Don't you want to know more about the world?
I miss you dearly. That being this old version of me, that being living here and liking it. I want to remember a couple of things: I need to stay here because I am fascinated with the world and the people in it. I will always be in love with it. No-one is more interested in people than me, what they say and how they say it, and why they do what they do.
I let someone mistreat me recently. Isn't that a silly thing?
This morning, I'm thinking of how it's good to say the same things to yourself over and over again. Affirmations made very little sense to me when I was younger. A lot of things made little sense. I try not to worship invention. I really try not to. Saying new words is the business of men with bigger projects and legacies than me. English deals in a density of modulation variation adjustment [iteration]. I don't think it's bad. I just think that Linguistic imperialism has relegated the center of academia to the western world [The educated Chinese reader knows about 8,000 characters. People don't invent new ones. I know enough to talk to my mother. What does it mean to sound educated?]. Do you believe that accessibility must come at the cost of nuance? I hope it's not true.
It's wonderful that we have the language to describe what's before us. Here's what I'll say about new words: cyber-balkanization has redefined hegemonic media into a multiplicity of manufactured and contradictory narratives [the internet is in bits and pieces], and sometimes we wander to where we're not meant to be. It'll be new to someone. I'll write worse and lose. I promise.
No wonder everyone writes a manifesto. Don't we need to say it again? And again? I refuse to feel ashamed of losing. I will be serious and sincere. Children are serious and sincere. There's wisdom in naivety. But you knew that. Don't you miss when violence was a puzzle? Don't you miss when you were responsible for nothing, and life was what was done to you? It doesn't have to be a terrible thing, growing up. You can lose.
I try not to (miss it). I don't know how I feel about the childlike or the childish. Maybe what we forget is that life is still something outside your control, that the amounts of control you have over fate never really excuse you from the politics of life. Death and violence and cruelty. Maybe everything has to do with having eaten less. Maybe what we forget is that life is not something that is done to you anymore, that you're here and that you're moving. You can change this story. You know this, don't you? Forget it.
I try to hide. I miss everyone I've ever lost. God, do I have to say it again?
Lets straighten our story out.
Let's say it all again. One more time.