First Published: 2022 January 24
There are days of my life which seem to fly by, filled with joy and productivity. There are days of my life where I feel sick, and feel myself recover, even though nothing major happens. And, there are days like today, where everything just feels slightly off. I’m hopeful that this time tomorrow I’ll feel like my normal, energized self again.
It’s the first day of classes, which is exciting and fun. It’s the second to last day that my upperclassman is in town for a while, which is sad. It’s1 the first day in a while I’ll get to leave a like letter. So, I really hope that I wake up tomorrow filled with joy and excitement for the day.
At the very least, I’d love to feel something. Today is one of those days where all I really feel is exhausted, which is sad since I did next to nothing today.
This is only one hundred and sixty2 words, which is nowhere near my goal. I wish I cared enough to keep going.
First Published: 2022 January 23
Nehemiah 8:8: “Ezra read clearly from the book of the law of God, interpreting it so that all could understand what was read.”
According to the priest at Mass tonight, today is the celebration of the Word of G-d. If that’s the case, then the readings are especially appropriate. The first reading has Ezra reading the Lord’s word to the people of Israel. The Gospel has the Word made Flesh in the person of Jesus Christ reading the prophecy that he himself fulfilled.
There’s something beautiful about that to me. It’s really fantastic to see how so much of the bible is mirrored between the Old and New Testaments. Last time I heard these readings, I thought of them as “one of the more straightforward Gospels” It’s so weird to me how these readings used to seem plain and simple. Looking at them now, they seem incredibly deep, more-so to me at least than a lot of weeks.
The second reading in particular is something I feel that I should read more often. It reminds me of a quote from1 St. Therese of Lisieux which says something along the lines that a garden of nothing but roses is not more beautiful than a garden with all the flowers of nature, and a daisy is not made better by being a rose. There’s no part of me that was not lovingly fashioned by the Lord and Creator of all things, and I need to remember that more in my day to day life. We are not unloved beings in an uncaring universe, but deeply loved and beloved beings made in the image of the Lord, who is Love.
I believe↩︎
First Published: 2022 January 22
Prereading note: I’ve decided I’m going to try to shoot for 5001 words a post from now on so that I know what 1000 words feels like.
Today as I pulled up my text editor to work on the blog post, I realized that I was about to hit writer’s block. That is, I could not think of anything to write today. Thankfully, old Jonathan knew this day might one day arise, and helpfully gave me some ideas.2 One of them was to write about my newfound enjoyment of villanelles.
I’ve written before3 about how, among my many goals for self-enrichment, I have had a goal to write more poetry. When I began this blog, probably due to my location, I focused on sonnets. For whatever reason, sonnets don’t really speak to my soul the way other forms do. I just cannot connect to pentameter.
That being said, one thing that I loved about sonnets is their constraint. I found that having the very restrictive rhyme and rhythm helped me not only to write them, which was the first-level goal of my doing so, but also to write better outside of poetry, because I became more aware of cadence. When I wanted to restart writing poetry again, therefore, I thought it might be helpful to find another constrained pattern for writing.
I don’t know if you’ve ever tried searching the internet for a list of poetic forms and how they work, but I could not find a good list. So, I used my brain and thought about who in my life might have a list of poetic forms easily at hand. And so, I messaged one of my close friends, who was an English major.4 She pointed me to the villanelle, which is constrained in a very odd way.
A villanelle is a nineteen line poem, comprised of six stanzas. Five of the stanzas contain three lines, and the sixth contains four. The second lines of each of the stanzas rhyme with each other, which is fairly normal. The odd constraint comes with the interplay of the first stanza and the last line5 of each remaining stanza. The first line of the first stanza is the third line of the second, fourth, and sixth stanza of the villanelle. The last line of the first stanza is the last line of the third, fifth, and sixth stanza. And, the first line of each of the remaining stanzas must also rhyme with these lines.
As a result, you technically only need to write thirteen lines to fill a villanelle. But, the repetition of the lines means that you need to think about how each line can serve multiple story elements. The most famous example6 of “Do Not Go Gentle into the Good Night” by Dylan Thomas.
Writing them has been really illuminating for me, because it has really forced me to improve a skill that I previously had left fairly undeveloped: revising and editing a poem. Villanelles almost require revision, because I at least will often realize that the rhyme I chose is too constrictive, or the line isn’t evocative enough. That being said, the cadence of a villanelle is incredibly moving to me, so I hope that I’ll keep writing them.
Not counting this text: 545 words outside footnotes, 58 with footnotes.
I said 1000 initially but that’s so many↩︎
side-note: I do really think of my past, present, and future selves as distinct entities, which probably says something about me/influences the way I act but↩︎
though I’m not looking for where right now↩︎
who I also met in London which is pretty fun↩︎
s↩︎
that I’m aware of↩︎
First Published: 2022 January 21
Sometimes there are perfect storms in my life, where multiple, seemingly unrelated events conspire to cause something to occur to my mind. Today I got to experience one again! As always, I’m very excited by the concept of metacognition.
First, the background. I’m reading a book called “Don’t Teach Coding (Until You Read This Book)”, a book about teaching computer science targeted to secondary and below teachers, many of whom do not have formal training in computer science themselves. Rather than being a manual of how to learn Java1, the book2 instead takes an incredibly high-level approach to computer science. It begins by defining computer science less as bits on the page and more as a formal language. Without continuing this digression, one important topic it mentions is the concept of extended memory.
Extended memory is a concept which more or less says that when you need to look at your phone to remember someone’s phone number, it’s not that you’ve forgotten it, it’s that your brain is using your phone as an external storage device for memory. I really like it as a concept, both because it appears consistent with scientific findings3, but mostly because it is anti-Ludditical. One extended memory I’ve been using since I started this blog4 is a series of journals.
If I remember correctly, I’m now on journal four, which was started November 24, 2019.5 Since switching many of my note-taking and artistic concepts to other media, I’ve struggled to find a use for the journal, which is a large reason why it’s lasted so long. As I’ve mentioned a few other times, I’ve recently started bullet-journaling lite. It’s been really helpful when I decide to do it.
But, what happens when6 I lose the journal itself. In searching for it, I realized that I would be out more than the pages of writings and art that I’ve made, but also my ability to keep organized. I don’t really have a good solution to that, but it made me think about my reliance on this medium. Hopefully over time I will need it less, but I’m not really thinking that’s likely.
First Published: 2022 January 20
Last night I tried switching browsers from metal to the browser which used to be FOSS other than its logo, which prompted the CS department at my local school to use a reskin with a non-copyrighted logo. I really hope I understand what that sentence means in three years.
First Published: 2022 January 19
I’ve recently been thinking about how to live my life more intentionally. Something that I’ve been having a lot of luck with in the past days is having a list of activities to do each day. I really like how well it’s been going for me.
First Published: 2022 January 18
Lasterday I wrote about creative hobbies, so it seems only fair that today I talk about one of mine. Currently I’m moving my art from celtic knots to not doing to some symmetric art. My current piece is a line art that has vertical and horizontal symmetry.
I’ve almost finished, so have to decide on my next one.
First Published: 2022 January 17
1 I recently read a post that claimed everyone should have at least one hobby which creates. Something about that really stuck with me over the past week or so, and I’m using today’s post to try to explore why.2
First, I guess I should give the claim. I believe that every person should have at least one hobby which involves two3 components:
Creating something
Sharing that creation with other people
Ideally, I would rather that the creation be something physical, though that bias may come from other sources,4 but I’m not including it because I’m still working through how I feel about it.
Now I guess I should support the claim. Disclaimer for readers5, I’m going to be entering into a lot of speculative theology here, please feel free to correct me if I am in error anywhere. In the beginning of the Bible, we see the Lord make man in His image. There are6 countless tomes written about what it means that man exists in the image of the Most High. Today, I’d like to posit that a7 way we are like Him is in our inherent drive to creation.
Before He creates man, the Lord begins by creating the universe. He creates all the living things which populate the earth, the stars in their courses, and the laws which govern nature. And it is all beautiful.
While we cannot create planets and stars, we can still create beauty, and so show ourselves in reflection of the Almighty. Now we must move a few verses ahead to the creation of man. The Lord makes man for8 at least9 one reason, to share in the beauty of His creation. So too, we act in the likeness of the Lord when we share things we have created with each other.
Moving from the Genesis/religious argument, I think hobbies which create have an inherent goodness to them due to their adding of the sum beauty in the world. The worst written poem still has some joy within it, and a burnt pie may still taste ok.10 Too, giving to others means that you don’t end up creating only for yourself, as our lives aren’t meant for ourselves. We’re meant to share all that we are to lead all people to the Lord.11 Our Lord is the G-d of beauty and of love, and so any time we help people to experience either we are helping them to know the Most High.
I guess I should give examples of creation-hobbies. There are the obvious ones in hobbies which create12 permanent physical goods such as:
Woodworking
Crochet
Knitting
There are hobbies which create13 impermanent physical goods such a:
Cooking
Soap making
Baking
And there are hobbies which create intangibles, such as:
Writing
Drawing
Music
To me, all of these are creation-hobbies. Obviously, this is a non-exhaustive list, and I would not even stake a claim that my three categories are themselves exhaustive. But, in the first category, you can create goods which others look at time and time again, reminding them that they are loved each time they do. The second, though transient, can show that you were thinking of them and, in the first and third, share the most vital of human connections, food. The third shares our mind and heart with others in the most direct way, which can make it the hardest to truly share. But, all of them are wonderful and I obviously think sharing and creating more beauty is a good thing
I recently read a post that claimed everyone should have at least one hobby which creates. Something about that really stuck with me over the past week or so, and I’m using today’s post to try to explore why.14
First, I guess I should give the claim. I believe that every person should have at least one hobby which involves two15 components:
Creating something
Sharing that creation with other people
Ideally, I would rather that the creation be something physical, though that bias may come from other sources,16 but I’m not including it because I’m still working through how I feel about it.
Now I guess I should support the claim. Disclaimer for readers17, I’m going to be entering into a lot of speculative theology here, please feel free to correct me if I am in error anywhere. In the beginning of the Bible, we see the Lord make man in His image. There are18 countless tomes written about what it means that man exists in the image of the Most High. Today, I’d like to posit that the way we are like Him is in our inherent drive to creation.
Before He creates man, the Lord begins by creating the universe. He creates all the living things which populate the earth, the stars in their courses, and the laws which govern nature. And it is all beautiful.
While we cannot create planets and stars, we can still create beauty, and so show ourselves in reflection of the Almighty. Now we must move a few verses ahead to the creation of man. The Lord makes man for19 at least20 one reason, to share in the beauty of His creation. So too, we act in the likeness of the Lord when we share things we have created with each other.
Moving from the Genesis/religious argument, I think hobbies which create have an inherent goodness to them due to their adding of the sum beauty in the world. The worst written poem still has some joy within it, and a burnt pie may still taste ok.21 Too, giving to others means that you don’t end up creating only for yourself, as our lives aren’t meant for ourselves. We’re meant to share all that we are to lead all people to the Lord.22 Our Lord is the G-d of beauty and of love, and so any time we help people to experience either we are helping them to know the Most High.
I guess I should give examples of creation-hobbies. There are the obvious ones in hobbies which create23 permanent physical goods such as:
Woodworking
Crochet
Knitting
There are hobbies which create24 impermanent physical goods such a:
Cooking
Soap making
Baking
And there are hobbies which create intangibles, such as:
Writing
Drawing
Music
To me, all of these are creation-hobbies. Obviously, this is a non-exhaustive list, and I would not even stake a claim that my three categories are themselves exhaustive. But, in the first category, you can create goods which others look at time and time again, reminding them that they are loved each time they do. The second, though transient, can show that you were thinking of them and, in the first and third, share the most vital of human connections, food. The third shares our mind and heart with others in the most direct way, which can make it the hardest to truly share. But, all of them are wonderful and I obviously think sharing and creating more beauty is a good thing
a friend read and caught a bad turn of phrase, corrected↩
I’ve often found that simply writing things helps me to come to a conclusion↩
2↩
e.g. you learn better when physically writing as opposed to typing, so maybe physically writing someone a letter is better than emailing??↩
hypothetical readers of course↩
I’m sure↩
here’s the place↩
based on either I’ve been taught, think, or is true, I am unsure at this moment↩
weasel words am I right↩
especially if you avoid the burnt bits↩
oops, guess religious wasn’t over↩
semi↩
by design↩
I’ve often found that simply writing things helps me to come to a conclusion↩
2↩
e.g. you learn better when physically writing as opposed to typing, so maybe physically writing someone a letter is better than emailing??↩
hypothetical readers of course↩
I’m sure↩
based on either I’ve been taught, think, or is true, I am unsure at this moment↩
weasel words am I right↩
especially if you avoid the burnt bits↩
oops, guess religious wasn’t over↩
semi↩
by design↩
First Published: 2022 January 171
John 2:4: “Jesus said to her, “Woman, how does your concern affect me? My hour has not yet come.””
As I mentioned last time I read these, my family really likes the readings that happen this week. This time around, the concept that the Lord’s “hour ha[d] not yet come” really stuck with me, because it says that He was there with his disciples.
I know that I’ve always been taught that this was the beginning of His ministry, so I’m unsure why he already has disciples. But, it’s still beautiful that He listened to His mother without question.
a day late, I know↩︎
First Published: 2022 January 15
I’ve written before about how I make toffee, but I made it again for the first time in a long while today, and that seemed appropriate to blog about here. As before, the recipe is 1:1 sugar and butter, heated to hot then cooled. This time, however, as I have too much chocolate, I decided to make the toffee the way most of the internet suggests I should: chocolate covered. It came out well!
I guess it’s unsurprising that a recipe which1 is just 1 part chocolate, sugar, and butter, could come out well. Nonetheless, it was really fun to see that I can, in fact, make things taste good. I unfortunately didn’t let my chocolate cool enough before mixing it into the cookie dough but that’s life I suppose, I’ll have moreso chocolate than chocolate chip cookie.
allegedly, I did not measure the chocolate↩︎