surprising differences between Australia and America

1. * Our main right-wing party is called the 'liberal party', but, in the US, liberal means left wing
2. * In Australia, the color for labor (left wing) is red and the color for the liberals (right wing) is blue. In the US, the color for Republicans (right wing) is red, and the color for the democrats is blue.

heavy is the mantel

English was my worst subject in high school, but I had a friend who did 3 unit English, and I remember him studying Such is Life by Joseph Furphy and Catch 22 by Joseph Heller. Only years later, having read Such is Life and knowing something about Catch 22, did I realize what a huge ask our English teachers were making in selecting those texts. I've known PhD students that found Such is Life challenging and I've had smart adult friends who didn't get Catch 22 at all. 

what writing is about

My disordered thinking is replete with closure...it's all about ending and decline and defeat, but writing is all about possibility and potential. You can write about anything, and as soon as you do, you're creating meaning, even if you write about something negative.  

rights and wrongs

This morning I read Philippians chapter 2. Verse 3 and 4 read:

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.

That's an attitude that is rare even among Christians. We hold onto our views tightly, and if someone thinks differently, we argue with them. We have to be convinced to change our view, if we do at all. But imagine having the attitude that others know better than you. Imagine if that, rather than telling people when you think they're wrong, was your default reaction. 

It might sound a bit illogical or even foolish, but it's the attitude that Christ had. He was in the right, and we're not, but he took on all the wrong so that, through his sacrifice, we could be made right. 

palimpsest

I deleted my old blog, caeusura, in 2019 and then at the start of 2020 I began this blog. I thought it was gone forever but when I checked the wayback machine, the whole thing was there. 

I've been working my way through the posts and adapting some of them to this blog. My overwhelming impression as I read through the old posts I wrote between 2014 and 2019 is one of 'cringe'. For that reason, a lot of the posts, I don't bother adapting them or using any of them. Sometimes I'll use and adapt a whole post, and sometimes I'll take a few lines or an idea and build a new post from that. 

It's very weird to think that this blog is now older than my old blog. 

I'm glad that I was able to retrieve my old blog because it means nothing - at least nothing that I want to keep - has been lost. 

in the mirror

Creating art of some kind is validating because it's an expression of individual humanity, an expression of character. We can't see ourselves. Just as, physically we can't see ourselves unless we look in a mirror, mentally and spiritually, it's the same. But when you create something, whether in writing, music, paint, pixels or whatever, it's like looking in a mirror because you see the expression of yourself. 

blog timeline

The first time I heard the word 'blog' was this century. It was in 2004 at UNSW in a thesis seminar. We went around the room and each person talked about their thesis, and one person said that they were doing their thesis on 'weblogs', which, they told us, is sometimes abbreviated to 'blogs'. 

Then a couple of years (I can't remember exactly) after that, I started my own blog. My blog has been through three iterations, this one being the latest. So, the timeline looks a bit like this:

2006 - 2013 version 1

2014 - 2019 'caeusura'

2020 - present, 'voracioutee'