The Domain of Steven

In the dream, I’m late for my internship with an Asian film director. They’re shooting on top of a large cliff overlooking the sea. The sun is bright, sky is blue, and there’s plenty of lush grass beneath our feet. Our, being myself, the director, his assistant, and the hundred actors comprising two armies of rival nations, decked out in blue and red.

As I run up the hill to meet them, I find the director standing smack dab in the middle, with armies in formation in front and behind him ready to charge. He yells “Action!” and my mind fast forwards. He is preparing an actor for a scene involving him being pushed off the cliff by an enemy. The assistant irritatedly walks up to the director and starts haranguing him, complaining about safety and expenses and difficulty, how we could easily do this on a blue screen back at the studio. It’s getting late, he says, and the actors are tired. If we film this shot digitally, we can call it a day and not go back to this wretched place.

Wretched? This oceanside cliff is beautiful, a sharp contrast to the bloody feud that is taking place. I want to make my case to the director, but it’s not my place. I’m just an intern. And when the director looks into the tired eyes of his employees, he too lets out a weary sigh. Very well, we’ll call it a day, he says.

I don’t bother pleading, or helping them pack up, I just walk back the way I came. This place has a certain majesty about it, something that couldn’t be recreated by a second-rate computer geek who has spent his life indoors, who has never felt this wonderful ocean breeze.

At the bottom of the hill is a wall-less tent adorned with a sign that says WI-FI INTERNET. Several tables have been strewn about, packed with people on their laptops. A few people are sitting on the fat, pillow-sized stone slabs that serve as a railing for the small ramp that leads down the cliffside to the water below. There’s one poor shmuck who is standing in line, apparently not content to sit on the grass or sit in the sun.

Curious as to why they’d make a rail that leads downwards, I hop onto one and start to make my way down. My balance wavers a bit, and I decide that it’s best if I sit down and scoot instead of walk. The ramp alternates between slanted and straight, and it would be a fun slide if the friction of the granite wasn’t such a killjoy.

I reach the bottom and find that the water is actually pretty shallow. It would probably just reach past my feet, if I stepped in, nothing like the ocean I saw from on top of the cliff. It’s inconsistent. But life is consistent. The only place something like this could happen is…a dream? Is this a dream?

As rebellious thoughts fill my mind, I remember that I’m in bed after having taken a nap. I give a gentle mental push, and suddenly my hands feel the smooth sheets of my bed instead of the rough rock.

I immediately pull my mind back, my head spinning with the realization about where I am and what I can do while here. I have had a lucid dream only one other time, where I was on top of a large building. I wanted to jump off but I was too afraid, worried that I might be sleepwalking and would wake up moments before my death.

But this time I was too curious. I stood up on the stone railing and looked back the way I came. Another inconsistency, the railing was not part of a ramp that led up the cliffside, it was now simply a long curved railing that led back to an island. There was no cliff behind me anymore, just the expanse of the sea. The water was still foot-deep.

The best stories are made when you’re bold, curious, and just a little bit stupid. I dove head-first into the shallow water.

My head entered, then my body, then my legs. I was fully immersed, and there was plenty of room beneath me in the cool water. I wanted to come up and take a look around and found it effortless to rise to the surface. The island was still in the distance, but the railing was gone and the water was now a proper ocean. I started swimming, not caring which way, and it was the easiest thing in the world. I was totally uncoordinated but it was as if I had on a miniature life jacket that had that helped me float.

It was amazing, liberating, and in a flash it was over. I was on my bed, eager to go back into the water but too certain that I was awake and would not be able to return. And so instead of reliving it in my dreams, I sat down at my computer and relived it through my memories and my words. Hopefully I’ll have more lucid dreams, because I’m sure as hell not diving into water outside of one.

The Sims is a series of award-winning games that let you control simulated people, each with their own needs, desires, relationships and futures. Some players choose to build elaborate houses, giving their characters a dream home and letting them roam free to do as they pleased.

I, on the other hand, played The Sims very efficiently. I built rooms only as large as they needed to be, with items strategically placed to minimize the space they took up and the time to travel between them. I did not decorate the interior of the house, because pretty scenery really only mattered when they left the house to go to work, and indoor decorations would not help that. I did not buy a full-length mirror because a square hanging mirror served the same purpose at a fraction of the cost while not taking up any space.

I built bachelor houses that were essentially very large cubicles, with no extra money spent on walls for the bathroom because no one would ever see him and it would never be an issue. I did not buy a lounge chair or sofa because it would not double as an eating chair, and which I would then have to purchase separately. The house had one chair. It was the chair in which my Sim ate, watched television and learned skills from. I spent money making it extremely comfortable, because that chair and the bed were the only sources of rest I provided my Sim. When he needed comfort, I did not let him simply sit down, I would top off his fun need by also making him watch TV. If he was already at full fun, I would discontinue TV watching and make him read a book to learn a skill.

But hermit Sims have stunted job progression because later promotions require you to befriend your neighbors. To accomplish this, I had a systematic way of rapidly maximizing a relationship level. I did not bother with most of the interaction options like backrubs and pranks, I did what I needed to do in order to get where I wanted to be, and then I sent them along their way.

I would talk to them until our relationship level rose a bit and then mixed in jokes, all the way until when a hug became the best option to increase relationship points. I chose these because they were efficient and reliable, but also because they raised fun points as well.

Talking, joking, and hugging were fun. With just those three, my Sim no longer felt the desire to watch TV. As long as he could keep talking, he never wanted to read a book, or play games on his computer. To keep the game understandable and not needlessly complex, the developers generalized a Sim’s need for recreation into a single quantity that rose whenever something that could be construed as fun was accomplished.

It doesn’t work that way in real life, sadly. Given constant exposure to something, we grow tired of it, and we are not as affected by it. Conversely and notably, the absence of something can make us profoundly affected by its reappearance.

For the past year I have been in the presence of amazing friends and socialization. I love being with them and have made shockingly large changes to my plans for next year in order to keep being with them, but they are not everything that I am. They don’t do everything that I like to do. And so sometimes, as much as I want to spend every moment with them, I also want to spend moments relishing the comforts that I enjoyed so dearly before I met them.

Yet even with the best of both worlds at my fingertips, each having done nothing to dilute each other, I can’t have everything I want. I am always missing something, missing someone, neglecting someone.

But given the choice to be everywhere and do everything with everyone, would I take it? Would it only make me tire of everything faster? Maybe it would. But at least I would never have to apologize.

She once told me that if we were to be together, she would probably have an argument with me and break up with me after only a few months. She had told me more than a few times that I couldn’t handle her temper, that no one could, that I was only inviting disaster by asking for full disclosure.

I am reluctant to admit that she was right, but she was.

Yet things were completely different for me when I was instead just a friend. I was able to bear the brunt of an attack the likes of which I’d only seen once before, one that had been a giant blow to my sensibilities. I was able to push past thoughts of her being with other guys, to embrace her as eagerly and passionately as I had done hundreds of times in years past. I was able to learn of things that I would not have thought I could tolerate. I was able to put myself and my own needs above those of other people.

That last note is the one that gives me pause, for that selfishness is exactly what was enabling me to function so well in the presence of difficulties. I have sometimes said that unlike those who treasured independence, I loved being dependent. I loved having someone to whom I could dote on, who would appreciate the details I paid attention to and fuss over.

But I was not always able to meet expectations, and my need for their approval ensured that I always felt it. It is in the dissolution of this dependence that I became more resilient. Perhaps only ever so slightly, but noticeably.

Is the improved defense worth staying single, worth putting myself before other people? Is this, in contrast to how I have lived my life all these years until now, perhaps the better life for me after all? I can already see Cristen telling me that to lead such a life would cause me to miss out on life itself.

Or perhaps I have simply underestimated myself. Perhaps my being unscathed should be attributed not to being selfish, but to simply knowing when I need to back down. Perhaps my tolerance is owed to an understanding of new rules.

The one thing I do know is that being godlike is not all it’s cracked up to be.

It’s still hard to imagine my parents as people who once had lives like the one I’m leading right now. To me, their lives had always started with…well, me.

It’s when tidbits about their past are fed to me that I start to get curious about what their lives were like before they settled down. My father offhandedly mentioned that he actually entered Polytechnic University as a chemical engineer major, only to discover that he didn’t like chemistry. It was then that he turned to silversmithing, and finally deciding on mechanical engineering.

My father, the man who loved his job so much that he set up a drafting table and work environment in his basement, actually thought he wanted to do something else? I can’t imagine him as a chemical engineer, and I didn’t even know silversmithing was a major!

My parents actually bought a house in Brooklyn, on 70th street and 20th avenue. They had intended to move out from our 1-bedroom apartment in Queens, away from all the relatives that lived above us or within a few minutes drive of us, away from the routes and venues and nuances that I know so intimately. I wouldn’t have gone to Montessori, Renaissance, and maybe not even Mega Academy. I would have lived a mere three blocks from my friend Sally, who currently lives two hours away by train.

But for whatever reason, they didn’t move out. My dad drove there during the fall to sweep the leaves in front of the property and in the winter to shovel the snow. Eventually my parents realized that they weren’t going to move there, that taking care of it was too much of a hassle, and that they weren’t strict enough as landlords to make money off of it. They sold the house at a loss just to be rid of it.

When I hear about my parents’ pasts, when I learn about how they stumbled, when I realize that they might be perfect parents but were not always perfect people…through learning about their failures I find the courage to face my own. Not everything fell into place the way they wanted, but I can’t imagine them falling any other way.

Even the naive get tired when the only progress to be made is negative. Luckily nothing ever breaks; instead, incompatibilities are discovered. The ideal was worthwhile, but ultimately it belongs solely to the mellow.

Strangely, the closest I came to crying over her was when she was being cursed out. As with all instances of tearing, I was split between wanting to embrace it and suppress it.

It all came about from a thought that had been stubbornly persistent: if I could go back one year, would the knowledge of one outcome change my behavior? Would I work harder towards keeping us together, or would I be resigned and bitter? Would I do nothing and simply appreciate our time more? If so, what would happen when the last day passes uneventfully? Would I assume that the same events happened and call her a liar?

No, I never assume the worst of people; instead, I fear it. Every action would be laced with hesitation and restraint, every hug less heartfelt, every kiss reminding me of the things she did and might still do. The changes in my behavior would be the same reasons why I couldn’t take her back.

Change is what everything boils down to. What would I change? What has changed? Could I change? Could she?

I have always honestly believed that people can be anything they want to be. That they could change themselves to be whoever they wanted to be. I do not, however, believe that you can change someone else; it has to be purely of your own volition and desire. At the end of the day, you are the only person there who can tell you to keep trying.

So no, I don’t think I would try to change what happened, because I did nothing wrong. I did not give the relationship my all, but I gave the relationship everything I was willing to give. I did not always put her over everyone else because I needed to have a life apart from her, and the presence of that life was kept a particular rift from closing. What happened was not something we had any control over; it was simply a result of how we were.

Given the chance to relive that year, I would do everything the same way I did it, up to the day where it was done, and would once again be done. Would I be able to say all this while in the comfort of her arms? No, but that’s exactly why I wasn’t.

She always told me that she wanted to make me confident in myself. She wanted to make me believe that I was as smart, sweet, witty and cute as she thought I was. I had always thought that somewhere out there, there would be someone who did find my jokes funny, and my quirks cute, my attempts at romance charming. And somewhere out there, there’s someone who really does have the same balloon fetish you do, or thinks that the huge tumor on your forehead is actually pretty damn sexy. In each of my relationships, I had been propelled by sheer excitement. Someone actually liked someone as strange as me? Someone honestly wanted to spend time with me, and just me?

It was possibly the ultimate compliment. It made me feel secure about myself, made me feel that I could be myself and still experience that mystical feeling called love. That there would finally be someone I could pour all my effort into and have them reciprocate in full, that someone would notice all the little things, make me feel all the things I’ve wanted to feel and maybe a little more. And as doubtful as I had been all my life…she actually succeeded.

I noticed my freshman year of college that I approached people with confidence, raised up and cushioned by the fact that I had someone to run back to if a social encounter ever failed. It made me more confident and outspoken around everyone, and I really do have to thank her for that. It made me unafraid of sharing my hobbies, my jokes, my self…and I had a better idea of who that self was. She reinforced that in me, that my real self was so close to the one she loved, such that I embraced it and let it fly. She helped me define me, even while she herself was so unsure.

But the dip in the Styx wasn’t perfect, and the qualities that perhaps made her cling to me so readily and lovingly were the ones that have left deficiencies in me. Would I ever be able to find a girl that didn’t make her interest so obvious? Would I ever be able to ask one out, or make one see me as a lover and not a friend? Would I ever be able to keep one?

Which is why I have posts like this. Thoughts, dreams, nights, days like this. Just optimistic enough to hope, too rational and risk-averse to substantiate. It rarely affects my attitude towards people…but that doesn’t keep it from affecting me. But I’m still here. I’m still hoping. And perhaps one day I’ll start trying and things will start happening. Because now I know what I want to reclaim, match, and exceed. I have her to thank for making me sure like never before of my reasons for defying reason.

Instead of writing what I would like to think about, perhaps I’ll write about what I am thinking about. Which, in fact, is nothing. Nothing at all. I’m feeling more listless now than I have all summer. My mind doesn’t think of quips, it doesn’t think of comforting words, it doesn’t think of conversation…it just doesn’t think. It doesn’t process information. It forces laughs when they’re prompted, it forces eye contact when it’s prompted.

And yet I’m not sure what triggered it. My first day at work was spent being excited, nervous, and cheery. I talked to each and every customer with my usual gusto, left work happy, and met up with friends. And sometime between shopping with them at Bed Bath & Beyond and getting home, a part of me just stopped trying.

Perhaps I’m just tired. I dealt with a lot of people today, and had to wrack my brain for solutions to their questions. I know that I have a low quota for social activity, and I often appreciate alone time after going out with friends. But this isn’t quite a need for alone time, because not even watching TV or checking my RSS feeds provided me with any satisfaction.

I originally attributed it to loneliness. Playing with Bunnie vividly reminded me of the lack of physical contact in my everyday life. As strange as it sounds, I had never missed it before she entered my life. I had appreciated it but never felt a desire for it. She was the one who showed me what I was missing, showed me of the power she held over me. I know that simply by hugging me tightly and not letting go, she could make me forget about my deepest and most entrenched worries. Strange and unnatural for someone who relies so heavily on reason.

But now, there’s no one to go to. This is one of those rare occasions where I actually don’t know the answer to my own question. Perhaps there is an answer out there, but honestly, I don’t even know if there’s a question anymore. And there’s no one to notice that I’m not there asking or answering. The freshmen here are looking for the easygoing friends that they can become lifelong buddies with. My sophmore friends are in their own little worlds, and I suppose I’m in one of my own. The difference is…I’m not so sure I want to be in it by myself. I may have people here with me, but I certainly don’t feel like it. I feel too awkward to call attention to myself, feel embarassed when I do get attention, and yet complain that I don’t get attention?

Maybe I’m not lonely. Maybe I’m just regretting.

Back in Stuy, there was a saying that often wormed its way into speeches or closing opinion pieces in the school newspaper, like that joke about laxative* that stopped being so funny after you’ve heard seven different comics say it in a row. (I am surprised neither was anyone’s yearbook quote.)

Welcome to Stuyvesant High School. Choose two of the three: grades, friends, or sleep.

The Friday before my Astronomy class final, I powered through a monster seven-hour study session with three classmates in preparation for the final. In doing so, not only did I fry my brain, but I finalized my answer to that joke in the process, an answer which I was leaning towards my junior year and had solidified by my final year of high school.

I choose friends. It doesn’t matter what else I have. Without friends, being well-rested just makes me restless and bored. Without friends, the time spent studying seems even lonelier, and the grades feel hollow and pointless. Yet with friends, I can feel energetic and motivated even when I’m running on empty. A dollar spent with friends on five fried dumplings can feel more rewarding than any meal I’ve eaten alone. Friends can make me feel like I have a place in the world, a niche that no job earned by good grades could ever fill. Friends is the only choice that will comfort me when I don’t have the others.

So thank you, all of you, for showing me this unique facet of the world: one where school isn’t everything, where a simple piece of molded plastic can provide infinite enjoyment, where money is no longer considered squandered but merely spent for a good cause. As much as my future clamors for more attention, thank you for grounding me in the present. Thank you for showing me that even though the most enjoyable things are often ephemeral and a waste in the long run, a life not lived is the worst waste of all.

*There are some things that you need to buy together. “Should I get the laxative…or the toilet paper? . . . Give me the laxative. Paper bag, please. And yes, I want the receipt!”

**I was tempted to say, “Friends, I choose you!” but I choked and died a little inside. I still think it’s a tiny bit brilliant, so it’s been relegated to this addendum.

Every character in World of Warcraft is allowed to learn two tradeskills, things like blacksmithing or alchemy, though in WoW they’re called professions. Professions are like college educations; they put you deep into debt in order to complete, and they’re near-worthless until you finally do. Once you’ve learned all that you can, you want to put that knowledge to good use, namely to work off those training expenses. Some people tersely advertise “300 engi/alch,” “port to darn/if/sw 1g,” or “arc transmute 5g.” I chose to advertise a little more flamboyantly.

“Like vibrating mechanical objects, but can’t tell the difference between a Mechanical Squirrel and a Sniper Scope? Want to get back at that mage with an exploding sheep? Let Iskar the Incredible Inventor with his 300 Engineering handle all your engineering needs!”

“Have slippery fingers and keep dropping your vials? Whether it’s Swiftness potions or Rocket Fuel, let Iskar the Incredible Imbiber with his 300 Alchemy handle all your substance-related needs!”

“Parents never talk to you about the birds and the bees? I can reenact the story with your Thorium Bar and Arcanite Crystal for just 5g! Come see the Miracle of Life…arcanite bar style!”

“Tired of Aragon the paladin and Gimlii the warrior begging for money? Change it up and have Llegolaz the hunter beg instead! Take a portal to Darnassus for just 99s! Friends ride free!”

“Tired of the contaminated canals of Lagwind and the soot-filled air of Lagforge? Take a trip to the clean, cool, tree-hugging wonderland that is Darnassus for just 99s! Friends ride free!”

I programmed all of these messages into individual “macros” that so I could advertise a particular service to all three major cities with the click of a button. The biggest rewards would be when people would LOL in the trade channel after my advertisement spam. The racier ones often provoke a LMAO or a WTF. Sometimes people would send me a private message saying that they didn’t need a transmute, but if they did, they’d buy one from me. Whatever the reaction, I enjoyed eliciting them and making money in the process, and it’s something that I’ve missed since I stopped playing WoW. I miss the people in my guild, their quirks, their voices, their talents, their generosity and companionship. I miss completely annihilating players that think I’m an easy target. I miss manipulating the economy, perfecting methods of killing a dozen monsters at a time when other people have to slog through them individually. I miss being good at something. The feeling of success is what I look for in a good game, and I stuck with WoW because it provided it so well.

The game has since changed drastically, and made itself dead to me in the process. I was in love with what it had been, not what it now is. I’m sure that I’ve changed in the interim just as the people who I played it with have changed. Even if they don’t remember me as fondly as I remember them, the least I can hope for is for my guildmaster’s words to ring true: “Iskar, no one will forget your macros.”

I didn’t get any work done when I was sick this past weekend. I had told myself that I’d rather be healthy and unproductive than ill and unproductive, but tonight is a night of healthiness and unproductivity, and I found myself wishing that I was sick so that people wouldn’t blame me for being unproductive. That maybe if I had some terminal illness, people wouldn’t expect anything of me. I don’t want to do any of this. Sometimes I feel like watching TV, or playing games, but honestly I don’t know what I want to do. At times like these I want to do nothing. Just play whatever game I’m hooked on, try new ones, make feigned attempts at exercising, sit around and wallow in my memories, sleep.

Resigning myself to a fate would be so much easier than taking control of it. It’s especially hard when I don’t much care where that fate leads me. College will let me go anywhere, but I don’t want to go anywhere. I want to get a mindless job somewhere and live in a small apartment and spend my free time being lazy and doing useless things. Last summer’s routine was wake up, work, load up World of Warcraft, raid, PvP, sleep, and it was great. I want a boring life like that because it isn’t at all boring. It’s filled with small pleasures. It’s contentment. It’s happiness. It’s having nothing expected of you, nothing asked of you, no goals to meet and no achievements to fulfill.

I have no ambition. My soul was placed in the wrong body. My wonderful family and girlfriend were meant for someone who wanted to go places, to make a name for himself. He was supposed to make his family proud of him. I should have been born into the family that lived in the middle of nowhere and had no prospects, so that nothing would be wasted.

If I had that life, would I ever want more? I don’t know. I certainly didn’t know I would ever want to be dying and in pain. But as I’m lying here in a pile of failures that would take true ambition to climb out of, I’m wondering if I would even have the ambition to do everything differently if I started over. This semester was supposed to be the one where those habits stopped. I always start out so strong, so resolved! But there are more sentences I could use the word “always” in, and none of them speak highly of me.

I need stronger guidance. I need someone’s ambition to ride along, to direct my focus and make use of it. I need someone to recognize what I can do and use me. After that…all I can hope is that they bring me to the top with them.

Sometimes I wonder whether I made the right choice by majoring in computer science. There are definitely parts about the subject that I don’t like: the algorithm analysis, the complex math, the debugging, the snowball effect that results from misunderstanding a concept…

But there are flashes of insight and revelation that completely reassure me that I made a good choice. They make me feel elated and ecstatic, turning my mind into a clairvoyant machine bristling with implications and inferences. My emotions snowball, but this time they gather understanding rather than confusion. Even when I’m doing math that seems way over my head, and that I’ve been struggling with for days, all it takes is that one moment of clarity to completely turn things around.

The most telling sign that computer science is a good fit? When I make those discoveries, I feel really, really geeky. And I love it.

For the past twelve hours I have been thinking entirely in terms of Mario Kart: Double Dash!!: I keep envisioning myself blue sparking. Blue sparking around the enemies in the game I’m playing. Blue sparking around the hall. Blue sparking around my kitchen table.

I loved the game the first time I played it. It was easy to jump into, and it gave you a sense of speed not through being faster than other racers, but by the sheer chaos of what was going on around you. Whether you were facing an incoming shell, a pair of racers bobbing and weaving through your path, or a trio of giant pirahna plants ahead attacking riders who came too close, there was always some impending doom that you had to avoid. Because you received more powerful weapons the farther away from the lead you were, there was always a hope for redemption, and always a paranoia about the people behind you. You know, the ones that wielded weapons even more powerful than yours?

I was obsessed with the game when I learned how to blue spark. All the on-screen chaos became perfectly controllable: a matter of judging the right angle at which to slide down the course and around the corner, of how hard to yank my vehicle to dodge an obstacle, whether I was coming in hard enough to snag the item box or not.

The kicker was that I could do it. Heck, I could do it wonderfully. I no longer just held down the acceleration button down a straightaway, I drifted down it like a snake, relying on the continual speed boosts to propel me faster than I could have gone just driving straight. I was constantly in the zone, each successful powerslide a work of art that I brought about with my own hands.

I believe that my mind is using the memories as an antidepressant, an upper. By constantly reliving my successes, I’m kept in a state of euphoria. It instills confidence into me about my skills and my judgement, my ability to predict what needs to be done and then take decisive action. My mind is cheering me up. My mind is a good friend.

For the past twelve hours I have been thinking entirely in terms of Mario Kart: Double Dash!!: I keep envisioning myself blue sparking. Blue sparking around the enemies in the game I’m playing. Blue sparking around the hall. Blue sparking around my kitchen table. Blue sparking around my worries. Blue sparking around my concerns.

When I blue spark, I feel like I can go anywhere and do anything. The problem is when I can’t, and when blue sparking becomes an obsession instead of a tool. I become so overwhelmed with the need to blue spark that I don’t pay attention to what is in front of me, and tumble face first into the problems blue sparking was supposed to avoid.

My mind means well but sometimes does more harm than good. Like my dependence on constant blue sparking, I have become so reliant on my mind’s tricks that I’m not sure how well I could function without them. I just have to keep practicing and hope that one day I can finally obtain the control it makes me believe I have.

If I had a lifetime to train as a fighter, I would specialize in counters. I would wait until my opponent attacked, then analyze and redirect it to throw him off balance, following up with an attack at the newly created opening.

When I play chess, I always prefer to be black because I do not like taking the initiative when the sides are equal. Even when playing white, I would use the extra move to build up a fortified position. As my opponent would mount an offense, I would deftly repel the attack and then take advantage of the weakness caused by overextending. (Skip to the next paragraph if you’re not a chess geek.) I’m sure you’ve seen a bishop dive towards the side of the board close to the opponent’s pawns in their starting positions in order to snatch up a piece. And I’m sure you’ve seen the bishop get chased back by the pawns, leading to the bishop getting stuck in some obscure nook while the pawn player’s bishop, knight, rook, and possibly queen now have room to breathe. I’m the pawn player. They’ve looked to gain a small advantage or equalize the playing field, and I’ve manipulated the situation to deny it and open up more possibilities for me.

When I play Magic: The Gathering, I actually do not choose to go second. This is because I do not have to actively create new opportunities with all my pieces like in chess; rather, a new opportunity presented to me automatically each turn as I draw cards, and going first ensures that I can strike at an exposed opponent as early as possible. The board starts as a clean slate, unlike chess where everything is already defended. Indeed, my Magic playing style is no different than that of chess or fighting: I am what is aptly called a control player. I enjoy playing cards that break down the foundation my opponent tries to set up, or that nullify his efforts and leave his resources exhausted. By locking my opponent down, I can set up for a decisive blow. I also have a somewhat comparable propensity for cards in aggro decks, since constant overwhelming force keeps the opponent off-balance sometimes more efficiently than a control player could hope for.

I should have expected that in mediums with so many different approaches, I would learn more about myself by examining the strategies I used. I approach social situations the same reserve I bring to duels in Magic and chess. I want to predict the best thing to say or do, but that requires me to deeply understand the people I’m dealing with. I strive to be empathic to the point where I’m easily overloaded. I can read a single person, and am comfortable with a group of sociable friends, but group dynamics with an unknown person tend to be too much for me. In those situations I simply blank out: I’m fully aware of what is going on, and will respond to questions directed towards me, but I can’t manage to think of anything to say. Even when conscious of my absence in the conversation, my mind works impossibly slower at generating anything beyond interjections.

I prefer to read and respond. I may start up conversation with you, perhaps lead a discussion, but make no mistake, I’m still of the same disposition, I’ve just analyzed the situation and determined that provoking a reaction was the best move. I mentally jot down potential conversation starters as the talk progresses, ready to whip out the most interesting one when the energy wanes. With groups, talks tend to move around too much for me to complete so many mental calculations. I can always jumpstart a conversation, but I can’t think of ways to insert my own thoughts between keeping contingency plans and reading the everyone’s attitudes.

I’ve noted many times, most poignantly when handing in late papers, that I should lower the standards I set for myself. If I did not expect myself to be able to handle my opponent’s attack, how would my chess playing be affected? Would I not be as addicted to denial cards in Magic? Would I be more outspoken in conversations?

Cristen’s continued presence in my life answers my question for me. Yes, if I changed my attitude, my behavior would change, possibly for the better. But at the same time, I can be wonderful just the way I am.

Can a couple have a glaring problem go unnoticed until a better lover comes along?

If it was grounds for breaking up, why was it not noticed before?

If it was noticed but ignored for lack of a better lover available, was the deserter justified in making the abandoned believe nothing was wrong and that their future was assured, even while unhappy?

Are reunions really about enjoying each other’s company and bragging about accomplishments? I get the feeling that underneath it all, everyone is secretly interested in not just seeing whether or not their friends have changed, but finding out whether they’ve changed themselves.

There will always be people better than you, but it’s not about being the best; it’s about being there when it counts.

The desk lamp that casts shadows across the room can still wash away my worries and make my room feel like home. I love being in a school with such animate people in abundance, but it’s still nice to be alone with your thoughts. As I look at my desk and see the free pens stolen from Splash and Collegefest, the post-its hanging off the side of my monitor, homemade Japanese flashcards lying next to new ones waiting to be filled, and my keyboard hanging off the table while being supported by an open drawer so that I can have room to put my books, I’m amazed at the extent to which I’ve settled down. In fact, the only thing that shocks me more is the realization that I’m not homesick, but happy and content.

Now if only this cough would go away and I could finally get the hang of Japanese and calculus, everything would be peachy keen.

I’d love some cheap Chinatown food, too.

Everything I hear about MIT brims with coolness. Uberness, even. Running around in the middle of the night trying to avoid campus police, climbing on top of the dome, putting a car on top of the dome, creating ingenius works of technical brilliance, dressing up the school in homage to the video games of old…it’s almost like the school is too crazy to be real. MIT seems like this mystical place where the best of the best go, and do things that are talked about forever.

Perhaps it’s (counterintuitively) because I’ve heard such great things about it that I could never bring myself to even apply there. It’s like I’m not sure if I’d be the person I envision MIT students to be. I don’t know if I’m smart enough, resourceful enough, creative enough, motivated enough - heck, I don’t even know if I’m weird enough! Stories tell of MIT students creating programs in their spare time that I’ve relied for years, yet even when prompted I couldn’t create a program I’d use once a month. It may be that I can’t do it, but I think it’s more that I don’t want to do it. I don’t want to create something amazing, or to explore the intricacies of something we take for granted. That’s not my bag of fun. Mine usually comes in annoyingly Starforce-protected form.

I suppose it’s best summarized by my vocal explanation to my mother as to why I might be hesitant to apply to an extremely techy school like RPI, “I’m like ‘Hey, compsci is pretty cool,’ while people at RPI are like ‘OMG COMPSCI RULEZZZZ!’” I don’t think I could ever make the change that characterizes those students, and I’d be alienated. I’d be the kid that didn’t do anything crazy; he just passed his classes, hung out with friends, and played lots of games.

Yet when I read it, I don’t feel that there’s anything wrong with that life. In fact it sounds great. I love friends, I love games, and I even love classes on occasion. I could live that life for four years in any other college and I wouldn’t mind. I could live a 9 to 5 life for the rest of my life, with random socializing and games to mix it up, and I wouldn’t mind. It’s only when I see people doing so much more with their lives that I start to get envious. I’d love to be them, but I don’t want to be them enough to do anything about it. Is it possible to be content yet left wanting? Can I really be content when I feel inferior?

This jealousy is going to drive me crazy one of these days.

Happy and sad,
Tired and awake,
I’m not sure how much more
of this cycle I can take.

I procrastinate. I sleep at 1 or 2 AM on a daily basis, waking up at 6:25 AM. I do very little homework, if at all, due in no small part to my tendency to get sidetracked as well as starting my homework as late as 11 PM despite coming home several hours earlier. I regularly feel remorse for my actions, though inaction would be the more appropriate term, and then five minutes later go back to procrastinating.

And yet I keep doing it because once the ten seconds of remorse runs its course, I’m perfectly content. Maybe even happy. There are plenty of things I love to do in the world, plenty of things that I have already done, and plenty of things that I have yet to do. I could step away right now and I’d be satisfied with the things I’ve done. Content with the memories made.

That contentment is perhaps what’s keeping me from being more efficient. Most of the time I like how my life is going. Sure, I’m sleepy during particular classes, and will eventually get yelled at by a teacher for handing in a project late, but I’ll do fine. I’ve done fine, I will do fine, and I’ll be content with however “fine” is defined, so why change that?

I had thought that with my shifting from Xanga to Blogger to Deadjournal to Freewebs to Movable Type to Wordpress that maybe I wasn’t a traditional. I do like new techy things: new gadgets, new programs, new discoveries. Yet the more I think about it, while there may be instances where I like to shift around, I really prefer to settle into grooves. Be it in an online world or in school, I’ve had the most fun when it was something I could rely on.

I just hope that when the dust has cleared after I’ve left college, that something will be a someone.