Seeing

“We don’t see things as they are, we see them as we are.”

- Anaïs Nin

Taken

“Be yourself; everyone else is already taken.”

- Oscar Wilde

For Fear You Will Be Alone by Richard Brautigan

For fear you will be alone

you do so many things

that aren’t you at all.

Impromptu Emotions

It’s impossible to prepare for the unexpected, but I still try. Before I go to bed, when I wake up, whenever I am merely alone, I run scenarios through my mind. If situation x comes up what would I do? So I create these situations in my mind, and I run through all the options. I run the options till their final conclusion, in hopes that when/if the situation does arise, I will always know how to act, what to say, how to move my face, where to put my hands, and how to feel. I suppose it’s a type of game theory. I do it out of survival. People generally assume I’m always so cool and collected, but that’s because I was neurotic earlier rehearsing for my performance. Sure, most social actions are performance. I talk (obsess) about identity a lot. I choose who to be, and then do all the necessary actions, dress, emotions that such-and-such would do. Such as the intellectual, the partygirl, the wild one, the quiet one, the geek one, the kind and caring friend, the calm and mediative one, the good daughter, good sister, good girlfriend…

Few have ever seen me not know what to do and how to act. Very few have ever seen the panic I get into if a situation occurs that I did not prepare for. It doesn’t happen often really. Some say a more honest me comes out. I don’t know if that’s necessarily true. When it does, I shut down emotionally. I’m so horrified at the prospect of saying the wrong thing, of moving the wrong arm at the wrong moment, of even blinking wrong…wrong being of course, unrehearsed, not a part of some specific identity.

This is very hard for me to admit. It’s that dark, sick thing about ourselves that we don’t want anyone to know. Well, since I try so hard to be perfect, I certainly don’t want anyone to know that the perfection is false. I know that perfection is unattainable. I also know it’s subjective. I’m just trying to play my role/identities/performance flawlessly. I suppose when I say perfection, I mean to play the role so well, that people think it’s real. That I did it without practice. That this is who I am. I also suppose that we all do this to some extent or another. 

Lost on the Market

Thinking back to my post on the lack of a defining overall movement or characteristic of my generation, except disappointment at our political system and economy, I wonder if this lack of a concrete label, except something as amorphous as the “Dot Com Generation,” is the reason we are so obsessed with labels?

In other words, are we so label-orientated because we don’t have one? I suppose this is a basic summary of a postmodern identity, and maybe all my years of theory finally hit home, because unlike anyone older than me, I feel that being born in the late 80’s made me lost. I didn’t even have a time of identity illusion.

This isn’t just another lost puppy “who am I?” question, but more of a, “i?”

I wonder if the lowercase i means anything. It is that “i” that defines my generation. The one where the self isn’t prime. Maybe that’s a good thing, the “I” begins to take less precedence. Yet I don’t see us becoming any less selfish. Narcissism seems to be frolicking with all of our “i”-pliances, our technological prosthesis. It makes me think of Allucquère Rosanne Stone’s book The War of Desire and Technology at the Close of the Mechanical Age, where she discusses how Stephen Hawking and his machine that allows him to communicate are not separate from one another. I can walk away from my computer and still be “me,” but for him, without it he is silent.

I wonder if it is becoming so hard to market ourselves. There are no easy categories to cling to. Yet we haven’t escaped the need of them. Do we need labels of every other product out there because we don’t have labels ourselves?

So are we lost or have we transcended? Have we become meat? Have we escaped our meat status with our communicative technologies?

What grade meat would you be?

I think since I’m free range, I get lots of exercise and good, clean, organic vegetarian food (so no worries about diseases), perfect vision, no allergies, no high fructose corn syrup..Advanced education, multicultural background, bilingual, great at cooking Asian and Southeast Asian food, no hormones, marketable skills, high resistance to heat, Expert in Microsoft Office Programs on Macs and PC’s, graphic design skills, research capabilities, debate skills..strong teeth, good back, lots of energy, good sense of humor… Yeah I’d be pretty good on the market.

What are we? “We” meaning my generation.

Last class we were all silent. It’s not that I haven’t done the reading, I didn’t know how to respond. Defintions have become so difficult because we grow up aware of so many circumstances that we cannot make choices anymore because we are constantly walking on eggshells. I suppose I can highlight aspects of my identity, my personality, but which ones? I have a really hard time answering questions as to my generation. I feel we are all so fractered. We have no cause to rally around. We have all this wonderful technology to bring us together but it’s hard to make a community. We create online communities around random things like lolcats…yet, what actually happens is that the lolcats creates the community and defines us. We are defined by our interests, our facebook profiles, our black and white artistic myspace photos. They are not are reflection of us, but are our prosthesis. Without our Blackberries we are very silent Hawkings. Without our easily defined boxes of name/age/location/favorite movies (because none of can ever name one)/artists, quotes, mottos…nice clear boxes…We’re not a ‘we’. Perhaps because without all of that we cannot connect to others. It’s like saying “Oh, hi! I am a real person. Here is my business card. You decide if you want to associate with me.”

What’s real anymore?