Sometimes I enjoy me time, not always but sometimes. I believe it makes me happy, happy to be at one with myself, happy to think my own thoughts without anyone interjecting with reality and explaining that my thoughts are little more than pipe dreams… and what exactly are pipe dreams? I often wonder about the terms we use and where they actually derive from, usually I can’t be bothered to research them, my lackadaisical nature is such that I’m content to wallow in ignorance rather than seek out the truth…what does that say about me? For what it’s worth I like to imagine that pipe dreams is some reference to the thoughts garnered by people who have smoked some marijuana, in a pipe obviously, and who have not thought out the practicalities of their thoughts… a bit like me believing Jennifer Aniston or Neve Campbell will one day call me up and ask me for a date, actually…fuck the date, I always imagine they just want to make love to me… yes, make love, not fuck me senseless =)
But pipe dreams make us happy, even if only for a moment and that moment is all we need to get along isn’t it? Let’s face it, what else do we have? The vast majority of the human race, if they are fortunate enough to be employed, don’t actually enjoy their jobs, most of us do it as a means to an end, it pays the bills and, if we’re lucky, allows us the freedom to buy a decent bottle of wine or malt which will numb the pain of reality for a few hours…If we’re not so lucky we’ll make do with the cheap supermarket hooch that does the same job but leaves us with a shitty headache the next day.
Happiness, what is it? why doesn’t it last? I’ve been happy, quite a few times actually, but it never seems to be long lasting… I mean if happiness were anything other than a state of mind we’d be happy all the time wouldn’t we? Hmm… upon writing that I realise I’ve slightly contradicted my own statement… If it is a state of mind then surely we can condition ourselves to be always happy, you know, like those nutjobs you see who are always grinning and trying to spread cheer to us all… usually religious nutjobs who believe ‘god’ or ‘jesus’ has entered them and is channelling good thoughts to us all.. well, I’m sorry, the only Jesus I know is a dumb fuck Spanish waiter in Soho and whilst he may enter you, I doubt the brand of happiness he’s offering is any longer lasting that the one you get from a 1986 Borolo, sorry to burst your bubble folks…
Let’s face it, life sucks, if we take the good times and add them up and then take the not so good times (I’m reluctant to say bad for fear of imposing needless negativity to the subject) I’ll bet my sweet ass to Jesus (the waiter from Madrid) that the good times end up in the minority column… Don’t believe me? Count how many times you’ve been happy since you were 18, I won’t start before then as the formative teen angst years are too much of a handicap, so come on, just looking at your life as of today, can you really say you’ve been happy the majority of the time? If you’re sitting there saying yes and disagreeing with me then I’m calling you a fucking liar! Be honest, you’re fooling no one but yourself… yeah that’s right, add them up, the happy times are outnumbered but that doesn’t stop us believing and nor should it… don’t for a second believe I’m happy being unhappy that’s too easy, if I believed that I wouldn’t be constantly questioning the whole charade we call life…
I read a great quote by Douglas Adams, author of The Hitch-hikers Guide to the Galaxy, it sort of puts it all into perspective and one day, when I get high on marijuana again I’m gonna try and remember it so I can pontificate over it with friends who will tell me to shut the fuck up. Here’s what Mr Adams had to say…
It is known that there is an infinite number of worlds, but that not every one is inhabited. Therefore, there must be a finite number of inhabited worlds. Any finite number divided by infinity is as near to nothing as makes no odds, so if every planet in the Universe has a population of zero then the entire population of the Universe must also be zero, and any people you may actually meet from time to time are merely the products of a deranged imagination.
Beautiful, isn’t it? OK, well I thought it was… it made me happy so who’s to say I’m wrong and you’re right? or vice versa for that matter!
For all I’ve said on the frailty of happiness, I still cling to my own happy memories as I’m sure you do to yours, with luck during the reading of this entry you’ve recalled a few happy times from the past that were close to being buried under the avalanche of shit we call life… However, I urge you not to cling to those moments too tightly, don’t hold onto them as beacons to be held up in the night as if to show us the path forward, rather remember them with respect and use them as motivators to future happiness because eventually we will forget them, hopefully only because we’ve replaced them with more recent memories that bring us warm, snugly feelings of joy and no, I’m not back to thinking of Jennifer and Neve… or maybe I am?! ;-)
And so, I end with the usual musical interlude, provided today by Nick Drake and his hauntingly melodic Ride…enjoy, I always do =)
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