Prelude: a Self

I have been feeling drained and fatigued lately. I accused the gloomy weather, atmospheric pressure, and lack of vitamin D. At least they cannot fight back. But maybe that is not all. In a world where short-form videos and omnipresent recommendations algorithmically jail attention, am I desperate… desperate to seek a niche place to heal? I suppose there is.

I remember back in grade 4, there wasn’t much Internet. People were still buying Nokias. I read anything that I could find: how to pass a driver’s test, parenting books, my parents’ diary and their love letters (they were hard to find though; I came across them when I was opening all the drawers in the house. And they stopped writing letters after I popped out. After that, they started journaling more about me and less about themselves). And there was that girl who lived on the same block, and every time I saw her on the way to school, she was reading and walking at the same time. But I never talked to her. People do the same but on phones now.

Later, in grade 7 or 8, I finished Steve Jobs, One Hundred Years of Solitude, and Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind. That’s the last time I read for joy, out of curiosity, or simply because the title was mentioned in another book, roughly 12 years ago. After that, it was all for some purpose.

Lately, I started to read more proactively and more selectively for joy again. That is such an overstatement. I just read one and a half books, The Stranger by Albert Camus and a bit of The Fall. But these one and a half books are already enough for me to rediscover how valuable reading is. I noticed many things I wanted to say are already well written on paper; many ideas I had have been discussed over hundreds of years.

But in between those 12 years, nothing is chronologically ordered. I was once diagnosed with major depression, on meds, then cut all connections with my friends and posted nothing on social media, like I went into a coma and then rebuilt my life from scratch in solitude. Around that time, I wrote many poems whenever I had an episode. I met someone, then we broke up. I do not know what kept me going, but I tried to give everything a reason, to explain everything to myself. It felt like I was patching holes, loosely taking burdens off chunk by chunk for a stranger.

Who am I now?

I don’t like crowds and any places where a toilet is hard to find or needs a long wait, so no concerts or music clubs (I went to Vatican City once when that pope was still alive; he gave some speech, so there was a crowd. But yeah, all I remember was that their toilets were adequate). I also don’t like fruits that need peeling, cutting, and are hard to bite (so peaches and pears). I don’t like lifting weights and getting sweaty; I want a sport I can do year-round, indoors, with no sweat, so I swim. I had 12 pairs of the same kind of socks because I don’t want to match them and toss one sock while the other is still good. I also have 5 shirts of the same kind, so there is no need to think about what to wear today.

I don’t like to make things hard for myself (but I was in one of the hardest programs back in university). People don’t die because of old age; people can die anytime. So being happy in life is not about pursuing it or saving it for later, but avoiding pain and suffering. I am a boring person, some say, but on the other hand, I am a strange one. Some said to me (quietly and politely) that I am not one of them; I am outlandish like a misshapen rock.

Why am I even doing all these?

An existentialist may say “to be seen and make some impact,” but an absurdist may say “not everything that happens needs a reason.” I don’t need a reason, do I?