Entropy

I have this strange feeling that my universe is shrinking. It seems like it's an unavoidable part of life for most people. I've felt for the longest time that I was constantly meeting more and more and more people. Then I graduated college, moved away, my friends scattered, and old people I knew since I was a kid started dying off. Bridgewater was nice because it had assembled a network of hundreds of really bright 20-30 year olds, but beyond work, it was really, really hard to meet new people. After I made it back to Columbia, things still seemed a little easier, but the sense of stability I'd known since I was a kid was gone. People are mobile, even in backwoods South Carolina. With all the technology it's still so easy to lose touch with people you really care about. Let's also add that people get married, have kids, and get tied up in their own little universes, or they chase some career they think will make them happy. I just feel like I am trying to make this nice neat little core group of friends, but life/time is like some centrifuge pulling apart the pieces of life I cling to so dearly.

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On to other, more inspiring topics. Neitzsche talks about the Übermensch, or overman. It's his archetypal person.

"All beings so far have created something beyond themselves; and do you want to be the ebb of this great flood and even go back to the beasts rather than overcome man?"


I've got a few friends who I think may be living close to their potential. One is a professional poker player, one is a professional cyclist, one ran for mayor right here and Columbia and owns his own graphic design business, one who was teaching English in South America and is going into the Peace Core, one just got her PhD in Epidemiology from Johns Hopkins. They aren't extraordinary people, but they are people doing what they love, what they think needs to be done, and making a living by doing it.

Right now I am not. I am taking the easy way. The secure way. I am doing what people with jobs do. It's not very exciting. I feel like a shell of a man. This was a chance to be great, and I suppose I did it use to do some things I have always wanted, but I also squandered it. I had unlimited free time and guaranteed income. Yes, I paid off my debt, fixed up my house, got a new car, ect.... but so what. I could have just sold me house and been done with owning it for good. I think working to make the neighborhood a better place was a solid goal, and I actually accomplished a good bit in that regard, but ever since January, I've been off my horse. Just dicking around.

Anyway, I have some things of my own that I want to do. I'm trying to be practical, but it doesn't mix very well with idealism, or what my parents expect and want out of me. I didn't think their opinion of me mattered very much, but I when I told my dad I wanted to camp out on one of the islands on the Broad River for a few weeks and then canoe from Columbia to Charleston (on top of my ecovillage, NYC & Europe plans) and he gave me some disapproving look with a furrowed brow and cocked head. It made me feel like I am just being childish and need to grow up. I didn't realize they still had that power over me. It made me rethink what I was doing, but I think he worries I am going to be some lazy indolent bum like my mom's brothers... I am not worried about that, but I really do think life is a game... a game no one can win. I see no reason not to enjoy it while I have the chance. I guess I am just torn between taking the plunge (doing what I really want) and passing up an opportunity to be successful in a conventional sense (good career in finance, lots of money, pretty wife) and I am trying to juggle the two at the same time and as a result, am doing a half-assed job on both.