Still Amazed, ...never grow up. Options

[Hobbes]

I can claim the benefits of education, partake in my own eagerness to learn independently about 'stuff', and have a seemingly-endless wealth of knowledge at my keyboard-tapping finger-tips...

BUT...

there are still some things that, despite a full (or at least, reasonably substantial) understanding of, continue to amaze me in a rather childish way; almost like I am still assuming magic must be involved as opposed to, say, physics.

For me, these things include:

~ Aeroplanes. Yes yes yes... I know how they manage to lift off into the sky, but when I'm walking along the street and look up to the clouds to see the winged tonnage soaring amongst them, the six-year-old within me expresses his disbelief: "They are HUGE! They don't seem to be flying THAT fast! Surely the only thing keeping it in the sky is sheer willpower?!"

~ Magnets. These things can move. They can MOVE without being actually TOUCHED. If that isn't magic, I don't know what is. And yep, even now, as I quickly approach my 28th ... 27th and 12 months ... next birthday, I can still occasionally be found running a magnet underneath a thin tabletop in order to make its partner appear to move on the surface: As.If.By.Thought.Alone! Or manipulating iron filings! Or seeing how strong a magnet is by creating strings of attracted paper clips to dangle from it. Or running a magnet over a CRT screen to make pretty colours, and then getting in a panic when the effect suddenly seems to have become permanent (and then remember the degauss button to make it all alright again).

~ Bubbles. Blah blah. Surface Tension. Blah blah. Surfactants. Blah blah. Elasticity. Pft, whatever. They are bubbbbbbles!! Having a niece means having an excuse to buy/make mixture and spend a summer's day blowing bubbles, catching them, attaching them to one another, enlarging them, popping them, getting mixture in your eye and blinding yourself briefly. Bubbles are great

So. What do you still marvel at, even though you really should know better?

[CrazyFooIAintGet...]

But science/technology IS amazing.

It's easy to trivialize these things just because they are familiar but that doesn't mean there's not crazy shizzle happening there.

[Phantom]

I feel like that about sunsets,
I know we spin around like crazy people around the sun like we have nothing better to do,
but when you just stand still and look at what the sun does with our sky, it just makes a total rainbow out of it. It looks like
the sun is getting touched by the sea making it disappear in a so wonderful moonlight. That still to my logics is so un-logically lit
by the sun that is so much further away from us.

Another thing that amazes me is coloured glass. I love it. I know how to produce them but still,
transparent colour that manipulate light! ITS AWESOME

[Pikasyuu]

Probably human cruelty/sociopathic behavior/lack of empathy.
Short on time, sorry for the lack of depthhh.

[Hobbes]

I feel like that about sunsets,

Ah yes!

Stupidly, I often marvel that I can be chatting online to somebody a couple of thousand miles away, yet it is possible for us both to look out the window and see the same sun in the sky. I know it might seem obvious, but I find it rather wonderful to know that there's a shared visual feature, despite that kind of distance.

[I_am_the_best]

I get this with just... life. I mean, what the hell? Seriously just what happened?!

[vicrawr]

I feel like that about sunsets,

Ah yes!

Stupidly, I often marvel that I can be chatting online to somebody a couple of thousand miles away, yet it is possible for us both to look out the window and see the same sun in the sky. I know it might seem obvious, but I find it rather wonderful to know that there's a shared visual feature, despite that kind of distance.

I saw a really stellar sunrise this morning about 6 am. That part where the top of the sky is still blue and it gets brighter as it goes down to the horizon. Then it turns purple and orange and is just spectacular.

[Pikasyuu]

I feel like that about sunsets,

Ah yes!

Stupidly, I often marvel that I can be chatting online to somebody a couple of thousand miles away, yet it is possible for us both to look out the window and see the same sun in the sky. I know it might seem obvious, but I find it rather wonderful to know that there's a shared visual feature, despite that kind of distance.

I saw a really stellar sunrise this morning about 6 am. That part where the top of the sky is still blue and it gets brighter as it goes down to the horizon. Then it turns purple and orange and is just spectacular.

those colors actually inspired part of my dayan tattoo - from my window as the sun rises, you get a blue-to-yellow contrast that is strikingly deep, so the outside petals of the hibiscus are blue, they fade into a more slate color, and eventually become yellow towards the middle. my artist did a nice job shading.

[mooooooooooopo]

I know we spin around like crazy people around the sun like we have nothing better to do,
but when you just stand still and look at what the sun does with our sky, it just makes a total rainbow out of it. It looks like
the sun is getting touched by the sea making it disappear in a so wonderful moonlight. That still to my logics is so un-logically lit
by the sun that is so much further away from us.

I second that, still can't get my head around us spinning at 1000mph (at least at the equator) around the earth's centre and faster still around the sun.

It also boggles my mind that the atoms we're all made from are mostly empty space, kept apart by electron shells repelling each other (IIRC).

[Hobbes]

I still can't get my head around us spinning at 1000mph (at least at the equator) around the earth's centre and faster still around the sun.

Ooh, that's a good one. We should all be clinging on for dear life!

I also find it astounding (and this can get somewhat existential if you let it) that my own existence, as a person, with the features I have, and the start at life I had, is reliant on one particular cell out of millions, meeting another particular one out of 400 or so. That is amazing enough, but even more amazing is when you consider how many times that has had to happen. i.e. it has occurred for each parent to exist, and then each parent of THAT parent, and each parent of THAT parent, etc. etc. etc. A massive, mind-blowing tree of incredible odds. And that's before you consider that, along the way, any one of them might not have surived long enough to reproduce, and could have ended/altered the chain that makes you who you are.

*explodes*

[Phantom]

I get this with just... life. I mean, what the hell? Seriously just what happened?!

Indeed like what? How come we can do all these amazing things (if you let go of the negative effects some choose to produce).
A small child in the uterus, coming out and everyone around can see the wonders of existence. The child making his/her first steps
exploring this big world where time does not exists yet, of following everything around them. Slowly experiencing what society means
and how social contacts have rules and boundaries. Enjoying how love lifts and hurts the mind and heart.. feeling life, and all the miracles
that exists around us. To be able and see and hear and smell and touch, everything gets more beautiful when you understand more and more about it.
Nature with her strange ways of being unpredictable and hard, but oh so beautiful, just like life

[Hobbes]

Enjoying how love lifts and hurts the mind and heart...

I'm not sure that the notion of love is considered to be "understood" yet. I know I certainly don't... But it is still a valid example. I continue to be amazed at the creation of an emotional bond with someone (whether mutual or not), how it has formed, and the way it effects us: emotionally/mentally and physically. And these feelings can be positive, or negative, or sometimes even both. It's such a small and simple word, "love", but it encompasses a ludicrous amount of feelings.

Also...

The air is full of data! Bluetooth, and WiFi, and radiowaves, and microwaves, and infrared! But... but... we can't see it! And yet, statistically, there be must a moment when clumps of 0's and 1's are whizzing past our eyes. The back of my mind still thinks the world should look a bit 'duller' now compared to 25, 50, 100 years ago, as if light finds it harder and harder to pass through the ridiculous amount of data in the air

[Pikasyuu]

love changes shape every second you're on earth.

the way i loved Dayan wasn't necessarily the same way i'd love somebody now, but i would never, ever not call it love, because it certainly was love at the time it existed - and still is now, in a quieter, more lonely way.

there's such a broad scope of emotions with loving someone. i find that it's incredibly rare for me to see someone and truly, really adore them without first thinking of what about them irritates me or why not to be with them, or even why it just wouldn't work. even when that exists, it isn't necessarily enough - there are circumstances, hurdles, the wrong time or place, but..i think even through all that, learning to appreciate and nurture the feeling just because of what it is (and because you never know when it might come along again) is a staple of actually caring about someone through and through. when, even after your own bitterness or pain at whatever might have happened falls away and the warmth itself is still there..i think that's something to hold onto.

the chairman in memoirs of a geisha makes several very good points about how you have to savor life. i get bored easily, so when little miracles come along or i feel something that i thought i was too jaded to feel, those are the times when you have to just stop and breathe in everything around you.

[Daria]

The sea amazes me. HUGE amounts of amazement, and I grin like a child whenever I learn something new that blows my mind about it.

[Hobbes]

The sea amazes me. HUGE amounts of amazement, and I grin like a child whenever I learn something new that blows my mind about it.

I absolutely agree. Even though I now live very close to the sea, and so the 'novelty' should perhaps have worn off, I could still easily spend hours just gazing out at the water.

Similarly, the stars. I am constantly in awe of those tiny points of light in the sky, and I find it difficult to draw my eyes away from them when necessary. And I always find it amazing that, technically, the points of light I am looking at could be from a star that doesn't even exist anymore.

[Hobbes]

love changes shape every second you're on earth.

the way i loved Dayan wasn't necessarily the same way i'd love somebody now, but i would never, ever not call it love, because it certainly was love at the time it existed - and still is now, in a quieter, more lonely way.

there's such a broad scope of emotions with loving someone. i find that it's incredibly rare for me to see someone and truly, really adore them without first thinking of what about them irritates me or why not to be with them, or even why it just wouldn't work. even when that exists, it isn't necessarily enough - there are circumstances, hurdles, the wrong time or place, but..i think even through all that, learning to appreciate and nurture the feeling just because of what it is (and because you never know when it might come along again) is a staple of actually caring about someone through and through. when, even after your own bitterness or pain at whatever might have happened falls away and the warmth itself is still there..i think that's something to hold onto.

This thread has changed into something I could not have preempted. From my thoughts of, "Oooh... bubbles! Oooh... magnets!" to discussions of love. It is good, and I like it

Syuu, much of what you say makes me chuckle a little, simply because I was discussing similar things only last night, and you might as well have been in the room with me, listening, recording everything said and...

...

*looks under cushions and in cupboards*

...

okay, it's just a coincidence

Seriously though. Much of it resonates profoundly. I still am constantly learning what love is, what it means, what effect it has, how to interpret it, and how to deal with it. Feeling 'in love' with somebody has, for me, always meant a risk of unrequited feelings. The assumption has generally been that it is not a mutual adoration and, no matter how much I want to be with someone, or share an aspect of my life with someone, it is not to be. Or the other person might already be in a relationship, or happy as they are, or would not want to be with me, or it just wouldn't work "logistically", or etc. etc. etc.

I have always found "unrequited love" to be difficult, often torturous. I, perhaps foolishly, find myself getting emotionally attached to people rather quickly, so am somewhat prone to developing strong feelings of affection for certain people. Couple this with not wanting to ruin a friendship by declaring an adoration, and you'll generally find that I don't often speak up about such things - holding back those good feelings, for fear or experiencing the bad things.

However, I am finding myself slowly being convinced otherwise by someone far, far wiser than I. And it's refreshing, and exciting, and intriguing.

It should be, and is, wonderful enough to be experiencing those kinds of feelings for someone, and to know that they are a part of my life - that I am lucky enough to have such feelings. It can be awkward to declare that you have a certain type of love for someone, and discover they don't feel the same way, but really that should not take anything away from how you feel.

I fear I am not articulating this well enough. And I certainly feel as though I am missing a crucial point along the way.

That final line of Syuu's paragraph I quoted says much of it, in a far more concise form:

"even after your own bitterness or pain at whatever might have happened falls away and the warmth itself is still there..i think that's something to hold onto."

I am starting to feel like I am being granted permission to love. That it is actually 'okay' to love someone, even if there is little or no chance of it blossoming into whatever romantically idealist fantasy I might be desperately hoping for - whether that is because of their own feelings, the situation, or because it is actually better for me to NOT be in that relationship. But that's fine. It doesn't make the love any less real.

For me, that's new.

I think I'll finish here, and wander off in the distance with an aura about me that says something beautiful... something meaningful... something like: "Hmm... I suck at explaining stuff"

[Phantom]

I think I'll finish here, and wander off in the distance with an aura about me that says something beautiful... something meaningful... something like: "Hmm... I suck at explaining stuff"

Woaw, the words and the way you wrote is better than I could ever explain myself.
You and syuu make me feel ok, about the choices I recently made in my life.

Love frightens me, always makes me feel I have to project something different than what and who I am.
Love hurts me, whenever I have to end things that, probably where perfect.
Love.. I love it, it makes the world disappear and stand still, like I don't need to breath, like I only exist as a heartbeat.
Love is the only feeling I want to feel if I ever have to choose.

I never worry about the love not being mutual or not, even though it's of course always nicer if it is.
I just want to know I can still love whatever happens in my life, whatever I had to or have to face,
I know as long as I can love someone or something I will be happy.



Now for less heavy things, somehow I do not understand mirrors, how it feels like they can see you I always feel like a little kid when I watch myself, always try to make funny faces like it is someone else I am looking at, hehe.

[Hobbes]

Now for less heavy things, somehow I do not understand mirrors, how it feels like they can see you I always feel like a little kid when I watch myself, always try to make funny faces like it is someone else I am looking at, hehe.

Hehe. Gimme a couple of mirrors facing one another, and I still enjoy the infinity! Similarly, pointing a camera at a screen which is displaying the camera's view, and creating a swirling distance of infinite repetition. Never fails to amuse me.

[gothictheysay]

Speaking of data-related things, yeah, cell phones. I don't understand most technology other than on the surface, but for some reason cell phones seem really special.

[Hobbes]

Speaking of data-related things, yeah, cell phones. I don't understand most technology other than on the surface, but for some reason cell phones seem really special.

Hehe... even when I had to learn a little bit about how cell phones and the cellphone network works, it still didn't stop me thinking how unbelievable it all seems

[voices_in_my_hea...]

Similarly, the stars. I am constantly in awe of those tiny points of light in the sky, and I find it difficult to draw my eyes away from them when necessary. And I always find it amazing that, technically, the points of light I am looking at could be from a star that doesn't even exist anymore.

The stars are the first thing I thought about when I saw this thread. They're so far away that my mind couldn't even begin to comprehend the distance, and yet they're there every night, shining away. While humans live, love, work, and die, these stars have been the same as they always were. It's almost poetic - while we've toiled away creating new technologies and generations, while languages, fashions and entire cultures have faded in and out of existance, the very same stars have been watching us.

[Phantom]

Music, sound and music instruments!

[I_am_the_best]

^YES! I really think music is just like another logical system, equal with maths and language.

Also sight. That's weird. I mean I understand the physics of it, but still - it blows my mind!

[voices_in_my_hea...]

The thing that still trips me up the most about sight is the fact that we really see everything upside down...but our brains do their brain-magic and turn it all the right-side-up.

[Hobbes]

The thing that still trips me up the most about sight is the fact that we really see everything upside down...but our brains do their brain-magic and turn it all the right-side-up.

Yeah, I was reading something recently about a guy who experimented on himself by wearing glasses that flipped the world upside down. After some time, his brain took over, and everything looked the right way around again.