A Status Post

What would I want to tell all you about what life is turning into here?

I've grown my wings again. (little trite, but effective) The last couple of years I've been trying to fly with my arms, but now when I push, it's not just a gesture.

I don't think that it's because I'm in an environment again where people think the way I want to, or who care about the same things (cause that certainly isn't true). But it's that by just being given the opportunity, I've been able to let myself believe again that this way of doing things (the reflectively critical way of living life) is the main event and not a sideshow. I forgot what it is really like to hold yourself accountable for every little word that comes out of your mouth, and how much freedom that gives you. It is so nice to be really vulnerable again.

These are the things that go through my mind recently when I'm walking around or smoking (the copious amounts of) cigarettes. (philosophers are SMOKERS - and add that with no ban on indoor smoking...bad news for the lungs) The other things that have been swimming is that there is this unfortunate and invisible limit on what is considered to fall under the category of experiences that can be held accountable. Basically, if a person doesn't think a certain thought or experience permits of evaluation, then it is not up for discussion. This happens here. And it makes me sad, because we can fly to the mountain castle, but instead we often settle for regimented low-altitude passes of scouring cornfields for UFOs.

And philosophers get gunshy. If they don't have an immediate argument for it, they're less likely to throw it out there, even if it is something that might be really important. They're a lot like everyone else that way - stick with what you know. Some of the first-years here are straight up shit-scared. And that makes me worry about what they'll be like when they eventually get over it. Give a kid a little intelligence and they'll turn into a monster, right? Well give a philosopher a little semantic theory and...well, I'll spare you the details, but it isn't pretty.

It's a little early to say such things, because who can know what will be in store, but I really miss talking the straight shit with you all. Those moments were like oboe solos in symphonies for me - a time out of time. I'm on the hunt here for those windows with the lights on. I think the descriptions I've given here sketch out a set of extremes that those moments somehow transcended, and they give me a lot of hope for both poles of this world I call home - my hybrid human/professional philosophic life: accountability and all the wonderful vulnerabilities and virtues that come with it, without an intolerance for the prima facie indeterminates that look like they don't want to play along - and an accountability that's willing to dance to atonal stylings (or at least the B52s).

Which (he gestured with a crook in his lips) brings me to my next post...