Back to the Present

As is common among young adults leading meandering lives, I sometimes take a stab at blogging.  I had one going strong a few years ago until eventually my posts dwindled to the point where I was basically only taking the time to make Oscar predictions, thinking that perhaps someone might care.  But I’m back again because this is America, which means that I have a voice, and this is the Internet, which means that I naturally assume everyone should want to hear what I have to say.  

Just now I’m home for the summer, awaiting graduate school, and I have very few ways of passing the time.  I found myself fondly recalling those times when I read fervently and took time to process the words I took in, frequently on my blog.  Or when I watched movies with such focus, that I simply had to go write about what I had seen - whether to share my experience with others or to selfishly relive it, I do not know, and do not especially care.

I have not taken that same time and care with my thoughts this summer, sometimes creating a facebook post or a tweet to summarize a brief insight, sometimes just pushing it to the back of my mind.  I have read less, I have certainly read scripture and other works of spiritual substance less, and I have watched more lighter-fare television shows than the types of films that had such an impact on me last year or the year before.  Is this laziness on my part?  Or perhaps exhaustion?  Again I do not know, and do not especially care because I hope that trend is past and I might once again find the energy and will to actively engage with the art of film and writing that I love so deeply, or with the discussions of religion and politics that so invigorate me.  

This is my recommitment to analytical thought, to careful consideration of the things I see and take in.  But it won’t be the same as my last blog.  It cannot be.  A few weeks ago I went to see Midnight in Paris, Woody Allen’s latest film, about a writer who gets the opportunity to visit 1920s Paris which he loves and admires dearly, meeting Hemingway, Dali, Picasso, Fitzgerald, and Stein.  He realizes though that the past he admires has a past of its own - he learns that it is just in our nature to always look back nostalgically, wistfully yearning for what used to be, either ignoring or unaware of the important present.  

So I intend to write here, now, in my present, about what I see or hear or learn or feel.  I acknowledge that this is primarily an exercise in my own mental stimulation, and that the majority of you who stumble upon this site, likely following a link I post elsewhere, just don’t give a crap.  But I invite anyone who does read this to give feedback on my thoughts and opinions, to challenge me, to ask me to cover other topics.  Hopefully I’ll get the ball rolling in a day or two.  See you then.