the happy medium mafia

Apologies for the extended silence. It will probably continue. I'd love to explain what happened, but it would be imprudent to go into specifics. Furthermore, I'm apparently not imaginative enough to phrase the matter in vague enough terms to satisfy my safety needs without sounding like I'm making shit up, I've gone unhinged, or I'm participating in something completely nefarious (and, uh... none of that is true, of course). Believe me, I have tried. The drafts made me laugh but they were not fit for posting.

(I like to think I'm not half bad at pouring my heart out, sparing no detail. And I'm decent at being blandly pleasant while revealing little to nothing of myself. But the happy medium eludes me....)

Not looking very happy.

Anyhow. Be assured that all is well with my family and I don't need any help or advice. My biggest immediate problem is simply that I have to keep my yap shut about precisely the things I'm most inspired to write on, which feels depressing and stifling. Angering, even. I have notes for nearly one hundred original posts that I'm not sure will ever see the light of day. On the bright side, I'm learning to garden. And maybe I can channel my thwarted blogging urges into my novel.

I'll post a bit on relatively harmless subjects as they occur to me. Along with links, quotes, and such. I've made some rather serious playlists on Youtube lately as well.

the most dangerous gamer

One night in his apartment, with the lights of San Francisco twinkling for miles outside his windows, I warned Blow that I was about to do something that might aggravate him: I was going to tell him what I thought Braid was about, and he could do with that whatever he wanted.

“Okay,” he replied with a half smirk, leaning back in his chair.

“So obviously there’s the theme of the creation of the atomic bomb,” I began.

“I think you can make a very strong case that that is an unambiguous reference,” he replied, which I interpreted as the Blovian equivalent of Yes.

“But I think what has frustrated you about people’s interpretations of Braid is that the atom bomb itself is a metaphor for a certain kind of knowledge,” I continued. “You’ve been chasing some deep form of understanding all your life, and what I think you’ve found is that questing after that knowledge brings alienation with it. The further you’ve gone down that road, the further it’s taken you from other people. So the knowledge is ultimately destructive to your life, just like the atom bomb was—it’s a kind of truth that has a cataclysmic impact. You thought chasing that knowledge would make you happy, but like Tim, part of you eventually wished you could turn back time and do things over again.”

Blow remained silent.

“Does that make sense?,” I asked.

“Yep, yep.”

“So?”

He smiled.

“Well, I would say that I would not be frustrated at all with that interpretation.”

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