grassy

It's hard to say what permutation my vices will take. I had a friend who said I was off the mark and that I don't have any legitimate vices. Maybe I am using the word vice out of hand. Maybe I am hyper critical. I was thinking that I am a man who makes way too many decisions based on fear, which is a different twist than being hyper critical. I also thought that my atheism and my judaism are actually logical partners. I have the sense that my critical thinking faculties can be considered something Jew - ish. And it is those faculties that spawned the atheism in its fullness. My intellect and my sense of the world has to be somewhat attributed to being Jewish, regardless of my sparse level of immersion. This writing, right now, feels Jewish. Maybe I'm mixing my metaphors, I don't know. Maybe it's just another example of religions glomming off of innate human attributes. But that's going one level deeper. I'm literally talking about what is stereotypically Jewish. I think I am being a very good Jew by discarding God. God flies in the face of what would be the natural result of study and analysis. Questioning the very existence of religions as an honest category of belief is a different story. But it's typical of me to go to that next level. That's why I write. And that's also why if I don't write, I get into trouble. I spiral without any ground level to refer back to. That's why this paragraph doesn't have to end, really. This is one version of a spiral.

The funny thing is that I don't really know that I am spiraling. Maybe it's because I am so used to it. Maybe it's because society doesn't encourage or include a built-in space for something like this. I feel I have to insert it unnaturally. I am made to be shamed for this sort of introspection. Introspective work. I suppose I shouldn't blame society as a whole. It could be just my experience, my environment.

The funny thing is that I have noticed I get uncomfortable being close to other introspective people. I love them more deeply, and maybe that is a cause for discomfort. I don't fear them, my preferred go-to emotion. I can't seem to sustain trust, intimacy, love, affection. I only nestle in it as a departure from my everyday life. My everyday life is basically devoid of that. I wonder if leaving the orchestra would be a step in a new direction. Oddly, as I was leaving, I was getting more of a sense of bonding with my orchestral colleagues. Maybe the act of leaving engendered the space that I require for that sense of closeness. It provided that implied distance from them, so I was safe to feel my feelings fully.