I was not a happy camper this weekend. Saturday was nice – Matt and I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He’d never been before, and I’d been wanting to take him there for a while. I love the Met – it’s like travelling around the world and across history. Ancient Egyptian relics, 20th century art, medieval armor, musical instruments, early American furniture, European paintings – and that’s just some of what we saw. We were there for several hours and didn’t even see every department. I need to go there more often. And since I live in Manhattan now, I really have no excuse not to.
(One of my favorite Met exhibits ever was Art and the Empire City, which appeared five years ago, and which I saw twice. It displayed the art and cultural history of New York City from 1825 to 1861 and included some great paintings of long-gone city landmarks.)
The rest of the weekend, though, I was kind of bummed out. We didn’t do much of anything. I’m not good at doing nothing. I feel unhealthy and guilty if I sit around watching TV, and I was getting cabin fever in the apartment. Matt is usually content not to do much, but I’ve always liked (or felt a pressing need) to take advantage of the city and all it has to offer.
Last night, I came back from a fruitless bookstore trip. I got into the elevator and 11 or 12 loud freshmen appeared out of nowhere and crammed in as well. I just about lost it when I got back into the apartment. (Matt was at a meeting.) The building has been more crowded since all the students moved in last week. But I’m living rent-free in a very nice apartment in a great neighborhood, so I really shouldn’t complain.
Matt and I have different attitudes toward life. Although he gets stressed out about his job and can be hard on himself about short-term things, he doesn’t really worry about the long term.
Me, I worry about more existential things. I worry about death – not dying, but death. I’m not religious and don’t think there’s an afterlife. In the back of my mind there’s always the knowledge that one day I will cease to exist, and that I’m not taking advantage of the short time I have on earth. I’m not sucking the marrow out of life. I don’t know why I have such a cramped view of things. But I do.
How do you people do it? How do you live without these ever-present fears?
There are people out there who are content with their jobs, who are content to do nothing. They’ve either found something they enjoy, or they haven’t but they don’t worry about it. Sometimes I wish I were like that.
But mostly, I just wish I knew what I wanted out of life. But it seems that what I want changes from week to week.
Matt and I talked about all this a couple of times this weekend. He doesn’t understand why I always feel the need to go out and do something. But I see it as taking advantage of the fact that I’m alive. Because I won’t always be.
Okay, so you and Matt have different ways of looking at the world and life. Terrific! I doubt that either of you will ever fully bring the other over to his point of view, so you need to focus on how not to get to the boiling point over it.
Here’s my suggestion:
Figure out what you want to do and, if Matt would rather stay in, go out without him and suck the marrow out of life on your own or with other friends. And think of the fun you’ll have later on describing to him all the exciting stuff you did and saw and experienced.
That way, you get to go out and use the city to its full advantage and Matt can participate or not as he desires. You won’t be annoying him by prodding him to go out all the time and he won’t be annoying you, by staying in all the time and doing nothing.
Then you can come together again later and share your individual days with each other.
Sounds like somebody might want to take a listen to the closing number of Avenue Q and hear a bit about Princeton and his search for purpose.
You don’t fear dying, yet you fear death ?
How can you fear something you so resolutely believe you cannot, and shall not ever, experience ?
I cannot see anything true about nihilism. Instead, i’ve carefully, and unemotionally, examined my own internal a_priori knowledge, and that has over the years been more than ample evidence (to me at least) that my consciousness has existed without this body and its accompanying empirical experiences. It’s not a faith, but rather is a conclusion that eminates from my own internal observations of what i know (e.g., straight lines, the notion of absolute measures, etc. — all of which cannot exist in this physical universe, yet we (somehow) have knowledge of them (that whole Kant thingy ;-)).
Although i don’t find comfort in an afterlife (which, is really a non-issue for me in this life), i do find comfort and power from the knowledge that humanity is building something incredible and great and that those who follow will, hopefully, share in that construction. That my being continues on, despite my body’s death, is ancillary to what i’m doing here and now.
I find inspiration in the process of creation, not so much experiences, and that has very little to do with death’s imposition of a pause in my wider life, without this universe. Indeed, i’ve never found anything more motivating in life than the process and act of creation. That should be reward enough for any soul, in my not so humble opinion.
rob@egoz.org
How do people deal? Well, good question. A big huge holy mess of them self-medicate. Alcohol, pot, Xanax, television & video games, whatever they can get their hands on. You know.
Still more are literally too busy working two or three jobs to make ends meet to have time to be freaked out about little things like the quality of their life.
Some people are blessed to never get The Fear or The Dread. Their brain chemical levels are all nice and tidy, and they walk around feeling compassionate and optimistic all the time. (I used to be one of them. Gawd.)
To soothe the itch you seem to have, I suggest volunteering. I’m being completely serious. When you have so much in your life that you begin to doubt your ability to enjoy it, it’s time to start giving to those who are really in need. (Service also puts the whole quality-of-life/death thing in perspective, too.)
Have a great day!
When I had my stroke in Xmas 97 I was virtually dead for two solid months. I was just lying there in emergency ward at Midway Hospital before being shipped out to Rancho Los Amigos where the aneurism, the result of undiagnosed high blodd pressure, was was identified and dealt with. I was then sent back home and it was several weeks before I regained anything like consciousness. Plenty of short-term memory loss to deal with, among other things. I just lay on the couch, zonked on medication, and watched TV coverage of the “Heaven’s Gate” suicides.
Cozy, no?
Naturaully this was all a Preview of Coming Attractions.
When you die — that’s it !
Except of course for the fact that worthwhile people leave plenty behind.
In the early 90’s it was one damned AIDS funeral after another, so my generation is VERY used to death.
Still the passing of Gavin Lambert was something of a shock. Yes, he was 80 years old, but when you see somebody out and about all the time you think of them as being here forever.
Isn’t the Met lovely? I used to work there, you know. The Count of Montebello is utterly adorable. And he’s doing a great job. Noblesse Oblige is part of his DNA.
Unlike the egregious Barbara Bush who’s heavy on the noblesse but isn’t at all interested in oblige
Ignorance is bliss.
C and I have had 23 years of similar differences. I don’t mind relaxing and letting go of the need to do anything. He, like you, feels compelled to see and experience every inch of the city. He will do this to the point of exhaustion. I will not. Also, he is extremely hard working. I feel that work is an imposition. I’ve managed to engineer my working-self into a position where I delegate most everything to my staff. C, on the other hand, is a workplace enabler who will pick up the slack when a non-performing employee leaves things undone. I would get rid of an employee before I’d ever do the work I hired him/her to do. Part of this is due to our age and experience differential. I’ve aleady lived in Europe for a few years and already done and read and seen most everything I had thirst for. He doesn’t have the same educational background, and feels compelled to read every word of the Sunday Times. I just graze.
We love each other deeply. Who can figure it?
I have been reading your blog for the past few months and have really enjoyed it. In fact, your blog partially inspired me to start my own up a few months ago. This particular entry of yours really struck a cord with me – I can very much identify with your restlessness. In fact, I had written about my own restlessness in an entry titled “The Restless Ones.” Whatever the case, it was nice to see that I am not alone in this area!
It was also interesting to note some of the differences in thought between you and your boyfriend. While I have yet to blog about this one, I should one day soon as I have discovered the topics I continually cover with my therapist are totally the opposite of the topics my boyfriend covers with his therapist – yes we live in LA. :)
Anyway, keep up the great work!