Month: December 2016

Reality is a tiny thing

This weird thought I’ve just had in the bath, rather than on the toilet for a change, which in fact was quite frustrating because I had to wait to get out of the bath to get it out (the weird thought, that is).

Bear with me, I’ve been reading a lot of Deleuze lately and I’m now reading Waiting for Godot (in fact I was reading this in the bath just now so I think it is this text which informed today’s weird thought).

My current book

My current book

There are many, many (beyond counting) moments which make up ‘reality’. These moments, or pulses, are the things we ‘do’ or ‘experience’ in our conscious lives: getting out of bed; eating some toast; ice-skating in the sunshine; squeezing out a botty burp that is giving us stomach ache; eating a hot, ketchup covered wurst at the German market in Birmingham; watching EastEnders; reading in the bath; being amused or touched by a comment of a friend; washing a cup; feeding a cat; or being moved by an act of kindness from a stranger. These moments make up reality. The moments each last just a tiny fraction of time. There are millions of these fractions of reality in a lifetime.

So, are you still with me? We don’t remember all of these moments, but we remember a few of them. The ones we remember are those realities that give us a sensation. It doesn’t matter what this sensation is, what matters is the intensity. Some moments of reality don’t give us much of a sensation: making a cup of tea, talking on the phone to PlusNet, sitting on an Arriva Train Wales with a laptop or wrapping yet another Christmas present. However, a few moments do give us a powerful sensation. During a lifetime there are probably quite a lot of these powerful sensation-inducing moments: an unexpected kiss, a resonating comment, a moment of pure and painful laughter or a smile on a train. Those moments of sensation, from moments of reality, turn into memories.

Is sitting on one of these going to Welshpool memorable?

Is sitting on one of these going to Welshpool memorable?

The memories of those sensations coming from points of reality can be incredibly strong. If I shut my eyes, and remember, really remember, I can feel those moments in my head, moments which may be from many years ago and which lasted only seconds. In my head I can make them last much longer and repeatedly. The feeling can be quite strong and intense. Yet, the reality of those moments was just a fraction of time when they actually happened. In my head, they have happened many times again.

And when I’m no longer of this world, those memories of those sensations of those realities will simply no longer exist. To me they are huge. They can’t be, though. They only feel huge. I can’t give the memory of those moments to anyone else. I just have to accept that they will disappear with me.

Even Deleuze likes to wear a cat now and then

Even Deleuze likes to wear a cat now and then

Thanks, Deleuze and Beckett, for that cheery thought!

 

What art and Facebook have in common

This is the weird thought I had at 2.05am when my youngest child woke me up with earache and the need to tell me that he didn’t enjoy the film he had seen at school that day (something to do with wolves and snow from what I could gather).

The little angel that woke me up last night

The little angel that woke me up last night

When I returned to bed, after dishing out the usual cuddles and Calpol, my mind wasn’t ready to settle back down to sleep so it started to think about the big questions of existence: life, Facebook, friendships and time.

That addictive social media beast

That addictive social media beast

I’ve had weird thoughts about Facebook before, and this is related to those. This thought is about how Facebook has achieved something truly great. For all the  criticism it gets for time suckage (yes, it is good at that) and inane babble (yes, it is very good at that too), I believe that it has had one revolutionary consequence. It has disrupted the natural flow of change and time in our lifetime. A natural flow that has existed since man first stepped out of his gorilla suit and discovered fire.

This man has just said goodbye to his best friend because he's moving to another cave

This man has just said goodbye to his best friend because he’s moving to another cave

‘What on earth are you on about?’ I hear you all cry, in unison. Well, let me explain.  As we go through life: birth, babyhood, toddlerhood, childhood, school days, college, university, work, parenthood, work, retirement and death, people come into our lives, we build up relationships with them, then we or they move on. That is the natural way of things. We make friends at school. We all leave school. We eventually lose touch. We go to college or university. We make friends. We leave. We lose touch. We work. We make friends. We leave. We lose touch. Getting to know people and saying goodbye to people are part of the rich fabric of life that we just have to get used to. The joy of friendships and the grief of leaving is part of what normalizes life. Beginnings and endings are natural. It is just the way it is. Some people do stick with each other for life. That is quite rare though. And that depends on both parties staying in the same location for their entire lives. Most people drift in and out of each others lives like blobs in a giant interconnected Venn diagram.

However, Facebook has changed this. Facebook allows for those Venn diagrams to overlap and grow bigger. Facebook has helped to turn the world into one giant rhizome of interconnectedness. Our relationships are now like cauliflowers rather than spring onions. Thanks to Facebook, virtual friends can become real ones, and real ones can become virtual ones. This process can swap over and repeat and repeat. The important thing is that the friends you leave behind now will remain in your Venn diagram. They will never leave. Saying ‘goodbye’ isn’t quite so devastating as it used to be because you will see the people you leave behind at your leaving do, later, on Facebook.

How our friendships work in the post-Internet age

How our friendships work in the post-Internet age

Facebook has therefore successfully ruptured the path of ordinary, everyday, universal existence (you can tell I’ve been reading a lot of Deleuze recently). This way has existed for so long we aren’t really quite sure how to handle the change yet. What has that got to do with art? I hear you ask. Art aims to rupture, break free, find a point in the disorder and chaos of time and do something amazing.

Therefore, Facebook is like art. Facebook has achieved an amazing thing. It has ruptured. It has created a new ‘sensation’.

I’m now going to post this to Facebook to all those friends I’ve had in real life, I now have in real life, and I will later not have in real life: a whole great big blobby Venn diagram of friendships.