Contemplative and Rambling

[bennj]

As I was IMming at Robin, who was too busy doing her hum paper / avoiding her hum paper to notice, LJ is very much a different kind of Time Suck from the others out there: the Shmack, the video games, chasing each other with things made out of duct tape both large and small. Already, LJ seems to be a place where one can talk about feelings. This

Comments

[willskyfall]

You are speaking from what sadly, on the surface, appears to be a minority--but certainly not a minority of one.

I know I came here because of the possiblity that I might balance CS with acting; I can't speak for other people, but I've seen several messages of this sort on LJ. The resistance speaks . . .

[troglodyteking]

Congratulations - two days on LJ and three posts, and you have already made it into my memories file.

I very much agree. Thankfully, Stanford is an environment that fosters such sorts of conversations, or at least can, to a certain extent. At least, I suspect more than Harvey Mudd.

[amoken]

It takes a little while to find the right people, but you can find people to have such conversations with at Mudd, even regularly. In fact, Mudd eventually abounded with such people for me, in comparison with other places (high school, UCLA, the Real World, ...). By "eventually" I mean that frosh year I had very few such people (handful by the end of the year, if that), and by senior year I'd accumulated many. Mudd has many bright, fast, interested, interesting, and diverse minds, and these minds all experience emotions and desires much like you. If you look, you'll eventually find folk who fit the bill.

[snailprincess]

You comment reminded me of some stuff. I know real, meaningful conversations can happen at Mudd. The lounge used to be a haven for them. I can't tell you how many nights freshmen and sophomore year I stayed up late in the lounge discussing just about anything with John Walseth, Cube, Matt Brubeck and assorted others. They are probably some of the most intellectual stimulating conversations I've ever had, and I don't think they ever involved math or any such thing. And they were amazingly low on wanking.

Man, I miss those guys. They're gone know, but I'm sure there are others like them around.

[snailprincess]

It sometimes impressive how alone you can feel surounded by people, even your friends. I think you'll find you're surounded by people who are looking for the same exact thing you are, but quite often we don't really know where to start. I think it's difficult for a lot of us to open up and wanking about classes or whatever is sort of an easy place to start. Unfortunately it's also an easy place to get trapped.

In anycase, figure this one out and you'll be doing better than I ever did.

[ywalme]

Deepest apologies. I'm notorious for almost always being willing *to* listen, but being terrible *at* listening -- I'm working on this, but I probably wouldn't even have noticed that you wanted to talk even if I hadn't been writing my paper / playing games. In the future, if you want to talk, be blunt and beat me upside the head with it; that's usually what it takes to draw my attention to that sort of thing.