Desperation

When I was first confronted with Thoreau’s declaration that “The vast majority of men lead lives of quiet desperation,” I remember quietly, desperately hoping I wasn’t one of them. But Thoreau didn’t mean this statement as a criticism so much as a self-revelation. He made a point to separate himself from his assumptions and routines in order to discover unexplored ways in which he could find fulfillment, pleasure and contentment.

Not long after reading Walden for the second time, I went through my Kafka phase. Here was a man who lived a life of overt desperation. Realizing that the flaw with living could lie not in the desperation involved but in not voicing that desperation was a real epiphany for me. Reading Kafka might have led to my appreciation of the grunge music surrounding me at the time, although it’d probably be more accurate to credit fellow computer nerds Josh, Damon and Cory for that. Besides, Kafka was far less satirical than grunge. His The Castle is the greatest ode to frustration that I have ever encountered.

Walt Whitman was the one who most successfully relayed to me the possibility of desperately clinging to hope. Completely removed from Kafka’s despair, Whitman had no apprehensions toward self-contradiction, confusion or the unknown. His words: “I too am not a bit tamed. I too am untranslatable. I sound my barbaric yawp over the roofs of the world,” inspired me infinitely. At the same time, his extreme optimism weakens him for my cynical self, because it’s less impressive to think well of things if you assume they’re going to turn out great than to think well of things despite realizing it’s all going to shit.

Douglas Adams seemed to revel in the fact that everything’s going to shit. That was the beauty of it for him. He understood than when all is lost, there is nothing to lose. Life doesn’t come with an instruction manual; not one that’s of much use anyhow. The most you can do is keep a towel nearby and, above all else, don’t panic. And when that plan fails, turn on the Improbability Drive and hope things work themselves out.

I see myself as embracing a combination of Thoreau’s asceticism and curiosity, Kafka’s cynicism and frustration, Whitman’s tenacity and hedonistic ambition and Adam’s indomitable sense of humor. In my experience, all you can do in this life is try. Try desperately, but don’t panic. Typically, Yoda had it backwards: Try or try not, there is no do. Doing has a finality that can only be equated with death. In any other connotation, completion is illusory. Therefore, the idea of fulfillment is dubious. Our pursuits toward that which would seem to fulfill are worthwhile, but we cannot predict our enjoyment of something we have never experienced. Also, fulfillment is fleeting by its very nature. The more you have of something, the more mundane it becomes. Thoreau left Walden after two years, inevitably finding it wanting.