is the word 'diary' better than the word 'blog'? probably not.
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Brilliant Ill-Adjusted. And: Absurdity Saves.
I've been thinking about the disparate group of brilliant but ill-adjusted men I know. I�m not saying that all the men I know are brilliant and ill-adjusted, nor am I saying that all the brilliant men I know are ill-adjusted, etc. I�m saying that, for whatever reason (and perhaps there just is no �reason�), I tend to meet and then never stop knowing brilliant ill-adjusted men. They don�t tend to live near me, or anyone else, because apparently brilliant ill-adjusted men have to travel around, keep moving, and settle any place where most of their friends don�t live.
Anyway, I was thinking about this because it was the middle of the night, I was awake thinking too much, and so I checked email on my Sidekick and read a brilliant email message I had received from one of this group of men that we are for now calling �Brilliant Ill-Adjusted.� Funny, clever, full of a sense of the world�s absurdity. The kind of message you read and then wonder at on at least two levels. (Level one: Brilliant! Level two: Um. Ill-Adjusted? What's going to happen? Level three: Brilliant? Sure am glad I know this guy... Etc.)
And then I thought (and this is a terrible thought to have, but it is the kind of thought that occurs to one when one knows someone who has killed himself): If I had been forced to predict who in my acquaintance would commit suicide, I don�t think I ever would have picked C----. I mean, I knew he was unhappy. And I knew he was having a particularly rough time. But to me it seemed like the kind of rough time that we all have sometimes. Like when a bunch of things we have been hoping for just don�t work out all at once, and we are left unmoored, wondering WTF we are going to do next, or ever. Anyway, I know personally that one can live through such a thing, more than once, and so it never occurred to me how desperately unhappy this person I knew was. And that is sad. To have stood next to him and known he was unhappy and tried to talk about life but not quite manage it and all along not really knowing just how unhappy he was. He orders another round of drinks, and we take silly polaroid pictures.
In the middle of all this I realized that Brilliant Ill-Adjusted people, even though they function daily with a knowledge that they simply do not fit into the world as it is, but instead have to strike it on a tangent and get used to always being a bit out of its orbit, those people will probably never commit suicide. Because they will have developed a much too finely honed sense of the absurdity of life to do something that drastic. That is what I think. Absurdity saves. And maybe that�s all you have if you don�t have �Christ� or whatever else saves. And I don�t even mean that as a depressing statement, but as a realistic one, and, for me, even a hopeful one. Absurdity saves.
Hard to change topics from that one!
In other news, Marilyn came out and stayed with me Saturday day and evening. We went out for some food and I had some amazing chocolate chip cookie pie. It was good to see her, and have her around. She went to a party nearby on Saturday night and I stayed home because I had two 80-page student theses to read. Sunday I made her almond-vanilla pancakes and basil-lavender eggs, and sent her on her way back to Boston.
On Friday night I had planned to stay home but Chris called and lured me out to the Tunnel Bar in Northampton. Then we had Thai food. At the restaurant we had to wait for a table, and he said, jokingly within earshot of the hostess, who knows who he is, �Why are we waiting? Doesn�t she KNOW WHO I AM?� And I said, �Oh, she knows. We are waiting for a table because she is pissed about �Stacy�s Mom�!�
Other good news: Chris has, stashed somewhere in his house, a DVD of early skits that led to what became the Greg the Bunny show! Apparently they are much more raunchy and outrageous than the shows that aired. And I am excited for the day when he finds the DVD and hands it over to me!
10:39 a.m. - February 01, 2005
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