Quantum Friendship

Before leaving Bowling Green, I was walking and talking with a friend of mine who posed a theory rooted in quantum mechanics. I guess it was more of an observation than a theory, and I can’t remember his exact words from four years ago, but the idea was something like this:

Nobody ever remains exactly the same, so they become different people. Your friends essentially cease to exist, in a manner of speaking, because they are never quite the same as they were in your memory.

It’s not a bad thing. It’s not a good thing. It’s just a… thing. But it’s been resonating in my mind for four years now.

”So what I told you was true, from a certain point of view.”
”A certain point of view?”
”Luke, you will find that many of the truths we cling to depend greatly on our own point of view.”

I saw him again yesterday. His theory is certainly sound; he has changed quite a bit (or at least his life has).

Life inexorably moves us in that direction, doesn’t it, old buddy?

We talked about many things yesterday. Then-and-now reflections on academia, musical philosophy, business ambitions, and the quest for fulfillment. I have barely begun to process everything I took in yesterday, pondering and pontificating about life on the stage of pizza, beer, coffee, hiking, and Chinese buffet.

”Memory can change the shape of a room; it can change the color of a car. And memories can be distorted. They're just an interpretation, they're not a record, and they're irrelevant if you have the facts. I have to believe in a world outside my own mind. I have to believe that my actions still have meaning, even if I can’t remember them.”

It’s good to visit friends. It seems like there’s never going to be enough of that, but we’re not all neighbors anymore, nor will we ever be again. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing after all. I’ve been consumed by this frustration, lamenting things that are beyond my control. I’ve been going stir-crazy here in Wisconsin, waiting and waiting. Soon I’ll be going to Minneapolis, then Kansas City, then a few other places, then back to Austin. I must focus.

I certainly feel better about composing now. Basically, just do stuff. Academia really messed us up. We became acclimated to intellectual existentialism with our music, thinking we had to do something profound or it was a waste of time. We don’t have to compete. We just have to do what we do. You get a commission and you do it. The person is happy that you did it. We’re better off forgetting the if-they-could-see-me-now mentality.

I’ve been restless and kinetic, but unfocused. That’s his diagnosis. Some things just don’t matter. Try as I might, though, I guess feeling “left behind” with this dispersion of kindred spirits across the globe is going to be something I’ll struggle with for a while.

”I will not say do not weep, for not all tears are an evil.”

Like I said, I’m obviously frustrated by a lot of things. Restless. Maybe that’s not such a bad thing, either. Maybe.

I don’t mean to short-change my friend here; obviously I could glean a lot more from yesterday and post a series of blog posts about revealing the secrets of the universe, but that’s a lofty ambition. One thing at a time.

Probably someday I’ll have kids of my own, and that’s going to filter my priorities, for sure! Yikes. It always makes me sad to lose touch with friends, and sadder still to think that it’s inevitable, especially with kids in the picture. I guess it doesn’t have to be that way. “What way? It doesn’t have to be sad, or it doesn’t have to be inevitable?” I don’t even know. You tell me.

We live fast and love hard. That’s the way to go, my quantum friends.

Today is my birthday. I just turned 29.

”You okay, Jim? How do you feel?”
”I feel… young!”