Tag: Waxing Philosophical
What’s Been Going On
A Good Juicy Paradox Since the birth of my daughter Persephone, life has been very interesting to say the least. That comes as no surprise, and yet it’s a huge surprise at the same time. Contradict myself much? I do love a good juicy paradox. It’s no surprise because, after all, it’s blindingly obvious that […]
Read More → What’s Been Going OnDeleuzional
Choice quote from the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy’s entry on Gilles Deleuze: Overlooking many important nuances, we can say that Deleuze’s basic notion is that in all realms of being intensive morphogenetic processes follow differential virtual multiplicities to produce localized and individuated actual substances with extensive properties. Simply put, the actualization of the virtual proceeds […]
Read More → DeleuzionalHow Marxist Are You?
I was recently contacted by a college student at a certain large Midwestern state-sponsored university. It seems he was enrolled in a revolutionary film studies class, and was working on an assignment to give a Marxist reading of a radical media text, and he chose ROX. His task: to compare us on a scale of […]
Read More → How Marxist Are You?Hellacious Saturday
As I rode my bike to my book club yesterday morning, I wondered idly what name the day might have. Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Easter Sunday… surely this Saturday must have a name too? We had a new visitor to our book circle, a woman named Charlotte. I’d guess her to be somewhere around my […]
Read More → Hellacious SaturdayTruncated Scale
A friend recently commented on how our country is politically polarized. Yes, I feel that — but I also feel that many of us are apathetic and alienated from the political process. How could these both be true? It seems contradictory, paradoxical. Perhaps the answer, or part of it, has to do with our narrowly […]
Read More → Truncated Scale“Are You Going to Help Other People?”
One of the young volunteers asked me a pertinent question yesterday: “So, when we get done painting your house, are you going to help other people with their houses?” I confessed that I hadn’t thought about it. I’ve been so focused on our own renovation for almost three years now. “That’s how some people I’ve […]
Read More → “Are You Going to Help Other People?”A Note from Dad
Dad wrote me a nice note and, since I know he reads this blog, I thought I’d answer him here.
Read More → A Note from DadIt’s Like
We’ve been slowly re-occupying our full house. We’ve been living all cramped up in half of it for two and a half years. The other half, the lower floor, was under renovation for waaay longer than I’d expected. But the flood that caused our renovation also disrupted the lives of everyone we knew, including my […]
Read More → It’s LikeVoting Philosophy
My voting philosophy is pretty simple. Here are my general rules: Vote against the incumbent, if there is one. Don’t vote for a candidate of either of the two major entrenched parties. These are not rigid by any means. I’ll make an exception if I believe in a particular candidate or if some other calculus […]
Read More → Voting PhilosophyUltimate Arguments For and Against Having Kids
Note: I was working on this miniature essay just before Katrina. I’ve only just finished now. I fully realize that most people don’t think much about whether or not to have kids. They either know what they want and act on that instinct, or they don’t think about it at all and just do what […]
Read More → Ultimate Arguments For and Against Having Kids