub and searching for a specific Youtube clip, which was an extremely bitchy thing to do to poor Simon. He didn't mention his displeasure at my opinions on what we should do for the night until we were in the parking lot outside our condo. He decided he needed to "inform" me that I had been being a bitch twenty minutes earlier and he just couldn't let it go.
After that comment, I was done trying not to fight with him and went into the house to work on my blog. As I was working on my blog, successfully ignoring the fractious redhead at the computer desk, I made the mistake of striking up a conversation with my cousin on Facebook. In talking to him, I found out that he had been addicted to heroin for the last three years and had been lying to me about it...but that is an entirely different story so I won't go into detail. After a slight row at bedtime, Simon and I managed to make nice and fall asleep without strangling each other.
Upon further reflection on my bad day, I realized that James the Rat might be right. Maybe we don't have bad days, but days that we can learn from. Yesterday sucked, for lack of a better word, but Simon feels better today and we have been pretty nice to each other all day. I guess I just need to learn how to deal with his over-sensitive nature and he needs to learn to deal with my overly-terse nature. Perhaps we can find a happy medium...or we can just continue to have days like yesterday every once in a while so we can be grateful for times we get along.
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