kareina

In a conversation with a friend yesterday he chose a word to describe me, and I laughed, admitted that it might apply, but then commented that I didn’t think that the word would have made the list of top ten words I’d come up with if someone asked me to choose some to describe myself. (No, I don’t remember what word he used, but it doesn’t really matter in terms of the direction I plan to take this rambling bit of text.) He promptly countered by asking what 10 words I would use to describe myself. Therefore, after admitting that I’d likely come up with a different set if asked on a different day, I proceeded to choose ten descriptive words (again, I don’t remember what they all were, but ‘intelligent’ and ‘neat-freak’ both made the list). He then promptly asked “but are you happy?”

That question stopped me in my tracks—yes, I am happy and generally known as such, but I never would have thought to include it in a list of ten words describing myself. Why not? Because I see descriptions as being about what a person *is*, and emotions as being something a person *has*. Sure, in English, we use the phrase “I am happy” (or sad, or any other emotion one can name), but when I think about it, emotions are (or can be) fleeting things. They are a measure of how one feels at this very moment in time—a sum of one’s reactions to the stimulus one is exposed to. Expose a person to lots of good things and they are more likely to be happy. Expose a person to all of their pet peeves in quick succession, and they are likely to be annoyed, if not downright angry. Many of us have the capacity to run a whole gamut of emotions over the course of a day (or an hour) as we react to different circumstances.

Including an emotion in a description of a person, be it myself, or my perception of another would be akin to including what colour clothes they are wearing. One’s clothing colour today is helpful information if you are scanning a crowd looking for them, but there is no guarantee that it will be the same from one day to the next, and so has no place in a general description. Even those of us whose wardrobes contain a very limited colour pallet (can you say black and navy blue are always a good thing?) still have clothing in different colours, even if it is just because the older items have faded while the newer items are still at full dye saturation. While it is true that, some people experience one emotion so much more often than others that it might make sense to include that one in a description of them, I think that even people suffering from a broken heart or clinical depression still have happy moments now and again, and even people who are generally happy still see moments when enough of their pet peeves have been demonstrated in their presence to feel a flash of annoyance.

So, there you go, now you know why I don’t list emotions when asked to describe myself. Now, had he asked for ten words about how I feel…

After posting last night clovis_t and I went for a walk. The moon wasn't up, and our neighbourhood is far enough out into the country as to have no street lights, so it took a while of walking for our eyes to adjust to the starlight, but after being out for a bit we could see not only the stars, but had a lovely view of Mt. Wellington, possibly because the Hobart city lights were enough to bring the outline of the peak into relief. It was truly beautiful, and made me glad to be outside on such a fine evening. Towards the end of the walk the winds picked up and clouds started closing in from the west, obscuring the clouds, and encouraging us to head back inside. Then we did our daily yoga routine followed by another hour of uni work. By then it was 02:00 and I was tired, so I took a nap, getting back up at 03:45 on time to watch the inauguration on TV. This is the first time I'd seen Barack Obama giving a speech (though I've read the texts of several of his speeches hitherto), and I was quite impressed. Not only is the content good, but the delivery was excellent. I was surprised to learn that he pronounces his first name rather differently than the other Barack's I've met. The ones I know say "bear-eck", so I didn't expect to hear his said "ba-rahck", but then again, his way of saying it better reflects the language patterns from which the name stems. If this man and his team are able to accomplish even 1/4 of their goals for making the world, or at least their portion thereof, a better place it will be good, but something about the energy and sincerity he puts into delivering his message (and the fact that the whitehouse web page was totally revamped as soon as he swore the oath) leads me to believe that he won't rest till they accomplish the lot.

After watching the ceremonies clovis_t, who hadn't had a nap, was very sleepy, but I was energized. So I decided to go for a jog "around the block", which took 25 minutes, and then I went to sleep about 06:00. Woke up just before noon inspired and ready to work--thinking of things I want to include in the discussion/conclusion section of the thesis (which chapter I hadn't yet really started yet) and sat down and typed up over 300 words before breakfast! Breakfast is now done, and I've caught up on reading livejournal and e-mail, and it is time for me to return to work. I have decided that I'm not going to keep working on the painfully slow process of gathering the figures together for chapter five, but instead I'll give it a read and see if there are any other edits and send it off to my advisor with the figures that I'd gathered thus far, and a note saying that if he wants to see any others let me know, and then I'm going to do more work on the discussions and conclusions.

It feels wonderful to feel so inspired! I feel good about my health, my fitness, how much I've learned in the 3.5+ years of my PhD project, and my ability to finish it soon. I'm excited about the various job applications I've got out there, and am looking forward to naught but good in my life! Such a change compared to yesterday's resigned plodding along at needful but tedious tasks with little to no interest. Funny how emotional outlook can make such a huge difference. Life is Good!