Anyway - An American in Paris. Good movie. A bit more indulgent than some of its contemporaries, but it had some genuinely beautiful and charming bits that resonate with me to this day. One of these is a line that I remember out of context, and think about from time to time: "I'm old enough to know what to do with my young feelings." Now, if memory serves, this line was said while scrutinizing a couple of attractive young women, so it takes a bit of a creepy turn. Sigh. Nonetheless, the wordplay stuck with me. And this is what was running through my head as I sat here, munching on Mr. Noodles (not dry anymore! I've been converted! Surely this is a sign of growing up...?) and carrots while nursing my third cup of coffee of the night, at 2:30 in the morning: "Am I too old to still be doing this?"
Ahh, yes: the mid-all-nighter existential crisis. I know it well.
"But seriously, Hatch - focus. This kind of behaviour wouldn't be unbecoming of someone in their early 20s, or working on an eight-pager for a throwaway undergrad class. But here you are, 25 years old, and finishing your last thesis chapter the night before it's due, and you STILL haven't learned! This could have been a glorious opportunity to get your work done early - to chip away at it over several days, or weeks even(!), and be able to enjoy a good night's sleep before submitting it. Instead, here you are, same atrocious work habits as usual, and oddly blasé about it. Shouldn't you feel at least a bit ashamed of yourself?"
The part of my brain that likes to respond to all aggressive queries with Eminem lyrics responded, "Yeah, I probably got a couple of screws up in my head loose, but no worse than what's going on in your parents' bedrooms."
The rest of my brain giggled momentarily at that sick burn, then returned to its usual programming. And that's when the An American in Paris line floating through the dredges of my sleep-deprived brain. And I reflected. And then responded in kind.
"You know, brain - you're not wrong. Realistically, I know that this sleep-deprivation, though I may be getting awfully skilled at functioning amidst it, is pretty bad for me. As are Mr. Noodles, for that matter. And you're entirely right: one of my foremost New Years Resolutions this year was to finally teach myself to stick to a sensible work schedule when it came to thesis writing. Womp womp.
But you know what, brain? I'm going to go out on a limb and say that I feel old enough to know what to do with my young feelings - or, in this case, tendencies. Yeah, this isn't a super desirable situation. And I know I'd normally try to rationalize it away by pointing out how busy a week it's been - I had my 25th birthday party and am moving in two days, after all. But I won't. I know that I could have been working on the actual writing of this ages ago, and that I spent most of my work hours dicking around on point form notes, which, granted, are actually pretty helpful. But here I am - working away, and actually kind of enjoying it. And this is probably the second or third last time I can even foreseeably do this on thesis work before I finally defend this sucker. So, instead of lamenting my inability to move on past outdated work habits, why not just enjoy them while they're still around, and I'm still able to sustain them, even if just a bit?"
Brain is impressed. Brain is satisfied. Brain nods approvingly, and backs away. Mike drop.
So that was cool.
Anyway, I will momentarily be putting this cursory late-night wisdom to practice. But, before I depart, I even managed to stumble across a lil' fact type dealio today amidst my writing, reading, and procrastipacking. I squeezed in a long overdue skype session with my friend Kate, and with it came this piece of previously unknown knowledge:
#59: Catnip is a plant. You can grow it in pots. In your house.
So there you have it. I must admit, I had never devoted too much thought to the ontological nature of catnip prior to our skype conversation, but I did assume it was some sort of dog food-esq mismash of various unsavoury crushed animal bits and chemicals, so this was news to me.
And that's all, folks! Back to writing about supervillains, violence, the military, and Iron Man! And - you guessed it - taking the chance to remind myself that I actually love what I'm writing about when it gets down to it. And that's pretty rare and special, and worth appreciating. So off I go!
Jarvis - drop my needle.
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