Perfect Day
Just a perfect day,
Problems all left alone,
Weekenders on our own.
It's such fun.
Just a perfect day,
You made me forget myself.
I thought I was someone else,
Someone good.
~ Perfect Day, Lou Reed
Today in one of his more tangential moments, JWB played us this song and asked us whether we thought it was light or dark. i said it was dark of course--that it rang of desperation and impending tragedy.. in hindsight, i really should have said 'desperate-exuberance' instead because he immediately pounced on me for taking the easy choice of two dichotomies, saying that i was a 'glass half-empty' person.
i was quite stunned because i suddenly realised that he was right--i am an incurable cynic. i'm really not a pessimist, because i do believe that good things do happen... i just don't think v well of the intentions of other people. i think there's a continuity between cynicism and misanthropy and i'm somewhere just left of the middle.... anyway
i thought our lesson on Emerson was v inspiring :)) i still think of Emerson as the crackpot tree-hugger from my philo class, but he has some interesting ideas about living that i truly admire. today we looked at this extract from The American Scholar:
The world-this shadow of the soul, or other me-lies wide around. Its attractions are the keys which unlock my thoughts and make me acquainted with myself. I run eagerly into this resounding tumult. I grasp the hands of those next me, and take my place in the ring to suffer and to work, taught by an instinct, that so shall the dumb abyss be vocal with speech. I pierce its order; I dissipate its fear; I dispose of it within the circuit of my expanding life [...] I do not see how any man can afford, for the sake of his nerves and his nap, to spare any action in which he can partake. It is pearls and rubies to his discourse. Drudgery, calamity, exasperation, want, are instructors in eloquence and wisdom. The true scholar grudges every opportunity of action passed by, as a loss of power.
had my palm read today by Master Khor... a very bizarre experience. when he first looked at my hand he was startled and stared at me earnestly, asking that i not be offended by what he had to say. i was quite disturbed by the conviction with which he repeated many times that i needed to 學 做 人, or (roughly translated) learn how to be a person... i guess ancient chinese sages must have had v stringent ideals about society. fortunately everything else was less personal and more speculative (mostly misses). he claimed that i got my moral support from conservative parents, that i am intelligent and (hence?) should go into a business like food catering and that i need to work hard to succeed early in life or i never will (at this point.. v sound advice)
most bizarrely, he suggested that i should really take the advice of friends in my choice(s) of romantic partners, mainly because 1) i lack judgment in people, w regards to love, 2) i will surely end up with someone less than my equal (his words) who will make me intensely unhappy and 3) i will find it v hard to leave someone.
Problems all left alone,
Weekenders on our own.
It's such fun.
Just a perfect day,
You made me forget myself.
I thought I was someone else,
Someone good.
~ Perfect Day, Lou Reed
Today in one of his more tangential moments, JWB played us this song and asked us whether we thought it was light or dark. i said it was dark of course--that it rang of desperation and impending tragedy.. in hindsight, i really should have said 'desperate-exuberance' instead because he immediately pounced on me for taking the easy choice of two dichotomies, saying that i was a 'glass half-empty' person.
i was quite stunned because i suddenly realised that he was right--i am an incurable cynic. i'm really not a pessimist, because i do believe that good things do happen... i just don't think v well of the intentions of other people. i think there's a continuity between cynicism and misanthropy and i'm somewhere just left of the middle.... anyway
i thought our lesson on Emerson was v inspiring :)) i still think of Emerson as the crackpot tree-hugger from my philo class, but he has some interesting ideas about living that i truly admire. today we looked at this extract from The American Scholar:
The world-this shadow of the soul, or other me-lies wide around. Its attractions are the keys which unlock my thoughts and make me acquainted with myself. I run eagerly into this resounding tumult. I grasp the hands of those next me, and take my place in the ring to suffer and to work, taught by an instinct, that so shall the dumb abyss be vocal with speech. I pierce its order; I dissipate its fear; I dispose of it within the circuit of my expanding life [...] I do not see how any man can afford, for the sake of his nerves and his nap, to spare any action in which he can partake. It is pearls and rubies to his discourse. Drudgery, calamity, exasperation, want, are instructors in eloquence and wisdom. The true scholar grudges every opportunity of action passed by, as a loss of power.
had my palm read today by Master Khor... a very bizarre experience. when he first looked at my hand he was startled and stared at me earnestly, asking that i not be offended by what he had to say. i was quite disturbed by the conviction with which he repeated many times that i needed to 學 做 人, or (roughly translated) learn how to be a person... i guess ancient chinese sages must have had v stringent ideals about society. fortunately everything else was less personal and more speculative (mostly misses). he claimed that i got my moral support from conservative parents, that i am intelligent and (hence?) should go into a business like food catering and that i need to work hard to succeed early in life or i never will (at this point.. v sound advice)
most bizarrely, he suggested that i should really take the advice of friends in my choice(s) of romantic partners, mainly because 1) i lack judgment in people, w regards to love, 2) i will surely end up with someone less than my equal (his words) who will make me intensely unhappy and 3) i will find it v hard to leave someone.