With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.
The good life, as I conceive it, is a happy life. I do not mean that if you are good you will be happy - I mean that if you are happy you will be good.
Too much sanity may be madness and the maddest of all, to see life as it is and not as it should be.
The only way to find the limits of the possible is by going past them into the impossible.
August 17, 2009 - 1:26 a.m.
Why am I putting off updating tonight? Maybe I'll write an entry analyzing that. Maybe not.
I went to the Met game today. Yesterday, David Wright, their best player and their only star that isn't hurt, got beaned. He has a concussion. Needless to say he didn't play today. Despite that the Met's won. Their starting pitcher, Pelfrey, pitched a beautiful game but left tied 2-2. They won when Daniel Murphy drove in the winning run in the ninth. In other words a great game. The Mets aren't going anyplace this year, the games are meaningless, but a great game is still a joy. The essence of the game, is the game.
I still don't have AC and it was over 90° today, at least it was supposed to get that hot. I realized tonight that I'm enjoying the challenge of staying cool without air conditioning. Not enough to not want to go out and get one. I really don't like it when it is over 80. Earlier in the summer the building hadn't built up that much heat and it got cool at night. Now it doesn't. It's 76° outside but if feels warmer in here.
When I got home I went shopping for the first time in ages. I had one of my few bad experiences with an employee of Trader Joe's. After he packed my bag he realized that he forgot a banana and he threw it threw the air into the bag onto hard things. I should have exchanged it right then. I didn't. When I got home I saw how badly it was bruised. It wasn't when I picked it out. I check them carefully.
I keep a ridiculously busy schedule. Here is what I have for this week.
- Monday – Anthony da Costa
- Tuesday – Amy Speace
- Wednesday – Mets vs Braves
- Thursday – Sometymes Why
- Friday – Piñataland with Deni Bonet
- Sunday – Mets vs Phillies
When I decided what to wear to the wedding I ended up going for something that Sue called "daring." That's something I would never have done when I was younger. I still have plenty of social anxiety but I've learned that the best thing to do is to do what I will make me happy even if there are social risks. So now I where outfits a bit off the beaten track, I ask strange women to dance, I start conversations with total strangers. I've done it long enough now that I don't even feel that much anxiety in many situations. When I got to the wedding I started talking to what turned out to be the best man and had a lot of fun doing so. Same thing happened when I sat at my table where I didn't know anyone. When Lisa's friend who was acting as videographer said that he wanted us to tell funny stories about Lisa everyone said, "Let Gordon do it. He has the best stories." That's a lot better than my life in high school.
The things that we are afraid to do actually have very mild consequences when they go wrong and the things we do to avoid embarrassment stop you from enjoying yourself. I used to hate weddings. They were times to sit around and feel awkward. I now enjoy them even when I'm not with friends. Why is that such a hard lesson to learn. Why did I have to wait till I was so old? The first wedding I asked someone to dance was Aubrey's. That must have been around 1993 or 94 so I was in my late thirties. What's funny is that was when I was at the nadir of my attractiveness. I look a lot better now. I'm still socially awkward, I'm still an oddball, but I'm the oddball having fun.
This is turning out to be an upbeat entry. I wasn't sure about that when I started. I could have written about my list of people that I wish liked talking to me as much as I like talking to them. I have a list. I find myself going through it. When I'm smart I stop myself from doing that; it's completely counterproductive.
I think what I'm groping towards this entry is that despite the fact that I have a high cost of doing business, in the end I like myself. Maybe that's why I didn't want to write it. How do you write that without sounding narcissistic? How do you spell narcissistic? So I'm not telling you how to live your life. I'm just telling you about the person I know best, me.
Welcome to Neuroworld - August 22, 2009
Fan on the Run - August 21, 2009
Scene Kid - August 20, 2009
As Cool As I Am - August 19, 2009
Quest for Coolness - August 18, 2009
Email me: GordonLew at gmail
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License. Horvendile August 17, 2009
