Posts

Cognitive dissonance.

Image
He hates the mail in ballot as much as any baby boomer hates remote work, the death of the fax machine, the cloud, LGBTQ+, anything remotely progressive. He, like most late Gen X and Baby Boomers, can’t understand these things because he simply lacks the ability to see life from the perspective of anyone else. Like all narcissists. If remote work does not work for them (because they can’t act like a dominant boss in front of their family) then remote work doesn’t work for anyone. If cloud technologies mean that their local team don’t have to be on 24/7 stand by, then it means life may become better for people and that upsets them because they ‘had to suffer’ when they were younger and therefore want everyone else to suffer for the rest of time. He is a weak and pathetic man with many weak and pathetic supporters. Dominance, control, hierarchy, that is what they crave. Control is their main desire… they want to control because they feel they are superior in every way and, therefore, the...
Post a Comment
Read more

Car Park Armageddon

Image
  Stepping outside for a moment, hoping for a quiet view of downtown Dallas… there is a person standing on the roof, looking down at me, a car darts past me on its way down, then another car… but there is a car coming in, too. Oh, the entering car sees the space close to the door is open and immediately turns to dive into it. Headlights in my face, I simply give up and close the door. 9pm Sunday night, car park Armageddon. I have never seen a car park so active in all of my life. It is the 5 th floor of the building, it takes 10 minutes to get up here, but I have never been outside when there is not a car coming in or going out. I go back inside, lie down on my bed, start sending some text messages, but nobody replies… perhaps they are driving in and out of a car park somewhere, too.                     Monday midday in the pool with a book. It’s the kind of break that you can’t take when you...
Post a Comment
Read more

say no to convention

Image
  A jog, a swim, a trip to the supermarket… sushi and mimosas for brunch. Soccer is a disaster, but the day is beautiful, the solitude is beautiful. The lady at the super market prepared fresh sushi for me and it was incredible. In an hour or so I will walk to the Ginger Man Pub for a beer or two and to see my neighbours before returning home to laze the afternoon away and attempt to avoid existential dread and despair. It is easier to fight that off when the night is peaceful and calm.                     I set myself the goal of writing and publishing every day, and I have done so for two months or so now… but there are days like today that I think I may not make it haha. I also fear the pain and boredom that people may feel when they read these entries. They serve as a ‘poetic’ nod to posterity. You see, The Ginger Man turned out to be quite social and a great discussion about music, litera...
Post a Comment
Read more

Ojos Locos

Image
  In my final year of high school, we took great risks… in our final exams we passed around notes. However, these notes had nothing to do with the exams, my closest friends and I had formed a band and we were sharing lyrics. We were trying to form a humorous metal band, we called ourselves Grandfathers of Destruction (GOD). This particular day, I received the note and opened it… I read the opening lines and could not contain my laughter… ‘I pull out my sword and Satan crawls in fear.’ We risked expulsion from the final moment of high school graduation and all for the desire to share lyrics that were beyond absurd.                     Our peers were experimenting with drugs and alcohol, we were travelling out into the darkest downtown and going to extreme concerts and raves and nightclubs. The next day we’d show up to school in a daze of exhaustion and lack of sleep. I was by no means a party p...
Post a Comment
Read more

a better place

Image
  On the couch with an ancient copy of To The Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf. The copy was given to me by a gentleman I met in Tulsa, Oklahoma in 2010 when I was visiting from England to see friends. He gave it to me the day before my birthday sixteen years ago, 7 September 2010, and he wrote a note on the inner sleeve, ‘To my friend across the pond.’ I cherish it. I say ‘ancient’, but this copy was printed in 1966, the same year that England last won the World Cup.   Literature is the archaeology of human suffering. We can excavate the traces of this suffering from within the pages of global works throughout millennia of literature. From cruelty, enslavement, war, racism, infidelity, ennui, family relationships, it is all there to see. The keys to happy living could be mapped out from these findings and yet we tend to repeat the same mistakes in endless cycles because we struggle to break away from tradition and ‘how it has always been.’ One of the saddest things in literature...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Empire of the Hermit.

Image
  Three years ago, on this day, I was in Europe. I did it right… I went for a work trip to France and then took vacation in France and Spain. This time last year, I was in Europe again, but I did it wrong. I took a vacation first in Spain, then France, and had to cut it short to work. This also meant that my vacation was spent thinking a little bit about work and my preparation for that as I had to present several times during the work period. Having learned from that mistake, in March this year I went again and really did it right. I worked from France, then took a vacation in France and Madrid and really was able to relax and enjoy the time.                     This year I have travelled less than most years in the last twenty years… that is because I am saving every penny I can to build an empire. The Empire of the Hermit. An Empire of solitude and peace and distance. One that recognizes th...
Post a Comment
Read more

The Plague Rages

Image
His face appearing on the screen is vomit inducing. His voice is an unbearable scratching of nails on the chalk board. His announcements could even raise a Buddhist Monk to a furious rage. Turning from this to look around at society… it seems there is sadness everywhere. I often think that much of this sadness is self-inflicted in the sense that expectation results in disappointment and, ultimately, sadness. For example, so many single people in their late thirties and early forties are so desperate for marriage and children that they will either race into something that is not suitable or they will remain alone and, instead of focusing on the positive things they can do, they wallow in pain and shame and misery because they were ‘left on the shelf.’ So many get married and have children and find it is worse than being alone. Then there are those who have purchased homes and are sad because it is a heavy burden. Added to this, people are commuting great distances in traffic to sit in a...
Post a Comment
Read more