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The world is a quiet place
Jul. 3rd, 2003 11:45 pmLast night I finished Equal Rites and started Lemony Snicket's autobiography. I'm already half way through. It's highly enjoyable in it's silliness. I'm also on chapter 3 of the first book in the Gormenghast Trilogy. I'm not sure whether I'll stick with it right now or save it for some other point in time. Probably save though. Right now I'm looking for quick fixes. So, after I finish the biography I'll read another Discworld book and maybe some Elizabeth Peters.
Mom and I have continued watching random movies over the past few nights. Tonight she rented Punch-Drunk Love before she came home from work. It was . . . different. And I don't mean that in a bad way. I don't really know what I mean. I will say that it's nice to see Adam Sandler do something different. And I do like his movies. Some of them are guilty pleasures. Anyway. Parts were really sweet, parts were really scary, parts taught me life lessons. (Such as don't call an adult hotline no matter how lonely you are and don't give your social security number to anyone. Both of which I already knew.)
Now the other night. That was the movie that really played with my head. Frailty was on TV. Whoa. Talk about a freaky movie. And this was the kind of movie I love, too. Psychologically scary, makes you think, makes you go "wait a gosh darn minute!". It was great though and inspired the following thoughts.
I think religious fanatics are the scariest type of people out there. Seriously. Because the thing about religion is that you can never know for sure. Which is actually the point of religion. Faith and belief. But the idea that someone could be receiving visions from God that told them to do things . . . Well, who's to say they aren't? Who's to say it's God? Or Satan? No one can ever really know, beyond a doubt, what is really going on in a person's mind. They could be lying. They could be delusional. They could be both. But you can only take their word for it that they're not.
The human mind is a strange thing and the things that go on in it are even stranger. The mind is actually a scary place. If you see something and your mind tells you that it's real there's nothing you can do about it. You believe it. You believe that it's true, you believe that it's real, and you believe that everyone who doesn't believe is either crazy or uninformed. And then no one can tell you otherwise because your mind has tricked you into believing something so thoroughly that you're stuck.
This is all actually reminding me of a quote I pulled from Neil Gaiman's American Gods when I was reading it earlier this year. The quote stood out to me at the time. (Great book, BTW.)
All we have to believe with is our senses, the tools we use to perceive the world: our sight,
our touch, our memory. If they lie to us, then nothing can be trusted. And even if we do not
believe, then still we cannot travel in any other way than the road our senses show us; and we
must walk that road to the end.
-- Neil Gaiman, "American Gods" Ch. 6 pg. 139
The mind is a tricky thing.
Anyway. On a completely different level of randomness, here is a bit of fiction that I wrote several months ago. Sometime last year I think. I haven't really looked at it since then, but I was just going over old bits and pieces of writing with Neesha and she didn't discourage me from sharing so . . . yeah. I definitely wouldn't mind feedback. Good that is. It can be bad as long as it's constructive.
( Between Wake and Sleep )
Mom and I have continued watching random movies over the past few nights. Tonight she rented Punch-Drunk Love before she came home from work. It was . . . different. And I don't mean that in a bad way. I don't really know what I mean. I will say that it's nice to see Adam Sandler do something different. And I do like his movies. Some of them are guilty pleasures. Anyway. Parts were really sweet, parts were really scary, parts taught me life lessons. (Such as don't call an adult hotline no matter how lonely you are and don't give your social security number to anyone. Both of which I already knew.)
Now the other night. That was the movie that really played with my head. Frailty was on TV. Whoa. Talk about a freaky movie. And this was the kind of movie I love, too. Psychologically scary, makes you think, makes you go "wait a gosh darn minute!". It was great though and inspired the following thoughts.
I think religious fanatics are the scariest type of people out there. Seriously. Because the thing about religion is that you can never know for sure. Which is actually the point of religion. Faith and belief. But the idea that someone could be receiving visions from God that told them to do things . . . Well, who's to say they aren't? Who's to say it's God? Or Satan? No one can ever really know, beyond a doubt, what is really going on in a person's mind. They could be lying. They could be delusional. They could be both. But you can only take their word for it that they're not.
The human mind is a strange thing and the things that go on in it are even stranger. The mind is actually a scary place. If you see something and your mind tells you that it's real there's nothing you can do about it. You believe it. You believe that it's true, you believe that it's real, and you believe that everyone who doesn't believe is either crazy or uninformed. And then no one can tell you otherwise because your mind has tricked you into believing something so thoroughly that you're stuck.
This is all actually reminding me of a quote I pulled from Neil Gaiman's American Gods when I was reading it earlier this year. The quote stood out to me at the time. (Great book, BTW.)
All we have to believe with is our senses, the tools we use to perceive the world: our sight,
our touch, our memory. If they lie to us, then nothing can be trusted. And even if we do not
believe, then still we cannot travel in any other way than the road our senses show us; and we
must walk that road to the end.
-- Neil Gaiman, "American Gods" Ch. 6 pg. 139
The mind is a tricky thing.
Anyway. On a completely different level of randomness, here is a bit of fiction that I wrote several months ago. Sometime last year I think. I haven't really looked at it since then, but I was just going over old bits and pieces of writing with Neesha and she didn't discourage me from sharing so . . . yeah. I definitely wouldn't mind feedback. Good that is. It can be bad as long as it's constructive.
( Between Wake and Sleep )
