Lidfearless2012

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Theodore

Over mijn bibliotheek

Collecting songbooks and learning how to read them. [N.B. I'm in the process of cataloging my CDs on my personal wikithing page.]

Update: Because it's a fool who plays it cool by making his world a little colder. It's important though to keep an open mind about George and the Maharishi and trippy people like that. (Even though I never liked Sgt. Pepper as much as some people do because of all that, although I suppose if we can at least keep the military out of it and hold it down to love and peace, then that's one thing.)

......

"Then I saw her face-- now I'm a believer! not a trace, of doubt in my mind. I'm in love, mmmm, I'm a believer, I couldn't leave her if I tried...."

.............

*shrugs* You might find me strange, but bitter people tire me excessively.

.............................................

Also, my ratings are too high, but they are reasonably consistent. Here's where it's really at:

6/10 (F)-- 0/5
7/10 (something's wrong) -- 1/5
8/10 (not too bad) -- 2/5
9, non-favorite -- 3/5
9, favorite -- 4/5
10 (favorite) -- 5/5

..............................................

"You could spend a lifetime looking for a perfect flower blossom, and it would not be a wasted life."

And, of course, it's opposite:

'What does (historical/political term) mean?'

You could spend a lifetime answering that question, although it might be a wasted life....

................................................

"If within yourself you find no reasons for joy, then look at others. Go among the people. See how they can enjoy themselves, surrendering themselves wholeheartedly to joyful feelings.... do not say that everything in this world is sad. Joy is simple, but powerful. Rejoice in the rejoicing of others. To live is still possible."

...................................................

Love is my creed, and my love is selfish: I cannot breathe without it.

.... I snipped and modified that from a letter, since the sentiment is almost as desirable without a pen-pal.

(Incidentally, another one of the lines above without quotations marks is also paraphrased since it also benefited from adaption and personalization. I didn't mention the source because there wasn't a good enough reason to, similar to the situation with the quote given above about joy, where there wasn't a good enough reason to distract from the text itself with the accomplished name, as though I were the sort to clutter my writing with name-dropping as though I would write like I wanted to advertise for the Met, since that's hardly an appropriate attitude when peering over that guy's shoulder into his personal letters and his weird little world.... And anyway those (perhaps) honesty curious should be able to utilize the eye of the google, since I don't think that I use sources unverifiable by reason of extreme obscurity, nowadays.... And it's not like you really figure things out by having someone stuff it up your nose literally and explicitly anyway. You can offer something to someone plainly: "She loves you", and you can even nudge them a few suggestive things, "Remember when she sang that song you love?", but if they stubbornly refuse to turn their head and look in the direction you're pointing in, "It has nothing to do with the guy playing piano on the record, Juno's mercy!", then you might as well give up, because you can't make them reach out and take something, and certainly not by endlessly specifying meaningless specific things, like the day of the week the song was recorded and the name of the neighborhood in L.A....

(And I have multiple bases that I want to touch before I'm done, but it's not like any of this is meaningless, frankly....)

And of course it's possible to essentially write notes to your own thing if you feel the need to assume that others aren't familiar with your own world, not only citing sources but providing them with descriptions and stating the basis of their relevance and the aspects under analysis in that situation, the way that children who do not really pay attention to context clues (or foreigners in need of interpretation) want it explained literally and explicitly whether "the way John would do it" is a compliment, but many people are in the habit of writing notes that contradict the text, since they with a false generosity take it upon themselves to assume that the presumed foreign children will benefit from their teacher's "class, this means that" attitude, giving bad interpretations to people not thought to be capable of screwing it up properly themselves, and since they think that the essence of wit is the deployment of facts, no matter how clumsily they are handled, they create interpretations which only reflect the prejudices of those internal states which they do not think worth understanding, albeit with a few facts strewn awkwardly and ineffectually about, like in the house of a proud rich man with poor taste, where the furniture is expensive but foolishly arranged....

And so the notes contradict the text, as though Lennon & McCartney wrote a prophecy and Jagger & Richards founded a church, by writing those notes which represent what people actually think about the sacred things. It's a common pattern in art and religion, isn't it. God commissions a prophet to write a book, and the devil hires a theologian to prepare the edition.... And to ask for any important book without notes, "just the text", is like to travel back in time and become that wide-eyed naive Protestant idealist who doesn't understand how the world works: the Viennese masters are dead, and people make money preparing interpretations, which means that convenience ("here, let me help you understand") becomes more than convenience, it becomes a packaging that you can never quite dissemble so that you can look inside.... (because there is something inside the box, and the difficulty involved in bending back cardboard can be exaggerated grossly), although there comes a point where the protesters settle in, and no longer wish to play the iconoclast who drags down every statue raised to solemnity, like the country singer who praises the simple things or the bluesman who lives in the swamp. The problem mutates and becomes that those "superstitions" of "ignorant" people were so "maudlin" (and some words, like probably "superstition" and certainly "maudlin" should basically never be used except sarcastically), and therefore the "learned" accordingly begin to teach their own errors from their own mind-illusion phantasgorias....

Although, the trouble with any honest attempt to notate your own text is that when the kids in the schoolyard don't understand a single word you say, if you actually explain each word you used, creating explanations to which explication may be demanded, no matter how good they were, and especially if people don't know what to pay attention to.... ("It doesn't matter which roadie it was!") And basically, ninety-nine times out of nineteen people don't have the patience to compensate for their lack of knowledge.... If I have all day I can teach you anything I know, and if you're sufficiently clever I can make a single indication and you'll see just where it goes, but if you're stupid and impatient you'll just curse me off and walk away ignorant, which is why people like that don't read either texts or annotations or anything else unless they are very pompous and stupid, so that they can "understand" it, and expensive, so that they'll value it, and skeptical and economic or pseudo-economic, so that it will be as emotionally blind as they are.... (Or pseudo-emotional, like the nun who talks animatedly about "God's love", (the vague grand one, not the one who lives on "Rocky Mountain High" and casually chats with John Denver), and then becomes instantly bored and dismissive if you bring up your girlfriend....)

Of course, in contrast, if you're interested in the content, it's not at all certain that it's necessary to wow you with the fact that the poet was fascinated by Homeric pots or that his last name vaguely resembles my own, only to pass along the clever bits like a conductor with a symphony or the asshole between you and the girl, who takes from you the folded note that on the inside says, Do you want to be my friend? Check yes or no., and gives it to her.... So much for the topic of annotation.)

Love is my creed, and my love is selfish: I cannot breathe without it... (Regardless of who else also or before....) I strive to plant this apple tree from Avalon, and I recommend it to all regardless of circumstances, since I cannot recommend the alternative, and since no matter what I feel towards those who show me that they are living without love, I never feel envy. Eventually I come to the point where I almost ask them, Why are you screwing yourself up like this? And they of course, break into something not entirely unlike scat singing, which would make me think that they were jazz aficionados, were it not that they were angry and not cool, and it were it not that it is not jazz, and not singing.... And, even, in a way, not as intelligent. ("na na na na, na na na na, Hey Jude...." "Jude is just the name of a fictional person, and the rest of that is just sounds." "But it's all part of the greatest song of advice ever given." (lowers head) "No it isn't...." (shakes head) How can I tell you that being sulky and surly doesn't make you more intelligent....? "And besides Wikipedia says that scat singing influenced rap, but it doesn't mention Hey Jude." "Well, maybe Wikipedia is written by a bunch of sulky intellectuals who don't realize that jazz along with the rest of the worthwhile universe doesn't revolve around surly, juvenile, unsocial crap." ".... You can learn alot from Wikipedia." "Yeah, because of how the bots are good at copying and pasting statistics, not because they don't have a solid editorial consensus that comes down from above that all children's stories are racist ploys...." "I have books that prove that." "You're murdering your inner child." "You're maudlin.".... "Dude, why are you messing yourself up." "What, you don't want science, and for us to invent light-bulbs. This is obviously a technical point. You're an American. Go watch football, you fucking third grader, before you drop out of high school and become a coal miner." ".... Okay. You know what, good advice." "Are you drunk, provoking me. You reject science, because of football." "This is like when the Baptists preach about Afghanistan." "Marx taught the truth about religion, you opium druggie. Go preach somewhere else. Go to the mall, preach there. But your religion isn't true." "....")

There is something most at home with surly, aggressive men and sulky, isolationist women, but sometimes it will try to follow you wherever you go, although its folly is never more obvious than when it wanders off its native turf in this way. It grows easier where there's alot of hate. (People think you need about a hundred thousand books and alot of shitty things to read about to learn anything, but you can learn alot, and even teach alot, whenever anything happens to you and your mind is clear enough to see it because your emotions are in order, and by in order I don't mean extremely repressed or aggressive.... And you can get a sense of something in a tiny fraction of the time it would take to exhaustively "complete" it, but no amount of squinting will let in what you automatically filter out and replace with something else....) There is a time when we meet with blind men who criticize paintings for magazines, theologians who explain the nature of marriage, and a man named Richard Wagner who writes about the nature of dance, and like a perceptive comedian stuck in a social prison of stupidity and rudeness, you must cry until you're emptied of the burden of that knowing, so that you laugh so hard you cry again, and start to wonder what the theologians will say about you if you end up ending up like Robin Williams.

(Aladdin's Genie doing an impression: It's not enough that I lambasted Meyerbeer for being a Jew, and got his reputation blasted black forever, no, I have more plans. I have to explain the nature of dance to you, which is very different from what the fornicators might imagine. The purpose of the art of dance, which comes from Greece, isn't to please a man, no no no, heavenly father save us, be a pious Christian, please. The purpose of the mighty Teutonic art of dance is to showcase the genius of the folk, to realize a great historical destiny, to create a subtle beauty that no penny-pinching, un-artistic Jew could ever truly understand. Understood? Good. Class dismissed. For homework, please study: redemptive love, the gods of the blood, the crimes of the Jews against Christian civilization, ways to politicize every single facet of life, and public relations. (sighs, drops accent) I'm not sure how much longer I can do this kid.... I think that when the Airborne Aryan started pretending he was a love expert, that was one step too far for me....)

(Incidentally, I'm sure that far more "scholars" claim that Richard Wagner believed in redemptive love, than would say the same of Jane Austen, even though that's a little bit like saying that the producer with the master copy of the feature film needs to check it with the copy being hawked illegally in NY for two dollars, to see if his copy has any mistakes.... "Okay, the hero dies and his widow commits suicide by fire in response, which in India would be called Sati, of course. I'll see if I can work that into the end of 'Pride and Prejudice', thanks. Okay.... 'Wickham died with the French bullet still lodged in his throat, and Elizabeth threw herself on a giant pyre and died. The End.'...." But clever Nazis need to be redeemed so they can go work for NATO, and girls need to prove that they are, totally, not!, girls.... And incidentally if someone vaguely Wagnerite-ish by reason of extreme stupidity were in an Austen piece (true assholes don't really feature in her stuff), it would probably go like:

Mr Kelly then insisted upon reading from his copy of Wagner's Essays, a book upon whose value he insisted fervently and indeed at great length he expounded upon its value for the entire town. But he had not read for more than two minutes, when Lydia interrupted loudly by saying, Do ya mind? Mr Kelly found this to be extremely rude, and wondered about the value of her education. At length however when he found the family more reluctant to rebuke Lydia for her outburst as he would have liked, he grew reluctant to continue reading. He closed the book and said perhaps he would continue another time. The room emptied quite quickly thereafter, with Jane offering to take Lydia outside for a walk to relieve her stress, (although Lydia soon ran off with Kitty to go buy clothes), Mary went to go play on the piano, and Elizabeth went to go write a letter to her friend Charlotte. Mrs Bennet however stayed in the room and told Mr Kelly in the most animated fashion that Wagner's criticisms had ruined the reputation of several famed composers in her eyes irrevocably, while Mr Bennet subtly implied that he wished that he were dead.)

Love is my creed, and my love is selfish: I cannot breathe without it.

Without love, it gets harder and harder to breathe, and without oxygen in the brain, we start to resemble the monsters that live in our dreams.... Even the simplest things become.... tenuous.

(A)"Aunt Jane, who was Richard Wagner?"
(B)"Oh, he was a rather illiberal man who wrote at great length the most confused ideas."
(C)"It's okay, Jane, I'll interpret for you! Wagner was a wretched monkey who deserves to raped by gorillas!"
(B) "Have you listened to how I talk? Do I talk like that?"
(C) ".... But he's alright, though, you should listen to all his operas; they're famous."
(B) "Oh, heaven preserve us!"

"Pride & Prejudice by Jane Austen, with Introduction & Notes by Lady Catherine de Bourgh"

(As told to her by George Wickham, I guess)

Seriously, though, they tend to come pretty close to insulting all the people who actually like the books for what they're actually about.... and then they expect to get paid every time one of those people actually buys one of the books.... These crazy tricks of these modern capitalists, I'm telling you. (rolls eyes) "I know, right! People make money by lying to people! They make all their money by lying! By lying! Who would do that?" Who indeed.

(sighs) (smiles) No, I suppose it never-- I mean, of course there's good in everything. There's certainly less to do, and that's something. (makes a sheet go swoosh in the air as she makes the bed) It's not easy being a wife and mother, of course. For all I know it could be easier, if nothing else, to just--
"A-ha! Jane has no belief! Jane is a cynic like us! She doesn't really care! Somebody, call the newspapers, quick!"
No, no, I am happy. I am free, but happy. I--
"Hey Joey, did you know Aunt Jane has no belief? She's a cynic like us! She has been the whole time!"
(shakes head) (in a hushed tone) Crediting me for cynicism because of my optimism? Beyond belief!

Johannes Brahms: I don't know, friend, I suppose it never happened for me. To be honest, it's a God-damn disappointment. Sometimes it feels like a wasted life.
Strauss the Son: Oh, it hurts me to hear you sound so gloomy!
Johannes Brahms: You're right; it is weak to give into despair.... I am.... I am, happy. I am free, but happy. *starts to get up* That gives me an idea for something.
Strauss the Son: There you go! You show them, old friend! They'll remember you long after they've forgotten me, and my silly dance music!
Johannes Brahms: They'll remember both of us. You make people's lives better.

You know it seems the more we talk about it, it only makes it worse to live without it, but let's talk about it.... Love is my creed, and my love is selfish: I cannot breathe without it.

*pull out your short, boyish hair, and scream* That. Does not. Make sense!!!!

Mike Love: Sure it does. That's who I am....

*pull out your short, boyish hair, and scream* "Peter Pan" is a reactionary plot! Wendy is brainwashed by Victorian propaganda and doesn't know any of the 27 Things That Every Liberated Non-Family-y Postmodern Woman Must Know!!! Someone must have messed her up! *starts pulling out hair and jumping up and down*

*tilts head and looks out from over the tilted-down Lennon/McGuinn granny glasses* That's not why I read "Peter Pan".

*while having something of a breakdown* You don't make any sense!.... If only she got violated by monkeys or angry natives, then she would get radicalized and see the light! Stupid bee, doesn't she have any fucking sense in her stupid head, to realize that she's the oppressed aborigine of every country, everywhere in the entire world! Why is she so blind! I start to hate her so much; she's too stupid to listen! And she's so British and polite and white and.... Bad! Bad bad bad! I bet she judges me! I bet that little bee judges me! Well, she's bad bad bad! I hope those monkeys and angry natives violate her! I hope they get her good, the little British bee! *screaming into the ground*

*untilts the granny glasses, continues reading* You really need to calm down.

*for no real reason, Clint Eastwood scowls in* Okay, little girls, who's ready to go fight some commies in 'Nam? I'll make a real man, out of you, a hero! You'll earn the adoration of the most patriotic of your countrymen, get into the history books, and kill some dirty gooks to boot! So, which one of you little girls is with me? How about you, reading the little girl's book? You ready to become a military hero?

*doesn't even look up or stop reading "Peter Pan" in the granny glasses* I'm not in a hurry to do any of that, no. No hurry today, to learn to kill, to take the will, from unknown faces.

*scowls* Is that what you get from your little girl books?

*suddenly contemplative* Actually, if I were going to fight someone, it would have to be you....

*scowls more* But what about Western Civilization, you little girl?

You mean like Abba? "Voulez-vous?.... A-ha! A-ha! A-ha!.... Voulez-vous?.... A-ha! A-ha! A-ha!..."

*scowls superlatively* But aren't you a man?

Oh please. They couldn't have even run Abba without the guys. The guys wrote the songs and played the instruments and did everything except lead vocals. And while I don't actually say this this way, I don't actually allow girls into my group; we're a guy group only.

*back to ms boy hair screaming* You bigoted shit!!!!

*goes back to reading "Peter Pan"* Actually, I was gonna call you the bigot.

*patriotic inspiration* Huh. You think you're enough of a bigot to serve your country in an unjust war, you little girl, boy, whatever you are!

*pulling at the hair, screaming at the ground* I'm ready to, kill!!!!

*smile-scowl* I can see that the West is finally making some progress as far as little girls are concerned. I'll make a man out of you, little girl, a hero!

I'll, kill!!!! *screaming into the ground*

*shakes his head, puts the book down* what does that even mean.... They make no sense....

Love is my creed, and my love is selfish: I cannot breathe without it.

So if it gets cold outside, and you've got nobody to love, maybe you'll understand what I say when I tell you there's still just no real way to give up.... Even when I wake up at night because I see the monster that lives in my dream, because it's getting harder and harder to breathe....

L. Cat de Borg: But there will be no love in the future; it is not logical.

How dare you saw that love is unacceptable, so condescending, unnecessarily critical, don't you know that the best music is kinda messed up and always about sex.

L. Cat de Borg: Oh my.

Jane: *stifles a laugh* (under her breath) Is there anyone out there, because it's getting harder and harder to breathe....

Love is my creed, and my love is selfish: I cannot breathe without it.

So get up there behind the mic, Jane, and pretend that you're in love with somebody you actually know, instead of only with something or somebody somewhere, maybe only in your dreams.... Get up there and tell us you're in love, Jane, lovely Jane Bennet, and hope that Hermes will smile on your holy fiction and maybe back you up with some guitar and get his brother Mercury on the keys because of how he digs your girly diction....

Because....

.... When all's said and done, and the storm of the feelings you found are gone, will it leave you with a quiet love, or a quiet hate, something to die with, or something that will let you live....

That could be Jane's song, something like that. We'll just have to consult with Air Supply and poke around in the Book of Love a little bit, but basically....

Love is my creed, and my love is selfish: I cannot breathe without it.

I know that all that is better than what the talentless, unimaginative losers would do, firing off one little statement of some petty distinction, in a way that they think is pithy, and then, if you care more than they do, they'll write you off as a fool for caring, but.... It's funny.

It never ends up the way it started in your head, but maybe that is why I write it.

Either that, or the religious aspect, of course. ^^

Over mij

I have an inactive account (Tullius22) that I used to catalog regular books, but I've found that books-- and even movies!-- don't make me happy. Music makes me happy, so now I'm studying what makes me happy.

Update: However, since I don't want to be too puritanical-- music is all that matters! Nothing else!-- (since that's the whole point, not to be trapped in it all, a useless nowhere man making all his nowhere plans for nobody), I'll also include some stuff from other fields, like fiction, psychology, biography and poetry, and maybe philosophy but not (academic) history. (Excluding historical fiction would be too severe.) If it's of some use to the individual, then I'll consider taking it in.

{Although I still like to remember, "Before the fortnight was over, I saw six murders, two riots, and a war-- not gonna watch my friend's TV no more." Psychodrama city-- don't need none to-day....}

["Lord have mercy, I've got to stop thinkin' bout that."]

.................

'I am *not* a great reader, and I have pleasure in many things.'

................

"But I will endeavor to banish every painful thought, and think only of what will make me happy....."

...................

"Think only of the past as its remembrance gives you pleasure."

....................

When I was a child, I was taught about the head, but not the heart. I was shown how to study, and allowed to do so in pride and conceit.... and ignorance.

"Then I was mean, but I'm changing my scene, and I'm doing the best that I can."

.....................

'The priest wants us to die for the Faith, and Dad wants us to die for Ireland, and I wonder if there is anyone in the world who wants us to live.'....

Haters gonna....

"I stay out too late
Got nothing in my brain:
Or at least that's what people say,
Oo-oo
That's what people say,
Oo-oo
I go on too many dates
But I can't make them stay
Or at least that's what people say
Oo-oo
That's what people say
Oo-oo."

~re: the confusion surrounding speed dating

Woonplaats

Long Branch, NJ, USA

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50 Russian Folk-songs door Traditional

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The Beach Boys Anthology door Brian Wilson

The Four Seasons: In an easy arrangement for piano door Antonio Vivaldi

Favoriete auteurs

Sarah Addison Allen, Jane Austen, Augusten Burroughs, Ned Vizzini

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