The Question re-emerges: Magic or Logic?

 Logical scientist claim that the secret to a happy life is buiding relationships. So, I decided to try that. Whenever I have to go out of the way to help anyone who seeks it of me, I tell myself - You are building your community, your people. This person is now going to be your person. 

(Now I need to cajole myself so much because helping others is not really my thing.) 

So now that I am more helpful and reaching out to others and all that, I am hopeful of being not too eccentric in my approaching old age. 

But this morning, someone I simply love and adore called me at five thirty in the morning. I was so energized by this short 15 minute call. It was magical.

What is all this relationship building and socializing really, when compared to the magic of spontaneous bonds that we never ever logically strove or never even attempted to create? 

I am a coward now

 Obviously, this post has no magic or logic. 

It is about the cowardice I experience when I watch a movie or a series. 'Gore' pops up on the top left corner of the screen, and I instantly close that work of art and look for something else to watch. 

I also find most fashionably edgy series distressing. It is no longer thrilling to watch fictional heroes and heroines face hurdles and withstand the pressure of dealing with the consequences of their stupidity or bad luck. In fact, so burnt out am I from living through the situation I have made out of my life, that even minor troubles in family dramas make me anxious. 

For instance, in a slow paced, picaresque novel style romcom, I started stressing out when a stranger  helps out the lady lead by offering to hold her suitcase. I am now sure that he is going to steal the suitcase. Pretty sure and that this is going to mess up the image of the decent girl with a decent job and a decent image. My feminist fears were that she would look lesser than the hero, who is weird, as men are wont to be.

So I only watch K Drama. Especially the older ones in which nothing much happens except for people walking and talking and eating and drinking. Even this genre has now evolved and tries to replicate the scary, violent side of life and I decided to give up on it as well and started to write this blog.

Enough. I have given ample proof to being in a disgustingly cowardly stage of my life.

 Here, I feel I should mention the great admiration I feel for L. M. Montgomery. I had not thought much of Anne of Green Gables when I first read it in class six. The romance in it made an impression. 

The term kindred spirit remained in my memory. When I saw the series Anne with an E, I thought the series was a very lyrical adaptation of the original and that the language used in it was very quaint. 

Then Saru told me that Anne with an E reminded her of me. I went back to the book to check how much of it had been altered for television. And what did I discover? The language of the book was exactly like what had been created for the series. My first thought was to be impressed by how good my language skills had been at six. 

Soon after, I began listening to the audio books of Montgomery. What a treat it has been! I think I will finish listening to all the books and then listen to them again a second time. I like this author almost as much as I do Dickens.

In "Anne's House of Dreams", Anne meets Paul Irving, once her student and now a 19-year-old College President, and reads one of his poems. She tells him that he would become a great and popular poet. He tells her that her writing is getting recognition too. She tells him/ or muses to herself (not sure which) that what she wrote was only good enough for children/women's magazines and that she would never count among the greats. 

 Wikipedia describes Montgomery's work as children's writing. I do not subscribe to that objective description. It is a balm to my 57-year-old self. For me, she is truly great for she is a creator who helps me dream in the 57th year of my life.

My youth was forcibly aborted due to economic reasons and now I am living in relative peace in my middle age. I have fewer responsibilities and more opportunities for enjoyment now. I am in tolerably good health and would just vegetate away but for Montgomery's "Children's books" that are full of dreams for the future.

This is my letter to the world...

 Beginning with Dickinson's amazing lines,

This is my letter to the world that never wrote to me,--

The simple news that Nature told,

with tender majesty

My impression on these lines of the poem is that the first two lines are simply arresting.

The poet could have been arrested by the thought herself.

 As a kid undergoing extreme mental turmoil, I had felt keenly about how nobody asked me what was happening to me.  \NObody. The world did not come forward to me or reach out to me even a tiny bit. I was drowning in confusion and sadness and watched everyone and everything in eyes groggy with pain. College, the professors, the thousand students who walked  by me everyday, the numerous passersby on crowded streets. 

maybe she felt the way I did, that no one came forward to understand the unique and poignant moments in her life.

But why does she switch to describing nature and its message in the next lines?

Then she writes

Her message is committed to hands I cannot see

What does she mean? Does she herself not get nature's message and even call it a simple one with tender majesty? Why would she talk about a secret that she cannot understand?

Then the guity last lines

For the love of her, sweet countrymen, Judge tenderly of me.

I think the poet's environment made women feel so inferior that she dubs all countrymen to be sweet and wants them to judge her substandard self leniently.

In the end I feel the poet is just doodling with words.

Diary entry on self

 Low energy, low resonance with purpose, low sense of direction

What to do?

Correcting the energy deficit can only be done by exercise. I am sure of this because I have felt extremely tired even after a day's rest and a good night's sleep.

Lack of purpose: This is a challenge. I am redoing a job that I did with great enthusiasm 20 years ago. And doing in the format that is used today. This format of communication through ppts and elaborate teacher training material is time consuming and unsatisfactory as opposed to the simple way of giving hand outs and listening to audio clips online.

Low sense of direction could stem from an ADHD that I experience since my school days. All the three are connected.

When do I feel the flow

Fortunately, I still feel the flow in a classroom. I pick up on what the students need, what steps are to be taken to cater to their requirement. I feel the same while playing Candy Crush. It makes me content instantly. While it may seem counterintuitive to play Candy Crush, an addictive game, it is an undeniable fact that the game gives me immense calmness and sense of security. It would be wiser to use the game judiciously, as a shot in the arm which would keep me going rather than wallow in substandard stagnation.

Reading for me: magic glazed logic

Did some serious reading as part of a project on a variety of topics related to menstruation. Making a note of my responses to them.

1. First topic with author's name and tagline
 Pathologizing Your Period 
B Y PA U LA J . C AP LA N
(Despite a lack of evidence, the psychiatric establishment has made extreme premenstrual distress a recognized disorder—and a boon to Big Pharma.)
I felt that this article goes beyond the usual discussion scope on premenstrual syndrome, which usually covers physical and emotional distress such as cramps, dizziness, hopelesness and tearfulness. It speaks about American authorities on psychiatry, categorizing certain unrelated symptoms under depression related to menstruation and labelling that as a mental disorder. Men also show these symptoms, it says.
So the question that comes to my mind is why they connect a mental disorder to menstruation. The author says that it is sexism and a boon to pharmaceutical companies.
My personal response was to wonder if some mental illness cases reported in the media, diagnosed as due to extreme PMS could be due to some other undiagnosed disorder. How can we believe a single doctor's diagnosis when the medical body has no proof that this mentally aberrant behaviour is related to menstruation?

Poof! Life has neither magic, nor logic

 How can i spend time in front of  laptop  without falling asleep? I feel very tired and sleepy in the mornings. For a long time, I have had a bad attitude towards content creation. I fidget, try out multiple things like playing a game, learning new things and listening to music. But I end up falling asleep in front of the computer.  I wonder what this is all about. 

I started writing this in June.

June and July are gone and so are 12 days in August. In the past sixty days, I have increased my out put to some extent, although I am not yet in an optimal flow. 

And there is the recognition that I am not motivated enough to work full time, although I need to work for a few more years in this way. Acknowledging this and workin on it.