Do you ever have times when you aren’t feeling particularly creative, pensive or profound? I don’t know about you, but I often find that I marvel and dwell on the simplest of things, analyzing concepts and reaching levels of understanding that give me an amazing sense of being. The absence of this is just plain frustrating for me and I feel that this perfectly describes the week I have had. I feel sort of blah in a way. Not depressed-no that is an entirely different feeling. I have just been experiencing a great absence of the ability to think and feel. Can anyone relate? Am I making any sense at all?
This could be caused by a variety of things, number one being that because I am nearly broke I am trying to save money on food by not eating a lot, thus voluntarily plummeting my blood sugar. I have also not had the privilege of sleeping normal amounts as I have been frantically trying to mentally and physically prepare for this upcoming school year. Or maybe, just maybe I am long overdue in reading a good book or watching a movie that makes me think until my head hurts. Do you know what I mean?
[I personally can think of several movies off the top of my head that fit this category- though they are different for everyone. Examples for me include V for Vendetta (I swear every time I watch that movie I get something new and amazingly profound out of it), Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind, The Reader (Saddest movie on this planet), and the Prince of Egypt (Yes, the animated feature).]
I think I am also feeling this way because I have lately doubted my ability to think. I know that sounds weird, but if you were taking some of the classes that I am, you would absolutely understand. One such course is art history, and is really a class on the analytical and mental processes of understanding contemporary art in history. Yes, it is the same art that baffles so many on this earth, the kind that includes weird abstract sculptures and strings hanging from ceilings (“My, what a masterpiece!”). Frankly, I just don’t get it. I essentially spend those class times doodling in my notebook and wondering what made me so dumb that I just cannot understand the meaning of heteroglossia when it comes to communicating art (yes, that is a real word and fun fact: even spell check on Microsoft Word doesn’t recognize it as one). I often find myself looking around the room at my peers -who are nodding and smiling as if they understand it with every fiber of their being- and longing for that same understanding. I don’t know, maybe I am just not wired that way.
When all is said and done, however, perhaps the perfect antidote to all of this fretting about non-thinking is a nice weekend of sleep, Oreos and brainless chick-flicks. Yes, that sounds about right to me. So with that, I think I should just bid you a Happy Friday and leave all of this thinking to the likes of Aristotle and Pablo Picasso.
