July 9, 2020

It's noon. I've just put on my jacket and boots to go for a motorcycle ride to a grocery store 20 minutes away so that I can pick up a few groceries. I feel guilty for not being particularly productive today. I have a story that I am sitting on. And I have a few stories that (desperately) need editing. I have failed to read Plato this week, and I hardly read anything last week.

This feels like leisure. I worry that this is decadent or too aristocratic.

But it feels good.

I worry that I feels too good. I worry that I will get soft. But I will allow myself this time to ride. I just hope I don't lose sight of my love/need for reading and writing.

Onward we go. (To Fred Meyer for some lean ground beef and hamburger buns.)

[...]

I had an odd realization while finishing up a chapter in Camus' The Rebel as he was talking about Nietzsche. I thought about when I first picked up Nietzsche. I was on my last few months in the army back in 2014 or 2015. I didn't quite know what I was getting myself into. Philosophy and "proper" intellectual thought (not just false prophets on youtube) seemed like a huge magnificent territory. 

Now I feel like I have become familiar with the terrain of Western Philosophy. I rarely read something that is unfamiliar. I have crossed over many of the same places many times. I'm not an expert. I don't know if I can fairly rate my own level of understanding. But I can say that I no longer feel lost.

My idea of philosophy has lost its greatness. Approaching philosophy and intellectual thought used to be feel to me like approaching the Monolith from 2001: A Space Odyssey. I don't feel that anymore. I think I grew out of it; that feels like the right phrasing. 

My relationship to it has changed. I still enjoy philosophy. I still find value in it. Philosophy and other pursuits are endless. 

[...]

The Philosopher's Stone doesn't turn lead into gold. It creates more value from something less valuable.

I think that this applies in something as mundane as a conversation. A boring conversation about the weather can have a positive influence on the world—thereby creating value. I suppose this is also salesmanship and customer service. Alternatively there is also engineering and the sciences that make objects more useful/effective/valuable.

Value is a mystery—intrinsic value even more so.

Like, what the fuck is intrinsic value anyway?

For me, at the moment, something with intrinsic value is riding a motorcycle. When I'm riding I'm there. —Wherever that is, I think it is a good place to be; it is valuable, and its value can increase or decrease.