Life Lessons From a Ten-Year-Old Cigarette Vendor
April 25, 2024 12:25 PM Subscribe
The act of trying to keep things the way they are is insanity. It’s an illusion. Trying something new means touching the unknown. It can be frightening and cause you to either fight or flee, rather than say yes.
It takes courage to change. Then again, why change when you don’t have to?
But when you don’t change, everything appears to stay the same. And this is the antithesis of life.
Life is change.
Life is always changing.
Change may or may not be good, but it is inevitable.
Change may or may not be good, but it is inevitable.
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Change may be inevitable, but I will not be touching this particular unknown today.
posted by zamboni at 2:39 PM on April 25 [2 favorites]
If you’re new to Medium, create a new account to read this story on us.
Change may be inevitable, but I will not be touching this particular unknown today.
posted by zamboni at 2:39 PM on April 25 [2 favorites]
This was a fun read but the life lessons are kind of meh. Change happens, sure, and you should try new things, but trying is different from blindly accepting or fetishizing newness and change. Change also doesn't happen: often the surprising thing is how much things stay the same. We need to think critically about both change and the status quo, and understand them and how they work and why we value them.
posted by ropeladder at 5:32 PM on April 25 [3 favorites]
posted by ropeladder at 5:32 PM on April 25 [3 favorites]
I was talking over dinner tonight of the Absolute Austin Thing that every person who lives here, inside of three weeks, laments long and hard about how "It's not how it used to be."
Whereas I see the whole point of Austin as "Not being how it used to be." And that it's a good thing.
It is currently changing at warp speed; yesterday afternoon, driving from south to north, a casual count of cranes in the downtown area gave me 8 without even looking hard.
Because I have "My name on a mortgage." this is "A very good thing." People who do not have their name on a mortgage, perhaps not so good a thing.
Though even that is bullshit -- all it means is that they might relocate, or move into a co-op type of thing, which, while not free, is less expensive and often pretty cool, has rather the feel of a hostel.
Change though, it's constant. I have not yet brushed my teeth tonight, bacteria likely having fun until the brush hits.
Austin not at warp speed? Easy to see if you knew it then and now -- take a bike ride on any of the many wonderful bike paths, or walk the gorgeous downtown, and number of Now things to do. Then watch the movies Linklater movies "Slacker"(1990) and "Boyhood"(2014) and then notice that it's ten years ago that Boyhood came out and that there has been huge change in the interim. "Boyhood" in particular is great for this exercise, as it was shot in four sets of approx 3 years, 2002 to 2013.
One of my best friends, Jimmy, has lived here maybe 30 years. When he finds himself in a part of town that he knows well yet does not recognize because of all the buildings knocked down and all the buildings put up, he doesn't lament, maybe marvel is a better term.
Don't even think about Houston. It's berserk. I was there Thanksgiving after not hitting town in maybe five years -- massive, unbelievable change. Huge pieces I found myself not recognizing.
Change. It's part of The Show. And it's A Beautiful Show, it seems to me, and more Beautiful if/when I don't fight the flow.
posted by dancestoblue at 9:37 PM on April 25
Whereas I see the whole point of Austin as "Not being how it used to be." And that it's a good thing.
It is currently changing at warp speed; yesterday afternoon, driving from south to north, a casual count of cranes in the downtown area gave me 8 without even looking hard.
Because I have "My name on a mortgage." this is "A very good thing." People who do not have their name on a mortgage, perhaps not so good a thing.
Though even that is bullshit -- all it means is that they might relocate, or move into a co-op type of thing, which, while not free, is less expensive and often pretty cool, has rather the feel of a hostel.
Change though, it's constant. I have not yet brushed my teeth tonight, bacteria likely having fun until the brush hits.
Austin not at warp speed? Easy to see if you knew it then and now -- take a bike ride on any of the many wonderful bike paths, or walk the gorgeous downtown, and number of Now things to do. Then watch the movies Linklater movies "Slacker"(1990) and "Boyhood"(2014) and then notice that it's ten years ago that Boyhood came out and that there has been huge change in the interim. "Boyhood" in particular is great for this exercise, as it was shot in four sets of approx 3 years, 2002 to 2013.
One of my best friends, Jimmy, has lived here maybe 30 years. When he finds himself in a part of town that he knows well yet does not recognize because of all the buildings knocked down and all the buildings put up, he doesn't lament, maybe marvel is a better term.
Don't even think about Houston. It's berserk. I was there Thanksgiving after not hitting town in maybe five years -- massive, unbelievable change. Huge pieces I found myself not recognizing.
Change. It's part of The Show. And it's A Beautiful Show, it seems to me, and more Beautiful if/when I don't fight the flow.
posted by dancestoblue at 9:37 PM on April 25
Though even that is bullshit -- all it means is that they might relocate, or move into a co-op type of thing, which, while not free, is less expensive and often pretty cool, has rather the feel of a hostel.Or they become homeless, and probably have to leave Austin because being homeless was criminalised in Austin by Proposition B in 2021.
posted by zymil at 11:55 PM on April 25 [1 favorite]
I looked briefly at the archive link for TFA. And BTW I have to endorse archive.ph where I denigrated archive.is, I'm having no Cloudflare woes with those former links. But I digress.
The thing expressed in the first sentence of the pull quoteprobably seems like is a deep insight to for the writer of TFA to have arrived at all by himself.(1) It is a commonplace observation for people who have spent any time reading in any wisdom tradition that has actual wisdom in it. You cannot make things stay the same: in fact trying to make things stay the same is how most of the suffering in the world gets made. But there is no way to be really safe from change. Accepting this fact is the beginning of wisdom.
Good work on TFA writer's part to have hit upon this from introspection on life experience. I'm glad they're sharing it. Too bad about the registration wall though. That was less skillful.
(1) The strikeout bits were the first draft reaction to TFA. The ones in italics are edits made to practice generosity in support of fairness. Because in fact there aren't many people fortunate enough to have time and inclination and resources to become conversant with the relevant literature.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 10:17 AM on April 26
The thing expressed in the first sentence of the pull quote
Good work on TFA writer's part to have hit upon this from introspection on life experience. I'm glad they're sharing it. Too bad about the registration wall though. That was less skillful.
(1) The strikeout bits were the first draft reaction to TFA. The ones in italics are edits made to practice generosity in support of fairness. Because in fact there aren't many people fortunate enough to have time and inclination and resources to become conversant with the relevant literature.
posted by Aardvark Cheeselog at 10:17 AM on April 26
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posted by MonkeyToes at 2:00 PM on April 25