June 9 - Surreal

Every now and again, I have a moment when I realize that not everybody in the world experiences the same things that I do and if I am allowed to be completely honest, I dig that. I like living a slightly surreal life. It keeps things interesting.

Now, I'm not saying that the things that inspire this thought are so far whacked out that nobody else has ever experienced them. I'm sure there are plenty of people who ordered RGB NeoPixels to sew into costumes today to give the correct "flying through space and time" effect. And I'm sure there are plenty of people who have had rockstars crash on their couch. And plenty more who have gotten press next to someone they have admired for years. But if I took a poll among the people I know personally, my guess is that the majority would not have all three of these things sort of going on at the same time. Which makes my life feel a little odd, but in the best possible way. And extremely fortunate.

The other lovely part about living a surreal life is that these minor triumphs, these little extraordinary moments, allow me to believe that I could have more minor triumphs in my life. And possibly one major one someday. Who knows? It's like Fate dangling the proverbial carrot in front of my face and letting me get just one tiny bite. I know that the carrot is there. I know what it tastes like. I know I can reach the whole thing. Someday.

Or maybe not. Who knows. Today, I'm just enjoying my surreal fantasies.

November 5 - Cool

On my way in to work this morning, I heard an ad on the radio where someone (I'm pretty sure it was Zooey Deschanel in a spot for New Girl, which I love) said, "We're cool." And it came out in the dorky, sort-of defensive way that the geeks I grew up with used to cling to in order to validate ourselves as useful members of society. You know the tone of voice. Someone decidedly uncool trying to convince himself (and others) that he is cool. And I thought to myself, "What's so great about being cool?"

I mean, seriously, think about it. This is the biggest, most on-going, far-reaching ad campaign in history (I say, having done absolutely no research on the topic). Everybody wants to be cool. Everybody wants other people to think they are cool. As much as we want food and shelter and to be loved, we want to be cool because we think being cool is our ticket to being loved.

But let's look at coolness for a minute, yes? The actual word "cool." It means not quite cold, but colder than warm. It describes a state of non-commitment. Cool can't even be bothered to slow down enough to be cold, nor is it as inviting as warm or as furious as hot. It's just...there. Cool just exists. And for some reason, we all want to be cool. We all want to just exist.

What?

Let's look at how the word is used, for example, in the context of a budding relationship. People feel the need to be cool around one another when they are getting to know each other so as to not scare the other person away. So they hide their feelings, they shrug things off that really annoy them, and they avoid saying the things they really want to say for fear they might venture into warm territory and therefore cease being cool. How many times have you told a friend to "just be cool" around the object of his or her affection? By which you are telling them to not show emotion, not be excited, not let this person who makes their heart skip a beat know that their heart is skipping just now. Yet we all yearn for the brilliant poetic moment wherein we learn we make someone's heart flutter just a little bit. So why do we have to be cool? Is there this big societal fear that if we tell one person they make our heart flutter, that it won't mean anything if we tell someone else the same thing later in life? Because I'll tell you right now, the heart flutters I feel for certain people now are just as lovely, if not lovelier, than the heart flutters I felt as a child.

I have, admittedly, spent a large portion of my life wanting to be cool, too. But I have to say, I'm tired of it. If I'm excited to see someone, I want to let them know I'm happy to see them. If I hear a great song on the radio, I want to have a dance party to it. If wearing a TARDIS watch that doesn't keep time very well makes me feel more like me, I'm want to wear a TARDIS watch that doesn't keep time very well. Fuck being cool; I want to be me. I want to be excitable and passionate and friendly and energetic and I want to use my fucking words to fucking tell people how I fucking feel about them, coolness be damned. There is so much amazing stuff going on all the time in the universe; why on earth would we want to not participate in it and not be affected by it?

Find one thing that you love and love it completely. Every day, with every fiber of your being. Fuck being cool.

I love you guys.