Some background to what follows can be found here. Other installments are here.
I started this as a way to train at touch typing (hence the title) which I have finally taken up learning more or less seriously. At first I was typing what nonsense came across my mind and deleted it once I had finished. Gradually, it just turned into a diary relating the events (not very numerous) of my life. This has also the advantage of keeping me relatively busy at work when I have nothing else to do which seem to happen rather frequently these days.
29 January 2002
Time for another session of touch-typing. Nothing to do this morning, so I might as well train a little more. I seem to be getting slightly more agile and to be making fewer mistakes although the speed is not really there yet.
As far as life is concerned, things seem to be brightening up slightly. The weekend was quite busy, which makes a very welcome change from the usual.
First there was the Chorus’ Xmas party; slightly delayed because they were celebrating their 10th anniversary over the Xmas period and thus had to postpone the party. It was taking place in a pub in Camden Town (The Black Cap) which had been rented for the occasion. Entertainment included a duo of standing comedian who were really funny and a twisted award ceremony. There were to be some dancing afterwards but the music was really too loud and since I new virtually no one there, I beat an early retreat. I was quite please though to have made the effort to go.
On Sunday, MFS called me to go to the monthly meeting of the Southeast section of her Buddhist association. I had been to the previous one already.
I must say that I am still not convinced by their practice; my strongest reservation being with the chanting bit. I still can not see how the fact of repeating a sentence for hours on end can have an impact on your inner life, let alone your outer one…Anyway, for some reason, I was feeling more relax this time round and rather enjoyed the whole thing. More and more I get the felling that the chanting is like some sort of excuse these people use not to have to take responsibility for their actions; although at the same time they say that it helps them to take responsibility. I do not understand why you would have to chant to know what is the right thing for you or what is the right way to behave. Surely, an ounce of common sense and reason could give the same results? When I listen to what they say and reflect about it, I feel that I am already behaving the way they strive to behave but I manage that by using my own reason which is, I think much more gratifying than to be relying on the expected effects of chanting.
Also, I think I do not want to do as this guy at the meeting told me he had done, which was to start chanting to prove that it did not work (12 years ago). I know that I do not want to be burdened by a compulsory task to perform every day twice a day and if something should happen from that chanting (some many people seem to be convinced that something does happen that you never know), I would feel guilty not to pursue in that direction. And I do not want guilt in my life any more. I think I have reach a point where I feel reasonably comfortable with myself and what I am and do not need moral support; just things to change in my life. That is to say to get a job, interesting and better paid, which would enable me to complete the process of opening up I am currently undergoing. I know that this is what those Buddhist people are in a way offering me as the aim of their practice seem to be very often material well-being… But I also know that I am on my way to where I want to and that if things just now are not very exiting, at least the configuration is right for improvement. It is now only a question of time. I feel like something is going to happen soon. After a very slow period, things seem to be gathering momentum again; so fingers crossed…. There is another meeting on Thursday, for young men only this time; I think I’ll go….
Yesterday I went to my second rehearsal with the chorus. Actually the first complete one I have attended so far. I had missed the warming up session of the previous one. I have to say I really enjoyed it. I like to pieces we are working on and after the rehearsal, as a few members of the chorus were still singing, I got almost emotional. Irrespective of what I think of individuals (what I saw on Saturday, was proof that most of them are no different from your usual poof), I felt proud to belong (well soon!) to an organisation whose aim it is to create beauty. I also felt some sort of tenderness for this group of men, from all walks of life, in mismatched looks, assembled there in front of me, singing their hearts out. This is one of the very few nice things about our condition that it brings people together and more often than not people who would otherwise probably never meet.
We’ll see if these feelings last long. Also there seem to be a few nice people there (although you can never be sure in this type of situations if there is a hidden agenda or not). My enthusiasm was a bit dampened by what I saw when on my way back to the station. I caught up with two (new) members and I realised that one of them had been waiting for the other for some sort of chance encounter…. I had noticed him staring in the direction of the other guy during the mini performance after the rehearsal. Was it jealousy at not having seen anyone I could fancy in the chorus and at seeing that some had been obviously luckier? Probably, but I started to harbour bitter thoughts about the way these people always have to spoil and blemish things with lust.
Tonight I will be leaving work early and am on my way to, first a preview at an art gallery, and them a book launch at Gay is the Word….
I started this as a way to train at touch typing (hence the title) which I have finally taken up learning more or less seriously. At first I was typing what nonsense came across my mind and deleted it once I had finished. Gradually, it just turned into a diary relating the events (not very numerous) of my life. This has also the advantage of keeping me relatively busy at work when I have nothing else to do which seem to happen rather frequently these days.
29 January 2002
Time for another session of touch-typing. Nothing to do this morning, so I might as well train a little more. I seem to be getting slightly more agile and to be making fewer mistakes although the speed is not really there yet.
As far as life is concerned, things seem to be brightening up slightly. The weekend was quite busy, which makes a very welcome change from the usual.
First there was the Chorus’ Xmas party; slightly delayed because they were celebrating their 10th anniversary over the Xmas period and thus had to postpone the party. It was taking place in a pub in Camden Town (The Black Cap) which had been rented for the occasion. Entertainment included a duo of standing comedian who were really funny and a twisted award ceremony. There were to be some dancing afterwards but the music was really too loud and since I new virtually no one there, I beat an early retreat. I was quite please though to have made the effort to go.
On Sunday, MFS called me to go to the monthly meeting of the Southeast section of her Buddhist association. I had been to the previous one already.
I must say that I am still not convinced by their practice; my strongest reservation being with the chanting bit. I still can not see how the fact of repeating a sentence for hours on end can have an impact on your inner life, let alone your outer one…Anyway, for some reason, I was feeling more relax this time round and rather enjoyed the whole thing. More and more I get the felling that the chanting is like some sort of excuse these people use not to have to take responsibility for their actions; although at the same time they say that it helps them to take responsibility. I do not understand why you would have to chant to know what is the right thing for you or what is the right way to behave. Surely, an ounce of common sense and reason could give the same results? When I listen to what they say and reflect about it, I feel that I am already behaving the way they strive to behave but I manage that by using my own reason which is, I think much more gratifying than to be relying on the expected effects of chanting.
Also, I think I do not want to do as this guy at the meeting told me he had done, which was to start chanting to prove that it did not work (12 years ago). I know that I do not want to be burdened by a compulsory task to perform every day twice a day and if something should happen from that chanting (some many people seem to be convinced that something does happen that you never know), I would feel guilty not to pursue in that direction. And I do not want guilt in my life any more. I think I have reach a point where I feel reasonably comfortable with myself and what I am and do not need moral support; just things to change in my life. That is to say to get a job, interesting and better paid, which would enable me to complete the process of opening up I am currently undergoing. I know that this is what those Buddhist people are in a way offering me as the aim of their practice seem to be very often material well-being… But I also know that I am on my way to where I want to and that if things just now are not very exiting, at least the configuration is right for improvement. It is now only a question of time. I feel like something is going to happen soon. After a very slow period, things seem to be gathering momentum again; so fingers crossed…. There is another meeting on Thursday, for young men only this time; I think I’ll go….
Yesterday I went to my second rehearsal with the chorus. Actually the first complete one I have attended so far. I had missed the warming up session of the previous one. I have to say I really enjoyed it. I like to pieces we are working on and after the rehearsal, as a few members of the chorus were still singing, I got almost emotional. Irrespective of what I think of individuals (what I saw on Saturday, was proof that most of them are no different from your usual poof), I felt proud to belong (well soon!) to an organisation whose aim it is to create beauty. I also felt some sort of tenderness for this group of men, from all walks of life, in mismatched looks, assembled there in front of me, singing their hearts out. This is one of the very few nice things about our condition that it brings people together and more often than not people who would otherwise probably never meet.
We’ll see if these feelings last long. Also there seem to be a few nice people there (although you can never be sure in this type of situations if there is a hidden agenda or not). My enthusiasm was a bit dampened by what I saw when on my way back to the station. I caught up with two (new) members and I realised that one of them had been waiting for the other for some sort of chance encounter…. I had noticed him staring in the direction of the other guy during the mini performance after the rehearsal. Was it jealousy at not having seen anyone I could fancy in the chorus and at seeing that some had been obviously luckier? Probably, but I started to harbour bitter thoughts about the way these people always have to spoil and blemish things with lust.
Tonight I will be leaving work early and am on my way to, first a preview at an art gallery, and them a book launch at Gay is the Word….
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