It’s that time of year where I head back east to see family, and spend some time on Squam Lake. It’s also usually a time of reflection and taking stock for me, and it’s been a while since I wrote something like that here, so forgive the rambling post. For those that don’t care, here’s a picture:
Category: Life
General updates about what’s happening in my life, and personal writing.
Wil Wheaton Talking About Depression
I’ve quoted or linked to Wil’s depression posts numerous times over the years. Partly because his take on it resonates with my own, partly because I think awareness is important and worth signal boosting. His recent (ish, this was posted in May and has been sitting in my queue for a while) talk about living with chronic depression is another great example, and worth reading.
I was a worrier growing up (and to a lesser extent, still am), though not to the degree he experienced. I will say, in more recent years, it’s been manifesting as more social anxiety, which ain’t great, though I’m at least aware, and haven’t gone full hermit. But the chronic depression, that I definitely get. For me, it’s been sort of a low-grade background radiation in my life. The default level is functional, but present, and then sometimes there’s spikes or troughs where it’s more or less noticeable — more or less manageable. (I doubt this is news to anyone reading this, but if it is: hey, yep, and if I ever seem worn out and a little distant when we’re talking, 95% of the time this is why, and not anything you said or did. If you type “depression” into the search bar for this blog, you’ll see I’ve written about it a fair bit.)
It can be a little intimidating to publicly post about grappling with depression. Potential employers or romantic partners or friends may see this, and not take it positively. Also, exposing parts of yourself in any way on the internet these days can be a little scary. But I think it’s important. As Wil says:
Finally, we who live with mental illness need to talk about it, because our friends and neighbors know us and trust us. It’s one thing for me to stand here and tell you that you’re not alone in this fight, but it’s something else entirely for you to prove it. We need to share our experiences, so someone who is suffering the way I was won’t feel weird or broken or ashamed or afraid to seek treatment. So that parents don’t feel like they have failed or somehow screwed up when they see symptoms in their kids.
From Kyoto with Love
I’ve been in Japan for a few days now, and have managed to not die, starve, or even get lost (I’ve always had a good sense of direction, and while the addressing here is a little different, a quick glance at Maps to see how the streets are laid out has thus far been enough). It’s been fun! A few days in the Shibuya/Harajuku area of Tokyo, then took a Shinkansen down to Kyoto, where I spent today exploring the Fushimi Inari-taisha and surrounding area – not a bad way to spend your birthday. Tomorrow, I head to Nara. While there’s plenty to still see and do in Kyoto, it’ll have to wait for another trip.
I’ll admit, I feel a little torn. While I’ve been enjoying my solo adventure (always have, always will), I can’t help but feel it would’ve been great if I’d been able to line up a travel partner as well. Something to bear in mind for next time, I suppose.
One thing that sort of struck me when I got here: It’s easy to get drawn into the spectacle of a place, pseudo-mythologizing something because of the differences or wonder of the thing, but it’s so much nicer when you get there and are struck by the reality. People live here. The beauty of the mundane.
Off to Japan
I’m hopping on a plane to Japan tomorrow morning, for 11 days of wandering around, looking at cool stuff, and hoping I don’t make too much of an ass of myself. I’m not bringing a laptop, but am bringing a camera, so there may be some photos when I get back.
I’m hoping to have some good long thinks while wandering, so you may see some posts (actual posts, not just linking to others)! Or I might end up radio silent until I’m back: time will tell. In either case, I look forward to seeing what y’all are writing/photographing/drawing/creating when I get back!
Snow Day
I’ve been trying to keep a regular routine of posting at 5pm (through the magic of scheduling posts), but this one is a little late. It’s been snowy here in Portland, and in that vein, here’s some snow related links for your perusal:
- Project Habakkuk, a plan by allied forces in World War II to build an aircraft carrier out of pykrete (a mixture of wood pulp and ice). It ended up not happening, but even the stories that came out of the early phases are kind of awesome.
- 2018 Sapporo Snow Festival, because who doesn’t love some exquisitely done snow sculptures? As a regular player of Final Fantasy XIV, I’m of course tickled by the Nidhogg they made:
- Tom Waits performing a poem by Bukowski, “Nirvana”. The snow is a key set piece, in my opinion, but bonus points for being a story about a drifter and diners and the magic.
- A collection of photos of snow over at Unsplash. When you’re stuck having to shovel or are stressed about driving conditions, it’s easy to forget that fresh snow can really be quite beautiful. Go take a minute to browse, and you’ll see what I mean.
I’m sure I’ll soon be back to griping about the deplorable state of the internet and how social computing has failed us, but for now, enjoy the snow day.
Happy Valentine’s Day
To all of you (with or without that special someone), I hope you’re feeling loved and appreciated. Not just today, but today’s as good a reminder as any. I thought about writing something pithy about dating in the modern era (seriously, take all of the performative bullshit of modern society and crank it up to 11, since dating was already pretty performative), but instead I’ll just leave it here: love who you love.
Happy February
My month-long hiatus from Facebook and Twitter are officially up at this point. Overall, I think it was a worthwhile exile: I wrote and shared a lot more here, and felt less stressed in general. It’s not some magic cure-all for stress or unhappiness, and I definitely still got into funks, but I do think it moved the needle on my general wellbeing.
I do think I’m not going to bother reinstalling either app on my phone, and frankly I’m not feeling particularly compelled to log in otherwise — though I wouldn’t say I’m officially “done” with either service, nor do I plan to delete my accounts any time soon.
So, yeah. If you’re on the fence about getting off social media (or at least drastically reducing your footprint there), I’d recommend it.
Going to Japan
I’ve been talking about wanting to go to Japan for years — Japan and Greece were my go-to bucket list destinations going as far back as when I was 11. I still haven’t visited either of those countries, 25 years later, and it’s high time I corrected that. Just booked tickets for a trip to Japan for my birthday in April! I’ll be there for 11 days (well, I’ll be gone for 11 days, but 10 days there due to timezones and transit). My plan is to bookend my trip with a few days in Tokyo on either side, then take a train down to Kyoto and Nara in between.
I tend to look for quieter spaces, and I’m fascinated by a lot of the shrines and temples, but I’m also going to try and hit some other stuff (keeping an eye on tickets for the Ghibli Museum for instance). I’ve not done much foreign travel (and basically none to non-English speaking countries), so I’m a little nervous about it, but also excited to finally do this. Do you have any tips for things to check out or stuff I should prepare for in advance?
2018
While there’s no reason you couldn’t choose to reflect on the past at any point in the year (and let’s face it, we could all do with more reflection), the end of one year and the start of another is as good a time as any. Yes, that’s right, it’s time for another new year post.
I’m not going to dwell too much on the current political, economic, or social debacle we call modern society. There’s plenty of that to be had all over the internet, and I don’t have too much to say about it that hasn’t been said by people far cleverer than myself. I will say that I hope we are able to show each other a little more compassion, a little more kindness, and a little more acceptance — and not just for those like us. While we should be intolerant of intolerance, it’s easy to let that slip into intolerance of other things as well.
On a personal level, 2017 wasn’t actually a bad year. I moved into a new house (where I was finally able to get all my things out of storage), got a new job (that seems to be going well, and finally let me move out of QA), and have been (relatively) stable overall. I’ve made a few new friends, and reconnected with some old ones. I managed to knock out a few things on my to-do list (mostly administrivia-type things that have been on my list for ages but never made a priority, like getting Global Entry/Pre-check, and some banking/financial stuff). While none of this is particularly exciting or revelatory, it all adds up to a pretty positive personal 2017.
So, what does 2018 have planned for me? I’m not entirely sure. I’ve got some things that I’m not sure I’d qualify as resolutions, but are definitely some aspirational goals. A few highlights:
- Get fitter: I’ve never had a particular interest in a 6-pack or being super buff, but the years of sedentary work and hobbies are starting to catch up to me — my general fitness, energy levels, and weight could do with a tune-up.
- Travel more: I’ve had wanderlust for years, and it’s showing no signs of abating. I’d like to carve out some time and resources for some more diverse trips — while I’ve done a ton of domestic travel (3 more states to go!), I’ve done very little international travel. I’d like to correct that. I’m currently planning to try and go to Japan for my birthday in April — my current thought is to fly in to Tokyo, then take the train down to Kyoto and back, with maybe a few stops in between. If you have thoughts on things to see or do, I’d love to hear them!
- Connect with people more and try to foster stronger relationships: I’m pretty shit at keeping in touch with people at regular intervals, even people who I really care about and value. While anything social takes both parties being interested in investing some energy into it, I feel like I could be better about doing my part. I sometimes worry that I’m imposing, or that I’m coming off as network-y/reaching, and I need to get over that.
- Organize my time better: my life is relatively stable at the moment, so this feels like a good opportunity to get into some better scheduling habits. Allocating time for playing games and watching things, AND time for reading and writing and working on projects, instead of having all of it be a sort of mishmash that happens in fits and spurts (with a fair bit of sitting in analysis-paralysis pondering what to do with my evening, if I’m being honest).
- Create more: I’ve always had issues with trying to tackle large projects and aiming for a high level of quality and complexity from those projects. This leads to a lot of feeling overwhelmed or disappointed with my output, and it ending up abandoned. That’s not very useful — not everything has to be perfect or amazing, and frankly gets in the way of actually improving enough to where those big projects are actually achievable. So this year, no big “I’m going to make a game!” or “Write a novel!” stuff, just “create more, finish things.”
That’s probably enough — too much and you’re spending all your time aspiring to aspirations, and not enough movement towards achieving them. In the vein of that last goal, you might have noticed that I tweaked the site design a few weeks/months back. I didn’t bother posting about it, and it’s not done — but it’s something. I made the theme mostly to play with new CSS stuff like grid and flexbox. Expect further tweaks as I go along.
Breaking Up with Social Media
Or at the very least, “taking some time apart.”
I’ve been thinking for a while about my relationship with social media (in particular Facebook and Twitter). I’ve been pretty tired of Facebook for quite some time, and have increasingly been feeling the same about Twitter — namely, they’re more outrage machines than valued information sources at this point, and frankly cost more in terms of mental and emotional wellbeing than they’re worth to me.
I’ve decided to take the month of January off from both Twitter and Facebook, entirely. After the month is up, we’ll see how I’m feeling on whether they’re reincorporated into my routine, and to what amount. In the past I’ve limited how much time I spent on FB, taking a sort of “vacation”, but it had ways of creeping back in and starting to absorb more of my time again, so this time I’m opting to remove myself from it entirely.
If you need to get ahold of me, there are lots of ways to do so (heck, slide into my DMs on either service and I’ll likely still see it). I’ll also be turning off the auto-crossposting this blog does, so if you do want to keep up with my sporadic posts, I’d suggest subscribing either via RSS or email.