It's All a Metaphor
I’ve got three more days, including this one, on my silly little project to write a 327 word essay 327 days in a row. Unless something pretty unexpected happens, or I decide arbitrarily to stop before finishing just to spite myself, I’ll finish on Friday—and then decide how often I’ll keep writing and posting after that.
Today, though, I’m thinking of how I might construe the project—and especially the remaining few days—metaphorically, as an analog to the days of my life, where once they stretched before me all but endlessly but are now an increasingly scarce commodity all the time.
Whereas it once seemed an impossible chore to fill up more than ten months of daily pieces, now, there are precious few opportunities for me to undertake this task which, although it has worn on me more than a few times, has also been reasonably fulfilling and has given a modicum of purpose and direction to my days.
I imagine what it would be like if, as in some Hollywood hospital drama, I had but two remaining days to ever write a 327 word piece. What profound words of wisdom would I try to infuse my final few essays with? How desperate would I be to say something deeply important with my dying gasps of blog?
One would think that if I haven’t said it already, in 325 days, it’s unlikely I’m going to suddenly share in the final two. I think my main message is Woody Allen’s observation that 80% of success is just showing up; in my case, though, it’s probably more like 99%.
When I’m on my deathbed—which with any luck, will be a solar-powered anti-gravity one suspended over my indoor swimming pool, I hope I’m not going to be expected to issue forth some brilliantly illuminating message for posterity to record. Rather, I’d like to go with little fanfare, hardly recognized at all.
This is certainly a metaphor for that.
Today, though, I’m thinking of how I might construe the project—and especially the remaining few days—metaphorically, as an analog to the days of my life, where once they stretched before me all but endlessly but are now an increasingly scarce commodity all the time.
Whereas it once seemed an impossible chore to fill up more than ten months of daily pieces, now, there are precious few opportunities for me to undertake this task which, although it has worn on me more than a few times, has also been reasonably fulfilling and has given a modicum of purpose and direction to my days.
I imagine what it would be like if, as in some Hollywood hospital drama, I had but two remaining days to ever write a 327 word piece. What profound words of wisdom would I try to infuse my final few essays with? How desperate would I be to say something deeply important with my dying gasps of blog?
One would think that if I haven’t said it already, in 325 days, it’s unlikely I’m going to suddenly share in the final two. I think my main message is Woody Allen’s observation that 80% of success is just showing up; in my case, though, it’s probably more like 99%.
When I’m on my deathbed—which with any luck, will be a solar-powered anti-gravity one suspended over my indoor swimming pool, I hope I’m not going to be expected to issue forth some brilliantly illuminating message for posterity to record. Rather, I’d like to go with little fanfare, hardly recognized at all.
This is certainly a metaphor for that.
posted by Professor Dave at 5:06 PM
1 Comments:
Well -- for what it's worth -- I would certainly miss my dose of 327 should it, metaphorically, cease to be, which won’t be the case because it already is and cannot cease to be – as we might interpret from a selfish human perspective. Only remembrance might turn that fact but that raises issues that you might best tackle from your philosophical perspective.
And don't you think it has been easy -- all this reading, sometimes in huge gulps when I'm out of internet range and I have to read one or two week's worth of 327s! (Right now I’m reading (and writing) from Durban, South Africa, but I’ve read from Cape Town, Spain (of course), Mauritius, Seychelles, France, England and I think at least once once from Portugal.) It's been a game of catch-up sometimes, but well worth the effort. How many bloggers can claim, as you might now, that at least one person has read every single word -- that's 327words per day per year -- from their blog?
I know. It doesn’t matter.
Only one reader of 327 has read all of 327 you might say? Surely not. Of that I am sure. But should it only be one, what the hell, it’s been well worth it from my point of view, not yours, maybe.) Besides, one doesn’t truly write to be read – not really, anyway – though it might be nice to hear an echo every once in a while. Or not.
Should there be no more 327 at least one reader will perish, metaphorically, and that doesn’t cease to trouble me, metaphorically, not psychotically (like I’m not showing up in front of your house to ride bikes with you or to sit in back of your class during the next term to follow you like a prophet.) (That sort of movie must have been done already, no?) Rather, it simply troubles me selfishly. Like this comment. 327 words. Pretty hard to do. No?
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