Well, I figure I ramble enough and I keep creating threads to do it with...so, rather than just keep making thread after thread after thread, I might as well just, you know, make a ramble thread. This might end up being necro'd quite often, though I leave this thread open to those who wish to just ramble as well. That said, I seem to be the rambler, here. Maybe "the whiner." I don't mean to come off as whiny. I just like to sit down and type for a while, and I don't want to just delete it afterwards. I want someone to read it, anyone, so that I might delude myself into thinking that how I felt matters to someone. I'm sure some people might consider what I feel to matter to them, but the fact of the matter is...I let it out a lot. After a while, anyone short of the most insanely patient person in the world would start going "OK, enough." I don't demand that sort of patience from anyone. I just want, when that patience is worn out, to be able to continue thinking what I feel matters, even though I know I am this quantum-particle in the fabric of the galaxy...to say nothing of the universe.
Being an atheist can be a bit depressing sometimes, eh?
Well, today's ramble isn't really a depressed one. Not compared to my others, at any rate. It's just...a ramble, really. Kind of aimless, though I have an idea where it'll start, at any rate.
Let's begin.
See, anyone who has seen how I look will describe me as a "goth" looking kind of guy. Yeah, that clothing style that some of the people in high school wore, with the leather outfits and the eye-makeup and the spikey collars and bracelets and the bondage pants. Most people grow out of it. I never did. It's not an attempt to be edgy or cool or "non-conformist." It's not an attempt to really be anything other than and outward reflection. They say clothing describes the person. "The clothes make the man" sort of thing. Some people feel comfortable in just jeans and a t-shirt. I just feel comfortable in black outfits, bondage pants adorned with chains, trench coats and, if I really feel vain, black nailpolish [gasp]. It's laid bare for others, in a sense; I have a taste for the darker things. I like dark storylines and settings, I like grim portrayals and topics. I like things that involve exploring, romanticizing, or even trivializing death. Not the acts of bringing death on others, but simply the cessation of our life-processes. I liked, if you can't guess, the Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, Nightmare Before Christmas, Corpse Bridge, Paranorman...things like that. Not to say I don't like light-hearted and cheerful things, of course...just, my preferences tend to run towards the morbid more often. Additionally, I like to express a taste for the darker things in other aspects.
The darkness, after all, is mysterious. I like mystery, and intrigue [part of why I love science so much]. Dark things are seductive. The portrayal of forbidden, taboo exploits of the seductive have always trended towards the darkness and those that "turn from the light." The darkness embodies loss; so often do many without hope for an afterlife view death as darkness; the grim reaper, for example. Darkness is subtle, and dangerous. The most insidious of predators both of man and animal prowl the night rather than the day...think of the expression "cloak and dagger." So often in media, for good reason, are creatures (man and animal) of the dark considered beautiful, alluring...tempting towards doom not through overt means but through plots or trickery.
Most of all, darkness is a time of stillness, and quiet, and peace. During the night, most people sleep. The streets are often empty, the lights in houses and places of business are off, the ambient sounds of human activity are few and far in between. There is quiet in the night. Those who remain awake are often left to their own thoughts, given time to reflect. In sleep, we are often quiet, our minds idly puzzling and drifting through thoughts without any direction of our conscious awareness. Darkness is peaceful. In a world where everything is loud, and face-paced and in your face and brash and aggressive, the night brings quiet, a feeling of patience, a lack of bullshit from people and their egos. During the night, except for those on the nightshift, there is no need to struggle with the capitalist soul-grinder to make a living.
The pants, well...I like bondage. A girl who smirks and smiles as she takes to her knees and lets herself be tied up, who puts trust enough in me to let her restrict her physical motions and let me direct how everything goes is just fucking hot. It's an ego-boost and it's infatuating to know that they will surrender control to me, trusting me and expressing it in such a very clear, straightforward manner to lead her, not in life but in sensuality and sexuality, giving me the reigns and trusting that I have the skill to do what we both want with skill and talent and confidence. Despite that it should bring pressure to be more capable, it does not feel that way...it is difficult to feel pressured into succeeding when someone you really care about is willing to go to at LEAST that extent to show you they're that confident in you.
Not to mention I love the way Tripp pants feel. They barely touch your legs and they swish so very nicely while you walk, and they do this cool billowing thing, too, especially in the wind.
I like fishnets because...you know, I can't explain that one with absolute certainty. I like the way they feel and I think they kind of add to the rest of the expression...maybe it's because fishnets are associated with sexuality. I don't wear them on my legs, of course, I wear them on my arms, but still. It is, I think, an admittance to not being close-minded and immature about sex. I think it's an expression that I think sex is far more preferable to shooting and guns and stabbing and killing and bloodshed.
All this on top of the fact I have a close relationship with death. I've seen a lot of it. I've become familiar with it. I respect it, and I am confident enough in myself to admit; I respect it out of fear. It is a fearful respect, a knowledge that it is a force that will always be greater than me and everything I hold dear, and that someday, it may not be today, or tomorrow, or the day after...but someday, it will catch up with me, and on that day, I will have nowhere to run. I accept it...but I fear it all the same.
So, if clothing is an expression of self for others to see...my outfit should surprise no one. It is not an attempt to catch the eye, to try to come off as "non-conformity," or to seem "edgy" or "cool." Seriously, I know what people consider cool. If the gothic subculture was considered "cool" by society I think it'd be a LOT more prominent. It's laying out who I am, that I am not so self-conscious as to hide my personality from the world. So much of me is laid bare, in so many ways, because I do not fear peoples' opinions. I am not fearful of the opinions of others when I say I am sad to the point of crying uncontrollably. I am not fearful of people knowing I occasionally like to tie up a willing female partner and whip her across the ass while she squeals and begs me for another. I am not afraid of people knowing I am bipolar or a former heroin and coke junky. The words of the world around me don't scare me. My fears are much deeper, much more carnal, and much more horrifying, and I face them, where everyone else seems to just ignore them or try not to think about them or, in the case of the religious or "spiritually minded," delude themselves into thinking that it'll all be OK in the end and happiness will come eternal or there is a special place in the universe for the individual or the masses.
Even those fears are often laid bare, because it's not the people I share them with that I need to fear.
So I pull on my fishnet arm stockings and my bondage pants, I pull on a t-shirt with a logo or symbol or general embroidery of an interest or interests (after all, someone may share the interest and it is an invitation to share that interest!), I slip on Trenchy (yes, Trenchy, I nicknamed my trench coat, deal with it), pull on my black gothy combat boots, and I go outside and deal with people like anybody else does, in the same general ways anybody else does...unless it's the night-time in which case I'm just doing it for the sake of comfort, because when I look in a mirror, I see myself completed in visage, speaking to myself silently to remind myself who I am.
A guy who likes the quiet, the isolation from others, the concealment and stillness of the night, who openly acknowledges and faces death, and laughs at it, loves it, and fears it all at once in some strange triple contradiction. A guy who likes to dominate his sexual partners if they are so willing to accept that domination and control. A guy who is unafraid to express all of this to any who would inquire and/or wonder. A guy who is also self-conscious enough (yet honest enough) that he wants others to inquire and/or wonder.
I certainly don't dress like this for the booty.
Not too many girls I know that go for the gothic look.
Then again I don't overdo it, so...
Eh.
As I write this, I'm smoking a hookah. My hookah, by the way, is pretty cool. Brass skull where the tube is, brass plating all over it, weed-green accentuation, and green skull-and-crossbone motifs covering the water chamber. It's a cool little thing, styed more pirate-y than anything. I dig it. Smoking with some of those slow-burn stove-cooker coals. Coconut wood. Smells good. Shisha is Fantasia brand. Rainbow burst.
Stuff tastes like Fruit Loops. Mixed with the peppermint schnapps I'm drinking, it's really damn good.
Volunteered like usual this week. RCC on Monday and Thursday. Picked up the ladle at Salvation Army's soup kitchen of Dane County on Wednesday. Been wondering if I could start up a secular, non-profit soup kitchen to help out around here. Came to the conclusion that there's not enough of a humanist base around here to support such a thing.
Considering doing an outreach program of some kind to see if I can find any local humanists, see if we can come together and do something around here to help out.
Not enough humanists in the world. Too many atheists turn to nihilism and misanthropy.
Such pessimistic world-views. No offense to any nihilists on here, though I tend to take some ire towards misanthropists. As if we need any more reasons to hate each other as it is...a thousand thousand (not an accidental double-word) reasons as it is. Nationalism, sectarianism, racism, sexism, greed, power tripping...let's just add another one to the mix, shall we? Pile another problem onto the camel's back. Sighs.
"Such pain we cause the world," say the misanthropists. We, the sole creature on this planet with the power to hurt or help the environment in which we dwell...and misanthropists choose instead to abandon humanity as a lost cause, as if all we do is evil and destructive, when we have only been given such a short time to prove our worth. As if destiny itself has decreed we shall be the doombringer...even when our scientists and ecologists continue to find new ways to work with the world rather than against it, to find new ways to preserve that which our past ignorance almost destroyed, or what the fickle whims of nature has almost destroyed were it not for human intervention.
To be human is to err, but to be human is also to realize when one errs and to have the power to correct that error, and to work to make up for what we have done, for however much we see fit to do so.
Instead of hating all of humanity...try finding the ones doing good, and work with them to do good, and stop writing humanity off as a lost cause. We're a young species, and in our past we didn't know any better. Now we're beginning to know better. If you know better...DO better. Don't just lay blame everywhere and say it's inevitability of a species so varied in personality as ours is and give up. Giving up is for the weak of will. Giving up is for kids born with a silver spoon in their hand who lose their money and decide life suddenly isn't worth living.
Dyed my hair black over the last couple days.
Hasn't quite taken entirely on one side despite the second attempt.
Fuck you, L'Oreal.
Should've gotten a professional dye.
Bought a couple necklaces.
Had some spare money left over from a really, REALLY cool friend, who I will not name because I am not sure if they want me to or not, but they know who they are. Decided to buy something to boost my spirits.
![[Image: J-HumCirPendSilv.png]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=www.evolvefish.com%2Ffish%2Fmedia%2FJ-HumCirPendSilv.png)
24" necklace of this.
![[Image: P-AANecklaceS.png]](https://images.weserv.nl/?url=www.evolvefish.com%2Ffish%2Fmedia%2FP-AANecklaceS.png)
18" necklace for this.
That second one seem familiar?
That's enough for this ramble. I feel more relaxed now.
Feel free to ramble, yourselves. It's therapeutic.
Being an atheist can be a bit depressing sometimes, eh?
Well, today's ramble isn't really a depressed one. Not compared to my others, at any rate. It's just...a ramble, really. Kind of aimless, though I have an idea where it'll start, at any rate.
Let's begin.
See, anyone who has seen how I look will describe me as a "goth" looking kind of guy. Yeah, that clothing style that some of the people in high school wore, with the leather outfits and the eye-makeup and the spikey collars and bracelets and the bondage pants. Most people grow out of it. I never did. It's not an attempt to be edgy or cool or "non-conformist." It's not an attempt to really be anything other than and outward reflection. They say clothing describes the person. "The clothes make the man" sort of thing. Some people feel comfortable in just jeans and a t-shirt. I just feel comfortable in black outfits, bondage pants adorned with chains, trench coats and, if I really feel vain, black nailpolish [gasp]. It's laid bare for others, in a sense; I have a taste for the darker things. I like dark storylines and settings, I like grim portrayals and topics. I like things that involve exploring, romanticizing, or even trivializing death. Not the acts of bringing death on others, but simply the cessation of our life-processes. I liked, if you can't guess, the Grim Adventures of Billy and Mandy, Nightmare Before Christmas, Corpse Bridge, Paranorman...things like that. Not to say I don't like light-hearted and cheerful things, of course...just, my preferences tend to run towards the morbid more often. Additionally, I like to express a taste for the darker things in other aspects.
The darkness, after all, is mysterious. I like mystery, and intrigue [part of why I love science so much]. Dark things are seductive. The portrayal of forbidden, taboo exploits of the seductive have always trended towards the darkness and those that "turn from the light." The darkness embodies loss; so often do many without hope for an afterlife view death as darkness; the grim reaper, for example. Darkness is subtle, and dangerous. The most insidious of predators both of man and animal prowl the night rather than the day...think of the expression "cloak and dagger." So often in media, for good reason, are creatures (man and animal) of the dark considered beautiful, alluring...tempting towards doom not through overt means but through plots or trickery.
Most of all, darkness is a time of stillness, and quiet, and peace. During the night, most people sleep. The streets are often empty, the lights in houses and places of business are off, the ambient sounds of human activity are few and far in between. There is quiet in the night. Those who remain awake are often left to their own thoughts, given time to reflect. In sleep, we are often quiet, our minds idly puzzling and drifting through thoughts without any direction of our conscious awareness. Darkness is peaceful. In a world where everything is loud, and face-paced and in your face and brash and aggressive, the night brings quiet, a feeling of patience, a lack of bullshit from people and their egos. During the night, except for those on the nightshift, there is no need to struggle with the capitalist soul-grinder to make a living.
The pants, well...I like bondage. A girl who smirks and smiles as she takes to her knees and lets herself be tied up, who puts trust enough in me to let her restrict her physical motions and let me direct how everything goes is just fucking hot. It's an ego-boost and it's infatuating to know that they will surrender control to me, trusting me and expressing it in such a very clear, straightforward manner to lead her, not in life but in sensuality and sexuality, giving me the reigns and trusting that I have the skill to do what we both want with skill and talent and confidence. Despite that it should bring pressure to be more capable, it does not feel that way...it is difficult to feel pressured into succeeding when someone you really care about is willing to go to at LEAST that extent to show you they're that confident in you.
Not to mention I love the way Tripp pants feel. They barely touch your legs and they swish so very nicely while you walk, and they do this cool billowing thing, too, especially in the wind.
I like fishnets because...you know, I can't explain that one with absolute certainty. I like the way they feel and I think they kind of add to the rest of the expression...maybe it's because fishnets are associated with sexuality. I don't wear them on my legs, of course, I wear them on my arms, but still. It is, I think, an admittance to not being close-minded and immature about sex. I think it's an expression that I think sex is far more preferable to shooting and guns and stabbing and killing and bloodshed.
All this on top of the fact I have a close relationship with death. I've seen a lot of it. I've become familiar with it. I respect it, and I am confident enough in myself to admit; I respect it out of fear. It is a fearful respect, a knowledge that it is a force that will always be greater than me and everything I hold dear, and that someday, it may not be today, or tomorrow, or the day after...but someday, it will catch up with me, and on that day, I will have nowhere to run. I accept it...but I fear it all the same.
So, if clothing is an expression of self for others to see...my outfit should surprise no one. It is not an attempt to catch the eye, to try to come off as "non-conformity," or to seem "edgy" or "cool." Seriously, I know what people consider cool. If the gothic subculture was considered "cool" by society I think it'd be a LOT more prominent. It's laying out who I am, that I am not so self-conscious as to hide my personality from the world. So much of me is laid bare, in so many ways, because I do not fear peoples' opinions. I am not fearful of the opinions of others when I say I am sad to the point of crying uncontrollably. I am not fearful of people knowing I occasionally like to tie up a willing female partner and whip her across the ass while she squeals and begs me for another. I am not afraid of people knowing I am bipolar or a former heroin and coke junky. The words of the world around me don't scare me. My fears are much deeper, much more carnal, and much more horrifying, and I face them, where everyone else seems to just ignore them or try not to think about them or, in the case of the religious or "spiritually minded," delude themselves into thinking that it'll all be OK in the end and happiness will come eternal or there is a special place in the universe for the individual or the masses.
Even those fears are often laid bare, because it's not the people I share them with that I need to fear.
So I pull on my fishnet arm stockings and my bondage pants, I pull on a t-shirt with a logo or symbol or general embroidery of an interest or interests (after all, someone may share the interest and it is an invitation to share that interest!), I slip on Trenchy (yes, Trenchy, I nicknamed my trench coat, deal with it), pull on my black gothy combat boots, and I go outside and deal with people like anybody else does, in the same general ways anybody else does...unless it's the night-time in which case I'm just doing it for the sake of comfort, because when I look in a mirror, I see myself completed in visage, speaking to myself silently to remind myself who I am.
A guy who likes the quiet, the isolation from others, the concealment and stillness of the night, who openly acknowledges and faces death, and laughs at it, loves it, and fears it all at once in some strange triple contradiction. A guy who likes to dominate his sexual partners if they are so willing to accept that domination and control. A guy who is unafraid to express all of this to any who would inquire and/or wonder. A guy who is also self-conscious enough (yet honest enough) that he wants others to inquire and/or wonder.
I certainly don't dress like this for the booty.
Not too many girls I know that go for the gothic look.
Then again I don't overdo it, so...
Eh.
As I write this, I'm smoking a hookah. My hookah, by the way, is pretty cool. Brass skull where the tube is, brass plating all over it, weed-green accentuation, and green skull-and-crossbone motifs covering the water chamber. It's a cool little thing, styed more pirate-y than anything. I dig it. Smoking with some of those slow-burn stove-cooker coals. Coconut wood. Smells good. Shisha is Fantasia brand. Rainbow burst.
Stuff tastes like Fruit Loops. Mixed with the peppermint schnapps I'm drinking, it's really damn good.
Volunteered like usual this week. RCC on Monday and Thursday. Picked up the ladle at Salvation Army's soup kitchen of Dane County on Wednesday. Been wondering if I could start up a secular, non-profit soup kitchen to help out around here. Came to the conclusion that there's not enough of a humanist base around here to support such a thing.
Considering doing an outreach program of some kind to see if I can find any local humanists, see if we can come together and do something around here to help out.
Not enough humanists in the world. Too many atheists turn to nihilism and misanthropy.
Such pessimistic world-views. No offense to any nihilists on here, though I tend to take some ire towards misanthropists. As if we need any more reasons to hate each other as it is...a thousand thousand (not an accidental double-word) reasons as it is. Nationalism, sectarianism, racism, sexism, greed, power tripping...let's just add another one to the mix, shall we? Pile another problem onto the camel's back. Sighs.
"Such pain we cause the world," say the misanthropists. We, the sole creature on this planet with the power to hurt or help the environment in which we dwell...and misanthropists choose instead to abandon humanity as a lost cause, as if all we do is evil and destructive, when we have only been given such a short time to prove our worth. As if destiny itself has decreed we shall be the doombringer...even when our scientists and ecologists continue to find new ways to work with the world rather than against it, to find new ways to preserve that which our past ignorance almost destroyed, or what the fickle whims of nature has almost destroyed were it not for human intervention.
To be human is to err, but to be human is also to realize when one errs and to have the power to correct that error, and to work to make up for what we have done, for however much we see fit to do so.
Instead of hating all of humanity...try finding the ones doing good, and work with them to do good, and stop writing humanity off as a lost cause. We're a young species, and in our past we didn't know any better. Now we're beginning to know better. If you know better...DO better. Don't just lay blame everywhere and say it's inevitability of a species so varied in personality as ours is and give up. Giving up is for the weak of will. Giving up is for kids born with a silver spoon in their hand who lose their money and decide life suddenly isn't worth living.
Dyed my hair black over the last couple days.
Hasn't quite taken entirely on one side despite the second attempt.
Fuck you, L'Oreal.
Should've gotten a professional dye.
Bought a couple necklaces.
Had some spare money left over from a really, REALLY cool friend, who I will not name because I am not sure if they want me to or not, but they know who they are. Decided to buy something to boost my spirits.
24" necklace of this. 18" necklace for this.That second one seem familiar?
That's enough for this ramble. I feel more relaxed now.
Feel free to ramble, yourselves. It's therapeutic.
