Yay Josh Ritter!

Seeing him May 20th...can't wait.

Atlas Shrugged, Ayn Rand

She felt a bored indifference toward the immediate world around her, toward other children and adults alike.  She took it as a regrettable accident, to be borne patiently for a while, that she happened to be imprisoned among people who were dull.  She had caught a glimpse of another world and she knew that it existed somewhere . . . She had to wait, she thought, and grow up to that world.


The adversary she found herself forced to fight was not worth matching or beating; it was not a superior ability which she would have found challenging; it was ineptitude-a gray spread of cotton that seemed soft and shapeless, that could offer no resistance to anything or anybody, yet managed to be a barrier in her way.  She stood, disarmed, before the riddle of what made this possible.  She could find no answer.


Through the years of her childhood, [she] lived in the future – in the world she expected to find, where she would not have to feel contempt or boredom. 


The purpose of philosophy is not to help men find the meaning of life, but to prove to them that there isn’t any.

The Magus by John Fowles

"if a person is intelligent, then of course he is either an agnostic or an atheist. Just as he is a physical coward. They are automatic definitions of high intelligence. But I am not talking about God. I am talking about science".

Ok unfortunately my computer is broken hardcore so I can't type all I want to say. But Bills present to me was the most thoughtful thing anyone has done. I got to see Josh Ritter live! And now were going again in may and I am so excited. I will probably die. I especially want to see him perform "Kathleen".

How great are his lyrics?!! This is part of "Rumors" off his newest album.

He plays pianos with fistfuls
Of broken Belvedere crystal
And he's trying to forget you
But the music's never loud enough

So you're gonna have to show me
How that dance is done
The one where somebody leaves someone

He's impaling the front row
Fighting fires with arrows
And he'll act like he forgot you
But the music's never loud enough

And this is from "Man Burning" off of "Hello Starling". Not only are his lyrics amazing, but the music itself kills me it's so beautiful.

Don't stand so close to me
Don't be another tragedy
I've burned everybody who had a hand to lend
No one put me in this hell
I lit a fire underneath myself
Now I'm blazing the same old trail back to you again

You will always be fond of me. I represent to you all the sins you never had the courage to commit. -Oscar Wilde, The Portrait of Dorian Grey

"Abandon hope, all ye who enter here."
— Dante Alighieri (The Divine Comedy)

"Into the eternal darkness, into fire and into ice. "
— Dante Alighieri (The Divine Comedy)

"What is a poet? An unhappy man who hides deep anguish in his heart, but whose lips are so formed that when the sigh and cry pass through them, it sounds like lovely music.... And people flock around the poet and say: 'Sing again soon' - that is, 'May new sufferings torment your soul but your lips be fashioned as before, for the cry would only frighten us, but the music, that is blissful.'"
— Søren Kierkegaard (Either - Or)

"Wickedness is a myth invented by good people to account for the curious attractiveness of others."
— Oscar Wilde

"We are each our own devil, and we make this world our hell."
— Oscar Wilde

"In addition to my other numerous acquaintances, I have one more intimate confidant. . . . My depression is the most faithful mistress I have known- no wonder, then, that I return the love."
— Søren Kierkegaard


"Those who do not like you fall into two categories; the stupid and the envious."
— John Wilmot


"I regret nothing. No woman with any self-respect would have done less. The question of good and evil will always be one of philosophy's most intriguing problems, up there with the problem of existence itself. I'm not quarreling with your choice of issues, only with your intellectually diminished approach. If evil means to be self-motivated, to live on one's own terms, then every artist, every thinker, every original mind, is evil. Because we dare to look through our own eyes rather than mouth cliches lent us from the so-called Fathers. To dare to see is to steal fire from the Gods. This is mankind's destiny, the engine which fuels us as a race. "
— Janet Fitch (White Oleander)

If evil were a lesser breed than justice, after all these years the righteous would have freed the world of sin.

The greatest trick the Devil ever pulled was convincing the world he didn't exist.

The Usual Suspects is a really good movie. Thank you, Bill, for the recommendation. Work at 6:30 am, oh joy! But guess what? It's money. And money is the root of all material enjoyment. Which is fun.

30 Rock is the greatest show ever, even more than Arrested Development. Because Arrested Development is genius, but every single episode doesn't fulfill my soul the way every single episode of 30 rock has moments that do. Maybe that's a horrible reflection on myself, but Jack Donaghy is probably my hero.

I seriously cannot wait for New Moon to come out, and I'm really excited to watch Twilight with Bill in preparation (for him).

I wanna pull it apart and put it back together

Isn't it funny how when life is sucking I write in my blog constantly, but when life is good I ignore it for months? How emo of me. Anyway, I'm trying to reverse that habit. So much has happened since I last posted...I decided not to go back to Hamilton (which was one of the healthiest decisions I've ever made), I got a boyfriend who is AWESOME, I got an actual job because I realized I needed more funding to continue with the lifestyle to which I have become accustomed, I (mostly) pulled my life together and stopped being an alcoholic on a downward spiral, and of course I caused trouble and pissed people off most likely because we wouldn't be human (and I certainly wouldn't be me) if things like that didn't happen.

I'm super happy right now because I got my Saturday work shift covered so now I can actually celebrate Bill's birthday and not have work at 6 fucking am the next day. Hallelujah.

It always astounds me how much happens in the span of a few months, and how much we can't predict about where life might go. SO MUCH has happened since college began; even since last summer. wowza my small human brain can't quite handle it. Good thing I'm a philosophy major because I spend most of my time being existentially dumbfounded.

Also, FYI to the world: I want these shoes. And I will get them. Soon...because I have a job, and no sense of reasonable spending.

poems

She turns and looks a moment in the glass,
Hardly aware of her departed lover;
Her brain allows one half-formed thought to pass:
'Well now that's done: and I'm glad it's over.'

And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust.

'My nerves are bad to-night. Yes, bad. Stay with me.
'Speak to me. Why do you never speak? Speak.
'What are you thinking of? What thinking? What?
'I never know what you are thinking. Think.'

He who was living is now dead
We who were living are now dying
With a little patience

The awful daring of a moment's surrender

Which an age of prudence can never retract

By this, and this only, we have existed

Which is not to be found in our obituaries

Down in it

And I was feeling some feelings you wouldn't believe.
Sometimes I don't believe them myself and I decided I was never coming down.

I was up above it.
Now I'm down in it

So what what does it matter now.
I was swimming in the hate now I crawl on the ground.

I used to be so big and strong.
I used to know my right from wrong.
I used to never be afraid.
I used to be somebody.

I used to have something inside.
Now just this hole it's open wide.
I used to want it all.
I used to be somebody.

And all the world's weight is on my back and I don't even know why.
And what I used to think was me is just a fading memory.

Baudelaire

One should always be drunk. That's all that matters;
that's our one imperative need. So as not to feel Time's
horrible burden one which breaks your shoulders and bows you down, you must get drunk without cease. But with what?
With wine, poetry, or virtue
as you choose.

But get drunk.

And if, at some time, on steps of a palace,
in the green grass of a ditch,
in the bleak solitude of your room,
you are waking and the drunkenness has already abated,
ask the wind, the wave, the stars, the clock,
all that which flees,
all that which groans,
all that which rolls,
all that which sings,
all that which speaks,
ask them, what time it is;
and the wind, the wave, the stars, the birds, and the clock,

they will all reply: "It is time to get drunk!

Closer, NIN

You let me violate you, you let me desecrate you.
You let me penetrate you, you let me complicate you.
Help me I broke apart my insides, help me I’ve got no soul to sell.

Help me get away from myself.
My whole existence is flawed.

You can have my isolation, you can have the hate that it brings

Help me tear down my reason, help me become somebody else.

Watch Disney Templates and more funny videos on CollegeHumor

Ebb; Millay

I know what my heart is like
Since your love died:
It is like a hollow ledge
Holding a little pool
Left there by the tide,
A little tepid pool,
Drying inward from the edge.

Kinda I Want To

i can't shake this feeling from my head.
there's a devil sleeping in my bed.
i cannot make this feeling go away

i know it's not the right thing.
and I know it's not the good think.
but kinda i want to.

i'm not sure of what i should do.
all of my excuses turn to lies.
maybe God will cover up his eyes

maybe just for tonight.
we can pretend it's alright.
what's the price i pay.
i don't care what they say.
i want to.

Portrait of a Lady

“I have saved this afternoon for you”;
And four wax candles in the darkened room,
Four rings of light upon the ceiling overhead,	5
An atmosphere of Juliet’s tomb
Prepared for all the things to be said, or left unsaid.

Inside my brain a dull tom-tom begins

Absurdly hammering a prelude of its own, Let us take the air, in a tobacco trance, Admire the monuments, Discuss the late events, Correct our watches by the public clocks. Then sit for half an hour and drink our bocks. Now that lilacs are in bloom She has a bowl of lilacs in her room And twists one in his fingers while she talks. And youth is cruel, and has no remorse And smiles at situations which it cannot see.” “Yet with these April sunsets, that somehow recall My buried life, and Paris in the Spring, I feel immeasurably at peace, and find the world To be wonderful and youthful, after all.” You are invulnerable, you have no Achilles’ heel. You will go on, and when you have prevailed You can say: at this point many a one has failed. I take my hat: how can I make a cowardly amends For what she has said to me? With the smell of hyacinths across the garden Recalling things that other people have desired. Are these ideas right or wrong? My self-possession gutters; we are really in the dark.

The Waste Land

Sometimes something as simple as poetry excerpts remind me there's a point to living and that life is beautiful. I used to worry that that was a dumb reason to live, but now I realize there is NO reason to live, no point in life. And that's not depressing, it's wonderful and liberating. My brain has been thinking the wrong way all alone; it's time to reprogram. Every time i feel a stress about a decision, or try to make a choice for the "right" reason, I need to stop and look at what I'm doing and thinking, and why. This is exactly what Ayn Rand meant by selfishness.

I sat with Jason drinking wine, listening to a beautiful song, sitting in the sun, and I realized that's exactly what I want an thats exactly the point of life. Everything I love, everything I want to do..I should do it, embrace it, and enjoy it. Of course, there are limits to consider which is where it gets tricky. But that's okay.

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering	5
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers. What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow Out of this stony rubbish? I will show you fear in a handful of dust. I could not Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither Living nor dead, and I knew nothing, 40 Looking into the heart of light, the silence. THE Chair she sat in, like a burnished throne, Glowed on the marble The wind Crosses the brown land, unheard. The nymphs are departed. 7 After the frosty silence in the gardens After the agony in stony places He who was living is now dead We who were living are now dying With a little patience

Novelization

My cold stare isn't watching you, it's literally penetrating you. Going right through, as though you don't exist. Because, to me, you don't. Or I wish you didn't. Either way, I'm not interested in who you are. I sense that there could be something interesting on occasion, but this is a rare flicker in the darkened swamp of my daily rounds. I can't describe what the waitress looked like, I don't know what color shirt the girl next to me had on this morning.

And yet, when I want to, I can turn on the charm. Make you intoxicated by me, curious for more, feel lucky for the opportunity to know me. The cruelty that exudes from my pores gives me some sort of allure and mystery. This is how I catch my prey...they come to me, but only when I want them to.

Oleanders in a glass of milk

Loneliness is the human condition. Cultivate it. The way it tunnels into you allows your soul room to grow. Never expect to outgrow loneliness. Never hope to find people who will understand you, someone to fill that space. An intelligent, sensitive person is the exception, the very great exception. If you expect to find people who will understand you, you will grow murderous with disappointment. The best you'll ever do is to understand yourself, know what it is that you want, and not let the cattle stand in your way.
— Janet Fitch

Her hatred glittered irresistibly. I could see it, the jewel, it was sapphire, it was the cold lakes of Norway.
— Janet Fitch

The soul selects her own society,
Then shuts the door;
On her divine majority
Obtrude no more.

Unmoved, she notes the chariot's pausing
At her low gate;
Unmoved, an emperor is kneeling
Upon her mat.

I've known her from an ample nation
Choose one;
Then close the valves of her attention
Like stone.

Am I still tough enough?
Feels like I’m wearing down.
Is my viciousness losing ground?
Am I taking too much? Did I cross a line?
I need my role in this very clearly defined.

I need your discipline; I need your help...
You know once I start I cannot help myself

And now it's starting up, feels like I'm losing touch.
Nothing matters to me; nothing matters as much
-Discipline, NIN

I hope they cannot see the limitless potential living inside of me.
I hope they cannot see I am the great destroyer.
-NIN

"I'd rather die than give you control." — Trent Reznor

"Those who are faithful know only the trivial side of love: it is the faithless who know love's tragedies." — Oscar Wilde

"When the soul suffers too much, it develops a taste for misfortune."— Albert Camus

"Sorrow is knowledge, those that know the most must mourn the deepest, the tree of knowledge is not the tree of life. " — George Gordon Byron

"Every heart has its secret sorrows which the world knows not, and oftentimes we call a man cold, when he is only sad." — Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

"We are each our own devil, and we make this world our hell." — Oscar Wilde

"With freedom, books, flowers, and the moon, who could not be happy? " — Oscar Wilde

I don't want to be at the mercy of my emotions. I want to use them, to enjoy them, and to dominate them."— Oscar Wilde

"In three words I can sum up everything I've learned about life: it goes on." — Robert Frost

"Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood? Pythagoras was misunderstood, and Socrates, and Jesus, and Luther, and Copernicus, and Galileo, and Newton, and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is to be misunderstood." — Ralph Waldo Emerson (Self Reliance)

"Be careful, lest in casting out your demon you exorcise the best thing in you."
— Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

"Remorse.-- Never yield to remorse, but at once tell yourself: remorse would simply mean adding to the first act of stupidity a second."— Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

My head is filled with silvery stars -Wilco

Lately I've been thinking a lot about God. I know that no matter what happens, I will never believe that God is real. There is no way that God, if he existed, would allow the world to exist as it is now. Unless he's a sociopathic freak who enjoys watching pain. But I doubt that. I don't know why we are here, or how the universe got created. Part of me thinks it has to be a miracle of some sort, but part of me also thinks that it just happened. There was an explosion or something and now after much evolution we are here. We aren't special or important, we're just animals that evolved from some cells, and we aren't the be all and end all. Humans are here for now, but eventually we won't be. We've only been here a short time, but we think we're the most important thing ever.

I guess that's part of why religion irks me. Because it feeds into the notion that we are so very special. The earth is young, we were the first creatures, and the earth is here for us to "subdue and have dominion over" (Genesis). This is just wrong. We don't matter any more than the lichen on trees matter.

This does not mean that I don't find the world amazing and beautiful and complex and fascinating. I can bring myself to awed tears if I think hard enough about the fact that we are here, and the universe is infinite. Human beings cannot even comprehend what infinity is, because we are finite beings.

Lately, I've been trying to grapple with how people can live their daily lives with certainty that God is an actual man or entity. I'm willing to concede some sort of spirituality, but I could never ever believe that there is an ACTUAL real God. And the idea that plenty of people, many who are quite intelligent, think God is real astounds me.

Am I missing out on something by lacking any sort of faith in a higher power? I really don't know. But I'm too rational and set in my ways to ever accept God as fact. I don't even like capitalizing the word God. It annoys me. I don't think that having faith necessarily makes you a better person or happier. It surely can, but it isn't a guarantee.

I'm trying really hard to evaluate my life and understand who I really am. But God is not going to help me do this. Other people might look to God, but I look to myself. And what worries me is that by always looking to myself, I will never grow into a less self-centered person. I have the ability to love very deeply, but I also have the ability to hurt very deeply, frequently without real remorse.

But so many great minds and great thinkers have been atheistic, self-serving, and messed up that it makes me think I don't really want or need to change. Even if I manage to grow and manage not to hurt people directly, I think I will always still see people as insignificant in some way. There is a very limited number of people who I would truly put before myself. Everyone else is secondary to me, my goals, my desires, and my life. Half the time I don't even see other people.

Waiting for sedation to disconnect my head. -Elliott Smith

I keep collections of some of my favorite quotes.... so here is one collection of similar themes. Next post will be my favorite happy/love/nature quotes.

God is dead and no one cares
If there is a Hell, I'll see you there
-Heresy, NIN

Truth be told, I'm lying.
You wonder where it all went wrong...the list goes on and on.
-Gives You Hell, All American Rejects

Wickedness is a myth invented by good people to account for the curious attractiveness of others.
— Oscar Wilde

I have the feeling that drinking is a form of suicide where you're allowed to return to life and begin all over the next day. It's like killing yourself, and then you're reborn. I guess I've lived about ten or fifteen thousand lives now.
— Charles Bukowski

Lying's the most fun a girl can have without taking her clothes off. But it's better if you do.
-Closer

The blackest sea
And it runs deeper than you
Wave goodbye
To what you were
The rules have changed
The lines begin to blur
She makes you hard
It comes on strong
You finally found
The place where you belong
-With Teeth, NIN

Work is the disease of the drinking classes.
-Oscar Wilde

On the surface, all is calm.
-Swimming Pool

You can do what you want to, whenever you want to, though it doesn't mean a thing...Big nothing.
-Elliott Smith, Either/Or

I am so all-American, I'll sell you suicide.
I am totalitarian, I've got abortions in my eyes.
I hate the hater, I'd rape the raper.
I wasn't born with enough middle fingers.
Let's just kill everyone and let your god sort them out.
-Irresponsible Hate Anthem, Marilyn Manson

Remember what you said
You know the part about life,
Is just a waking dream
Well I know what you mean
But that ain't how it seems right here, right now
How can this be real?
I can hardly feel
Anymore
-NIN

You're distant and cold, and a sight to behold... everybody just sighs. But no one gets off with you very long, cause you don't feel bad when you lie.
-Shooting Star, Elliott Smith

Religion is a crutch for people not strong enough to stand up to the unknown without help.
-Robert A. Heinlein

First of all, whenever I hear anything described as a heartless assault on our children, I tend to think it’s a good idea. I’m happy that the president’s willing to do something bad for the kids.
-William Kristol, the editor of The Weekly Standard

Hatred, the mischievous delight in the misfortune of others, the lust to rob and dominate, and whatever else is called evil belongs to the most amazing economy of the preservation of the species.
-Friedrich Nietzsche

I am the voice inside your head
I am the hate you try to hide
I am the high you can't sustain
I am the need you have for more
I am the bullet in the gun
I am the truth from which you run
I am the silencing machine
I am the end of all your dreams
And I control you
You let me do this to you.
-Nine Inch Nails

Listen carefully....... That's the sound of me not caring.
-Pretty Persuasion

So once again the way you feel will never ever stay the same and I'm to blame. I wonder just who made the rules up for this game. Well I guess I just don't understand about what you want and what you need. And I guess I just don't understand about how it has to be.
-Nine Inch Nails

I'm drunk, and right now I'm so in love with you. And I don't want to think too much about what we should or shouldn't do. My moral standing is lying down. This is the only time I really feel alive.
-The Only Time, NIN

Who's my next victim? You?
-Nola Rice, Match Point

If you want to lie with me
You're going to be a liar
-Marilyn Manson

But there is no real me: only an entity, something illusory. And though I can hide my cold gaze, and you can shake my hand and feel flesh gripping yours and maybe you can even sense our lifestyles are probably comparable... I simply am not there.
-American Psycho

Guilt is a rope that wears thin.
- Ayn Rand

All it amounts to is a tear in a salted sea
-10,000 Maniacs

MEOW!

Can't we all just get along?

If evil were a lesser breed than justice, after all these years the righteous would have freed the world of sin.

When they finally come to destroy the earth, they'll have to go through you first. They'll have to deal with you first, and my money says they won't know about the thousand Fahrenheit hot metal lights behind your eyes. That crushing, crashing, atom-smashing, white-hot thing... It's invincible. When they finally come, what will you do to them? Gonna decimate them like you did to me? Will you leave them stunned and stuttering? When they finally come, how will you handle them? Will you devastate them deliberately? So, please use your powers for good. You're invincible.
-Ok go

Chaos? Check. Dancing star? Getting there.

Having spent your entire life exactly where you are tonight in the valley between intent and deed, you must have mastered this, the fragile art of a good excuse, the little things that get you to believe. You've spent your entire life quick-tongued and always right. Hasn't being right just let you down? Don't you think that maybe, this time, you were wrong? -Ok go

I may know the way to comfort and soothe a weary face, but turn away indifferent

Sit back, matter of fact, teasing, toying, turning, chatting, charming, hissing, playing the crowd.
Play that song again, another couple Klonopin, a nod, a glance, a half-hearted bow.
Oh such grace, oh such beauty, and lipstick and callous and fishnets and malice.
So precious, suspicious, and charming, and vicious. You're a million ways to be cruel.
-Ok go

Weave, weave the sunlight in your hair

There is a pleasure in the pathless woods,
There is a rapture on the lonely shore,
There is society, where none intrudes,
By the deep sea, and music in its roar:
I love not man the less, but Nature more
-Lord Byron, from Canto IV of Childe Harold