The Open Matt Project

Define Irony

em·pir·ic [em pírrik] n
1. somebody guided by experience not theory: somebody who relies upon observation and experiment rather than theory to determine the truth about something
2. charlatan or impostor: a charlatan or quack, especially in medicine (archaic)

[Mid-16th century. From, ultimately, Greek empeirikos “experienced,” from empeiros “skilled,” literally “tried in,” from peira “try” (source of English pirate).]

I have thought of myself as a rational, logic-based kind of person for a long time. I have made fun of hippies and crystal worshippers for being "touchy-feely" and basically lost and confused. I've prided myself on my own objectivity, and my ability to abstract myself in order to see both my side of things and another side of things simultaneously. I love to bring things down to earth, and I find that practical experience is the perfect sword to slice through relativism's gordian knot.

Then I met Rose. She gently but systematically turned my head to look at the immense influence my emotions have on my behavior. She made me see that I edit my own memories based purely on my feelings at the time. I dramatically alter my speech and behavior depending on my moods, and my moods shift radically. She turned my introspective scrutiny towards binding my long term perspectives with my short term. She caused a meteor shower of grudging epiphanies, and the effects of the impacts have yet to be tallied.

I discovered that I'm hardly the logical philosopher I thought I was. I see that I have a razor-sharp mind, but it's more a force unto itself rather than a grounded anchor of reason. I use this mind to operate on myself constantly. It is constantly updating. I watch a love story on TV and resolve that I should open my heart more. I hear my friend talk about getting ripped off and refresh my cynical constructs about protecting my stuff. I arrive at the bar and far more people want to greet me than I want to greet in return, and I see myself as famous. This update process is so rapid, so frequent, and so urgently profound that there is little time to check for consistancy.

At the time, each time, every time, it is so flatly true, so real, that it simply is. It's my reality. The connections between moments are so tenuous as to be unimportant. One moment I'm friends with Bob, then he upsets me and he's not my friend, then he says something funny and we're pals again. Each is true and in conglomerate the pattern may mean that we're not such good friends, or very good friends, or any number of other relationships depending on an incalculable number of factors. The connections between the moments are less real than the moment itself.

I've had best friends betray me, and I've betrayed best friends. I've known people for many years who change completely who they are in that time. One day the pizza shop is there, the next it's gone. I've fallen in and out of love. My understanding of how the world works and why it is the way it is changes constantly. I just don't trust it enough to rely on it's consistency.

The only thing I've been able to trust with any real reliability is my instincts. My feelings about things have rarely been wrong, and I see now more than ever that it is they that comprise my foundation. At every major point in my life, it was my instincts that made the final decision. So naturally I find myself in the awkward position of realizing that my image of myself is fundamentally wrong. I am one of those crystal worshipping hippies. I'm just in disguise as a intellectual hard-liner. I am often moodier than a pregnant teenager, and without the excuse of being one.

You know what? I don't feel like writing any more.

Posted by Matt at July 16, 2003 12:21 PM