Cosmetic Change Only

The sum of what I accomplished today - though welcome and relieving - amounts to little more than cosmetic change only. It is perhaps this boring moderation which characterizes most my days.  Perhaps too I must be thankful I haven't anything especially piquant by which to recall my quotidian adventures - having avoided for the time being at least the lottery risk of an unfavourable gambit. Whatever the summation of this similarly abstruse navel gazing the deeper analysis is that there is a want of predictability on balance. Astonishingly this causal chaos is routinely overlooked as we mindlessly equate our existence with the foreseeability of a car wash.

In defence the Universe is ultimately personal; which is to say, there is nothing especially dynamic about what we do other than what by chance we are privileged (or ordained) to experience. I haven't anything but the most philosophic view of both fortune and misfortune - to the extent even of attributing those factors in equal measure to good and bad conduct. To be clear, the implication is that notwithstanding the most favourable conduct, there can be unfavourable results. This may be seen as a poorly contrived means of distancing oneself from effort. That conclusion however fails to recognize the inherent predilection for improvement.  Or, as some have quipped, "You are what you are!", a thesis which frankly I consider harbours a sizeable ingredient of truth. How else for example to explain the not infrequent competition between a Harvard brat and a ghetto surprise?

The thrust of this admission is that whatever we do - barring the usual qualifications of criminality and absurdity - contains within its particles both elaborate and compelling production.  Many artists for example are lavished with praise for having dedicated themselves to the most seemingly uncomplicated pursuits whose manifestations are nonetheless both groundbreaking and pivotal. Upon questioning, the artists routinely excuse the expression as purely automatic - as well they should! Seldom is our intellect anything more than native - and just as often accidental.

The acknowledgement of life's ambivalence doesn't deny talent; rather it emphasizes the fortuity of its manifestation. In my latter years I have indulged myself to savour whatever is in the kitchen for the time being. This is both practical and calculating, qualities which far exceed some others to which I might aspire. It also successfully overcomes the miscalculation of both one's talent and the serendipity of life. If we were inclined to measure our achievement by the standard of anything or anyone other than ourselves, we have instantly committed a foreseeable error of judgement.  Even without getting into the hopeless confusion of arguing the legitimacy of that proposition, its adoption has the inarguable defence of being uplifting by design.  I am not suggesting one submit carelessly to an inferior objective; instead I am advancing the poignancy of recovering the strength of one's own behaviour and absorption. Growth is normally incremental only.