Doing nothing

Well, 'doing nothing' doesn't actually exist except in death, does it? Even when just staring at a wall you're staring, breathing, blinking, thinking. Still, doing almost nothing is something like 'just sitting down and looking around', not really engaging in any activity. Doing this makes me agitated. Normally I ache to do something, as long as it isn't not sitting around and wasting precious minutes of days that are always way too short.

My ex used to try and get me to do nothing more often. Why, I'm not sure. Me, I've been trying to get people to do more, if anything. There are so many things to do, and there is so little time to do them in! Why just sit around looking out the window? I'm not saying just sitting and relaxing is wrong, but I am of the opinion that engaging in activities is generally more valuable than just sitting around watching people shopping, ducks mating, a random cooking show on TV or even a spider web near the ceiling you know you should clear away but don't, or lying in bed half the day being lazy.

For me there is a sole exception: weekends/holidays. After all, workdays are called work days for a reason, so I work my ass off for those five days every week, running around like a maniac (often literally), doing everything on a high pace. In weekends, I need to recharge my batteries, and especially when I'm not at home, with my PC available and winking at me, I can suddenly sit down not doing much of anything. How weird! It is like I'm a different person then. Sometimes I don't even recognise myself. But I can't do nothing for very long at a time, as the ache will still be there (reminding me I am still myself ;)), but is just slower to manifest.

Sometimes I long for just sitting around doing nothing despite my aversion against it. But in that fantasy I am on a mountain in Norway or some such place, contemplating the universe and my place in it, and just enjoying the beauty of nature in peace.
I will, however, have a notepad in my bag, to write down my thoughts. For I can't really just be sitting around staring at stuff, now can I? ;)

"To be idle is a short road to death and to be diligent is a way of life; 

foolish people are idle, wise people are diligent."

-- Buddha

Old age II

Eight months ago I wrote that old age terrifies me. Recently I have been thinking about (old) age again. I was thinking how you don't know how old you will get but can only expect at what age you die, and/or at what age you will become so sick or crippled that it will be almost the same as being dead. How do you adjust your life to match these expectations, and this uncertainty? Do you 'spread out' your wishes for life over the better part of 80 years, expecting to reach that age, or do you assume you will die tomorrow and live on the edge? Or something in between? Which leads to the concrete question of how best to live your life.

To me, living each day as if it is your last seems a bit excessive to say the least. Enjoying yourself as much as possible and not loafing about wasting your best years, on the other hand, seems like a good idea. I feel a strong need to do the things I want to do in life in the coming few years, before I possibly die in a freak accident or whatever. As I wrote before, I am afraid that my body will fail me when I am still fairly young. This may happen, I just don't know. I try to take the best possible care of my body in the time I have available for it (exercising, etc.) but still there is the uncertainty. I realised I am living like a man not expecting to live past thirty. Long-term commitments, especially kids, are out of the question. This spring and summer will be dominated by cool outings and activities. Et cetera... What else can I do?

"I am not afraid of death,
but the prospect of a dull life 
frightens me to death."

I can think of nothing worse than planning to do such and such around age X, or postponing activities time and again... and dying before you can do them. What a shame that would be! As illustrated above, the fear of no longer being able to do things that are on my 'wish list' has a huge influence on me. Without this fear I imagine I would be a very different person, perhaps settling down again and taking it easy - spending most of the summer on the balcony or in the garden with a stack of books and not really going anywhere. The idea alone frightens me.

Life is too fragile to be taken for granted, and too beautiful to waste just sitting around.

Who are you?

How would you answer this question? By saying your name? Certainly you would do so if a guy wants to check if you are on the guest list to a concert. Your name serves as no more than a means of identification, and by giving it, you are identifying yourself, perhaps so the other person knows he is talking to the person he meant to talk to, or to confirm it was you who ordered a table at a restaurant. Sometimes you will even need to show people a document confirming your alleged name. To prove that you are who you say you are. But who are you?

What if you were given a different name at birth? Would that have made you a different person? Seeing as you never had anything to do with the name you were given, and the ones giving it to you could not yet know who you are, it could not have made you a different person. In fact, a name is just a label. It is convenient. Just like giving the name 'apple' to that certain type of fruit, to be able to identify it. Pointing at a fruit bowl filled with a dozen types of fruit and asking for "that round piece of fruit" would not do. And similarly, "you there, with the black hair" would not do. So a name is a tool, and does not give any information about the core of you.

Most people asking you who you are, are not interested in the core of you, in what moves you. As soon as they know your name, they are no longer interested. And why should they, if their job is to let people into a concert building, for instance? But what if someone who really likes you is genuinely interested in what makes you you, and this someone obviously already knows your name? How would you then answer this question? 


Would you describe what you look like? This description would just be about your exterior, most of which you have never had much say over. You decide what clothes to wear, how long to grow your hair and how to style it, maybe add some make-up if you're one of the 3 Gs (girl, gay or goth) and take care of your body (or not) to make sure you are presentable and don't stink. If you stuff yourself full of McDonalds every day you will probably be fat. If you're anorexic you may be like a walking skeleton. But there is no escaping that same face, the same basic contours of your body, and there is only so much you can do to change your appearance. At the most, your appearance is a reflection of who you are, designed to give people a general idea of who you are without them having to ask you any questions. And indeed, by just looking at someone you can get a decent impression of him or her, and based on this impression you may decide to go and talk to that person, or to avoid him or her. But your appearance will never be more than a reflection of your true self, so a description of your exterior would not satisfy a person interested in what makes you you.


Would you give your profession? Would it do to give your job title, like "I'm a waste management and disposal technician" (meaning you are a refuse collector)? How much information would this give about who you are? Most likely you are just doing this particular job just because you need money, not because you like to secretly dive into piles of garbage bags when no one is looking. Okay, so say you are an artist. It is very likely you are not doing that job for the money at all. This would give someone more of a peek into the core of you. But is it who you are? In other words, if you changed jobs and became a fireman instead, would that change you? To what extent is your job part of you? A person genuinely interested in you will want to know more than just what you do for a living.


Would you say what your hobbies are? These are definitely things you don't do for money, so they represent your interests, and betray some of who you are. Now we're getting somewhere. Talking about your hobbies will give people an idea if you have any interests in common with them. If someone is wondering if you could be friends, having shared interests is a must. Your audience will be getting a clearer picture of who they are dealing with if you disclose your hobbies.

Would you talk about your lifestyle? It makes quite a difference if you're a loner who works at home and reads books the rest of the day, if you visit the pub and drink with friends each day after work, if you eat a home-cooked meal every day or usually eat frozen pizzas or eat out, if you like watching TV after work every night with your partner, or if you travel a lot and do odd jobs wherever you can do earn a living while roaming the world. Intertwined with your hobbies, this gives people an even clearer picture of what kind of person you are.


Would you share your policical views? Do you consider your 'being' left or right of center (i.e. having certain political preferences) to be something that gives crucial information about who you are? I'm sure some people must feel that way, especially in countries with a lot of political tension. Its relative importance for who you are can therefore vary.

Would you state your race or nationality? This is probably more important the prouder you are of it, and in certain countries, like multicultural ones, this could be more significant than in others. But is it who you are? What if you were born in a different country?

Would you state your 'chosen'* religion? I know religious types can first state they are a Christian or a Muslim before anything else, except maybe their name. So such people will probably consider this to be a very important part of who they are. Especially since it influences someone's lifestyle so, and possibly his or her hobbies. But what if you are a Christian (in this universe) who was born in a Muslim family instead, or vice versa? (Haha, religious people probably would not even be able to imagine this, so let's not go there.)

Or would you merely say you are John's wife, Emily's husband, or the colonel's son?

There are undoubtedly even more things you could say about yourself, as human beings are frighteningly complex, and it is very difficult to put into words what defines you (if you even know what does!). Suppose you were asked who you are and you tried to explain what makes you you, what would you say?

Just thinking about this makes you a richer person. Sharing your answer to the above question in the comments would also make my day :).


*This is in fact hardly ever chosen but imposed by the parents or even the government in certain countries.

Prioritising

This is so difficult when there are dozens of things each day you want to do. Besides the obvious, like working or studying, there are always chores that need to be done (but which are often postponed) and depending on how many hobbies you have, you always have other things you want to do. I, for one, have so many there is not one day I can do everything I want. To compensate I mostly run around like a maniac to save time, and I try to do every routine action as efficiently as possible for the same reason. I even zip up and buckle my belt as fast as I can to save two seconds. It's crazy.

Weekdays are different from weekend days, though. I seem to allow myself to relax then, falling into a completely different routine... of laziness. I do things at a leisurely pace and allow myself to spend the day doing fun stuff and resting. I am like a different person.
Sometimes I resolve to do some work or studying on a Saturday or something, but I shouldn't, because even the prospect of one hour's work makes my day a lot less enjoyable, constantly reminding myself I should go and do that thing after finishing the fun activity I am doing at the moment. And there is a reason I take it slow in weekends: I need to rest to keep up my frantic 'weekday pace'.

But enough about weekends. They are about having fun, that's clear enough. On weekdays, however, I want to have fun too. In fact, there are a number of things I just need to do on a weekday for it to count as a 'good' day in my book:
1) I need to be productive, meaning I either need to work and make money, or study - to finally finish my education and be rid of it.
2) I need to get a few hours of relaxation/recreation in.
3) I need to waste as little time as possible (when I need to wait for one minute for food to heat up, I do a leg exercise or something)

It will be obvious I won't feel very good if on any (week)day I relax too little (stress!), but if I don't get enough work done on a weekday I feel equally terrible. Being unproductive feels like being useless to me, even for a day. And I think being useful is one of the key features of existence. Contribute, or die.

I struggle with setting priorities each and every day, however. I could list dozens of things here that I want to do on a certain day, but I will spare you the dreary details. Regardless, I have to choose between these things every day, and this is especially hard when you have to disappoint people. And people seeking to make use of the time of another are disappointed every day, as people just have to make choices and will regularly choose to do something other than meet or speak with others, be it friends, colleagues or acquaintainces. There is just too little time.
Note that this does not mean someone does not have the time - someone just chooses to spend it differently. This is just the thing. When anyone cancels any appointment, or does not reply to an e-mail, it is because he or she chooses to do sometime else instead. This is why you can hold it against them in almost any case (except when there is an emergency). But should you? My solution is counting on people cancelling appointments, which will make the meetings all the better if they come through. If these people cancel, you were expecting it anyway. And if they cancel too often, screw them. Oops, I mean: deprioritise them ;). It's what they did to you, anyway.
If someone continuously deprioritises you, it can make you feel inconsequential, unworthy of someone's attention. If you work with these particular people, however (especially when they have a higher position than you do), you're pretty much fucked.

So every day is a struggle of setting priorities. I make a mental list of the things I really need to do, the things I really should do, and the things I really want to do, and try to make the most of it, to do as much I can in the 16 or so hours I am awake. It would certainly help if days lasted for 30 hours, though...

Working at home II

This blog entry described the numerous advantages of working at home. Unfortunately, there are down sides too. Although they are fewer in number, some are much more serious:

If I get only few job offers in a certain period (like in summer), I don't earn much money. If I get sick (or bust my knee..) and can't work, I don't earn one dime. If I go on holiday, I cannot work and will not earn one dime either. If I move house, I have to wait for the Internet to work (takes about a friggin' month) to be able to do any work whatsoever. If I run into (computer/Internet) problems, no one will fix them for me. And if I get sick for a long time, or break my fingers or something, I am totally fucked.

There are few moments I don't think about work: I never get home from work. If I get a quotation request late at night, I feel obligated to draw one up right away. Unless I am gone for the weekend, I never feel I am truly off work. Clients can call me at any time of day (though I don't always answer in evenings and weekends). I am at home by myself all day long, which can get lonely. I get distracted by personal e-mails and temptations (playing a game for a bit because I can, etc.) numerous times a day. Without a fair amount of discipline, I would hardly get any work done. I have no job security, as it completely depends on the jobs I get, so I never know when I will have how much money (which is quite handy when planning things). I never even know for sure when I will be able to go on holiday.

I have to take care of, and pay for advertising myself. I have to maintain client relations myself. I have to maintain and pay for my website myself. I have to do my own administration and pay my bookkeeper myself. I have to draw up every quotation and invoice myself. I have no colleagues so I have to do everything myself; I can rely on no one but myself. I have to pay for my hardware and software and numerous other things myself. I have to pay the heating and electrical bills myself. I even have to pay for the tea I drink myself instead of getting it from a machine for free.

I'm not even building up any pension (now). So if I get old, I'd better just forget to open my parachute!

Still, I don't know if I could work for a boss... It is like I am addicted to the freedom associated with being self-employed. But I guess there are worse addictions :).

Working at home

When I am having a wonderful dream and my alarm goes off, I can snooze my way back into the dream without fear of (serious) consequences. This is only one of the awesome elements of working at home. But this is not all.

I don't have to rush in the morning at ass o'clock to get to work in time. I don't have to drive through rush-hour traffic, eyes drooping with sleep. I don't have to eat bland peanut butter sandwiches - prepared hours before - on set times, and force them down my throat in 15 minutes to get back to work as soon as my short-as-a-leprechaun's-dick break is up. I don't have to rush to empty my bowels in 3 minutes in the morning to get to work in time. I don't have to go through a lot of trouble finding a time that suits me when making appointments with doctors, etc. I don't have to force breakfast down my throat at a time I can hardly eat anything yet. I don't have to get up extra early to get my friggin' back exercises done (at a time when I am hardly energetic) before going to work. I don't even have to do anything on a certain day, if I choose not to.

I can go jogging in the warm afternoon sun instead of after dinner, when in fact all I would want to do is relax from a hard day's work instead of running my ass off. I can get groceries at times supermarkets and bakeries still have fresh food and the shelves are full. I can reply to private e-mails all day long. During a meal I can watch part of a DVD or (youtube) videos, or read something interesting on the Internet. I can work like I am being chased by the devil for two hours and complete a four-hour task in that time, followed by a two-hour gaming session, if I choose to. I can listen to my favourite music all day long - and by that I mean all day long. I can work in my boxers with a big fan on me in summer. I can even work in my striped pyjamas while stinking but not feeling like taking a shower just yet, if I choose to.

No one tells me which jobs to take. No one has me translate dull legal documents. No one is looking over my shoulder all the time, pointing out my mistakes. No one but me decides what I do and when I do it. No one tells me I am working too slow, or too fast*. No one bothers me with inane questions, distracting me from my work. No one even knows what exactly it is I'm doing.

If I don't want to, I don't have to go to bed and try hard to fall asleep at a set time. If I oversleep and don't have time for my exercises before going to work I don't have to sit at work all day with back pains destroying my concentration and ruining my entire day. If I need a break I can at any given moment put my work on hold for fifteen minutes and play a game, take a walk or e-mail a friend. If I feel like crap and I can't concentrate, I can take half a day off to spend watching DVDs in bed (in winter) or in nature in the sun reading a book (in summer), catching up with work in the evening. If I want to get away from it all, I can even go on holiday for a week almost at any given moment if I choose to.

There are down sides too, but just for now, I like to think only of the advantages :). Yes, I can even kid myself into thinking this is a dream job, and it is all good, if I choose to.


*Someone recently told me of being fired for working too fast! What is this world coming to?!

Dependence and vulnerability

For years I felt limited, unable to do all the things I wanted, unable to be the person I wanted to be. I don't know why I thought at the time that the relationship I was limited by offered more good stuff than bad, but at least I saw the light at some point.

Ever since I have fiercely been safeguarding my independence. It has become my most valued possession, not to be taken away by anyone. Relationships I have been in over the past fifteen months have allowed me a great degree of independence (while being monogomous, of course), and I would not have it any other way. The moment I feel unable to do the things I want to do, the things that make me happy, and which make me who I am, that's the end of it. Fortunately there are girls who understand this. As it stands, I am very happy in my current relationship, and I've got the best of both worlds: a great girlfriend (who also values her independence), and independence and freedom at the same time.

Even so, one part of being in a happy relationship scares me: the more you love someone, the more difficult it is for you if you lose that person. And being afraid of losing someone makes you vulnerable. Of course, when you're young there is a far greater chance of losing a girlfriend (or boyfriend) because she breaks up with you than losing her because she dies of disease or gets killed in an accident, but it is losing your partner, nonetheless, possibly a great shock.
Last year, my aunt died of cancer. She had been married to my uncle for decades and the man was devastated by her death. Losing her sort of meant his world ended, I guess. I don't know for sure because I haven't even spoken to him since then. However, I hear he spends a lot of time alone and hardly wants to see any people now, so I think it a safe bet that he is truly devastated by the loss. The idea that my life would be 'ruined' by losing one person makes me extremely anxious. It means I would be incredibly vulnerable, and I don't want to be dependent on anyone.

This got me thinking: will I ever settle down with a woman, buy a house together and have kids and all that, or will I be too scared of my resulting vulnerability and dependence? Suppose I had two children and a wife: I would then have tripled the chances of becoming an emotional wreck if some drunken asswipe killed one of them with his car. I am not one to be guided by fear, as that normally takes away a lot of fun from your life, but being dependant on (the well-being of) one person is something that does scare me.
It is like I need to know for myself that I could do without my chosen partner if I had to, for whatever reason, as a means of self-protection or something. Sure, I am able to be in a loving relationship, but it is like I am always prepared for it to end, so I will not be devastated by it if it suddenly does, like my uncle was.
In other words: investing too much in one person out of all the billions of people in this world seems like too great a risk. Just like investing all your money in the stock of only one company is: if that one company suddenly goes bankrupt, you are done for.

Am I seriously comparing women to stocks here? That is not the image I was aiming for ;) but being a careful investor seems to have common ground with being a careful lover, nevertheless. Not too romantic, indeed, but perhaps it is better to aim wide, instead of focusing on this narrow corridor with closed door upon closed door mocking your chosen route in life, even though you may be walking on red carpet for a while?

Dying young

As I have mentioned several times before on this blog, my lifestyle has changed quite a bit since my relationship of almost seven years ended. More than a year has passed since then and in that time I have felt more and more that I have to follow my urges and do the things I crave, and not postpone them any longer than necessary (e.g. to save money, or to wait for good weather).

Most of the time I used to focus on what was best for the future, so I was usually thinking long term, not indulging as much as I would have liked. My ex constantly discouraged me of doing things that could have been risky. I think in part as a result of restraining myself and not undertaking the activities I would have liked to, I sometimes got depressed. In retrospect I am not very amazed by this, as not indulging yourself every once in a while will make your life as stale as a forgotten glass of coke.

So this summer I am going parachuting and sometime this week I am going to eat a monster load of eggs, just because I want to. Obviously, the latter isn't all that exciting or dangerous, whereas the former is a huge thrill and something that could kill me if something went terribly wrong. However, immediately after announcing to someone I was going to boil and eat lots of eggs I was warned that my gall bladder would not like that. And when telling someone I was going parachuting, I was told of something that was in the news about a parachute being sabotaged and a girl dying. Warnings, and more warnings. Much more rarely do people say "Oh cool, enjoy!" or "Wow, can I join you?"
This tells me that people have a tendency to think long term and not take too many risks or do things that could have adverse consequences in the short term. Sure, overindulging, like eating at McDonalds five days a week just because you like it so much, is not good for you. And taking immense risks like some thrill-seekers do, striving to climb the highest peaks and bungee jumping off towers, is extreme and is almost completely focused on the short term, as it provides a huge thrill but is dangerous and in some cases even illegal. But occasonally giving in to your cravings, be it risky or bad for your health, will make you feel alive.

Undertaking more risky activities got me thinking about death. In another blog I mentioned that I didn't want to die in bed, as coughing my emaciated, frail form to death and being pathetic doesn't appeal to me at all. Instead, I would want to die parachuting, "forgetting" to open my chute. But in this scenario I am old. What if I get cancer or something in a few years? Suppose doctors tell me I have only three months to live and I will perhaps even be too weak during those three months to do many exciting things in that time? In that case I want to be able to say to myself that I have done everything in my power to have lived my life to the full, even if it ends prematurely.
Therefore I am now living every year of my life as if it is my last. The summers especially will be as full of cool activities as possible, taking into account monetary restrictions and people's desire to come with me. In the relatively boring winters I will save up as much money as possible to get the excitement going in summers.

This lifestyle acts a comfort to me as well. I have never been particularly afraid to die, but I do realise that even if I grow to be eighty years old, I will not have done everything I would have liked in life, as I have too many interests, wishes and dreams. As such, dying young should be terrible, inevitably missing out on a lot of cool things. The thought of dying before I can write a masterpiece book, for instance, is not a pleasant one. But doing everything I can to live my life to the full, year in, year out, makes me unafraid to die. If my parachute doesn't open this summer... so be it.

Not trusting your own body

I'm not the greatest fan of my own body. For about a decade now, my back has been giving me (a lot of) problems, some days more than others. A few years ago, when the pain got so severe I could hardly function properly (not being able to sit or concentrate), I went to see a number of doctors, but their 'guesswork treatment' (as the causes for back pain are often very difficult to determine) only made things worse. And I mean this literally: some electric shock machine gave me a 'permanent electric twitch' (for lack of a better description) by my left shoulder blade, which comes and goes, but which has been there for over 2 years now; and some treatment which passed radio waves through my back muscles made the pain a lot worse. (And when I told the doctors they dismissed this and even refused to see me about it, so I switched hospitals.) The other attempted treatments 'just' failed, at least not providing side effects.

Finally I just gave up (after the electric shock thing failed) and set my mind to accepting my back pains as an inevitable and uncurable part of my life. At the time I had already been doing exercises to strengthen my back and make/keep it flexible - the only thing that has helped me get through the day, since painkillers don't work at all - so I just started each day by doing these exercises for half an hour and tried to accept my predicament. After a while I managed to accept this, and it didn't limit me that much, as I could still do almost anything, physically, including all kinds of sports, so it could have been worse.

However, a few months ago I incurred a severe knee injury playing football, and I needed an operation to even be able to stretch my leg. After that was done, I started rebuilding my leg muscles and all that, but now, two and a half months later, my knee is still giving me problems. It is supporting my weight again, and I can even run once more, which feels great after being as good as immobile for two months. However, turning (quickly) often sends a shooting pain up my leg, and I cannot trust it to support me when jumping off a ledge or something, or making any 'uncommon' movements for that matter. This makes me feel like a grandpa who has to be careful doing all kinds of stuff in order not to hurt himself, instead of like a 25-year-old guy in his prime.
I love action: I delight in running and climbing onto and jumping off of things, and I'm going to go parachuting this summer, regardless of my knee. Therefore not being as mobile or flexible as I used to be is a nightmare for me. I think that if my knee doesn't get a lot stronger in the coming months, I will even call this injury the worst thing that ever happened to me, as becoming 'crippled' or physically limited is truly my nightmare.

In addition to my back and knee problems, there are some other physical unpleasantries, most likely related to my back problems. In short, however undiagnosed, it is probably a mild form of hypermobility syndrome, allowing joints to stretch farther than normal and such. Example: when doing archery, when I pull back the string to its full extent, my shoulder gives me some problems, like it is almost unable to handle the pressure on it. Things like that. A current concern is my neck, which seems to crack more severely by the day (and when I twist it, it sounds like there is sand in it). I wonder if I should stop headbanging at concerts. I thought about seeing a doctor about it, but as he will not understand why headbanging is so awesome, and dear to me, he will undoubtedly advise against continuing to do so, 'just to be safe', so why even bother going? (Safety isn't everything, as it makes your life dull and stagnant as shit.) Anyway, most likely my physical problems will get (much?) worse as I grow older. Which sucks.

So, you will understand I am definitely not the greatest fan of my body. I feel like I cannot trust it, that it will fail me; I feel it is getting worse in various places, like my neck, at the moment; I feel I need to do cool, active things right now instead of postponing them for various reasons, before my body fails me and I cannot undertake such things anymore. It makes me live in the now all the more, without as much regard for the future as I used to. So if I take risks now, resulting in fun or even incredible experiences, but running the risk or hurting myself (even more), I consider this worth it. If I played the part of the wounded animal just waiting for things to get better, not taking any chances, and thus not further damaging my body, but not going through wonderful experiences either, I may get to lead a 'normal' life longer, but I would feel like a scared little girl, living in fear. I would rather feel alive for a relatively short time than like a zombie not going out and doing cool things but staying at home and watching TV or something. (I would watch Night of the Living Dead.)

What I will do is train my injured leg and hope for the best, but I will not cower from potential harm to come to me. Perhaps playing football will be out of the question for the rest of my life, I don't know, but I will be damned if I just throw in the towel. So I will go parachuting, and do tons of other cool stuff in the coming years, before my rotten body decides it will disallow me to continue doing what I love. After that, if my body indeed fails me, I guess I will have plenty of time for the other things I have always wanted to do but never have time for, like writing a book or something. But I suppose that will have to wait as long as my body will still work with me.

And when I am old and I can't do active stuff worth shit, I will go parachuting again, but just fail to open the damn thing. Go out with a bang instead of coughing my sick ass to death in a bed with grieving family and friends next to me. No, I will not be pathetic and let my body rule over me. Life should be fun, and if it is no longer, with no hope of recovery any time soon, it should be terminated in the coolest way possible. At least then I will show my body it will never take my balls!

Staying put

There are a lot of people who seem to be content just staying in one place their entire life. I see it happening all around me, and if so many people seem to find this pleasant, it must be 'normal'. I am interested to know the reasons behind this desire, because personally I don't feel a close bond with my home town at all, and frankly the thought of living there my entire life repulses me, assaults my sensibilities as wrong, even. The world is so incredibly big, and these days it is so easy to go practically anywhere you want, that it seems ridiculous to stay in one place with so much to see and so many different places to experience. I understand moving to a different country - even for a few years - would be a bridge too far for most people, and I'm not sure I would want that myself (though I like to keep my options open), but moving to a different town in your home country, at least, should not pose too much of a barrier, I think. In a different country you would (in most cases) have to speak a different language (which may unable you to do your work properly, for instance) and your friends and family would not be there, except if you took your wife or something. These obstacles do not exist (or only to a far lesser degree) if you don't move too far away from your home town. But still most people stay put, and seem to like, or even revel in, their staying in one place. Is it because they feel comforted by the familiarity of their environment? Would a new environment (even if it is just 70 km away, which is 'far' by Dutch standards) be scary somehow? Or is it that it is mainly a matter of convenience: having your work place, tennis club, library, optician, etc. near you, as well as (probably) most of your friends and family?

"Is convenience loved more than boredom is hated?"

But I think that even though this is convenient, it is boring. And boredom has become one of my greatest enemies. That is why living in the area I was born repulses me so; it is more of the same, and even more of the same. There are hardly any alleys in my home town I don't yet know, and the salespeople in the shops there all have faces familiar to me. I recognise people in the streets and some recognise me. But I don't want to be recognised and perhaps forced into mundane conversation ("How are you? Good. You? I'm good too. How is work? Fine, been busy, you? Yeah me too. You know, same old..." AAAARGH!!). I like it better when no one I see in the streets knows me, and I can just go about my way without having to pay attention to other people (because if you know one but don't say hi because you didn't notice them, they will resent it) or running into people I knew when I was a kid, stirring up memories from what feels like 8 lifetimes ago.

One of the reasons my ex and I split up was that I went crazy seeing the very same environment each day while she felt comforted by its familiary. More than a year later, she is now looking to buy a house in the neighbourhood she grew up in. She is even looking at houses a few streets removed from her parents' house. Because that is convenient when you have babies and you can drop them off with grandma in a flash. But doesn't this convenience have the down side of being boring as hell?

When I moved away from my home town, I enjoyed finding out where the post office and supermarket were, among other things. Finally there were things I didn't know, and it wasn't all predictable and boring! That was quite a relief. I can't explain how good it felt to do something as simple as asking 'the locals' where the town hall was, since before, in my home town, it was practically inconceivable to not know where something was. But discovering new things only takes so long, of course, as after a while I knew where to find most places, and if I had lived there for years and years, the same problem as before would have arisen: everything would be familiar and dull. So, as long as I feel this way, I will continue to move around and discover new places, fleeing boredom, I guess. Which brings me back to my initial question: why are people content just staying in one place all their lives? Don't they find that boring? Don't they have a sense of adventure, of discovering new things and new places?

Well, I can't figure it out. My guess it they value convenience more than adventure, and somehow don't feel the boredom I do (or not as much). But if so many people prefer to live this way, apparently it is me who is 'strange'. Otherwise the majority of people would be moving around all the time, instead of choosing one place and improving it bit by bit until they have the 'perfect' garden and the 'perfect' .....ah, who am I fooling... they are never satisfied with the material things they accumulate. Just as it seems I will never be satisfied with the place I live. But fortunately, life will always hold surprises. If I knew the future as well as I do my home town, the world would be so boring that life would be futile. So I say: let fate hit me with a few surprises to keep life interesting!

It didn't necessarily have to be a busted knee though ;).