On Fun, and the Importance of Having It

Those of you who've had the displeasure of hearing about my last semester -- or were simply forced too far into a corner to be able to eke your way out while I bitched thereon -- know that one of the primary reasons for my slow slip into psychological oblivion was the fact that it was almost completely impossible for me to have any fun. Granted, if I were enjoying my teaching experience, surely that would have sufficed in the fun department. But when one gets dicked over in a particular way (I'll leave it to you, trusty reader, to determine to whom that "one" might apply), fun is a luxury that is oft desired, infrequently achievable, and, most sadly, rarely accomplished.

Which is a part of the reason why I've switched gears this semester and tried to kickstart the fun back into my life. If I've learned nothing else -- on a life-level, not on the academic-level that I'm sure certain departments wish I'd learned -- from the past six months, it's that life ultimately sucks if you're not making some concentrated effort to enjoy yourself. It's the great equalizer, the thing that humbles the insane workaholic and soothes the savagely preoccupied. Without fun, we as a people and as individuals risk slipping into the dangerous doldrums of repetition, of seeing our lives not as something worth truly embracing but as a cyclical pattern of events that ultimately becomes boring and devoid of meaning.

I know that seems like an extreme point, but really, think about it. If you don't have any fun, any diversion from the ordinary, what inspires you to wake up each new day save for the obligation required of your occupation or some other force of responsibility in your life (such as, perhaps, raising a child)? I say there is none, because I've been there. The tug of responsibility is simply not a natural human function: at the end of the day, we are animals, and the purpose of our existence is to continue existing. So long as we can safely accomplish that, by acquiring and maintaining a food supply, shelter, and (even this is optional, granted) companionship, then we have the freedom to enjoy the lives with which we've been blessed, and it's a natural impulse to take every opportunity to do so. Particularly since we, as humans, are also blessed with an ethical and moral center that, in most cases, means we don't really have to be all that concerned with predation.

So with all these naturally-occurring issues aside, really, why shouldn't we enjoy ourselves to the utmost? My own theory is that our society has created the construct of responsibility to replace many of the other natural reactions that animals should have but we don't. The problem is that so many people get so wrapped up in their responsibilities that we don't give ourselves enough time to, in a clichéd turn of phrase, stop and smell the flowers, to really enjoy that which life has to offer us advanced beings.

And in the past two weeks, I have, to that, said, roughly quoting, "Fuck that shit."

I guess it all began about three weeks ago, with about a week and a half until my scheduled return to Princeton after my lengthy winter break. I was supposed to be working for those last several days, continuing the pattern of 40-hours-a-week (only this time sans paper-writing pressure), when, one night, to a random instant message window, came an entreaty from Ruben, my roommate from last year: go with him to Florida over Intersession. This, of course, was hindered by two concerns: a) my schedule (which was already posted) for the last week of work, and b) the need for parental permission. Somehow, in a move that flies in the face of the logic of over twenty-one years of personal experience, I was able to resolve both of those concerns and attain a spot in the passenger seat of a Mazda 3 headed due south.

The trip -- whose photo gallery can be seen on my Facebook site, which is linked on the right side of this page -- was, in a word, outstanding. We spent eight days traversing over 2000 miles in a grandest of collegiate fashions: venturing to Blacksburg to visit a certain very special Hokie and to conquer a much-anticipated buffalo wing-eating challenge; continuing to Tallahassee to spend a day with Ruben's father and savor the tastiness of Southern buffet cuisine; heading further southeast to Tampa to spend some time with Ruben's mother and enjoy the environs and theme park entertainment the area has to offer; and ultimately finishing the journey with a hardcore drive back north, with a stop in Washington to visit my friend Alicia and steal some couch space in an effort to split up the trip before returning to Princeton.

Along the way, in unplanned departures from the itinerary, we had a delicious lunch in a South Carolina Cracker Barrel; had some complimentary orange juice shortly across the Florida border, which was drunk shortly after my companion kissed the sun-soaked Floridian ground on which he walked; enjoyed not only the lush and lavish landscaping of Busch Gardens Tampa but also the majesty and wonder of Walt Disney World (tickets courtesy of Mama Chops), where we men-on-a-mission were able to successfully achieve the highlight attractions of all four parks in just one day; stopped at the ever-glorious Russell Stover factory outlet store; stopped later along I-95 at the significantly less glorious and much more sketchy South of the Border; and finally ventured into the substantial JR tobacco and retail outlet store in North Carolina so that I could purchase cheap cigarettes and Ruben could obtain the cigar he would smoke in the backseat while I drove through Virginia and cathartically sang along to the semester mix I'd brought with me for musically therapeutic purposes.

All told, it was a man trip to the highest order, and instead of exhausting me to the point where I couldn't stand to return to Princeton and resume my academic pursuits, I was actually rejuvenated and excited to return to the new semester.

Which is not to imply that my semester has been all work and no play since my return to Old Nassau. On the contrary, I've made a valiant and mostly successful effort to mix business with pleasure and ensure I don't slip into the monotony of an oppressive workload too soon. I spent the first week of class shopping around, perusing my class options and, happily, deciding very quickly upon the three classes in which I would partake during this final semester. The literature courses -- one a lecture/precept course, in the standard Princeton fashion, the other a course so small it's being converted to a twice-a-week seminar -- are very interesting, in contrasting styles, and small enough to ensure I'll be allowed personal attention; my third course, in macroeconomics, is a huge 200-people+ lecture with 20+ in each precept, which means I could get lost in there so quickly that they'll never know I'm P/D/F-ing the course. Which is precisely how I'd like it.

Outside of my classes, all of which I enjoy for their own reasons, I've been trying to have fun in my extracurricular life as well. I've finally been able to rejoin the Band, since my relative departure from that group last semester was something I regretted with the utmost derision, and have been re-embraced with open arms, a fact that makes me very happy. Furthermore, when I am allowed a moment to depart from my academic responsibilities, I have at my disposal a Nintendo Wii and a copy of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess that's just itching to have hours logged upon it, a request I'm more than happy to fulfill.

But perhaps the most telling signal of change this semester came on Wednesday, and it requires a bit of a backstory. During my trip to the mid-South this summer with Charles and Julia (on our coaster pilgrimage, so to speak), we rode a ride at Paramount King's Island that was themed to the film The Italian Job and featured a roller coaster ride in Mini Cooper-shaped trains. While waiting in line, Charles and I had the opportunity to converse about our mutual infatuation with these automobiles, and vowed that we would, at some point in the future, test drive them together. We'd had tentative plans at the end of the fall semester, but my never-say-die teaching commitments kept me from being able to successfully keep said plans.

On Wednesday, though, we were both finally able to make the trip to Princeton BMW/Mini and hop into a Mini Cooper S for a spin around the backroads of Princeton and Plainsboro. After giving Charles a chance to experience the handling in an automatic -- which we both agreed was awkwardly geared to overshift for power and then radically downshift to conserve gas, which never felt entirely right -- I hopped behind the wheel of a bright blue Mini Cooper S with one of the tastiest manual transmissions I've ever had the pleasure of shifting. At no point on the trip was I ever in doubt about whether I was in a gear or in which gear I was at the time; it was an unquestionable pleasure. Not to mention the fact that the car (which, granted, is small, but is also, at 2600 lbs., heavier than one might expect for such a small package) has a whole lot of giddy-up, particularly in the very ballsy second gear. And naturally, the handling, the entire reason for purchasing a Mini, was as glorious as I'd dreamed. It truly was a pleasure to drive, and I have to admit that I'm seriously considering acquiring that vehicle for my own in the future.

But more than all that, being able to actually see that goal, miniscule though it may be, reach its realization was an intensely satisfying thing. Throughout my teaching semester, I was reminded constantly about the importance of focus and devoting my energy to that one thing and one thing alone -- but all it made me realize is that we are not meant to focus on only one thing in this life. If we were, how could we have careers at the same time during which we find and nurture love? How could we raise children and still bring home the money to pay the bills? And, perhaps most pertinently, how could we live our day-to-day lives and ensure that the pattern of daily existence doesn't cause us to lose our fucking minds? And believe me, coming from someone who came dangerously close to doing just that, it's a very thin line to cross, and one from which we are never too far.

Knowing that, however, and, more importantly, knowing how to stave that danger off score us a great victory in this crazy game of life. And while I hope no one ever has to experience that which I did to learn that lesson, I also hope that I will not be the only one who understands just how much we need to stop and smell those flowers every once in a while, for in the nectar of those budding beauties lies the very secret to sanity and happiness -- and that is far too sacred a thing to take for granted.