Diary 50
10.06.24
This autumn has brought a dense apocalyptic fog that obscures everything inside of it. While I’m running I feel more ghost than body.
10.10.24
people are echo chambers, my coworker says
over a pristine plate of yellowtail sashimi
made for a stranger
people are goddamn echo chambers
i agree, nod my head
suddenly bounding
through a highway tunnel
vortex of swallowed sound
ricocheting inside my
hands moving over a stranger’s
table touching silver
they’d had in their mouths
i’m unconvinced the room
isn’t already expanding.
are any of us reachable?
i ask myself, kneeling to pick up
a napkin soaked in god-knows-what,
piss? and soy sauce, already
equipped with an answer,
of course.
10.11.24
Dreamt that I was sliding stones across a long echoey frozen lake, waiting for one to return at my feet.
10.13.24
Taking a Japanese culture/literature class this semester which, paradoxically, has taught me just how much American culture glorifies the self. For example in Japanese, ojamashimasu is a customary phrase that people say when they enter someone else’s home, which essentially translates to “I am intruding” or “I am disturbing you,” (though a friend joked that it really means, “fuck me for being in your presence.”) And historically, it seems anything involving self-inflicted pain (seppuku, shinjū) is generally perceived to be honorable, sacred. The culture is distinctly others-centered and collectivistic; the self is minimized to a degree that throws the predominantly individualistic, self-aggrandizing culture we have here in the U.S. into stark relief. Prioritize yourself, we tell each other, protect your peace, cut people off who aren’t worth your time anymore. Perhaps this is most apparent on social media, within the fire hose of therapy infographics for self-optimization, micro-celebrities documenting what they eat in a day, and people blasting some of the most intimate moments of their private lives online for everyone to see. It’s strange and I still don’t understand it all. Also, not saying one culture is better than the other— these are two extremes. But it is amusing to consider if, instead of saying “nice to see you,” we all said “well fuck me for being in your presence.”
10.14.24
“Ultimately, this moment is the most interesting one,” says Klincewicz. “It’s what we’re called to share.” From this viewpoint, Klincewicz sees the future as expanding before him, vast and unknown. “Recently, I’ve realized I’m trying to get myself naked. To just strip myself of the pretense and the expectation and the fear and the ego and to just be. For me, that feels like jumping into a chasm.” No leap is ever certain; in the freefall everything remains possible. Klincewicz has earned that freedom, but what he does with it is peripheral. What matters is the solace of surrender.”
Claire Summers, “Julian Klincewicz Sees No Moment But Now,” To Be Magazine, 12/15/2023.
