Welcome to Learned, a short, weekly look at language, education, and everything else under the sun. I’m Joel, amateur linguist and professional slacker. This week, I'm trying to walk it off.
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I've been walking a lot recently. I walk partly as a way to exercise without having to venture into a gym, partly as a way to force myself to get out my camera and focus on the world around me, but mainly because I'm burned out and angry and I don't know what else to do with myself.
Sometime in the early 80s, I heard an MTV VJ describe Joe Jackson (the English musician) and Elvis Costello as the new wave of angry young men because of songs like Is She Really Going Out With Him? and Watching the Detectives. And I got it. Even if I didn't really understand all the lyrics (more so with the latter song), I got it. Both songs were about the unfairness of life. About how things just didn't work out. About how life just...sucked.
That feeling of unfairness, of unbalance in the world and the anger that encompasses it stayed with me and has formed the majority of my musical taste. As I got older, the songs I gravitated to the most helped me to understand the different kinds of anger I saw and experienced around me. The Clash told stories of being beaten down by life, Suicidal Tendencies railed about not being listened to, Concrete Blonde went back to the source and railed at God himself.
Along with a greater understanding of the causes and types of anger came the search for solutions. I found stopgaps, mainly by trying what didn't work: hitting people, yelling at people, throwing things, throwing temper tantrums, and crying. I regret to say that I didn't completely abandon these tactics until well past the age where I should have. But I did abandon them and I found new outlets. Music was one, as was writing, but the big one was walking.
As a teen, I'd go on long walks around the neighborhood, sometimes with friends, sometimes alone, and try to figure shit out. We never really solved much, but it made the grey a little less gloomy sometimes. When I got older and got a car, the walking slowed but didn't stop. And then, living in other cities after college, I walked a lot just because I enjoyed it. (Seattle is a fantastic city to walk through.) The point being, it was never just for exercise. And most often, it was to try to stop being angry.
There's an inspirational quote that goes around: superimposed over some bucolic scene is some variation on the phrase, "What happens if you wake up and you're just not angry anymore?" Well, how the fuck would I know?
I like Henry Rollins' take on anger:
"It's good to be able to deal with anger somehow other than drinking, fighting, crashing cars, hitting your kid, your wife, your husband, your whatever: Paintbrushes, pens, movie cameras, guitars, microphones, typewriters -- these are good things. Weights. These are positive ways, good ways to deal with anger, frustration, alienation, rage. 'Cause all the other ways do nothing but hurt people."
So, I've been walking a lot recently. And I've been thinking about why I'm angry so often lately. As always, it boils down to the external and the internal. And what it comes down to, always, is fear. It's the old litany: I'm afraid of failure and I'm afraid of success. I'm afraid of moving forward and of staying still. I'm afraid to try. I'm afraid of disappointing others and of I'm afraid of disappointing myself. It is, on the whole, easier to be angry.
I used to think, in that punk rock, angry young man kind of way, that anger was a fuel. That it could be turned into greater purpose. And I still think that. Like I said, Uncle Henry's quote is a good one. But I think I'm at a point now where the anger is just burning with nothing productive being brought forth. I think I need to find something new to do. Because I don't think I'm ever going to wake up feeling not angry. I don't really think I'd know what to do if I did and that's a problem in and of itself. And I don't really want to be that guy anymore.
Amen. Source: FalseKnees #381
So, I've got a goal now. I'm trying to turn walking into something a little more rewarding than just burning off the fires. I've got some good friends who are into hiking and Japan is a country just littered with interesting hiking and walking trails and I've got the wherewithal to make use of them if I can just...work my way up to it.
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That's all. Stay safe, stay curious. Learn something.
Joel