Well, Nashville is on my mind again. Seems that if we go, the meetings are on a wednesday, thursday, and and a friday until noon; we have to head back right after. The university is insisting on a rental car and that is good. One can get walk away insurance and there are no car worries (Pat has a big meeting in St. Louis soon, and for this one we are riding the train across the state and back, as one with assburgers, predetermined to be fascinated by transportation and machines [even though the US has no mind for the aesthetic when it comes to passenger trains, like they did in the 30s and 40s], well, this train ride leaves me in much anticipation, I hope there is a McDonalds on the train). But the car has to be back at a certain time so the trip will be short. But that is okay as one has plenty of time when one is retired, or I suppose one could say one is rapidly running out of time when one is retired, after all, ones life no longer stretches out before one in old age, but even in youth, ones life could be very short. Life is becoming where contingency and necessity have their way with us, despite all that free will crap being floated about: one of those optimist/pessimist deals I guess. I dont know about other old people, but I find I get tired of living, SOS it seems like, one has seen it all, heard it all, etc, life becomes a giant TV re-run that one has to watch over and over again. One would think that life could offer infinite diversion as one moves along into ones own personal damnation, but the organization of man seems to want to reduce options to a minimum and standardize everything. This is good though, if one is pushed inward by the boredom and domination of this process (Stoicism was the first response to this external slavery that we all happily embrace now and label freedom.), if one can not make that movement into inwardness, it would seem one is in for much bitterness and defeat. Seneca, and Cato, I dont know if the younger or elder, retreated to the country side leaving the affairs of state and moving inward into themselves; becoming true philosophers late in life. Philosophy is like that, it is really not a young mans game except in a few rare instances, it is a genuine no payed career for old men who can do it and are not distracted by the affairs of everyday life and desire, but few there are that can, most old men get trapped into their past and only remember half truths which must continually be repeated, rather than move into spirit and the future and chip away at something new and rare. Existence by giving man mind has bestowed a great gift onto him that the vast majority of men readily and eagerly squander, but then everything in nature, where nature seems to be a superfluity, can be multiplied for a few and the majority cast aside to get the few; not all need to go inward during old age. But old age is a time for the inward movement as the distractions of life become just that, bothersome distractions. I wonder if I will see any famous people in Nashville, I am not sure I even know what any look like let alone their names.
Posted on: Sat, 22 Mar 2014 20:19:20 +0000