The unfortunate days

The Art of Living on Someone Else's Effort - Chapter 1 (Draft translation)

I had sore feet. I was heading home after a hard day at work. Not hard work itself, but hard in the way the day had gone through. It was one of those days when nothing seems to go right and that every small step is slowed with dozens of small obstacles on the way. I started the morning full of energy and got over the first obstacles with momentum, as if to ignore that they would come across, repeatedly, throughout the entire schedule. The following setbacks began to undermine my patience and for lunch time I thought I had got out of the wrong side of the bed. By mid-afternoon I started wondering about what had I done to deserve so many stoppers. Finally I went home with a foul mood and feeling like having wasted all day unproductively.


Funny there were so many such days, when everything slowed down and I seemed to never reach the end of tasks. However, from time to time, things were solved out by magic, almost as if all the pieces were fitting together the right way and at the right time: your boss smiled, your colleagues collaborated around and even the coffee tasted like never before. I used to think that both the happy days at work, as well as the unfortunate ones, were part of a whole. They were the result of constant effort and dedication, only that this result did not appear gradually, minute by minute or hour by hour, but stumblingly: success did not show up yesterday, but does today, tomorrow will not, the day after tomorrow will show up again, and so on. The fruits of good practice seemed to emerge unpredictably and capriciously. I believed that it was this average that mattered and told myself I should be evaluating my performance at longer periods of time instead of trying to make every day a perfect one. Still, when a day like that was so frustrating I could not help my mood to resent, and specially with those stubborn new shoes causing me so much pain.

Transmeme XXXV

I can only have an opinion when I ignore the true facts.

The World Theatre XII – Degrees of Approach

People are very surprised when I tell them I do not like to travel, I never liked it. I guess what gives travel me is not worth the discomfort that going to a faraway place provides. Especially for someone with bad orientation, little sense of adventure, with flat feet and who hates walking.

When I ask instead to people why they like to travel, they say 'oh, it's nice to see new cultures and lifestyles.’ So the act of traveling is exposed as a means of personal enrichment. That's when provincial easygoing people like me must defend us. To do this I developed my own theory, which allows me to counteract that injury. It is a theory which shows that, in my way, I am a traveler too.

    

 Image: Simon Howden / FreeDigitalPhotos.net

Transmeme XXXIV

Smart women are extremely sexy.

Odious comparisons XII - The minority of well-being

Image: Foto Gratis

One day I noted a fact that caused me some irritation, namely, that if only the very wealthy continue to enjoy the natural scenery and outdoor sports, there would not be problems of sustainability in natural areas, nor resource predation, nor wear, contamination or uncontrolled erosion.

This statement is somewhat disturbing and undemocratic, I know, but I am sorry to admit that it is true. Let me explain: Originally, there were few true mountaineers, hikers, climbers, skiers, very few. Most people had very little available leisure time and fewer resources for which, at the time, were real adventures. Only a small group of vocational and nature lovers made the effort to enjoy grateful natural resorts. Then there were the minority of well-being. Those had more leisure time, and amenities and were the first to practice leisure tourism and discover that the beaches were good for something more than fishing, and the skis could be used not only to get from one town to another on the mountain.

Fortunately, years of progress have facilitated the emergence of a middle class with more money and some free time. Thus the leisure industry in the landscape emerged and everything else, including the environmental impact. The apartments populated coast lines, the mountains were invaded, mussels disappeared from beaches and trash piled in the roadsides. So regulations became necessary, the laws of coastline, preserves and closures (until public-spiritedness once finally comes out). All this was not necessary when a few privileged enjoyed it. It's the democratization that brings progress, luckily for all.

It is not a question of classes; it is a matter of numbers.

Transmeme XXXIII

Those who enlighten me are those who make me laugh too!

Answered Questions XI - Concurrent Creativity

Chaos theory or industrial espionage. I do not know what the cause, but the truth is that I have been watching for years many cases of artistic productions (call it so), apparently about the same, which occur simultaneously. I think some of them are the result of an esoteric phenomenon I call Concurrent Creativity.

Perhaps the most striking cases are those of the films. Do you remember the launch about the same year of two films about illusionists? Do you remember two animated films featuring a fish? Or an ant? The same thing happens with books. Perhaps you can recall some examples; it would be nice to have a list.   

Transmeme XXXII

Mainstream culture is average poor, but sets an ecosystem for interesting artists to take advantage of.