November 3, 2020

 I realized that I fell in love with Seattle last year. And it really was just that—love. It was the kind of love that comes with a lot of blindness. 

I had a lot of hope for this city. 

When I would visit from Bellingham during my college days, I would read deep into every storefront and every interestingly-dressed person. I tried to read too deeply into every single detail They felt to me as if they were full [trächtig] with stories and potential, like dark cloud promising a long-needed rain. But those clouds grayed out. And not much came out of it. It was a flat gray sky with a steady mist. 

It's hard for me to love Seattle right now. I feel like I got spit out. It's mostly my fault, and COVID has complicated everything. 

Wherever I am, I need to make the most of it. And I'm in Seattle right now. It isn't the promised land. It's home just like Horizon City was home.

...

I tired to draw, but the lines never really came together on the page well enough. I never learned to feel the depth of objects. I never even attempted to learn to manage color and value. 

Writing never brought me much in the real world; it only shaped my internal world. It has always been too fragmented. Separate characters never fully developed any sort of meaningful depth.

My academics were always weak. I never learned how to juggle my individual thoughts with telling professors what they needed to hear. I never felt the need to strive for perfect scores. 

I had my hands in too many baskets. It hurt too much to stay stuck with one thing. It always felt like too much of a sacrifice.

A ghost (and I'm not sure which one) says, "Blow its fucking brains out." 

It means for me to kill my stillborn dreams of being a writer/philosophy/artist-type.

My half-desire (my day dream) to be a writer was probably never a true desire. I think it was founded on the wrong ground—to egotistical or rooted in emotional infantilism, needing to feel special.

...

—Not Navel Gazing. Not Solipsism.—Not Working for Them. Not Doing it for Them—

Suppose a man is put into solitary confinement. Then suppose that he has a wonderful time in his cell because he sees a tremendous inner cosmos: dramas unfold before his eyes, great beauty visits him, and the sweetest music plays.

When he leaves his cell, he is totally unable to describe the pleasurable and profound experience. Moreover, he wishes to go back to his lonely cell. 

That is sad solipsism. It is madness. It is not good; I take this last fact gratis.

Next, imagine a movie star that is known across the world and has brought joy to many people. Wherever they go, their charisma brightens people's days. They create value in others. But now suppose the movie star is sad and broken inside. 

It is not good; it is alienation and lacking in integrity.

Profoundness-in-obscurity and Hollowness-in-prominence.