So my loan for this semester came in, and I now have $4500 in the bank.
By my standards, that makes me rich. It is a strange feeling. I am so used to subsistence thinking that any change in that feels bizarre.
On the one hand, I feel more emotionally secure. I feel like the world is, at last, smiling on me a little, and that makes me feel far less vulnerable to the whims of fate in this cruel world.
On the other hand, I have to admit that I feel less connected to others. Only a little, but it is weird and offputting. It is like we are all socialists when we have nothing, but once we have something, we shift into thinking MINE MINE MINE! And the further along the scale of ownership we go, the more we go towards that end of the scale.
It kind of makes sense from an animal psychology point of view. In the animal world, there is no such thing as passive ownership. You only own what you can defend, So ownership includes the possibility of having to fight off other animals, including members of your own species, in order to keep it, whether utter is a banana, a fresh kill, or a mating territory.
And the less civilized parts of the human mind still feel like that. No matter how safe and secure society becomes, there is still a very loud voice in our beads saying that They are coming for our stuff and we have to be ready to defend it.
This manifests itself in many ways. In one person, it drives them to become a survivalist in order to justify taking wildly extravagant measures in home defense. In another, it drives anti-immigrant sentiment because she feels like that “They” are taking “Our” jobs. In still another, it fuels Psuedo-libertarian paranoia about the government taking “my money”.
You will notice that all three forms represent strains of conservative thought. That is no coincidence. The very core of conservatism is the primitive mind rebelling against the higher mind. And this paranoia of which I speak is very primitive indeed.
If there are liberal examples of this phenomena, I would very much like to know.
Back to my money.
I already know a few things I will get with it. New shoes for sure. Mine are so old their soles keep trying to get into Heaven (groan). And I eagerly await being able to buy a three hole punch and some hole reinforced paper.
When you are an adult, the smallest things make you happy.
Other than that, I dunno. Maybe a new tablet.
(—)
I am now sitting in my favorite Whites Spot, blogging, waiting for my food.
Everything before this section was typed as I waited for several buses to take me homeward.
I missed the first one, but it was a huge longshot in the first place. History class ended early and I thought there was a tiny chance I might be able to make the 6:41 bus instead of waiting for the 7:13.
And I might have made it if I hadn’t stopped to pee. Damn my diabetic’s bladder!
Instead, I trudged back up the stairs to wait for the next bus inside, where it’s warm.
The next time, I was on my way back down when disaster struck. My trick ankle buckled and I went a tumble down the concrete steps.
Luckily, I was only two steps from the bottom. It could have been so much worse. But still, I fell, and landed right on my bad knee.
Didn’t expect this kind of pulse pounding excitement, did you?
So there I am, in serious pain, lying on the cold winter pavement. And freaking out, saying “Oh god, no!” over and over, because all I can think about is that my full weight just came down on my bad knee and probably broke it in a much more serious way.
Basically, I thought I wouldn’t be able to walk.
Luckily, no serious damage was done. That’s why I am blogging from my favorite White Spot and not Richmond Hospital. I have some form of through the fabric scrape on the affected knee, but otherwise, I am shaken but okay.
Today’s Canadian History Since 1867 was rough because the middle section was all about how horribly racist tge West Coast was between 1890 and World War One. The Chinese, the Japanese, and the East Indians all had discriminatory and extraordinarily racist immigration laws aimed at them, including the dreaded Head Tax, and they were all the targets of mob violence from which tge law provided no protection whatsoever.
It was pretty fucking harsh. And depressing, considering the same shit is going down regarding Muslims today.
It is like people love the idea of “good things for everyone” when they think of it meaning good things for them, but lose grip on the concept when someone points out that “everyone” includes people they don’t like.
“When you said everybody, I didn’t know you meant like… EVERYBODY. Just, you know…everyone who counts. You know… real people. Humans.”
This is the sort of thing that tempts me toward misanthropy. But you can’t be both a humanist and a misanthrope. They are diametrically opposed.
It is weird how many people don’t get that. More of that “everybody but not EVERYBODY” thinking, I guess. You can’t love humanity and hate people, and if you think you can, you probably have some serious interpersonal and logical issues to work on.
Well, time to head home.
(—)
Home now. Took a cab. How decadent! At first I was thinking I would walk or maybe wait for the bus, but when I was done eating, I noticed it was raining, and I said “Nope! Taxi it is. ”
And I tried to tip the cabbie. I really did. The fare was $5.60 and I handed him a ten. I told him twice that he could just give me three bucks back, but each time is replied with something completely incomprehensible to me (either because it was not in English or in an accent so thick that it was effectively not in English”, and so I shrugged as he handed me back exact change.
No tip for you tonight, I guess.
That’s enough from me now. It’s been a pleasant day (overall) and I am going to flop out.
I just wish every day could like this.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.