On The Ning Nang Nong

400 Twitches And Blows

When Ning was set up, I had only a burning whim but no thoughtful vision on what I wanted to write in the thread. May be clack and clack some more. I was fuzzy on how to fashion my whim into a habit, more than fuzzy I was doubtful that I could ever sustain beyond ten posts because I lose interest quickly and leapfrog to another capricious novelty.

Ning in the shadow of QPQ has disciplined me in ways that now though seem natural would have been unimaginable for me back then. QPQ and Ning have vetted my interest, at times pained me to forge writing, at times amused me to recollect anedotes, but they have remained the mainstay of my exploration like two sacred totem poles around which my fluent and itinerant thoughts were looped.

There's method even in the madness but I had no appealing madness but only a mooncalf ambition to transcend and cultivate a method. What was that method? To write about things that fascinate me ! Refresh memories of wild food indulgence and swing between bouts of coherence and gaps of cackle.

Each post here seeded from the twitch of that coherence which inflated into a blow of cackle. A meek twitch initiated the post but soon the blow would overrun like a feral mooncalf. I would write something and read the next day to wonder, that's criminally punishable grammar. Then I would revisit some more and exclaim: seriously, I wrote that.

On this 400th post, I realize that I am only crawling and not galloping to reinvent myself. But each post nevertheless propelled me ahead, to continue, to strive and to invest in the prospect that one day out of this madness may emerge a meaningful method.

 

You are heh-hah-hehe! Going out for a run, will catch up with your posts on my return. Stay put, don't disappear over the Goldilocks jamais vu!

 

Ning Nang Nong has a contrived ascension and distinctive charm but nothing justifyingly Goldilockian than narcissism of the small differences parodied in the Monty Python's "Life of Brian" movie and also which side the bread is buttered.

The narcissism of small differences (German: der Narzissmus der kleinen Differenzen) is the thesis that it is precisely communities with adjoining territories and close relationships that engage in constant feuds and mutual ridicule because of hypersensitivity to details of differentiation. The term was coined by Sigmund Freud in 1917, based on the earlier work of British anthropologist Ernest Crawley. In language differing only slightly from current psychoanalytic terminology, Crawley declared that each individual is separated from others by a taboo of personal isolation, a narcissism of minor differences. ​

In my wild meditations in this thread, that punctilio narcissism manifests as

Ning is a factoid.
Nang is a fact.
Nong is the real fact.

... nevertheless they could all at times be as dubious as the identities of Nohl Pohl Kohl in Nietzsche's Ecce Homo that historians debated for years and resolved those monikers as:

Text: I have experienced three generations of them, from Brendel of blessed memory, who confounded Wagner with Hegel, to the "idealists" of the Bayreuth Gazette, who confound Wagner with themselves,—I have been the recipient of every kind of confession about Wagner, from "beautiful souls." My kingdom for just one intelligent word I—In very truth, a blood-curdling company! Nohl, Pohl, and Kohl and others of their kidney to infinity!

Critic's Footnote: Nohl and Pohl were both writers on music; Kohl, however, which literally means cabbage, is a slang expression, denoting superior nonsense.

Therefore your reasoning from Ning (vague n[oth]ing) to Nong (superior no[thi]ng) now serves as the perfect illusory vehicle to ascend from nihilism to a higher nihilism while sneaking in the pretense of considerate liberation and bright enlightenment in Nang.

 

flapped, but not stirred

Loved this analogy here about American and Russian writers.

This collection of material is an extraordinary demonstration of how much writers mattered in the Soviet Union. If you were a writer you sort of … mattered. Solzhenitsyn said that in the West a writer could go to the top of a mountain and flap his arms about like mad and nobody would take any notice, but in the Soviet Union if a writer stirred his hand in a certain way it sent shock waves through the viscous air.

 

fourth came and went
fifth was no dent
sixth was an ascent
seventh was a descent
eighth, only a vent!
ninth jumped to some extent
tenth was the key invent
eleventh chased as urgent
twelfth became an event!

 

English Attention: Souped up

There are many ways to say the same thing. But the humor in the joke was souped-up with the precise funny expression.

 

Okonomi,

Here's a gift for you in return. Who? Pamina Devi! What? Peter Sellars.

I was introduced to him when I began to explore Mozart's works. The man is a legendary anathema who gets the itchy goat of the critics for severe or rehabilitated adaptations of classical works. He takes Magic Flute and converts it into a Cambodian Pamina Devi.

Peter Sellars (born 27 September, 1957) is an American theatre director, noted for his unique contemporary stagings of classical and contemporary operas and plays

The great German soprano Elisabeth Schwarzkopf said of Sellars: "There are names I do not want mentioned in my home. Do not say that name in my presence. I have seen what he has done, and it is criminal. As my husband used to say, so far no one has dared go into the Louvre Museum to spray graffiti on the Mona Lisa, but some opera directors are spraying graffiti over masterpieces.​

Also , A funny man, that Peter Sellars

His "elfin wunderkind" looks are a steal!

 

Shame and Vulnerability

In college, if you had asked anyone what was more painful than being snubbed by a person they had feelings for, they would tell you that rejection has not hurt as much as their exposed vulnerability. Now they know that I like them. We fear at the disclosure of our vulnerability. They know that I fancy them. How shameful!

Few years ago, I watched a TED talk that challenged my (then) discretion to securely fortify and not wantonly squander vulnerability. Brene Brown's "The Power Of Vulnerability" ranks as one of the most popular TED talks. In the wake of her "breakdown", or as she jocularly called it "spiritual awakening", Brown delivers an explosive analysis on the intricately linked self-worth and shame.

There was only one variable that separated the people who have a strong sense of love and belonging and the people who really struggle for it. And that was, the people who have a strong sense of love and belonging believe they’re worthy of love and belonging. That’s it. They believe they’re worthy. The other thing that they had in common was this: They fully embraced vulnerability. They believed that what made them vulnerable made them beautiful. They didn’t talk about vulnerability being comfortable, nor did they really talk about it being excruciating — as I had heard it earlier in the shame interviewing. They just talked about it being necessary. They talked about the willingness to say, “I love you” first, the willingness to do something where there are no guarantees, the willingness to breathe through waiting for the doctor to call after your mammogram. They’re willing to invest in a relationship that may or may not work out. They thought this was fundamental.

What makes you feel vulnerable?” And within an hour and a half, I had 150 responses. Because I wanted to know what’s out there. Having to ask my husband for help because I’m sick, and we’re newly married; initiating sex with my husband; initiating sex with my wife; being turned down; asking someone out; waiting for the doctor to call back; getting laid off; laying off people — this is the world we live in. We live in a vulnerable world. And one of the ways we deal with it is we numb vulnerability.​

In the talk, she urges to invest in the vulnerability involved in a situation and not be daunted by potential shame as such ungainly reckoning to risk our vulnerability still upholds our self-worth and pride and expands on our capacity to feel and express uninhibited. It fosters in us the strength to withstand negative outcomes and overpower the circumstantial deterrents with obligatory shame. Don't fear shame.

....Can I be this fierce about this?” just to be able to stop and, instead of catastrophizing what might happen, to say, “I’m just so grateful, because to feel this vulnerable means I’m alive.”​

That learning had a striking impact on me since then. Let the fear of shame NOT deprive me of the hopeful uncertainty in my willed gambit. No matter how feeble or how inconceivable are my odds of success through my bared vulnerability, embrace the contingent shame and cultivate the willingness to approach and strike where there are no guarantees.