Yugen

Dawn Disquisition #1

It’s 5:47am, and I’ve been awake all night. Again. Usually the culprit is insomnia, this time amphetamines. Mathematically speaking: 

[(stormy night+alone+excess dopamine/serotonin/norepenephrine)*(3 hours)]^(procrastination)=this

Definitely supposed to be studying right now. Or if not studying, at least doing something more productive than updating my blog.. however, apathy seems to be a relentlessly assaulting me these days. 

If you happen to be in that unlikely company who somehow found their way to this post, this picture, this text, this paragraph, this sentence and finally these words: allow me a disclaimer. The rest of this post is an attempt at an honest account who I am right now and my life as I perceive it—including but not limited to all of my darkest vices and most decadent habits. In the event I actually follow through with this blog, it will hopefully be a permanent and easily accessible chronicle of my life and my perceptions, ideas, and intellectual development. If all of that sounds sort of boring to you, feel free to continue on your merry way. If you’re mildly interested but are too lazy and/or time-constrained, you can skim through the main points in bold.

In a way, this blog is a Facebook baby—that’s where I first became addicted to what social scientist’s are referring to as “ambient awareness.” If you partake in this mass social networking phenomena, then you obviously know it’s not the best medium for thoughts and ideas.. and even less so when you live in College Station, Texas and are a progressive libertarian atheist with a hometown in the most God-fearing backwoods of East Texas in an influential Christian sorority at the most conservative public university in South Texas. Me.

When your status update is delivered to the news feeds of a friend base that consists largely of radically intolerant conservative and/or religious population—not to mention 200 sorority sisters upon whom my statuses reflect—I can hardly update my Facebook about my daily secularist epiphanies or the latest drug I’ve tried. Or be vulgar. Sometimes the only way to most effectively emphasize a point is with a well-placed “fuck” or “goddamn,” neither of which quite pass the sorority standard for lady-like behavior.

So this is a place created for who I really am. This is where the real me can breathe. This is where all of my most genuine opinions, divergent inspirations, eccentric thoughts, audacious ideas and impassioned rants reside unstifled.

So who am I exactly? Externally, an undergraduate biological chemistry (recently changed from chemical engineering) major attending Texas A&M University with an intention of going to pharmacy school. More closely examined, a lover of science and understanding the nature of the universe hoping to make a career out of studying drugs, one of my favorite interests/hobbies.. As one of my greatest inspirations, Alexander Shulgin, puts it so eloquently: 

“Use them with care, and use them with respect as to the transformations they can achieve, and you have an extraordinary research tool. Go banging about with a psychedelic drug for a Saturday night turn-on, and you can get into a really bad place, psychologically. Know what you’re using, decide just why you’re using it, and you can have a rich experience. They’re not addictive, and they’re certainly not escapist, either, but they’re exceptionally valuable tools for understanding the human mind, and how it works.” 

I’m usually studying some random sub-branch of chemistry (organic, inorganic, physical, quantum, quantitative, thermodynamic, electro, etc etc) for whatever class, but in my free time I like to paint, play video games, travel, go to music festivals, and use the internet as a soapbox for my excessively lengthy if not occasionally gratuitous rants.

Intrinsically, defining myself is not so simple. (In fact, I actually stopped here several hours ago when I hit a block and started stumbling. I know, it’s impressive I even came back at all.) I like to think—possibly wrongly so—that I possess an aptitude for self-criticism and my observations on my character are as sincere as that allows. One word adjectives tend to be the most easy and efficient descriptive tools.. In a nutshell, I am: curious, chaotic, restless, irresponsible, capricious, nocturnal, perceptive, demiurgic, passionate, impatient, short-tempered, impulsive, empathetic, playful, sarcastic, skeptical, decadent, unconventional, selfish, stubborn, resourceful, quixotic, and insecure.  I’m happiest during thunderstorms, grey days, and nighttime. Emotional extremities make me uncomfortable. Sometimes I talk way too much, sometimes I spend hours in impenetrable introspection. In the past, I have been deceptive, manipulative, and cruel—but I’m trying to make up for that. My family comes before everything else. I like to surround myself with people who make me laugh. These guys are my current favorites.

I suppose that’s it for now, I’m already quite late for my Anthropology of Religion class.