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More navel gazing

I tend to see the world as a series of binary oppositions. I just read an article about this for my english class by Hélène Cixous (a french feminist) called “Sorties: Out and Out: Attacks / Ways Out / Forrays.” In this article, she documents the essentially masculinist (phalocentric) nature of binary oppositions. She makes a claim that inherent in these oppositions are value judgements. Things binarily opposed are not equal. One is better than the other. Moreover, it is how some chooose to define themselves, but labelling on thing as “me” and another thing as “not me”, opposing them, and then comparing them to rate how we are doing in relation to everything else.

I do this and it has not served me well. For starters, it means that there is always a hierarchy and thus I can never equally relate to anyone or anything I put myself in binary opposition to. Furthermore, it creates false dichotomies. There are a lot of grey areas in life. Real life is not “do X or be a loser.” this has been harming my worldview and my relationships.
I think it might relate to my trying to supress mourning and not feel sad, something that has also not served me well. I wanted to bravely soldier on and put the past behind me and not look back. It’s like I formed my self image from outdated ideals of maleness and manhood. How did I get such a masculinist viewpoint? It’s bizarre. Reading my blogposts from last winter is bizarre. I know I must have been in turmoil, but I barely acknowledged it.
So I’m confused about how I have formed my concept of self, but, while I cannot change the past, I can effect the future. I’m not going to say “these things must go now (or i’ll be a loser),” since this would just put me in another binary opposition, but I can look at how I am reacting to things as I react to them and see if I am falling into a pattern that might not serve me well. I will feminize myself. But don’t expect skirts or lipstick. I have boundaries.

Emotional history

Highschool – sad before coming out. after coming out, don’t remember

College – till senior year – don’t remember. I think I was a rilly happy freshwoman. Sophmore year, christi got sick, which was deeply alarming. Junior year, don’t remember.
senior year of college (97-98) – stressed to the point of trying st john’s wort, which i thought made me manic. I sad, “I thought i was depressed, but it was all in my head.” stress cause: thesis
right after college – unhappy and directionless after finishing major goals in life.
first jobs – depressed due to crappy hours and no music in life. mostly felt sad while stoned, but made major changes as a result.
netscape – very happy at first. better pay. better hours. bought music gear. made a lot of tape music.
christi goes to work at nolo – my netscape commute starts to suck. sili valley culture is very irritating. job is less interesting. want to quit, but am persuaded to stay, meanwhile, economy going south. becoming more and more unhappy
got laid off by netscape (2001) – feel very directionless. alternate between feeling relieved and like a loser. trying to convince christi to take a long leave and go to europe. she doesn’t want to. no idea what to do with life. i think i must have been unhappy.
trip to europe 2001 – christi got laid off by nolo, so europe trip happened. felt somewhat stressed at the time, but great experience. overall – happy
back to grind – fall/winter 2001 – 2002 – still not sure what to do with self. start focussing more and more on music, which makes me happier and happier. driver for om festival in 2002 perhaps happiest time in my life. then going to confrences, writing stuff, had an ensemble going, checking out grad programs. happy. on the way to visit a music thing in seattle when …
spring 2002 – mom gets cancer. miserable. sad. stressed. not much clear memory from this time. dark dark days.
fall 2002 – mom dies – days get darker yet. quit getting out of bed. barely able to function. don’t rember the winter, but know i was sad. blog posts indicate that i was working on grad school apps. trying not feel sad by supressing emotions (i think). probably acting weird.
spring 2003 – got accepted into wesleyan. neighbor said it was the first time she’d seen me smile in months. played a gig at jack straw. still sad, but trying not to. felt sense of direction.
summer 2003 – playing a lot of music. working on many projects. happier than i’d been in a long time. i think i was pretty happy and becoming happier the whole time
fall 2003 – not knowing anyone at school caused stress, so i was unhappy and lonely at first and returned to heavy mourning. created stress for myself by taking too many classes + doing too much work on assignments. got happier and happier until winter break, but possibly supressing feelings?
winter break – deeply stressed. feelings supressed as much as possible. broke up with christi.
the present – unsupressing emotions. feel mostly very sad. regret winter descision.

conclusion

tracking trends, I’ve been unhappy the last 6 – 7 years way more often than happy. however, 1. happiness comes in moments, usually, which might defy trends (is this true for everyone?) and 2. when i’m sad, i have an easier time remembering sadness and when i’m happy, i can only remeber that, which skews any data.
things that make me happy include having goals, having direction, new projects, and having music. things that make me unhappy is the abscence of any of those “having” things, a screwed up social life, death, divorce
please comment

The last key ingredient to a relationship

both people have to want to be in it. without that, you’re pretty much fxcked.

Differences between Need and Want

You could wake up one morning and realize that you’re not dependant on the loved one who is been irritating you. And depending on what your life has looked like before that point, you could yell, “I don’t need you!” and chase that person out of your life.
But that descision could lead to regret if you realize that you really want (but don’t need) that person in your life. You could make yourself miserable. Be forewarned.

Germany Pros and Cons

Ok, I want to do study abroad thing. It was a motivator in applying to Wesleyan. I have visited the institution at which it was held (Read what I said about it at the time). It’s an awesome thing. And I was planning to apply after I graduate.

Taking a year off to do it is a different thing tho. I had sort of pictured the year as a possible springboard to Europe, which it would not be if I had to come back to Wesleyan afterwards. I wouldn’t graduate until 2006 at the age of 30. Aaron says he would take over my lease. Since it would only be a year, I guess I’d find temporary shelter for Xena. But I would come back and have virtually no friends, since almost everyone I know would have graduated. Any contacts I made in the EU would have to be put on hold for a year so I could come back and take classes and do my thesis.
It would, on the other hand, put me a lot closer to Christi, which is enough to motivate me to do it next year, if she wants me to. Application deadline could be pushed back to the end of spring break.

Thee things needed in a realtionship

  1. Love
    This is the most important thing to make a serious relationship work. But the Beatles weren’t right, it’s not all you need. But I think with love and determination, you can get to the other two.
  2. Communication
    You can love somebody to death, but if you aren’t getting that across, well, that’s a huge problem. You need to be able to communicate both what you need from the other person and to be able to understand what they need from you. I think communication fails more often than love.
  3. Boundaries
    Limits to what you can demand. Limits to what can be demanded of you. Limits to how far you’ll push, how much you want to know and what you’re willing to do. The clearer you are on these (and the clearer you communicate them), the happier you will be. Incompatible boundaries are a huge potential problem, but hopefully love will enable compromise. And if not, well, boundaries can break relationships. But they can also make them work much much better. I’m told this and I beleive it.

Germany?

I have an opportunity, potentially, to spend next year in Germany, doing the program that I thought I might do after I graduate. Apparently, none of the second years want to do it, meaning that I could apply for next year or apply for the year after. Karlsruhe is the warmest part of Germany and is about a day’s walk through the Black Forest to France.

I need to think fast. applications are due next week.

Today

The concert went alright. More people showed up than I expected. Composers were not publically acknowledged, so I felt kind of anonymous afterwards. I like my piece because it’s just intonted and the just reverberation is very nice.

It occurs to me, on the subject of depression, that I have a really good reason to feel sad right now. And I have a shrink. And I should feel sad. and that’s ok.

*pained noise here*

After Christi didn’t show up, I sent her some email asking her about rescheduling, etc. I thought that she didn’t write back, but I just found her reply hiding amidst supercollider mailing list crap

She doesn’t want to work it out. not ever.
I was a fool to break up with her
maybe this would have happened anyway.
I love her. I counted her as the most important thing in my life for a third of my life.
My shrink says that I should let myself feel sad when I feel sad.

this is so so so wrong. this isn’t supposed to happen. there must be some mistake somewhere. we’re married. we’re supposed to love each other. i was thinking all day about how much i miss her…..
alas alas alas alas woe misery
it would be very bad to call her right now and i’m not going to do it. very bad. very very bad.