2005-01-29 - 9:46 p.m.

On the internal soundtrack: "And He Shall Purify", Handel's "Messiah"

Monday, January 24, 2005

In a recent discussion about smoking as a teenager, an LJ-friend said I must have amazing self-control and ability to resist peer pressure because I never smoked or drank (and to this day, still haven't). But I don't think I have amazing self-control -- if I did, I wouldn't be sitting here writing and browsing zappos.com when I'm supposed to be working and have a deadline looming.

I'm not really sure why I never did the whole drinking/smoking/drugs thing. Part of it was that I was lucky enough to have found myself with friends who didn't drink or smoke, and by the time I got to college I had enough self-confidence that I wasn't affected much by what other people were doing. Part of it was a sheer lack of interest. I think alcohol and cigarettes taste bad (I tried my aunt's cigarette when I was 6, with my mom's permission, and good god it was awful) and I couldn't get past the taste to get whatever pleasant effects they are reputed to have. Also, my parents were drink-a-day people (they had a cocktail before dinner) so drinking just seemed boring. I also have a very strong aversion to having my consciousness altered in a way I don't choose -- so giving myself a head rush from hanging upside-down on a swing is OK, but taking a pill to get a similar effect is frightening to me.

I had considered that my deafness had something to do with it -- maybe since I'm already so different, peer pressure had less of an effect because I knew I would never be "normal" no matter what I did. In particular, my deafness keeps me from seeing the world the way it really is because I don't "overhear" things. The only things I hear are things that people say directly to me, on purpose, and you'd be surprised at how much people modify what they say when they know they're under the intense scrutiny of a lipreader as opposed to addressing everyone in general and no one in particular.

Anyway, this all makes me think that the only reason I didn't drink or smoke is because of a lucky combination of genes and environment. And that led me to re-ponder the question I ponder every now and then:

Do I really have any such thing as free will? In the sense that I am making decisions independently of what my genetic/environmental cocktail is telling me to do? Honestly, sometimes I think the only reason my life has been so good is because I have a genetic predisposition to be happy and because my specific genetic mix of risk aversion and desire to get what I want balances out well.

I'm trying to think of specific occasions where I had to force myself to do something I didn't want to do. There are two that spring to mind:

- The time I was in the airport at Fishkill, having a massive ongoing panic attack, making myself get on the airplane and go to Florida even though I desperately, desperately wanted to be back in our apartment. That was one of the worst days of my life.

- My natural inclination is to be shy with strangers, especially people my age. Up through high school, I didn't initiate conversations with people. If they spoke to me first, I could do okay, but being the first to speak just didn't happen. Upon entering college, where I had a clean slate, I decided not to be like this anymore, and learned how to approach people and make conversation.

Other than that, I dunno. Sometimes I wonder how people can abuse drugs or alcohol to the point that they are ruining their lives, and then I think, well, maybe it's just that their messed-up life is better to them than a life without alcohol. I don't know. OTOH, I know a lot of people who have kicked drugs, alcohol, and smoking, and continue to do without them even though they miss them all the time. So clearly it's possible to resist and to change, but is it possible on an person-by-person basis, or is it possible for everyone who chooses to do so? Aren't there some things, for some people, that really aren't a choice?

Then there is me sitting here writing when I should be working. I know I am capable of focusing and working like I should -- I've done it before -- so why am I not doing it now? Why am I being so weak? I think I'm choosing not work, and so I should therefore now choose to get my ass in gear, and that feels like free will to me.

I don't know where I'm going with this. I should work.

Tuesday, January 25th, 2005

From a Carolyn Hax live chat, and vaguely tangential to yesterday's free-will post:

Q: But Carolyn, how does one absolutely, nonnegotiably, know and like herself as-is. I don't even know where to start.

Carolyn Hax: I suppose some people break themselves in gently over time, but we hate them so we'll pretend they don't exist. Usually, you get there by having a crisis godawful enough to force you to scrutinize every aspect of your life to see if it's smart, stupid, working, failing, making you miserable, sucking your soul, or just wasting your time in irreplaceable clumps. Then you start admitting what it is about you that's to credit/blame for the above. Then you take this shiny new more realistic sense of your own strengths and weaknesses, and you start using it to make your decisions, instead of using your former standbys like wishful thinking, childhood dreams and societal expectations.

This is the most succinct explanation I've ever seen for how to be happy. Figure out who you are and what you really want, and make your decisions accordingly. I would probably add one more thing: Don't give in to fear. Sometimes people are afraid to do what they feel is really the right thing because they're afraid of failure or afraid that their instinct is wrong somehow. Or sometimes people are so risk-averse that they try to make themselves want the safer choice (I've done that). But in my personal experience, being true to myself has always led to the most happiness.

Interestingly enough, that "myself" thing is sometimes hard to figure out. I am an adaptable person, and can make myself happy in a variety of environments because it's in my nature to look for things to be happy about. I have a certain amount of leeway, I guess. But I only have so much leeway, and there are still certain specific things that make me deeply happy and fundamentally content, and to choose anything else (if I have the choice) would be to do myself wrong. An example would be the fact that I wanted a partner I could share everything with and talk to about anything, as opposed to settling for a partner whose natural tendency was to retain a fair amount of personal privacy and wasn't inclined to even think about some of the stuff I like to talk about at length. Another example, though less critical really, would be my desire to live in a walkable neighborhood in a city, rather than a suburb designed for the convenience of driving a car and having a nice big yard. Choosing the one that I really, truly wanted has made my life SO deeply satisfying, on a daily basis, and I'm SO glad I didn't settle for less.

Saturday, January 29th, 2005

I thought y'all might like to see the awesome socks that Faecat knitted for me as a kamikaze present. I already have sweaters in two of the colors (pink and blue) in the socks, and since I like my colors to match, this makes me VERY HAPPY.

Poindexter is doing an amazing job of making me far more photogenic than I ever imagined I could be. He's a genius.

In other fashion news, I went shopping today and fell painfully in love with a corset-style ivory boucle skirt suit, meant to be worn in the evening for a party, which means I would never wear it, ever. It fits funny, anyway. Perhaps I will go back to Lord & Taylor, put it on, and take a picture of myself in it to look at.

There are a lot of things I fall in love with but do not fit or are too impractical to buy. Lots of shoes, in particular. I am going to start putting pictures of these things in an album, so I can look at them whenever I feel like it. I already have a manila folder but I'm going to make a proper album. This will also be helpful to me because it will help me track my tastes -- I'm curious to see if I will still be loving these things in five years or if my love has been influenced more than I realize by what's trendy.

Speaking of which, I was appalled to realize that a type of tiered skirt that I had in EIGHTH GRADE is now back in fashion. It is EXACTLY THE SAME! WHY DID I GET RID OF IT?!?! I was probably just bored with it. I haven't grown much; it would probably still fit. This has made me resolve never to get rid of anything I truly love, because with a few alterations to make it more modern I can probably wear it again in 20 years.

I also stopped by Burlington Coat Factory, looking for the Coat Genius so I could finally tell him how awesome he is. I've been by twice now and he wasn't there, but he finally was today.

Somebody had thrown a red tweed coat over a rack and I made the mistake of trying it on and now I am completely obsessed with it. It's Guess, so it's overpriced even for BCF, and I have too much tweed already, but OMG I LOVE IT I WANT IT BLAHBLAHBLAH. I am giving myself a few days to calm down and see if the infatuation wears off or somebody else takes it before I can.

ANYWAY, so, it needed a hanger, so I used that as my flimsy excuse to talk to the coat guy. I felt ridiculous and a little giggly, like I was trying to ask him out. "Hi, do you have a spare hanger? This was just thrown over a rack." He was furiously organizing coats, like he always is, and he had a hanger tucked in his belt, if you can believe that. He handed it to me and told me where to put the coat -- "Designer coats are over there to the right." It was the perfect opening for me to babble about how "You're so great, you always know where everything is! You've been so nice to me and so helpful every time I've been here." He smiled and said, "My name's Barry. I'm the coat manager." So now I know his name, and I can say "Hi, Barry" when I go back to obsess over the red coat some more. :) :)

Speaking of living in the city, when I first moved here I wondered if I'd get irritated with parking the car on the street and having to walk over to it in the cold every morning. But we've been here for almost 3 years and I am not getting that feeling at all. We never really have to walk much farther than I'd have to walk across a parking lot if I worked in one of those big sprawling suburban business campuses.

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