mahiwaga

Contrary to the claims of my friends, disconnecting my Internet connection at home has failed to improve my social life. In fact, since I also don't have a T.V. anymore, or a phone line, and I'm not really sure that I'm still receiving mail at my erstwhile place of residence, I'm rapidly losing touch with any semblance of "reality" (whatever that may be) and I don't know when anything is supposed to happen anymore. Since I don't have my computer on almost 24-7 anymore, I'm not even sure what day of the month it is half the time.

Somewhat ludicrously, I think my sporadic posts to this blog are the only evidence to the outside world that I am, in fact, still alive.

This entry on f(r)ictions caught my eye, mostly because I am a supernerd who stupidly took the organic chemistry class that only chemistry majors and chemical engineering majors usually take, and the schematic of organic molecules reacting snared me.

But, even more synchronously, I have been using the term "free radical" to euphemistically refer to newly single people in my (increasingly incestuous) circle of friends here in the Midwest. (Skip the following if you have no interest in reading about organic chemistry or biochemistry—which I imagine will be both of my readers) The analogy, while extraordinarily nerdy, is, I think, also apt. Think of break-ups as the splitting of covalent bonds. Depending on how tight the bond was (how strong the relationship was) and how much energy was expended to break the bond (how dramatic the circumstances of the break-up were), you will end up with (1) two atoms that momentarily split apart, then rapidly join back together again (2) two atoms that were loosely bonded anyway even before the energy was applied, and which rapidly drift apart, either calmly binding with other unbound atoms or simply going its separate way as a stable, single atom or (3) two atoms that separate with explosive force, shearing electrons this way and that—in other words, creating free radicals.

Now, just as in a reaction chamber, the result of such a reaction depends on the neighboring molecules. If the other molecules in the chamber are sufficiently stably bonded, the free radicals will eventually shed their unpaired electrons without much ado. But if the other molecules are unstable as well, likely all hell will break loose. A chain reaction will ensue until some stable state is attained, which is typically nothing like the starting conditions.

You squeeze a bunch of molecules tight enough together, and some interesting (though possible devastating) things can happen.

Very few elements actually stay unbound, though. There are, of course, the noble gases, such as helium, neon, argon, and xenon, but even argon and xenon can be induced to bind to oxygen or fluoride, given enough energy. Non-reactive single atoms are very rare indeed.

So I suppose that's either a blessing or a curse, depending on whether you think explosions are a good thing or not.

(Some random scrawlings that I can't seem to make coherent)

Knowing that these are My Last Days in this City makes everything dreamlike and surreal, like I'm waiting for my own personal apocalypse.

The past and present meld together in a spiraling, feedback fashion. As I walk aimlessly across this urban matrix, I orient myself through space with nothing but memories: I pass that patch of sidewalk where he pointed the gun at me. I walk across that parking lot where my buddy took off his shirt and just about took off his pants before we stopped him. I drive down the street where we tried hailing cop cars to take us home. I walk past that club where my other buddy picked up those two women and where we danced countless drunken, sweaty nights—these last memories all blur, smeared by alcohol and repetion.

I try to un-know these past few years, pretend that I am once again caught in the moment, exploring this vast place that I am now familiar with (though I only learned an infinitesimal increment about it)

Knowing that my immediate future lies completely elsewhere, literally half a continent away, it is close to impossible to start anything new. No matter how adventurous I feel, I find myself walking through the same familiar streets, drinking at the same, tired bars. The only difference is that I no longer meet familiar faces.

My own personal, transient history is being erased even before I leave this place for the final time. I realize it is megalomaniacal to expect that I would leave a mark in this place, but the immensity of this city and my insignificance in it bears down on me in this solitary days.

The weather has morphed at least six times since I've been sitting here, recapitulating the seasons, with change to spare. The bright, blue sky of summer, the brooding grey of winter, the deep dark, pregnant rain clouds, the yellow glow of the sunlight gleaming through the breaking bank of clouds.

It's odd, this feeling, that, despite knowing precisely where I'm going to be in the next month (well, not precisely, but about as precise as you can be given the changing tides of Fate, Godel's Law of Incompleteness, and Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle), I feel completely directionless.

It doesn't help that there are a hundred, thousand trivial tasks that pull at me this way and that, these ridiculous loose ends that, like dandelions or gophers, just keep popping up.

It's like this cosmological game of Whack-a-Mole.

I still marvel at the sensation of being completely isolated and disconnected despite being embedded in a rock-and-concrete organism made up of millions of people. Sometimes, much like how motion-sickness and the concomitant nausea can creep up on you, I lose my sea legs and plumb the depths of this seething loneliness. Then I regain my equilibrium and composure, and plunge on dazedly, immune to passion, sorrow, or joy. It's amazing the sorts of things human beings can adapt to.