San Marcos Thoughts

Two concepts whirl in my mind now.

The first is Candide, which I just finished reading on the Kindle, quickly also, as if it were my task of brushing my teeth or of setting up a new Web UI page. Regardless, I feel I have gleaned primordial concepts from its words.

About the world being perfect or not... yes, I've had those same tingling doubts in me. And yes, I've also arrived at the futility of placing a categorical label on this incomparable world. Worldly goods, pleasures, all of the exotic diversity of wealth, arts, and knowledge in the world... it all excites and engages a curious mind, but wherein lies the promised panacea? I have not found it, and I had no remaining leads, and the best replacement I found was following the interminable string of desires and curiosities placed before me, whether they be mundane, noble, seflish, or altruistic. And each one I followed, whether I completed it or not, left me pleased or fulfilled for a paltry short time. For all goals end... wherefore lies then happiness? Life's aim? Ultimate purpose?

Candide states its ungrandiose, quieting secret almost at its end. First it settles all of its surviving characters at an isolated farm somewhere outside Constantinople, and scarcely a paragraph after thus situated, the old woman compares the myriad horrors and miseries all of them together had undergone with having nothing to do. Which was worse - the worst horrors that Voltaire could imagine its multiple miserable characters dragging through Life with, or having nothing to do. Nothing to do!! The worst horrors in the world are inconclusively matched against inaction! Lack of action is posed as possibly the worst evil in the world! "Martin especially concluded that man was born to live either in a state of distracting inquietude or of lethargic disgust".

Soon after, the closest idea to a solution appears in the words of an unassuming Turkish farmer: "... our labour preserves us from three great evils - weariness, vice, and want". Wow. And that chapter is dense in morals:

"Grandeur is extremely dangerous according to the testimony of philosophers"

"Let us work without disputing; it is the only way to render life tolerable"

And after Pangloss' final remark, which again defends its best of possible worlds: "...for if you had not been kicked out....... you would not be here eating preserved citrons and pistachio-nuts", Candide states Voltaire's quiet balm to the harsh complexities of the book's treatises...:

"All that is very well", answered Candide, "but let us cultivate our garden"

And all too true.

As for the other concept that inundates me.

Laura.

She's been in my mind. I was in Montana, and I thought how much she'd like it. I thought the same at Circle of Children. I sought her out while in Pittsburgh, but she had no time. I've been roving through the US, staying in Austin, languishing from lack of action before and after I came to Guatemala. Aparna's invitation to San Marcos was a refreshing spark of hope, and one single full day after having seen her again, I feel the beginnings of mental weariness, apathy, despondency, already sprouting somewhere in me. I do what I want, I go where I want, and I accomplish nothing. Worthy life? Hardly, but for the lessons it may provide for later decisions.

But I keep returning to that which I avoid in my mind, due to shame, or to pride, or to guilt, or to fear of disturbance. To rejection? To disappointment. But she's THERE. Seeing her smile, feeling that close connection and understanding, her tender care, her kind disposition... but beyond that, just... her... she comes to my mind, and overrides my years of hiding from telling her what I really want to create with her. A shared life, sweetened by our matching energies and visions.

I haven't really talked to her in almost two years, and the last time we even talked on the phone was 3 months ago. And despite the taunting questions "is it even possible? Can she even feel the same again? Isn't she otherwise engaged now? Would not someone else have enchanted her since then?", I must tell her. Whatever I do, she is in me. And her previously-absurd words of "I'm now looking for Earth, not for Air anymore" resonate with me now. And I ought to tell her. In person. As soon as I can. How soon can it be? As soon as after Google's interview? As soon as I can. But in person. So I must go to Pittsburgh. How soon? Now? Yes, I can go now. How feasibly? Very. I just require... the will. Do I have it? I want it. It's the one thing that matters. Google's offer simply presents feasible means... but she represents the purpose. The purpose! The main attraction - whom I'd gladly devote my time and effort to making happy.

Yes, doubting questions assail. But my resolution is growing stronger, and I ought to uphold Truth to myself and to Her. Here I go!