I went to New York City for the first time last weekend with a group of friends. We rented a big and disgusting SUV to go to a conference on oil and slime and geotrauma inspired by Reza Negarestani's text Cyclonopedia, which you should check out sometime if you're in the mood for disconcerting speculative realism. I learned a few important things while I was there. It is disconcerting to be with someone you love, but rarely see, and come to terms with changes - that is, changes in them, and the changes in yourself that become visible in that exchange. I only realize how I change when I witness old friends' responses to me in new settings and new times. It is not a negative experience so much as humbling. And it requires a period of grace - to recognize that this is what it means to love someone - to take things as they are. When you love, you are capable of doing that, I think. It is too big a burden if you don't. Don't love, that is. I also realized that my boyfriend is extremely important to me. In the moment - on a rooftop patio overlooking midtown Manhattan and the Empire State building, surrounded by drunk people - that I realized our paths wouldn't line up that night, I just felt such a pain and loss that I haven't felt in a long time. New York is one of those places that needs to be experienced with the people you love, or else it is just exhausting and anxiety inducing, at least for someone like myself. I am blessed to have spent most of my time with one person I love, but lacking my better half during a time at which I so needed him made me realize the extent to which I have found something profound in another person.
I also realized that I am very happy with my life now, to the point at which even such glamorous alternatives as NYC in the springtime are relatively unnecessary in comparison. I love being invested so deeply in work I love, I love being out from under the burden of unfriendly thinkers (i.e. Lacan) and in the arms of those who want me there (i.e. Deleuze).
I don't really have the time or desire to blog anymore, but sometimes it is cathartic. That was the original intent. I don't really have the outlet anymore, except maybe in my working-through theory and philosophy. In any case, followers - drift away, float away, slowly dwindle. I am happy with a whimper and not a bang for an ending.