Hey, I’m new here. Ironically, I’ve been held up in my room, staring at my keyboard, finishing homework for an environmental ethics class I took this semester. We have to write a “position paper” talking about environmental ethics. I’ve been so friggin stressed out and absorbed with the amount of work and intellecualized form it takes, I think I’ll just express my dissatisfaction with over-intellectualizing our relationship. So, I wanted to start the paper off with something about how pissed off my dog is that I spent all my time this week dealing with this dumb class and not going on adventures or something like that, but then, it hit me. So I wrote a page of the thing and am vowing to try and go to sleep now, but I can barely tear myself away from the computer, my notes, and textbook. Anyway, that was a long explanation. This thing is kinda worded for my professor (hopefully that habit won’t stick). it’s really hard to share stuff like this, but here it is:
Last night, I was outside on my back porch smoking a cigarette, an experience that happens countless times during a twenty-four hour cycle, but this time something happened that reminded me of how disconnected I have become lately. Normally at night, my eyes reflexively draw to the moon, almost always unconsciously. I don’t usually look around in the sky for it, they just bounce over to that silver, glowing piece of rock. Last night, though, it was right in front of me, unavoidable, and I noticed, surprised to the point of disbelief, that the moon was full. The phase it was in startled me because I realized that the last time I had noticed the moon it was a thin crescent, and there it had stayed in my mind. I hadn’t even noticed its recent absence in my vision, and the silver orb, shrouded in smoky clouds, drew attention to a recent lack in connection I had articulated in various forms to myself, but hadn’t fully experienced. The evidence was indisputable, and I couldn’t argue with the nearly perfect round shape and its indication that time had passed without my awareness, like I had argued with Descartes. My anchor in time and space, perhaps the only symbol of the endurance of natural cycles I have consistent access to, the moon had been waxing all that time. I’ve been working so hard with the anticipation of work’s end that I’m scared now, after seeing the moon and realizing the depth of my disconnection to a place I can’t even pinpoint with much confidence, that reintegration will be harder than I think. I went inside, stunned, wrote this passage, drank my tea, and hopefully, will sleep.