gvg@hp-pcd.UUCP (gvg) (04/07/85)
from: G.V. Goebel
to: This newsgroup
date; Sunday, 7 March 1985
I've been making a survey of the Net, in hopes of finding enough
interesting material to make up a technical newsletter for the
Portable Computer Lab here at Hewlett-Packard Corvallis.
You might say I'm "just passing through" this notesfile. The thing
that made me pause here was the odd memories that these remarks
dragged up ... from back in 1971, when I was going to Western
Washington State University, way up I-5 in Bellingham, Washington.
I used to think of suicide on occasion in those days; what makes the
memory interesting is that the thought seems inconceivable now ... and
I wonder: "I wonder what happened that makes things so different now?"
I'm not a hundred percent sure, and I am reluctant to say too much,
lest I sound like I am trying to give people advice ... I don't
consider myself a wise man, I would not be such a pompous fool as to
pretend I am ...
... but the temptation is hard to resist.
I guess what happened is that I just realized that worry was
counterproductive. Sure, there were many things that were far from
satisfactory - but worrying about them didn't not do much good. (In
fact, I find that it is completely impossible to get along with people
once my reasons for doing so are based on worry.)
One of the really nice things about middle age is that I take things so
unseriously. I found out that most people really did not notice me at all
- and then I realized: Why should they? And does it make much difference
if they do or not? I found out that people - myself included - really do
not do things for intellectual reasons - they do them for emotional reasons
that they themselves may not understand. I found out that life can be
pretty mundane - and, as such, perfectly pleasant ... and so on: things
are not what I was told they were, but it's no big deal.
End of ego trip, thanks for indulging me, and please don't ask me to do it
again.
It's been a beautiful week, I hope you enjoyed it.
Regards - GVG
hplabs!hp-pcd!gvg
PS: Once upon I time I played Unitarian for about a year and a half - a
disagreeable experience, I ended up getting disgusted with them and slipped
quietly out the back door one day; never went back.
One of the Unitarians - who I knew at work - came up to me some time later
and did a thorough analysis of my shortcomings and limitations. He
concluded that I should probably commit suicide.
I found the whole conversation - actually, it was more a monologue - pretty
appalling. I didn't say much at the time; all I could think of later was:
"If I'm gonna get crazy enough to kill either of us, mister, you can BET the
person WON'T be ME!"
ILLEGITIMI NON CARBORUNDUM