Imaginal Disk, hiatus, solipsism
written mostly on my notes app in the quiet hours of a plane ride
every couple months I grow a new favorite word
tends to be very bookworm-esque. stuff I derive from articles and big 500 page hardcovers. not anything you would hear a real person say
in late 2024 it was "languishing"
right now (and for a few months) it's been "solipsism": a philosophy involving a prioritization of the self, negative connotation (like being self-centered, head full of hot air, etc)
would like to insert more contextualizing examples here! I might not
the absorbed word tends to be reflective of my current state of mind, describes an idea with concision that was previously a bit more ooey-gooey. in the ether
in q4 2024 I felt like I was doing nothing, in a detrimental sense. in q1-q2 it's mutated into some sense of solitary confinement, that all I have left to gaze into is myself, a kind of inbred philosophical lens that grows recessive with each generation
solitude (positive connotation) has turned into into solipsism (negative connotation)
this self-care self-improvement streak is starting to feel redundant, diminishing returns
my purge of all social media was mostly a benefit, but with nothing to replace it with, that hole only widened. technology and social media are not a blanket evil. everything has layers. it isn't inherently bad to have something to distract you, to fill your time in an entertaining way. the bad part is not being able to exercise any control over it; at this point I feel like I've been too cagey over it, exercised too much control and abstinence to the point of not getting any returns from it
my bi-weekly call cadence with zach is growing more and more pointless when I have nothing to talk about except my fleeting thoughts that I plucked from the air in a stroke of luck, alongside dreamy airheaded plans for the near future that isn't quite here yet
it's depressive. nice that there’s a clear light at the end of this tunnel
I saw magbay live and it was everything
after not just one but two declined opportunities to see them live I said yes for their tour date in madison, which in hindsight was a very wise set of decisions
I'm reminded that when I visit home in these short bursts they are instantly and thoroughly rejuvenating. life begins again. conversation doesnt feel so forced. I'm not having to handwave to make my banal existence seem far more interesting than it is. I don't have to put up a facade
we bought merch, we gawked at those better dressed than us, we did a bit of makeup, I painted my nails for the first time in years (or, more accurately, had them painted because my technique is dogshit awful), we had a series of really not PC series of jokes on the 1am commute home. I danced my ass off (as much as I could with a 24oz beer can in my sweaty hands). it was the best. we were exposed as being embarrassingly ourselves
being at this gig was the biggest reminder, wake-up call that I've gotta fuckin live man. and that living is so beautiful
this publication will be going on hiatus for some time
indefinitely, I guess, though that makes it sound like I never want it to return
survival isn't... thrival.
wish that rhyme was legal in the english language
survival - merely getting by - doesn't elicit much in the way of interesting topics. it's why more than one of these posts (published or not) is like "here's the book I read guys". it's turning academic. it's beginning to feel like actual book club. I steadily feel like I'm writing for a scientific journal rather than. yknow. my journal
I often write to myself in lower case. in earnest I think the case in which I write affects the way in which I think. in Real Sentence Case you build up some sense of formality around what you write, whereas during rambling in lowercase, the personality of me doesn't tend to get lost in the verbosity and density as much
I also tend to super-edit myself with these blogposts. removing duplicate usages of rhe same word even if it was perfectly fine and legible in both spots and you wouldve never noticed or cared that I used it twice. chopping things up. lengthening things out. just to fit notions of formality. it’s subtracting me from my own writing to an extent
sometimes I wish I had an editor, a second person onboard to give me a new perspective on the grammar, but then I remember that that arrangement would probably worsen problems long before it solved them
such a far cry from the couple of paragraphs that the early posts used to be at the top of 2023, and not necessarily for the better
in my zach calls I always say "these are two weeks apart instead of one because we need to go live to have topics to talk about. too much frequency and we start entering a pointless, enervating churn mining our own cobalt thoughts. a similar phenomenon is happening here: I'm drying up the banks of deep thought
maybe I'll just break away the format. the issue is that I like the format a whole lot. structure is a benefit. there's a very good reason I set it up like that. it'll be under review
I watched A Real Pain (movie) on my flight and it was gorgeous. but it isn't an album so, fuck me, right?
imaginal disk is fun. there's no palms or tree leaves to read
(stealing that visual imagery from that one episode of avatar that I watched recently)
part of this, my crusade against solipsism, is losing the obsession with meaning, rejecting the mindset of "serious journalistic integrity" and poured-over analysis that has steadily plagued me and this publication
it's dumb music and fun music and I need more of that. the deep thought is far more rewarding against a backdrop of stupid nonsense shit. that contrast matters way more than I believed it did
my jersey club arc?
I will say, seeing them live amplified whatever I was already feeling towards this record
I love the sensory of intense emotion without having to put so much effort, strain on summoning it to the surface
watching / going to the movies not to critique it as art or whatever. just to be present and embrace it. I don't have to be like christgau or siskel&ebert if I don't want to
what might be worse than « writing about writing » is « writing about not writing »
substack contains all 9 layers of dante's inferno, and at the bottom are white libs in their late 40s
PS thanks griffin you rule. thinking more than I should about that 1am banter