‘Because I love hating people’ and other contradictions to live by

Oh, Internet, you make it so easy for me to express my inner self through links and haiku-length compositions. That realization about myself yesterday made me think today about the collection of contradictions and impulses curated in my brain.

This early sketch from the Tracy Ulman Show is one of my favorites. I can identify with Kavner’s anxious enthusiasm while reciting her escalating litany of phobias. It may also explain one of the reasons I so rarely use public toilets.

After a year of more-or-less Vulcan stoicism, it got me to thinking about those fundamental, illogical, contradictory impulses that are so enjoyable, like putting on my Team Pessimist or Mister Worst Case Scenario hat.  The pleasure comes from two things: First is the creative, intellectual pleasure of generating all the possible pitfalls and booby-traps and for-the-worst plot turns. Second, getting to the wildly improbable worst cases makes the probable mundane ones more tolerable.

Aside from actually not liking overly-sunny days (at best they make me sleepy), the near-perfect first Garbage album gave me a theme song for that impulse to laugh out loud when the wind drives rain (and hopefully soon snow) in my face. That first moment of discomfort gives way to something comical about the magnificence of the elements unleashed versus my peevishness about them. No use spitting in the wind about it, so why not just laugh?

I can’t mention Garbage without thinking–and in this case linking–to my all-time favorite Garbage song. It’s touches on my primal need to “embrace the strange” at the intersection of IDIC and NIN. And my wildly-associative brain loves the meme-mashing and old movie references. And Shirley Manson as singer or T-1001 terminator is simply magnificent.

Put another way, OKCupid asks, “Would you rather something good or something interesting happen?” For me, it’s 100% about Interesting. What’s usually interesting? Strange is.

Finally, in honor of Roy Batty’s incept date a few days ago, there is his absolute glee at Deckard thrashing him with a lead pipe and his wry comment after: “That was irrational of you… not to mention unsportsmanlike.” The unarmed Deckard is no longer a real threat to Batty–both of them know it–but it touches on a shared feeling that will later lead to unexpected mercy.  If I ever say “That’s the spirit!” to you, that’s what’s playing in my head, probably along with a sense of “NOW you’re getting it!”

Here’s to a rainy, interesting, strange, spirited 2016!