American education

American Education

You've probably already figured out (or know from my IP trace, w/e) that I'm an American. So my anonymity just dropped down from the entire English-speaking internet-equipped population of the world, to the " " of America. I'm willing to make that sacrifice in order to publish this commentary, because its something I feel very strongly about.

Low-potential kids. Stupid, learning disabled, developmentally delayed, whatever you want to call them, they exist. Its bad enough that we teach all kids of the same age the same material, in the same order, and (within a class) at the same pace, despite drastic differences in speeds of knowledge and skill acquisition. Example, despite being a very intelligent and academically talented person myself, it would still take me a few extra weeks to absorb all the information that a college class might try to condense into a semester. I'm slow, I own it, and I'm lucky that I have the ability to cope with that disadvantage. Others don't.

But what's worse, is that we are teaching all children, from the stupidest to the smartest, advanced academic material. My key gripe is with chemistry, but this can be easily applied to most maths, essay writing, almost everything students do in high school.
Why is this? Because we're trying to send them all to college. Bollox. College is not the place for everyone. It was the place for me. Huzzah. But when people who went to college come into political power and start making the assumptions that everyone can go to college, shit goes downhill fast.
Point is, lots of these kids are not going to go to college, and if they are, they're probably not going to use the calculus and chemistry and literary analysis skills that they all suffered through in high school. And for most, when they get to working, even with a college degree, that knowledge and those skills are even less relevant!
So why are we wasting all this time and all these resources to teach kids things that they will never use and certainly not remember, meanwhile there are clear educational deficits about things like filing your taxes, or making a budget, or proper nutrition, or fixing your car, skills of everyday life for the masses that are not being covered? Common issues like how to deal with the police, or what drugs can do to your body, are skimmed over if they are addressed at all, while an entire year is devoted to the study of atoms alone.

American education needs to make a reassessment of its utility. We know that a lot of these kids are not going to become chemists. But its taught for the purpose of finding and encouraging kids who do have the talent to go to college and pursue a scientific career, for the benefit of the country at large (since that's where much of the educational funding is coming from). So basically, these exhaustive academic classes are being used like talent-scouting, or weeding, as it were. And I swear the more analytic classes like calculus are just a method for colleges to measure your brain-power; they don't actually care if you do calculus ever again, so long as you demonstrate the ability to learn it.

We do this, sacrificing the masses at the altar of international competition, scientific progress, and - lets be real here - the big hope of the federal government is that we will produce scientists that build weapons. Perhaps this drive is left over from our competition with Russia, I don't know. But from a political philosophy approach, it isn't right at all.

Approval seeking

Approval seeking

I met a woman who was beaten by her mother, a very long time ago. Her sister (who was beaten even more severely) invited their mother to live with her. The clear response to this is "holy shit, that's stupid." But my friend explained it this way. The one person that a beaten child seeks approval from the most is the person who beat them. For whatever reason.

And I thought to myself, thats not true of me. I hate my mother, but she never beat me, not badly, so the rule doesn't apply. I can despise how she treated me without suffering the syndrome of caring what she thinks.

Wrong. Turns out, I have this same psychology, although I didn't realize it. I was very happy with my decision about where my life was headed next. I was going to be self-actualizing, to exert some independence, to join the real world! Well, when I told my mother what I planned to do and she expressed the slightest bit of discontent, I found myself in a dissonance state. I found myself doubting my plans, despite how agreeable to me they had been only a short time ago. I found myself remaking plans to do things her way, which was a continuation of the same stressful lifestyle I've been living, am living now, that's driven me to make drastically different plans for the future. All of my self-actualization ambitions went out the window when the need to make my mother happy invaded my brain and planted its flag. And once I figured out that this is what was going on, that this had happened to other people and it really never made anything better, I was able to take a step back, and try again to do what I thought I had been doing all along; to not care what my mother thought, and live my own life.

And so, this all to show that if you know how psychological cause/effect systems have manifested in other people, you can recognize it in yourself, and rewrite your story. And that's why I feel that the study of psychology etc should not be limited to the people who make it college. I mean really, teaching history as a requirement for graduating high school is justified with "we want to make sure these kids don't repeat the mistakes of the past." But based on that logic, isn't the teaching of psychology much more relevant? The idea that abused children are more likely to abuse their own offspring; seems like this knowledge could help someone to change their life a lot more than the knowledge that zoot suits were a product of the economic times. Yes that's all very interesting and perhaps changes how we interpret our surroundings and maybe even how we participate politically (and isn't that really the goal), but isn't making sure that child abuse doesn't propagate through generations more important? Priorities, lets have some.

When you know what your future is likely to be, you have the power to change it. We are teaching kids about the possible future of society, but what they need is knowledge about their individual prophecies, or the people that they choose to have intimate relationships with. I mean, if I had to choose between interpersonal psychology and basic chemistry... electrons go around protons, ooh look how that knowledge affects how I live my daily life!

And that brings me to my next point...

Lawyered

Lawyered

apparently, everyone thinks I should be a lawyer.

Why? Apparently I have a fabulous logical pathway, that or I'm just better at communicating my logical projection than others. And I have a lot of difficulty backing down from a fight.

Problem one: I have no poker face whatsoever. My emotions show straight through to my facial expression unless Im paying particularly close attention to keeping deadpan. Apparently I do all these little things that I'm not aware of when I'm having silent conversations with myself.

So, I couldn't be a trial lawyer. I couldn't stand up in front of a bunch of people and try to talk them into agreeing with me. Too stressful. But I probably could write beautiful persuasive reports.

If my profession had been chosen for me, I would have been a lawyer, so says people who are older and supposedly wiser than me. Then why did I choose to be a doctor? I have this one particular talent; is it transferable? Am I wasting my potential by pursuing the path that I am slightly less equipped for?

I don't think so. Because there's more to a profession than ability. There has to be drive; passion, ambition, whatever it is that keeps you fulfilling your potential for that particular task. If I were to pursue a career in law, I would probably be a lot less motivated, and so even with the advantage of talent produce a lot less than what I can accomplish in a career that I'm really passionate about.

Well, that's not news to anyone. But lets compare the motivations I might have for being a doctor versus a lawyer. Yes, biology is really cool, but its not the only thing I could get excited about. It's not like I always wanted to be a doctor. My current motivation is that its the best profession to allow me to help people directly and to get me out of a static, stagnating living situation. One thing I'm reasonably sure of is that I want to spend a lot of time out my home country. I want to go to Africa, South America, the places where they really need help. I could lobby for improvement in those regions from here, theoretically, but at least right now I have a desperate need to get out of industrialized society. I couldn't continue for years and years commuting from my home with internet and central air conditioning to an office where I had to wear really nice clothes all the time. I can't stand being dressy. My choice to be a physician is at least slightly motivated by my need to dress comfortably, and to not spend exhorbitant amounts of money making myself look nice for the benefit of people who simply use that as a baseline standard rather than as a bonus in their judgment of others.

There's something that is just not nearly as fulfilling as the hands-off approach. If I were to lawyer policy changes for the regions and populations I'm concerned with, I would still be relying on others to carry that through. I never meet the people that benefit from my intervention. I have no control over the quality of care, the human-to-human aspect. Because pretty much anything that gets lawyered through involves compulsion. Would I be sending military aide forces to these areas? Jobs that they didn't sign up for, individuals with prejudices who perform the job just within the lines set by their commanding officers? That's not enough. In fact, that really just makes room for things to get even worse, in terms of inter-cultural relations. No, if you want something done right, you have to do it yourself, isn't that the mantra? So if I want these underserved peoples to get not just medical care, but humanistic, quality of life care, essential education and a positive experience with visitors from other cultures, then I have to be the ambassador.

Social money

A Social Money Proposition

The Boba doesn't like me, and I don't like her. That's fine. I keep coming in because I like her product. Which makes a pretty general statement about capitalism.

What does money represent? I usually thought of it as "social utility"; people give you money when you produce something that is useful to them, and thus, has utility in the society. Which is a pretty stark view of how people view each other, and while it is representative of only a very narrow aspect of how we value each other, money ends up being the most important aspect of our lives because its how we eat, have a safe place to sleep, and improve our daily lives in various ways.

So this introduces some interesting caveats. Should we reward people for producing social utility? By which we can include anything that makes daily life easier; cell phones, internet, vehicles, medicine. Clearly higher quality goods make life even easier; fast internet, phones with alarm clocks built in, vehicles with anti-lock brakes. So one, we want to consume high quality goods, so the production of high quality of goods has to be incentivized. And that's how we get the modern better goods = more money schema. But that means also, that we're giving the means for a very high quality of life to people who produce very high quality goods. This has a number of consequences. For a start, it means that the highest quality goods are being traded amongst the producers, and the greatest social utility is concentrated at the top; T-Mobile executives can buy Ferraris, and Ferrari executives buy the best surround sound systems by Bose, and Bose executives buy the newest fanciest phones on the market. Circular, all funded by the millions of people who rely on T-Mobile for their cell phone service.

But from a more social perspective, do we believe that these executives, who (in the cell phone service example) have provided some considerable utility for millions of people that they've never met, deserve the rewards that their massive profits confer upon them? Yes, each person who buys into their phone service did so voluntarily, and so on some level must believe that the price of service is fair; thus, they did "fairly" acquire those millions of dollars. Nonetheless it seems like a fluke that someone who might not be very nice, who organized this massive operation but who doesn't directly make an effort for the betterment of my quality of life, has an absolutely fabulous quality of life because I, and others like me, funded it. On a social level, wouldn't we prefer that the nicest, kindest people got to have the nicest things? Or that rewards were proportional to actual effort, and not (as is made possible by current technology) reward-duplication without effort duplication?

If we preferred to reward people we liked, instead of acquiring the best product (bang for our buck), then the meaning of money would change drastically. Because if we only bought from people we liked, then the acquisition of goods would be secondary to the social connection built. In addition, we wouldn't be giving money to persons so that they could buy the best goods; they would, in turn, use that money to make transactions with people that they liked. Thus, if there were persons who produced very high quality goods but weren't well-liked, then those goods would never be distributed. And we would all be living in a lower utility state. Phones that don't get good coverage, slow internet, etc. But perhaps the world would be a nicer place. And maybe, actually quite probably, social issues would be massively advanced. Greater support for companies that were environmentally responsible, that treat their employees with respect.

But just as likely, and this has certainly been seen before, cyclic cliques would form; communities that only do business within their own ranks. International business would be extremely limited if existent at all.

Its important to note that this theory is different from reputation-based business. While such a model can be supported by personalities, the purpose is still nonetheless to track down the best quality goods, bang for buck etc. What I propose is a system is rewarding pro-social behavior, almost independent of goods or utility produced. Nice guys get paid more, even if the work they do is produces less utility. Which they would turn around and spend on other "nice" companies and services from "nice" people. Basically, having lots of money would mean, instead of "I have many people's lives faster stronger cleaner etc.", that "lots of people thought that their daily interactions with me made their lives better." And so old people who had been nice to everyone their entire lives would have plenty of retirement savings. And assholes who pissed everyone off would have nothing. And if we chose to support them, it wouldn't be called "welfare."
There's a rhetoric surrounding welfare, that tax dollars are supporting people who deserve a better quality of life but for whatever reason don't have the means to acquire it for themselves. But if money were distributed on the basis of social, moral "deservingness", then (I believe) even fewer people would argue that these people "deserved" to be supported.

Of course there is a major hole in this monetary theory, don't think I don't see it. If money is distributed on the basis of social agreeableness, then do goods and services still have monetary value? How much should niceness modulate the cost of goods and services? How would higher quality goods be valued, compared to their low quality equivalents?

I postulate that compensation would follow a social norm, similar to how tips for restaurants currently work. There would be a widely accepted baseline, modulated by personal opinion. In my mind, EVERYONE would make approximately $10 an hour. Property distribution would be completely different; the end of front yards, homogenous condo complexes, frequent parks. If rent still existed, it would reflect construction and maintenance costs, modulated by personal opinion.

So, if a society existed that focused on community cohesion, what would happen to all the loners, the deviants? They would probably create their own community. Over in that corner. And reinvent the system that we currently have; I don't care what you're like, I care what you can do.

And seeing where my opinion is on this, I should find myself a new Boba shop.

Curiosity

Potential difference between intelligence and curiosity.

First off, let us establish that there are many different kinds of intelligence. There are some obvious categorical differences, like social and verbal and mathematical, but there are also subtle differences, like what patterns or deviations a person spots in a data set, spatial and directional reasoning, processive reasoning, like the differences between mechanical and electrical engineers, or between molecular biologists and biochemists.

Usually, high intelligence, of whatever sort, is accompanied by an "infovore" state: a hunger for information for which one's brain is most adapted to process. Hence, writers were once often voracious readers, engineers took apart their grandfather's watch and poked their noses into auto garages.

What conclusions can we draw about people who play video games? Is that a kind of infovore state? Conversely, what conclusions can we draw about persons who are shown to have exceptional reasoning skills of one sort or another, but do not seek out challenges of those kinds? Can there be significant intelligence that is not accompanied by infovoracity? My gut reaction is no, but from an objective approach, there doesn't seem to be a reason why not. Even with opportunities available, a prodigious piano player may have no interest in piano. A person with notable skill at mechanical reasoning may not wish to pursue mechanical engineering, nor a processively adept brain fawn after a career in organic chemistry. If we accept these conjectures to be true, then it gives a little more credence to the idiom about "nothing more common than wasted talent."

A Note to Xero: Attention Seeking Behavior

Attention seeking behavior is filthy and dangerous. And I want to tell you so much that you should be afraid of me, but that in itself would be attention seeking behavior. Its hard to understand, sometimes, what you pick up on, what you don't, when you ignore me on purpose because you know or at least you think that its what I need. It's good. Even if you gauge it wrong in that moment, it all helps me to gain control of myself.

Am I being impulsive? I don't know. My life is not composed of compulsive actions, but I certainly entertain a lot of thoughts that I never follow through on. Does that make me impulsive? I think the fact that I told you, that I put it not only into words but into the dynamic of our relationship, says that this is one of those thoughts I might actually follow through on. I'm not sure that that makes it any less impulsive, but it would certainly be an outlier if it were impulsive.

Here's the really creepy part. I've already started looking for apartments. Comparing prices and square footage. Looking for areas that are close to your parents and convenient for the work we both see ourselves doing at that time. But don't worry, the thought never leaves my mind that it is TOO FUCKING EARLY for this. The way you lay yourself out there, it makes me feel like I know you really, really well, like there's nothing much I could learn in the coming months that could change my mind about you. But what worries me to the ends of the earth is that you're going to discover something about me that you can't stand, and I will already be invested, and be broken, again. Not the way you've been broken, but you know how can I hurt. You have your curse. This is mine. I haven't earned the right to feel so strongly but I feel it anyway. So really, what I'm afraid of is, I'm going to plan around this, plan for us, and then you'll find something you don't like and all that will fall apart. And I don't know what happens after that. I have a pattern, but its changing. And that pattern has never been in context of trying to find my way in the world outside of the school context. None of this is your problem I just happen to be thinking it. Moving on.

Anyways. Sometimes I feel like you're holding a stick of dynamite in your arms and you refuse to see what's there. But I feel like, if I can keep control of myself, that we could be something. I don't know what. But just for a year, I'd like to try. For all I can guess you would just move back in with your parents at the end of that year. But my plan, to go to medical school and work for the military, it involves a lot of being alone. And I want this experience, I don't want to wait another ten years. And I feel like, we could both benefit from this, if we're careful.
I know I'm moving too fast. I can't help it, I mean I guess I could but it would take a lot of mental effort. I just want to tell you, this is where I am. And even though you stir up all my psychoses, I feel like they're getting weaker, and that this, us, is a good thing.

I don't know how you know it, and in your position I could never trust it, but it is true. I will never, ever try to hurt you. I may manipulate. I may seek attention. I may break apart just so that you'll save me. I'm going to try really hard not to but when shit gets bad, that's what happens. But I won't be them. At worst, I will leave you so that I can't hurt you. That's my truth.

Because regardless of where I am, or how I feel about you, you deserve to be treated right. It just is.

And even trying to tell you this, this way, is attention seeking behavior. You can barely keep your eyes open. And you're probably interpreting me sitting up typing as passive aggressive behavior. Or perhaps you're too tired to give it any thought at all. The fact that you can barely keep your head up and yet continue to play gives me two thoughts. One, that it would be incredibly selfish of me to impinge upon your sleep time any more than I already have. And two, that your time management skills are just as bad as mine. And perhaps there's an addiction involved? I think that's a pretty severe judgment, though. We all have to cope. And talking about it isn't enough, not for you or for me or your mom. There has to be a distraction, something to divert activity away from that part of the brain while it heals from the insults that raise our blood pressure and would drive us to screaming at mirrors if we didn't let it out through... whatever.

How did I find you?

And now I begin to wonder if you know exactly what I'm trying to do, and you're not humoring me because you want me to get my shit together and say this shit out loud. Tall order, big boy. I don't talk very well. I write. And when I write, everything fits together. Almost.

a simple conjecture on carbon filters

A Wacky Proposal.

Bear with me. I say that a lot. And frankly I think its warranted.

So, Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons. Produced by burning biomass, including fossil fuels. Has a tendency to stick to particles in the air and get inhaled and cause cancer and all sorts of bad things.

Also has a tendency to adsorb "on almost any solid surface with a strong affinity for organic matter." Huh.

So, why aren't all school buses outfitted with a carbon filter? Catalytic converters are all well and good but they create their own problems. I see the clear drawbacks of a conventional air filter that would accumulate solids and get clogged, etc. No one would buy that, no one would want to deal with replacing it or forgetting it's there and having carbon monoxide backup. See, what I'm talking about is a filter that degrades as it is used. As the surface becomes saturated with pollutants, it flakes off (like rust) too big and heavy to be inhaled. Perhaps we should go with pellets, bb size. So anyways, they fall out of the exhaust pipe as they get used up and pepper the ground. Rain washes them away. Sewer treatment plant takes them out of circulation and collects the evil carcinogenic organic matter and prevents it from poisoning the dolphins. PS this system is not carrying more carcinogens into sewer water, its just shortening the trip and preventing them from hanging around in the air and our lungs in the time between rains.

So yeah I don't think a lot of people will be overjoyed by cancer pellets in the street, but its better than cancer microparticles in the air we breathe! I'm just trying to think up something fast, cheap, easy, with minimal ecosystem repercussions. Then again, who would notice little black pellets on asphalt...

And I picked school buses because those things stink something awful. Clearly they're not doing whatever it is cars are doing to keep that shit out of the air.

So there's my bitty contribution to making the metropolis a little bit more livable. Prototypes coming soon.

Ohh, also, since burning crop residues in developing countries seems to be a big problem, bicycle-powered fans. Yeah. You get a bicycle, and a house-cooling system, and a feed the fire so it doesn't smolder and produce a lot of gross stuff machine. Eh? Maybe? I'm desperate, I'll try anything.

And with your bicycle/fan you get a $100 EEEPC pre-loaded with bookmarks for wikipedia and Khan Academy!

Evoloutionary Biology and Psychopathy

Item four: Why are we fascinated by psychopathy?

Different people different theories. One woman who had a penchant for falling in love with psychopathic rapist/murderers hypothesized that we are fascinated by those who carry out our own never spoken, never acted upon desires and fantasies to kill. Another hypothesis is that they are simply so different from us.

There are lots of theories out there, so let me share mine. It might not be as valid as those backed up by statistics and evidence, but it is certainly just as valid as the armchair psychology hypotheses I've mentioned above. This is just as much armchair psychology, with a bit of Lay-Z-Boi evolutionary biology thrown in.

There is a ponderous amount of human variation that shows up repeatedly in all societies, but shows little indication of being "heritable", or naturally selected for in individuals. One example of this is homosexuality. Clearly it is not passed on directly from parents to children: that would require heterosexual reproduction. But perhaps tribes that produced homosexuals were more successful and so the randomized possibility for it to arise in a tribe was group-selected for. I believe that this can be true for a lot of "personality types". The risk-taker is more clearly one of these. They are, as individuals, much more likely to get themselves offed and not reproduce, but as members of the group they are highly advantageous for discovering new shelter or water sources, taking down dangerous prey, etc. Homosexuals might fit in by reducing the intra-sex competition for mates and the number of children in the tribe competing for food, thus improving the success of the tribe overall. Fewer men being killed in competition for female mates means more men to hunt, or conversely big strong "women" to stay home and protect the other women.

Why not also psychopaths? This evolutionary biology theory approaches psychopathy from multiple directions, many of which do not agree with each other, but bear with me.
The most popular evolutionary theory of psychopathy is that people who are uncompromisingly willing to take advantage of others are more successful. By stealing and adulterating without reservation, they gather more food and may produce more children. This theory is very straightforward and doesn't much account for the intricacies of a society. For example, how many women are actually willing to mate with a psychopath? Isn't the evolutionary theory of women centered around finding a mate that will support them and their offspring? Do psychopaths care for their own children? It probably varies, I couldn't tell you. But this theory does seem to center on the psychopath without giving due credence to how the tribe would react to such an individual.

Here's a theory, it has holes but nonetheless accounts for a group advantage to having a psychopath in the ranks. Let's assume for a second that a psychopath is capable of having loyalty, especially to their friends, group, or tribe. That tribe has an advantage when going to war with other tribes for territory or resources because they can sick this guy on the other team. Even warriors in costume will have reservations regarding some tactics. A psychopath will have no reservations. He will win by whatever means necessary and without any hesitation at the pain he might inflict upon the way. The tribe that has a psychopath wins the war, and propagates.

And now for a theory that is completely counter, that addresses more of "why are we so fascinated by psychopaths" rather than "why do psychopaths exist." This is applicable most to "advanced" civilizations, both of the East and West, with broad and exceptionless laws against harming others in certain ways (esp. murder). Because this is very different from the social structure we evolved in. Before, if there was a person that the tribe did not like, they were banished or killed. Now, we have to tolerate them. Presumably, a psychopath would be the type of person that a tribe would identify and banish or kill for the benefit of the tribe as a whole, although that circumspection would probably not be part of the thought process.
My theory is, we are fascinated by rapists, murderers and psychopaths because we want to kill them, and can't. It is our instinct to annihilate these threats to ourselves, our women, our children, our tribe, and when we can't act on this, it bothers us. And so we keep a very close eye on these people, tracking them, almost stalking, waiting for them to take a wrong step and give us that opportunity to act on our instinctual impulse to kill the deviant.
Now, when I say us, do I mean to theorize that every single human being has these thoughts? Absolutely not. The umbrella statement of my philosophy of people is that people are different. Just as there is room for homosexuals and psychopaths, so is there room for the warrior-protector, the type that wishes to kill the threat, the minister-patriarch, who wishes to teach the deviant the ways of right or at least aims to level something resembling justice (the system we operate under today), and the healer-matriarch, those who wish to care for those who are deviant, thinking that perhaps some TLC is all they need to stop being deviants. Clearly this is not an exhaustive list of personality types, and any given individual cannot be boiled down to such a simplistic description, I only mean to say that these are all valid viewpoints that can account each in part for our fascination with psychopaths. Since that was the original question.

Labeling versus Self-Identification

Item three: labeling vs self-identification

So there are a lot of new words popping up lately. This is a topic I've discussed before. Transgender vs genderqueer, bisexual vs pansexual. With an awareness of the diversity of human characteristics comes a diverse language to describe it.
But then we get a disconnect (between geographically or informationally isolated contemporaries), because this discourse isn't advancing everywhere at the same speed. I'll start with one story of a high school adolescent. I begin with a gender neutral designation, because to this day I don't think anyone can say with confidence how this person would identify. Born male, this young man was very shy and reserved until he started dressing up in girl's clothes and demanding that he be addressed by a girl's name, at which point "he" became much more self-confident. But, at least from what I could find, the only word ever used to describe him was "gay." The word "transgender" didn't come up until after his death (he was shot by another young man who he had been sexually harassing).
So here's the problem. Anyone from a metropolitan center that hasn't been living under a rock could immediately look at this person and identify him as transgender, male to female. The reporter of the case made note on television to say that this was not a matter of sexual orientation but of sexual identity. Okay. So now everyone from the outside has labeled this kid. Great.
But (it would seem that) this kid self-labeled as "gay." The question becomes, why? Did he not know the word "transgender" and simply pick the only word he knew to describe sexual/gender deviancy, because it seemed relevant? That's a story I can identify with, to an extent. But here's the other large possibility, that is now at the forefront of the sexual/gender identity discourse. It is possible to cross-dress without identifying as trans, or to identify as trans without having body dysphoria. This is a confusing concept, even for me, but that doesn't make it any less legitimate.
My conclusion is, who are we to say that this kid was not gay but transgender? If he calls himself gay, then isn't that what he is? And to what extent are people on the outside defining words, and people who actually experience these deviations defining the words through self-application and self-description? Don't I, in some way, define what it is to be transgender, by continuing to have severe gender identity issues without pursuing hormone therapy and continuing to tolerate, and sometimes even enjoy, my birth-assigned gender roles? And can't this young man, whether or not he was aware of the breadth of terms available to him, define what it is to be gay by selecting that self-label as befitting his unique constellation of attributes?

There occurs a problem when individual identity has to be translated into language, for the purpose of language is for one word to have the same meaning to many people, so that they can share ideas on the topic. Except that a person's identity cannot be constrained by a word that is intended to describe many other individuals. That would suggest that they're all alike (to a greater extent than they may actually be).
This doesn't seem like a problem on the outset, except that some people are so driven by their label that they will change aspects of themselves to fit the label "better" than they did before. One example is of a gay man who, once he identified that he liked other men, also started acting flamboyantly because that's what he thought it meant to be gay. It took many years for him to regain control of his identity, to accept that this word only described one aspect of him, and that the other attributes were not applicable. This man came through it fine, but you can see how such a situation could quickly become destructive for a different individual.

In large part, it should already be true that many words were invented to fit the personalities of individuals who, at the time, served as reference points for the definition. Unfortunately, as it turns out, there are lots and lots and lots of people who can seem similar to these reference point individuals, but who sport subtle differences that nonetheless deserve our attention. So what do we do? Invent a new label and say "you are not this, you are actually this other thing," or do we broaden the definition to include the subtleties of all individuals who choose to self-label with that word? What does gay mean? What does transgender mean? These words used to have one-sentence answers, but if you've read this article the way I intended in writing it, there should be some new breadth, if not downright confusion, on the matter.

Perhaps the two sources of definitions need to be maintained as separate. We all see how putting businesses and individuals under the same tax laws has worked out. So why not keep "I am called" and "I call myself" separate? That would be the most convenient. The boy I mentioned earlier could call himself gay all the way home, and we could call him transgender and be confident that we had a clear language and he had the self-identification he desired.
Well, no. I don't think that will ever work. Because part of rejecting someone's self-label is an inherent disrespect, a paternalistic disregard for their autonomy and freedom to define themselves. And part of a self-identity is being accepted as yourself by the people around you, or your friends at least if not the public at large. Who is anyone else to tell you what you are? But then, why would you choose a word to self-describe that doesn't match the at-large definition?

It seems that the key would be education. If this kid had known the word transgender, then we would know much more about him based on whether he continued to self-label as transgender or as gay. Because a cross-dressing guy that likes guys can still identify as male. That's part of the multi-dimensional spectrum that we (as a society) are becoming aware of. The same way that I can identify as trans while still operating with a cis public identity, and being the cis sexual interest of my partners. I have not yet been with a partner that appreciated me as my trans gender. Being okay with that, or at least continuing to tolerate that, is also part of who I am, and might be subject to labeling in some way, though if there is a designation for "identifies as trans but has relationships as cis", I'm not aware of it yet. Clearly even I am under-educated.

A lot of really fantastic essays are written on the subject, as part of gender studies classes, etc, that I truly believe could add something meaningful to the public discourse but once they are turned in for a grade, practically disappear from existence. And I think that's a problem. Why go to college if you're just going to keep your meaningful thoughts and lessons to yourself? Sure, education is largely viewed as training for the "real world", but a lot of good stuff is produced by people while they're there. I think it's wrong to ignore the important advances in discourse that can be made by students, just because they are students. Not to mention that the stuff written by 18 year olds can be a lot more accessible than high-browed academic writings to the target audience at hand, that is, young people who are trying not only to figure out who they are, but to communicate that to the people around them, to be accepted as themselves.

Changing motivations for physicians as social narrative

Item two: You and your hippie doctors.

So, I happen to work with this doctors' daughter. That's right, both parents are doctors. And she scoffs at young doctors for entering the profession for the money, claiming that her parents became doctors out of passion.

Clearly this is a kid that has never wanted for anything, has been confident that she would always be able to obtain gainful employment, etc. It's hard to believe that such a person could internalize the conception that choosing a profession based on passion is a luxury. Of course more people are choosing their jobs based on the money now than 40 years ago, because money is a lot more scarce, or at least has a lot less buying power, than it did then. Combine this with a recession that started about 4 years ago and the economic hardships we had before Clinton, the ridiculous rising prices of homes the past two decades, and it becomes much easier, for those of us who can identify with being in a state of want, to see why more and more doctors are in it for the security of income and the high lifestyle that they wish to maintain.

Granted, anyone who goes into medicine for the money either made a really bad decision, or was willing to sacrifice some income because they like the job for whatever reason. There are much more effective ways to get rich than to be a doctor, cleaner too. With fewer years in between of student debt and slave-wage residency.

My point is, I get pissed at people who get pissed at people who pursue jobs for the money. We all need money. Just because you're lucky enough to have it without sacrificing your moralistic dignity does not make you better than anyone else. It just makes you lucky. It doesn't mean that others in your position wouldn't make the same decision. It just means that they're not in your position.
Granted, I know plenty of very well-to-do young folks who don't use the luxury of choice to follow their morals. And perhaps I'm making a bad assumption that this young lady's aspirations are moralistic. Maybe she's just passionate about the profession as a stimulating activity rather than as a service to others. But my minimally-informed judgment is that she is actually a nice person, so I'll maintain the righteous moralist image. So applause to her that she is using her gifts, talents and financial luck for the good of humanity. I still do not believe that that gives her a right to look down her nose at people who pursue what is an otherwise noble profession for the money. I mean seriously, these people could have done a lot of damage on Wallstreet, instead they decided to earn their luxurious wages by cutting out cataracts, or whatever.

How Facebook has changed the way we read... everything

I have a lot of thoughts on my agenda to get out the door. On the off chance that someone will read them and say "hmm, you know, that actually makes a lot of sense!"

So let's start with item one: how the facebook age has changed the way we read, and write, print media.
My writing director has been saying that over the last 5 to 10 years she has seen many writers picking up on emotions in writings that simply aren't there, interpreting personal attacks that are actually part of standard rhetoric. Keep in mind that this is in the context of biological ethics essays, that is, very academic writings about very abstract concepts.
Now, whether or not the "insult" was intended or not by the writer is up to interpretation. My director's interpretation is that this is standard proceedings, seen in legal discourse and therefore not emotionally biased.

What she doesn't realize is that the readers today grew up on facebook. We have our social, very emotionally laden discourses through (what amounts to) print media. We must convey our complex intents, sarcasm, subtle insults, etc, through the words that we write, without the convenience of voice inflection, facial expressions, body language, all of the tools we would use in social discourse. In most print media we don't even have the convenience of italics, nor the fictional literary tools of "he said with loathing." Ergo, we have learned not only to write, but to read emotions in written words that perhaps were not detected before because writers of latter day only wrote for academic purposes and used the phone or face to face conversations for their social, more emotional discourses. Ergo we have learned to read and write emotionally, and that doesn't go away when we are presented with printed text from another source. Its almost as if we've invented a new written language, using the same words but with much more (or at least different) meaning than how it was used before.

I predict that all print media will evolve as the facebook generation comes of age. Academic writings will have to be much more directly objective, and will leave behind the discourse that was once legalese but has since been socialized to have strong emotional meaning. I welcome the evolution, to strip academic discourse of its ambiguity while also enriching our written language with a myriad of subtle meanings. It really opens up fiction writing and other genres in a way that was probably inaccessible before, or at least would have gone over most readers' heads. But now, we can detect the most subtle, and apparently sometimes nonexistent, underlying meanings, and previously "dry" authors will have an audience. This is going to be fun.

So hipster it hurts

Again I find myself with a spare moment. I'm in an Albertson's in Malibu, taking advantage of the free wifi, and some poor 19 year old sot is sitting here eating his lunch. What are you making of your life, young sir.

I'm happy with Xero. He is a good man. And so I have to wonder my organs are just not participating in the process lately. What did I do to mess them up? My brain is very attracted to him but my body is not with the program. If I didn't want to have sex with him, I would think that all parts of my brain would be on the same page about that. That's why I'm so confused that the spirit is on fire but the flesh is dry and flaccid.

I made him give me a massage. There is nothing quite so intimate as a partner who knows, to some extent, what they're doing, rearranging your muscles and healing you in a way that Western medicine just doesn't seem to appreciate. I had a long conversation with a woman studying Oriental medicine, as she calls it, but what others call Eastern medicine, and I have to say, in my mind there is some merit to it. She presented me with a theory that I think makes a lot of sense. Western medicine evolved from battlefield medicine. Repairing bodies and covering up ailments as quickly as possible to get a soldier back on the field. Dealing with an infected limb by hacking it off. And even though our knowledge of the body and pharmaceuticals has progressed drastically, there is still this philosophy of make it functional and get it done fast. Which isn't really healing. I may have a skewed perspective of Eastern medicine, but it seems that the emphasis is much more aimed at helping the body heal itself, about taking the time required, that time spent off one's feet is not such a terrible loss. Its just the way we live our lives, have lived our lives for many generations, this frantic rush to accomplish, not that anything particularly bad will happen if we don't, and yet that ifs the prevailing disposition. At this point, I suspect its genetic. White people. Something about growing up where its really fucking cold and having to get all the food in before the rains come to be able to survive 6 months of toe numbing cold. Only the desperately frantic, even without any clear conception of the consequences, survived. And so that is how we perform medicine, not just as doctors but as patients. Both are party to the intense need to get the patient back in operational order as quickly as possible. Minimize lost man hours. But when you're capable of slowing down, of working with your body as opposed to on it, or at it, then I think that is much closer to what we can clearly conceptualize as therapeutic.

And if we take this in context of the knowledge that the immune system is suppressed in response to stress, its no fucking wonder that we stay so sick and the healing process hurts. We always describe it as battle. Why not as growth? Its a very extreme paradigm shift but one that I believe is possible. We as a culture have embraced exercise as such, even though it is in a very real way damaging our bodies and can be a painful process. But we focus on the results, and thus can enjoy the process. Why not sickness? Why not go through that pain with calm and joy, secure in the knowledge that if biology is allowed to take its course, you will come out the other side stronger? Will to live seems to have more to do with survival rates than the medicine that we throw at a sickness. If this will to live were allowed to combine synergistically with a therapeutic calm, then I think it could be much more effective.

But these are just the thoughts of someone with no truly relevant training. Yet every day I become more and more convinced that getting training as a massage therapist would be a good thing in my life, because it is a good thing in others' lives that they just don't get often enough.

I want to see Tai Chi taught in inner city schools. The western conceptualization of physical education isn't doing anyone any good. Run around in circles, do sit-ups on hard surfaces. Training that is so painful and denegrating that these kids never perform the exercises except when they are forced to. That is not conducive to health. Not even a little bit.

I'm really the royalist hypocrite of all hypocrites. Look at me, having all these deep thoughts, while doing diddly about them and enjoying my wealth. What have actually ever done for anyone who really needed it? When have a sheltered the homeless, fed the starving? No, I give so little of myself, in any real sense. History will not remember me, not as I am now. Perhaps I'm waiting for the opportunity to show my colors. The new world order requires so much training to be of any legitimate use to anyone, that the beginning of any advanced endeavor has been pushed back by nearly a decade, for my profession. But perhaps I have internalized this artificial system, this lie, allowed it to be my excuse for not putting more of myself out into the world. Yes, its ridiculously expensive to fly out to third world countries for two weeks at a time, and so I try to do what I can, here, but even that isn't much. But the people I'm being given the opportunity to help, they don't need nearly as much help as I am willing and able to give. I am capable of so much and I am stagnant, and I am angry about this.

I wonder if massage therapy would be a viable therapy for kids with Asberger's, situational depression, etc. Human touch is very real and very important, and so often very, very neglected. Its probably something that would never, ever be allowed through public schools, but you never know what can be accomplished by the private sector. Its probably something that would be more appreciated at the middle and high school levels, although there is viability at the younger ages. I really don't know enough about it. I will have to ask a social worker for an opininon.

Baby its cold outside

So, I've been meaning to blog, and I happen to find myself with a few spare moments of being disconnected from any other distractions. So, despite being disconnected from the internet, a very unusual circumstance in my everyday life, I nonetheless have access to a word processor, and so, I type.

I have been dating this guy for... see now I'm actually doing the math. Almost exactly three weeks. And I don't know if by this time I had already given up on the marine biologist... I had this distinct feeling the first time I met Mr Mar-Bio that it was not meant to be. And even though I've only been dating this man for a short period, I have a very good feeling about this one. Not that that will actually mean anything in the prediction of the future, but its a nice feeling to have.

I was reading the book I checked out from the philosophy library (two weeks ago) today, and I'm glad I did. I knew why I checked out that book and it seems to be having the intended effect. Sex: A Philosophical Primer is some guy's 100 page summary of "if someone were going to make a philosophical study of sex, these are some things they should probably look at." I'm reading it in order to get a handle on my own feelings, to take control without strangling myself. To allow for the pleasant to occur without being led on into a painful recourse. I guess my real goal is to avoid becoming so attached that I get very hurt, but not be so distant if the connection really is good for me. So far, my instincts are leaning in the direction of "let go, have faith," but, I want to say I know better. In truth I know very little, but my experiences do not lend themselves to closing my eyes and falling backwards.

Although, I have to be honest. I, to my knowledge, have never been betrayed, not in any explicit sense. I have been emotionally manipulated within an inch of my being, at least it felt that way at the time, but if I were to be honest with myself, I have done all of the betraying in my romantic relationships. Not in all of them, but I know what I did, and I am sorry, not out of any romantic regret but simple human to human respect.

It's getting cold out here. Where is my boy? Light of my life, I await you. You'll already know that I'm here because my motorcycle is parked at your curb. Nonetheless I await you.

For the past many weeks I have had a secret hope that he would find my blog. I want him to know me, to know the things that I will not say, at least, would not vocally describe in such emotional detail, but I don't want to know that he knows. I have a crippling self-awareness, and so would be ever second-guessing what he thought about me in light of these facts, these musings, but nonetheless I do want him to understand me, as an emotional being. I do not flatter myself that my life has been so hard as to merit the poetic attention I give it, but, the pain is real to me, and if someone is to be intimately integrated into my life, they must be aware of that. Xero, I don't deserve the attention I seek, and it takes a lot of empowerment and selfishness for me to say that I want it anyway. I listen to you. I sit quietly, and you will just keep talking. You wear your heart on your sleeve. But I play close to the chest. This is how I communicate. I've gotten to good at keeping my mouth closed, and in truth, it is still important for me to maintain that state of discipline around many people. To break that habit for you, and to keep it up around others, is too hard. There's a term for it in cognitive neuroscience I'm sure, and if not it is definitely a well-described phenomenon. And besides, I will flatter myself on this, I am a good writer. Whatever it is, an intimate understanding of how others understand language, and ability to articulate abstract thoughts in ways that others can absorb, I have it. Usually, anyway. Some topics are harder than others. I'm just going to use that as my gett out of bluff free card.

Where are you, my sweet?! Your bane is here! To suck your life, to steal your soul, to poison the well of your well-being with concern for a person who will take and take and take and give until I die.

I am far too serious about this relationship. It is a little scary. I think mostly I'm scared of others finding out how serious I feel. Love at first sight is something you only get away with in fiction. Out here people look at you with a lot of... what is it? Suspicion? Worry? Doubt? Criticism. Disdain.

So many things to write about but they've all fled me now. Its getting very cold, of course by southern coastal standards which really isn't cold at all but my skin is prickling so stfu.

I have so much to do and I'm not doing any of it. I'm following my emotional self, to the death of objective, accomplishing self. But I'm growing, and with that I am attempting to find balance in my life. Of course what I really want to do is devote myself heart and soul and mind and body to my philanthropic cause, but the unfortunate fact is, I am human. If I ignore my other needs, love, friendship, comfort, intellectual stimulation outside the narrow range of my specific goals, then my accomplishment in that one direction will stagnate anyway. At least this is what I like to tell myself. If I cater to my human needs, then overall I will actually do better in my life's work than if I shunned them completely. This is my attempt to justify watching television and relentlessly (if a little shamefully) pursuing a gratifying sexual and romantic relationship. I will take care of him, and he will take care of me.

There is something that you can trust about senseless love. The way that oxytocin binds you into another person's mind. No matter how stupid, how sacrificial, how bizarre and inadvantageous to self an action might be, they will do it for you. If you are truly bound into a person's mind like that, you know that even when it is in their best interest, they will never hurt you. It's a trust beyond all other trust because you know that this devotion is beyond reason, self-serving motives, or sense. That even if this person went mad, they would tear down the house and destroy everything in their path and somehow, somehow, cut a circle around you, an island of peace and protection. In the rage of their mind you are suspended in a bubble, clear and beautiful and perfect, and you are the reason they live and die. Because that's what oxytocin does. And if you're lucky, your Bruce Banner won't have to turn into the Incredible Hulk to prove it to you.
And that's the thing. How do you know? How can you be sure that you are so securely bound into someone's mind like that, short of being the one person spared in their destructive rampage? By the way, this is not to say that love turns all people into rage-monsters. This is just an extreme and colorful example of what oxytocin is capable of.
I guess my question is, Xero, how will you know the extent to which I am devoted to you? People lie. And you don't want to think that I am lying but you've been lied to by people who said that they loved you, and so the thought is in your mind. I understand. And yes, I don't want to mislead you, I do have my doubts. Which is probably the only normal/acceptable emotion I'm having for a week 3 relationship. Would I move in with you? I don't know. Would I cosign a lease with you? At this point, probably not. Would I have your baby? Oh my god too much to think about. See, my friends would be proud. But this is all besides the point. I do feel very strongly for you. The fact that these questions don't already have answers is kind of a big deal.

Okay it is now 1:10 AM. I want to keep waiting for you, but... jeez man. This is getting a little ridiculous. Borrow someone's phone. Text me. Tell me wtf is going on. Conceptualize that I may not have checked my email and may just be sitting here at your front porch, being an idiot... Because, and I'm pretty sure this is true of other people too, I'm an idiot when I'm in love and there's the opportunity for emotional wholeness at the other end. I charge ahead reckless and foolish.

Hello France!

So, apparently I have been detected... in France... cool!

So whoever is reading me, please comment, tell me a little bit about yourself! What kept you interested to read multiple posts? Comments, suggestions, constructive criticism? Empathy? Advice? Let me know!

Eastern Medicine

Again I find myself with a spare moment. I'm in an Albertson's in Malibu, taking advantage of the free wifi, and some poor 19 year old sot is sitting here eating his lunch. What are you making of your life, young sir.

I'm happy with Xero. He is a good man. And so I have to wonder my organs are just not participating in the process lately. What did I do to mess them up? My brain is very attracted to him but my body is not with the program. If I didn't want to have sex with him, I would think that all parts of my brain would be on the same page about that. That's why I'm so confused that the spirit is on fire but the flesh is dry and flaccid.

I made him give me a massage. There is nothing quite so intimate as a partner who knows, to some extent, what they're doing, rearranging your muscles and healing you in a way that Western medicine just doesn't seem to appreciate. I had a long conversation with a woman studying Oriental medicine, as she calls it, but what others call Eastern medicine, and I have to say, in my mind there is some merit to it. She presented me with a theory that I think makes a lot of sense. Western medicine evolved from battlefield medicine. Repairing bodies and covering up ailments as quickly as possible to get a soldier back on the field. Dealing with an infected limb by hacking it off. And even though our knowledge of the body and pharmaceuticals has progressed drastically, there is still this philosophy of make it functional and get it done fast. Which isn't really healing. I may have a skewed perspective of Eastern medicine, but it seems that the emphasis is much more aimed at helping the body heal itself, about taking the time required, that time spent off one's feet is not such a terrible loss. Its just the way we live our lives, have lived our lives for many generations, this frantic rush to accomplish, not that anything particularly bad will happen if we don't, and yet that ifs the prevailing disposition. At this point, I suspect its genetic. White people. Something about growing up where its really fucking cold and having to get all the food in before the rains come to be able to survive 6 months of toe numbing cold. Only the desperately frantic, even without any clear conception of the consequences, survived. And so that is how we perform medicine, not just as doctors but as patients. Both are party to the intense need to get the patient back in operational order as quickly as possible. Minimize lost man hours. But when you're capable of slowing down, of working with your body as opposed to on it, or at it, then I think that is much closer to what we can clearly conceptualize as therapeutic.

And if we take this in context of the knowledge that the immune system is suppressed in response to stress, its no fucking wonder that we stay so sick and the healing process hurts. We always describe it as battle. Why not as growth? Its a very extreme paradigm shift but one that I believe is possible. We as a culture have embraced exercise as such, even though it is in a very real way damaging our bodies and can be a painful process. But we focus on the results, and thus can enjoy the process. Why not sickness? Why not go through that pain with calm and joy, secure in the knowledge that if biology is allowed to take its course, you will come out the other side stronger? Will to live seems to have more to do with survival rates than the medicine that we throw at a sickness. If this will to live were allowed to combine synergistically with a therapeutic calm, then I think it could be much more effective.

But these are just the thoughts of someone with no truly relevant training. Yet every day I become more and more convinced that getting training as a massage therapist would be a good thing in my life, because it is a good thing in others' lives that they just don't get often enough.

I want to see Tai Chi taught in inner city schools. The western conceptualization of physical education isn't doing anyone any good. Run around in circles, do sit-ups on hard surfaces. Training that is so painful and denegrating that these kids never perform the exercises except when they are forced to. That is not conducive to health. Not even a little bit.

I'm really the royalist hypocrite of all hypocrites. Look at me, having all these deep thoughts, while doing diddly about them and enjoying my wealth. What have actually ever done for anyone who really needed it? When have a sheltered the homeless, fed the starving? No, I give so little of myself, in any real sense. History will not remember me, not as I am now. Perhaps I'm waiting for the opportunity to show my colors. The new world order requires so much training to be of any legitimate use to anyone, that the beginning of any advanced endeavor has been pushed back by nearly a decade, for my profession. But perhaps I have internalized this artificial system, this lie, allowed it to be my excuse for not putting more of myself out into the world. Yes, its ridiculously expensive to fly out to third world countries for two weeks at a time, and so I try to do what I can, here, but even that isn't much. But the people I'm being given the opportunity to help, they don't need nearly as much help as I am willing and able to give. I am capable of so much and I am stagnant, and I am angry about this.

I wonder if massage therapy would be a viable therapy for kids with Asberger's, situational depression, etc. Human touch is very real and very important, and so often very, very neglected. Its probably something that would never, ever be allowed through public schools, but you never know what can be accomplished by the private sector. Its probably something that would be more appreciated at the middle and high school levels, although there is viability at the younger ages. I really don't know enough about it. I will have to ask a social worker for an opininon.

Brittle musings

So, I've been meaning to blog, and I happen to find myself with a few spare moments of being disconnected from any other distractions. So, despite being disconnected from the internet, a very unusual circumstance in my everyday life, I nonetheless have access to a word processor, and so, I type.

I have been dating this guy for... see now I'm actually doing the math. Almost exactly three weeks. And I don't know if by this time I had already given up on the marine biologist... I had this distinct feeling the first time I met Mr Mar-Bio that it was not meant to be. And even though I've only been dating this man for a short period, I have a very good feeling about this one. Not that that will actually mean anything in the prediction of the future, but its a nice feeling to have.

I was reading the book I checked out from the philosophy library (two weeks ago) today, and I'm glad I did. I knew why I checked out that book and it seems to be having the intended effect. Sex: A Philosophical Primer is some guy's 100 page summary of "if someone were going to make a philosophical study of sex, these are some things they should probably look at." I'm reading it in order to get a handle on my own feelings, to take control without strangling myself. To allow for the pleasant to occur without being led on into a painful recourse. I guess my real goal is to avoid becoming so attached that I get very hurt, but not be so distant if the connection really is good for me. So far, my instincts are leaning in the direction of "let go, have faith," but, I want to say I know better. In truth I know very little, but my experiences do not lend themselves to closing my eyes and falling backwards.

Although, I have to be honest. I, to my knowledge, have never been betrayed, not in any explicit sense. I have been emotionally manipulated within an inch of my being, at least it felt that way at the time, but if I were to be honest with myself, I have done all of the betraying in my romantic relationships. Not in all of them, but I know what I did, and I am sorry, not out of any romantic regret but simple human to human respect.

It's getting cold out here. Where is my boy? Light of my life, I await you. You'll already know that I'm here because my motorcycle is parked at your curb. Nonetheless I await you.

For the past many weeks I have had a secret hope that he would find my blog. I want him to know me, to know the things that I will not say, at least, would not vocally describe in such emotional detail, but I don't want to know that he knows. I have a crippling self-awareness, and so would be ever second-guessing what he thought about me in light of these facts, these musings, but nonetheless I do want him to understand me, as an emotional being. I do not flatter myself that my life has been so hard as to merit the poetic attention I give it, but, the pain is real to me, and if someone is to be intimately integrated into my life, they must be aware of that. Xero, I don't deserve the attention I seek, and it takes a lot of empowerment and selfishness for me to say that I want it anyway. I listen to you. I sit quietly, and you will just keep talking. You wear your heart on your sleeve. But I play close to the chest. This is how I communicate. I've gotten to good at keeping my mouth closed, and in truth, it is still important for me to maintain that state of discipline around many people. To break that habit for you, and to keep it up around others, is too hard. There's a term for it in cognitive neuroscience I'm sure, and if not it is definitely a well-described phenomenon. And besides, I will flatter myself on this, I am a good writer. Whatever it is, an intimate understanding of how others understand language, and ability to articulate abstract thoughts in ways that others can absorb, I have it. Usually, anyway. Some topics are harder than others. I'm just going to use that as my gett out of bluff free card.

Where are you, my sweet?! Your bane is here! To suck your life, to steal your soul, to poison the well of your well-being with concern for a person who will take and take and take and give until I die.

I am far too serious about this relationship. It is a little scary. I think mostly I'm scared of others finding out how serious I feel. Love at first sight is something you only get away with in fiction. Out here people look at you with a lot of... what is it? Suspicion? Worry? Doubt? Criticism. Disdain.

So many things to write about but they've all fled me now. Its getting very cold, of course by southern coastal standards which really isn't cold at all but my skin is prickling so stfu.

I have so much to do and I'm not doing any of it. I'm following my emotional self, to the death of objective, accomplishing self. But I'm growing, and with that I am attempting to find balance in my life. Of course what I really want to do is devote myself heart and soul and mind and body to my philanthropic cause, but the unfortunate fact is, I am human. If I ignore my other needs, love, friendship, comfort, intellectual stimulation outside the narrow range of my specific goals, then my accomplishment in that one direction will stagnate anyway. At least this is what I like to tell myself. If I cater to my human needs, then overall I will actually do better in my life's work than if I shunned them completely. This is my attempt to justify watching television and relentlessly (if a little shamefully) pursuing a gratifying sexual and romantic relationship. I will take care of him, and he will take care of me.

There is something that you can trust about senseless love. The way that oxytocin binds you into another person's mind. No matter how stupid, how sacrificial, how bizarre and inadvantageous to self an action might be, they will do it for you. If you are truly bound into a person's mind like that, you know that even when it is in their best interest, they will never hurt you. It's a trust beyond all other trust because you know that this devotion is beyond reason, self-serving motives, or sense. That even if this person went mad, they would tear down the house and destroy everything in their path and somehow, somehow, cut a circle around you, an island of peace and protection. In the rage of their mind you are suspended in a bubble, clear and beautiful and perfect, and you are the reason they live and die. Because that's what oxytocin does. And if you're lucky, your Bruce Banner won't have to turn into the Incredible Hulk to prove it to you.
And that's the thing. How do you know? How can you be sure that you are so securely bound into someone's mind like that, short of being the one person spared in their destructive rampage? By the way, this is not to say that love turns all people into rage-monsters. This is just an extreme and colorful example of what oxytocin is capable of.
I guess my question is, Xero, how will you know the extent to which I am devoted to you? People lie. And you don't want to think that I am lying but you've been lied to by people who said that they loved you, and so the thought is in your mind. I understand. And yes, I don't want to mislead you, I do have my doubts. Which is probably the only normal/acceptable emotion I'm having for a week 3 relationship. Would I move in with you? I don't know. Would I cosign a lease with you? At this point, probably not. Would I have your baby? Oh my god too much to think about. See, my friends would be proud. But this is all besides the point. I do feel very strongly for you. The fact that these questions don't already have answers is kind of a big deal.

Okay it is now 1:10 AM. I want to keep waiting for you, but... jeez man. This is getting a little ridiculous. Borrow someone's phone. Text me. Tell me wtf is going on. Conceptualize that I may not have checked my email and may just be sitting here at your front porch, being an idiot... Because, and I'm pretty sure this is true of other people too, I'm an idiot when I'm in love and there's the opportunity for emotional wholeness at the other end. I charge ahead reckless and foolish.

What were you thinking about suicide

I called my boyfriend tonight, because I was missing him and wanted to talk. By which, I mean I wanted him to talk to me. He doesn't ask a lot of questions, but my questions that he chooses to answer, he does at length. And colorfully.

Well, tonight, I started the conversation (ie prompted his monologue) on the nature of darkness. See, to me, darkness is comforting. Its where I can hide, where my emotions can't be read on my face. Which I am learning is an important way that I unconsciously communicate. But he took it in the direction of depression. Fine. He had interesting things to say on the matter. But then he took an even more extreme tangent.

He told me about one of his best friends, a marine and police officer, a trouble maker and mischievous joker.  A community serviceman and a loyal companion. And when he got in a fight with his wife in Vegas, he went downstairs to have a drink. It mixed badly with a medication he was on, and he spiraled into a depressive state. He sent a text to his brother, a suicide note, and shot himself. But he didn't die. He immediately started screaming "I don't want to die", "I didn't mean to", etc. He died 90 minutes later in the hospital, far from friends and family.

My boyfriend was choking up while telling me this story, but I couldn't help being angry at him. The more obvious surface emotion was, I want to be there for you. And there was an underlying reason. It hurt me. I was bothered by this, what was obviously an accidental suicide. Of course, it was no one's fault that being pregnant turned his wife into a royal bitch, so on that account he couldn't have avoided that particular stress in his life. And if he forgot that he wasn't supposed to drink after taking that medication, that's no one's fault either. Then it gets complicated. He was not in his right mind. He had enough gravity to contact a person that he knew loved him. But instead of talking to his brother, he sent a suicide note. In this moment, in a drug-induced state, he felt like he had no other choice than to kill himself. I can say plenty of "it could have been different"s, but it wasn't. And that's the point. Everything that was happening to him could have only led to that conclusion. To this suicide that even he didn't want.

This death is more tragic than others. Because there was support for him, and in truth, he didn't want to die. My boyfriend described him as the last person he thought would do this, and I believe that he was the last person who would, except for that moment, a drugged-up exception to the rest of his life.

Which is why that it cannot be used as an argument for why a person should not kill themselves. Some people, in right mind, for months and years on end without relent, do feel trapped. They do try other ways to escape the situation, and their anger, their sadness, their hurt, follows them anyway. These people feel unloved, like the people they would leave behind are not worth living for. And that's different.
My boyfriend argued that he wouldn't want anyone to go through what he went through with his friend's death, and that's why he wouldn't kill himself. Well, except that my boyfriend contemplated suicide as a cogent human. And I believe that, if as a cogent human, you believe that your pain is so great, that you need to leave, regardless of the consequences to your loved ones, then that is your right. You don't owe it to anyone to stick around, to make their lives a little more sound while you claw and scrape your way through your own. Anyone that is worth sticking around for, will make your life worth living. It can't be only one way.

My boyfriend called his friend when he himself was contemplating suicide. They talked about it. And my boyfriend is still alive today because of friends like that who were worth it enough to him to stay for, that he didn't want to hurt, and the fact that their hurt would be greater than his, tells me that his depression was surmountable. Having friends that love you can and should make all the other problems matter less. It just should. Because when all else turns to shit, you get down to the bare basics of the purpose of living; to enjoy it. And you do that with friends.

I don't know how I pulled through it. I think I just held on to the hope and reality that my situation was very specific and very temporary, and that there was a timer on it; I just had to survive long enough to get out. There were some days that I was so frustrated, so out of control of my own life, that I would sit and think seriously about it for hours. I thought about the people I would leave behind, and to be honest, none of them mattered enough to me to stick around for. They didn't make my life worth living, so why should I live for them?

By the grace of God I walk the Earth today. My life was not as bad as others. That doesn't mean I didn't feel real, deep, pain.

And that's another thing. True, I have been lucky enough that all of my at-risk friends survived. Some went into rehab, others got into relationships that picked them up, and one girl had a baby. But just because none of my friends completed suicide doesn't mean that I can't identify with the pain that goes with that. Despite expectations, I can understand that desperation of loss, the confusion, the anger. Just because I haven't been face to face with death in that manner, does not mean that I can't see through your eyes. So try to see through my eyes. Yes, I didn't go through that, but I went through things, things that were real to me and hurt me. The relative inseverity of the cause is no reason to discount my feelings.
There are some people who have seen terrible things, and are angry at those who self-describe as going through tough times without having had the same terrible experiences. I am angry at those judgmental fucks. To have felt that pain, you must know that it doesn't take that much of a loss to sweep your feet out from under you. Presumably, if you been to those dark places, you've been where they are now, and you know that while whatever they're going through is not as nearly as bad as it could be, it is painful, and it does disrupt your life. To such individuals, their tough times are tough, to them, and that needs to be respected. True, it is helpful to them to have perspective, to realize that their lives are no so difficult and that there is no reason life can't get better. But their lack of perspective should not open them up to bullying and ridicule, in light of their pain. Pain is real, and pain is painful to the one experiencing it, no matter what the cause. Put this in context of the recent infamy of Amanda Todd, and all of the harshness that has come with that, and perhaps you'll understand my anger.
Yes, many people think that what happened to this girl was her own fault, and that what happened wasn't bad enough to merit taking her own life. But what I see is a lack of effort to see it through her eyes, to understand her perspective, how she experienced her pain. And, especially, she had no one to talk to. I understand why Amanda killed herself.
But that young man had people to talk to, people who loved him deeply and would not stigmatize him for having thoughts of suicide. And so its harder for me to internalize that. If I were to be honest with myself, its hard for me to forgive him. I didn't have to meet him to love him, to miss him, to grieve for him. Or to be angry at him for leaving us behind.

PS
I don't know where to stick this but it needs to be said. Given, times are tough, its hard to get enough employment to keep yourself afloat, let alone support a family. When my boyfriend described how they drank to his memory, that's when I started crying. This man, in order to have enough money, took on twenty hour shifts and kept himself awake by chain-drinking Monster energy drinks and shocking himself with a stun gun. And that's when I got angry, that's when I saw the early warning signs that even now, years after his death, my boyfriend doesn't seem to have detected as a problem. A young man with other issues in his life, staying up for 20 hours, maintaining that with chemicals, shocking himself? That should have been the red flag. And when I heard it, I knew, or at least I hoped, I would have called it, that the warning sign would be caught and this guy could have gotten help before it got out of control. Even if he didn't see it as self-harm, there's multiple ways to look at this and see it as Bad. First off, he's making severe changes to his brain chemistry with chronic substance abuse and staying awake too long, along with shocking himself. Second, if you reflect on your own life, and you see that you have to do things like this just to keep a roof over your head and food on your table, how would that make you feel? I would feel angry, desperate, trapped, uncared for, that others could see this going on and not say "hey, this is not okay. You need to be good to yourself." Like my government had abandoned me and my friends didn't care. And maybe that's completely wrong, maybe this guy was a thrill-seeker and found a 20 hour shift to be a good excuse to mess with energy drinks and stun guns. But looking at what happened after, I can't help but draw a connection. I can't help but take it from my perspective. And that's the very same fault that I judge others for. Deja vu.

The weird ways I communicate

So I've been on all of one date with this guy. It's been six days since that first date. In that time, I had two killer exams and he lost his job. So Thursday night there was a lot of comforting to go around. But instead, I decided to drink and use that as a means of speaking my truths. There were things I needed to say. He was surprisingly receptive, and supportive. He brought out tears that I had been denying for a long time, he let me cry. Because he figured me out. I knew what signals I had been letting through, and he picked up almost all of them. But I learned something about myself from this. I really prefer to keep my mouth shut. I don't share personal experiences, I downplay my pain, and I "triple-think" before I speak; I very carefully consider the consequences of my words before I let them out.
But then you get a situation like this. I had to tell him things, things I thought might hurt him, that I didn't know how to say. Sober me would ruminate on it and it would never come out. But I knew I had a responsibility. So I drank, and the thoughts flowed. And you know what? I think he liked me more.
The funny thing is, I ran into a similar situation the next morning. You see, even for being significantly older than me, and being supported by his parents, and until recently working a full time job, he somehow also manages to have almost no money. He lives paycheck to paycheck. Now, this has two consequences in my mind. One, worry about his viability as a partner if he cannot be responsible with his money. Two, how I can possibly in good conscience allow him to wine and dine me. These two postulates can interact in an interesting dynamic. If he deems that he is able to treat me, then that is his right. He should be responsible enough to make that decision for himself. On the other hand, if he is not responsible enough to allocate his money reasonably, then he does then lose that right of courtship?
So when he checked his bank account to determine if he had enough money to take me out to lunch, I had an internal CPU surge. And, because I was no longer drunk, I took way too much time trying to figure out how to articulate my concerns without insulting him. Which, lets be real, when it comes to money, is almost impossible. But I realized that there was no way out of it, I couldn't hide that something was bothering me, so I talked. And he assured me that if was a problem, he would tell me. I really hope he holds to that. And if the situation now isn't a problem, I have to worry how bad the situation needs to be to qualify as a problem.
I asked how this had happened, and he prefaced with "that's where my life is right now." And for some reason, I understood. I realize now how easily I could be in his shoes, and how that wouldn't reflect my character. In better circumstances, I feel like his status would be very different. But that doesn't make him a lesser person now. But, I hope to be those better circumstances. To be a source of inspiration, a reserve of happiness. Of hope.

Well, that escalated quickly; and Genderqueer

So, a few weeks ago a friend of mine invited me out with some of his friends. They were nice enough people.  I liked one of them in particular. I got the sense he liked me too (he kept scanning me, however surreptitiously he attempted). So I asked my friend to give this new intrigue my phone number.

Saturday, lunch date. Sunday, home date. Sunday night, got a little rowdy. Monday morning, had coffee and conversation with the parental units. Went well.
When I told my close friends this, they decided to name my new paramour "The Escalator", since the relationship escalated very quickly. I didn't and won't bother to mention the multiple one night stands and the one "relationship" that started even faster than that. But this one is different. Sure, I might have had feelings for the last "relationship" (quoties for a reason, dear), but I wouldn't claim they were anywhere near this strong. There's this elation, that's a bit familiar and yet every time feels like the first and only time. With the last, I knew from the moment I met him face to face that this was not going to last. An unlove at first sight. But this one, I like him. Am I conceptualizing a future? No, but I haven't disqualified the existence of one. Not entirely, anyway. We have very different life paths; from the perspective of realism this is temporary, for fun.
But in my oxytocin-washed brain it is very, very real. I like him, a lot. But I hesitate, because, yes, this went fast. I did take the time to probe his mind, he offered up his past, I feel that I know him well, as compared to other first dates. Surprisingly, I feel like I can trust him. He's much bigger and stronger than me, but I'm not even a little afraid that he'll ever hurt me. So I took a leap of faith and offered up the most important points of my messy, infected life. I'm trans, I've cheated, and there's an ex that won't go away. I'm bothered that the trans bit is what bothered him most, but I won't let it be a deal-breaker. Ideals are nice to have, in theory, but life is too short to wait for the world to become the perfect place you envision in your head before you let yourself have some fun in it. God made me beautiful, even if for a long time I wished (and, in a more sedated way, continue to wish) for everything but. I've finally given up that dream, I think. Work with what you got. I'm not going to magically change into the person I was supposed to be. Maybe I'll re-approach the matter later when I find myself in the "ideal" situation. But life's too short. I have a beautiful man who thinks I'm beautiful and we're going to have fun together and if he wants what he sees as me rather than how I see myself then I need to just keep a lid on it and not go batshit crazy clawing at the peak of Maslow's pyramid. I used to think I could happy self-idealized, even alone, but now I know better. I crave intimacy above and beyond finding myself. I need another person to love me, more than I need to be trans. I guess this is a taste of how homosexual children in unsupporting families feel.

Maybe its in the language. I self-described as transgender because it was the only word I could grasp onto to describe my introspective identity. But now a new term has popped up. Genderqueer. And that term is much more forgiving, much more malleable. To describe oneself as genderqueer is to allow oneself to move seamlessly between identities as they fit best at the time. I think this can serve to reflect a more dynamic view of self. After all, my self-names have changed pretty consistently as I've grown, as well as my ideas about intimacy, and family. It allows me to safely navigate (what I see as) a contradiction between my fantasized identity and my real sexuality.

Over time my innate self-identity seems to be more, at peace, with my born gender. In dreams I am often my born gender rather than my transitive. In my dreams, my aesthetics are befitting of my born gender, and the androgyny I attempt in my daily life is lost. But these dreams are usually in context of my sexuality. Being sexually interested in a man grounds me to my born gender. I still can't decide if this is a betrayal of the person I was born to be, or if I should embrace the serendipity, and take my dreams and fancies as indicators that I have grown into a changing person. I do not abandon my transitive identity entirely. I do, however, entertain the possibility of accepting myself as dynamic, as non-binary, as genderqueer.


Its exciting to see how this field is evolving under the care of diligent and caring minds. Even as our society becomes more aware of the incredible variations in human gender and sexuality, the fluid non-binary nature of it all, we are now developing a language to talk about it, to put things in categories the way human brains can understand themselves. Even though we don't fit into categories, we often feel a need to organize ourselves as such anyway. The brain is incapable of conceptualizing the brain. And so terms like gender identity, gender expression, sexual identity, can help us organize our thoughts about the incredibly diverse and complex subject of these interrelated aspects of what it is to be human, but human in the way that connects us to our evolutionary ancestors. It's an exciting time to be alive. I'm glad I can share it with you.

Moving On, and other updates

So, that nice man I've been rambling about for months and months? Has a girlfriend. Which I only found out because I had the balls to ask the really awkward question. So, there's that. And now our relationship is, limitedly awkward. Not terrible, so yeah.

And now my attention is turned to another man, also vastly out of my age range, but at least he's pretty safely out of "old enough to be my father" range. Unless he hit puberty really early, but you know what, same argument as before. This is normal all over the world EXCEPT where and when I happen to live. He and I have mutual friends that seem to vouch for him, so I'll take the chance. Also, except for choice of occupation, he seems totally my type. Bear. I look forward to fantastic cuddles.

So, yeah, it seems that my most popular hit is "my boss autistic" google searches. Which I find fucking hilarious, apparently this is a thing, but definitely not the focus of my blog. It's sort of disappointing that my explicitly audience-oriented post on transgenderism has gone largely undetected, but I guess there are more and better resources for that now. I wish that had been true ten years ago.  I missed that boat.

I drew My Little Ponies on my motorcycle helmet. This makes me happy. If your boss is autistic, you should watch My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. It will make you feel better. Granted, I have friends that never got into it, even after a proper introduction, but se la vi.

Also I think Applejack doesn't get enough attention. When you ask people to name their favorite pony, I think AJ comes up last in the polls. Is it that her unique trait of family orientation is undesirable to me, and I'm just misinterpreting? Yeah let's go with that.

Do You See All This Flirting?

Yes, I'm trying to flirt with you just as hard as I can. And I'm wondering, of all the signals I'm sending, which do you pick up? And in all your little actions, conversation, small-talk, what are you intending to send as a signal? What of my actions are misperceived?

Like when you tell me that you love Wuthering Heights. I just about swallowed my tongue, mostly at the thought of an intelligent person enjoying such... angst. Especially a happy person like you. Then you made the most shallow analysis of the book I've ever heard. I am Heathcliff, for I go away then come back with lots of money. No, that is not what that book is about, at all. And then you mentioned that you loaned out the movie to someone else. Who else? Is there someone else that is special in your life? <paranoid jealousy> Am I not special in receiving this attention? How can I judge?

But then, I notice how you compliment me, in ways I don't deserve, and that when I got up to leave, you left with me, to accompany me, to talk about randomness. Are you Dickenson or Bronte? Really? That was your lead-in? But then why did you ramble on through my flirtation, "who's your Catherine?" Was it because we were outside, people might be watching? Probably, I took advantage of the opening without considering the circumstances strongly. But did you notice? Were you trying to discourage me, and if so, was it the circumstances, or the base concept? Do you want me to stop? I don't think so, not the way you wink at me.

My day was so much better once I decided to visit. I pushed down my fear, my excuses, my lack of excuses, and went. And then, I just did what came naturally, I helped someone with their homework and succeeded and it was awesome, and hopefully, I impressed you, just a little bit.

Then you made a connection. You tried to impress me, I think. Maybe, maybe not. And that's the theme of this post. What is just conversation, and what is flirting? Do you notice that I'm trying to reach out to you, or do you think its just my quirk? Did you think I was ignoring you when I decided to help that girl, or did you see it as an attempt to connect? (which it wasn't, I guess at this point its just instinct to assist in the learning process) Did you see my disdain for Wuthering Heights as an insurmountable personality difference? Probably not, but I guess it depends on how you interpret it. Also I found myself swearing up one side and down the other. I wonder if you noticed.

But I'm sure, absolutely sure, that you don't think about me as much as I think about you. Because I had to ask you if we were still on for today, approx 4 hours before the appointed time. If you'd thought about me at all before that time, you would have informed me of the cancellation. So where does that leave me? I'm a passing detail in your life, invisible when not immediately in front of your eyes. There are other ways to interpret this happenstance but that requires too much (wishful) over-thinking. Its unlikely that you neglected to inform me because you hoped I would show up anyway.

Which means that being proactive is the best thing I can possibly do. Waiting for you to notice me works zero. But to become a big enough part of your life, that you notice when I'm not there, well then... maybe you'll do something to keep me around? Wishful thinking.

But the important thing is, you take your hot chocolate with extra chocolate.

Trigger

You think you're fine
but something's wrong
then one day, out of no where
a trigger
and you're down and out
though you don't know it yet
your awareness hasn't caught up
with the rest of you
you're falling so fast

One day they'll hear a bang
and come downstairs
and there will be blood
running out into the carpet

and eyes will go wide
and they'll look at each other
and shake their heads
and lift their shoulders
never blinking

Did you know she felt that way?
I didn't know.
I knew she used to be,
but I thought she was over that.

Here's the thing.
Human beings can be trained.
Very, very well.
I've been trained.
You don't want to listen to me complain.
You don't want to hear when it hurts.
You'd rather kill our dog
than put up with her anxiety
so what about me?
How am I different from the dog?

Completely subjugated, dependent
there for your entertainment
the difference is,
you can't kill me. Law says so.
and unlike the dog,
I understand when you want me to hide it
but just because you can't see it anymore
doesn't mean its gone away

So its no wonder you'll be surprised
when my brains are leaking out
onto the floor
because you've trained me so well
to hide the emotions
that are displeasing to you
you don't even know they're there.

Yes, I was better, for a while
then there was a trigger
not that you'll know,
I barely know it now
but there won't be a change,
not on the outside.
outside is what matters to you
that is,
until outside is blood and turning cold
then you'll know
right there on the floor
and there won't be any other explanation
because no one else will have one
its the inevitable conclusion

she was depressed.
she was hiding it from us.
Why?
you'd know if you'd listened.
because you told me to.
Dad.

Dream Spring

I dream vividly, and often I'm lucky enough to remember them (at least parts) for even days after. Lately I've been having bad dreams, probably due to eating shortly before bed.

Often my dreams take place in recurring settings, places that don't actually exist, of my mind's own architecture. Had it struck my fancy, I would have quite the talent for architecture. Last night's dream was in a public bath, underground stone hot springs grouped in the corners of the cave. It was there that I waited patiently, hoping that my love would show up. And so he did, but not before another young man in the hot springs had sidled up to me. I remember he asked if I was single, and I said no, because I didn't want him, I wanted the one I awaited. But nonetheless when my love arrived, the young man had fallen asleep on my shoulder in the hot waters. My love's eyes wandered briefly across my bare breasts, then questioned me about my companion. When I said I did not know the boy's name, my love commented that I work quickly. I tried to redeem myself, to shove off the boy and make it known that he meant nothing to me, that I waited upon another's heart. My love began to talk about the delicacies of courtship, and I made note of consequences. In this dream he still does not know it is he, and I had to hint that he was the one I wanted.

Before I went to the springs another of my favorite dream-structures featured; a pool tube with bars and handholds so that I could do pull-ups from the water and hold on to the bottom while testing my lungs. If I were ever dastardly rich I might build something like it. But one can dare to dream.

Mostly I continue to think about my crush, and I think the boy in my dream represents all the playthings I'm wasting my time with now, on the premise that I have needs to fulfill and that my love would understand that they mean nothing.

A few weeks back, and I'm quite sure I didn't write this down, I dreamt of my love and he knew, and we were a couple, and he even impressed my mother (an impossibility in real life). One detail that stood out about this particular dream is he had platinum hair. But he always seemed to be running in front of me.

But these dreams only reflect how much I'm thinking about him. Because I am not one whose fondness fades with absence, and this one is special for he appeared in dreams long ago. He's probably appeared in my dreams five times by now.