Post-Finals Melancholy

Fall semester is officially over for me as of yesterday, and like many, I now don’t know what to do. No quiz to look forward to, no essay looming in the deadline, no class to run to with a crossaint in hand, not even office hours–nothing, nada. It should seem to be a big relief now that finals are over, but the entire process is just so extreme: before the finals, the world is dedicated to study; after the finals, the world is dedicated to nothing in particular. Life kind of jumps from one extreme to another, like blowing a big, red balloon until it is the size of 5 watermelons, and then just slowly letting the air slip away while watching it go limp.

Sure, there should be plenty to do, like catching up on some books, watching some episodes of the Daily show, or maybe even hanging out with friends. But after all the pressure is let out, you just kind of feel limp like the balloon with nothing much in mind. It’s a terrible feeling. And reflecting on it all, it seems that of all the classes I took, my most prominent memories consist of those spontaenous moments when I decide to hang out or do something with friends. Sure, I still remember the materials I learned from class, but those just aren’t substantive enough, especially for the feeling of limpness after finals.

But like most all my ruminations, there is an alternative narrative. Yesterday I was reading a New York Times Op-Ed piece by David Brooks that critiqued Gladwell’s new book, “Outliers”. The book talks about how many highly sucessful people are not really all that talented, but that the circumstances just happened to be in their favor, helping them nurture talent and ability at the appropriate time. Brooks argues that the book blurs the boundaries between self and society, attributing way too much credit to social forces and ignoring personal talent such as those found in Lincoln, Shakespeare, and Twain.

Despite Brooks’s conservative view on the social identity, I do have to give him credit for the way he argued and the new perspective he presented. The “individual will” that he proposed included the most critical element to personal success: the ability to consciously focus attention. He notes that the “Control of attention is the ultimate individual power. People who can do that are not prisoners of the stimuli around them. They can choose from the patterns in the world and lengthen their time horizons.” I found this section of his piece to be very insightful, and although my inclination and capacity to read the NY Times is most likely nurtured from a social construct, I find this particular insight on “control of attention” to be very true in deciding the actions taken towards success. If I am conscious of the social forces that shape me in my environment, then I can, like I am doing now, consciously focus my attention on the material (such as Brooks’s insight) that can help me succeed, regardless of the social background I have had. I can see how this can be taken to be a manifestation of my social nurturing, how my capacity to focus on this passage is due to my cultural context. However, I do feel I have a hand in deciding my destiny. The view that all things are a result of social forces is a bit like the monolithic Behaviorist notions of Psychology back in the 60s, and I don’t think man is quite that malleable yet.

To bring this tangent back into order, the discussion on self attention is the “counter narrative” I was referring to with the post-finals melancholy. Although I was feeling deflated from finals, my ability to consciously shift my attention elsewhere and focus on being productive will determine how I perform in the future. Therefore, although it is important to reflect on the post-final emotions, I should not let that keep me from being focused on the future. There is a plethora of philosophical counters to that conclusion (such as the need to live IN the moment), but I think for now, that option will be the best suited for my plans. Time to ditch the thinking and get to work.

The Strange World of Women’s Apparel

After taking a final today at 8 AM, I hung out with a few friends and found myself in a glitzy women’s apparel store named “Wet Seal”. The front of the store drew us in, and it was literally collaged with “Sales” stickers that screamed in red in black: “10$ Jeans”, “15$ Jackets”, etc, etc. Not surprisingly, I’ve never went shopping for women’s clothes before, and so I was quite intrigued by everything I saw. The first thing that kind of hit me and creeped me out at the same time was the army of  pink manneqins that populated the store like modern terra-cotta soldiers preparing for a fashion show. The gesture of the bodies gave the dolls life, but they had no facial features save for a slight protrusion at where the nose is supposed to be–kind of uncanny, really. The faces were too slick and too shiny to be ignored, and the fact that they were everywhere didn’t help much either.

The dolls aside, the place was well lit with stage lights that shone upon the stacks of clothes around the store, making some of the flashier fabrics and assorted ornaments sparkle. There weren’t any general lights to give the room a consistent hue–instead, individual spotlights were cast in different areas of the room, giving the place a kind of mottled and variegated lighting that punched out some and scaled back on other details. In addition to the individual overhead lights, a large, bright neon-pink sign/light titled “Wet Seal” was plastered against the left wall before the purple cash register like a proud flag of the pink mannequin army. The luminosity of the sign was spread amongst the table, clothes, dolls, and shoppers around, shrouding the check-out table in a protective (and fashionable!) aura. But the clothes that took in the mix of lights didn’t seem to need help–they themselves were adequately equipped with belts, buckles, buttons, pockets, laces, and many other decorative elements. The pants, in particular, were especally bold and came with confidant colors that grab the eyes: yellow, green, baby blue, orange, gold, silver, wax black, and, not surprisingly, pink.

I had always imagined clothing to be something of a necessity in keeping warm so that people will not have to brace the cold butt-naked, and although “looking good” was a helpful addition, I never really paid so much attention to the “fashion” aspect of clothing . As obvious as it may sound, I never truly came to recognize that some clothes existed simply for decorative purposes. For instance, there was the short sleeve jacket that stopped at the waist and didn’t even run arms length. “What a useless article of clothing,” I thought to myself. “That thing couldn’t keep a person warm if its life depended on it”. But my friend decided to try it on, and I thought it didn’t look too bad, actually. In fact, it looked pretty cool–like a pilot’s top but also with a tinge of elegante to the way the sleeves puffed at the shoulders and cut down abruptly at the elbows. And then there was the battery of gold-looking metal jewlrey that hung on the racks: the earrings, bracelets, shiny round stuff, shiny square stuff, shiny diamond stuff, etc. etc.  Again, my instinct was to judge these things based on their relative ability to keep some part of the body warm, and by that standard, the entire rack and all its shiny stuff was utterly and perfectly useless. Again, it took a friend to pose in front of a mirror for me to appreciate the different kind of “utility” to clothing.

It was then the store started to open up to me. The store’s glittery and ornate interior, its use of  pink, purple, and other bold colors, along with its army of ubiquitous “style-mannequins” all started to  “make sense”. The piles and piles of fluffy, curly, extra-short/long, patterned clothing no longer seemed inane. Instead, they became now a crucial element to a grander scheme called “managing the appearance”–an important part of daily life that warrants significant consideration. I saw a friend try on a sleeveless turtle neck sweater that ran a foot below the waist. “What a useless”—I stopped myself. A fellow friend added, “You could add a belt to the waist, along with some long socks. That would be so cute!” I agreed. An hour went by, and all throughout, I tried to take a piece of clothing I initially found kind of pointless and give it some twist of aesthetic meaning. For the most part, I did well. On one occasion though, I came across a gigantic set of sleek black leather boots that ran up to the ankle. They looked very intimidating, and I tried to imbue it with aesthetic meaning but couldn’t seem to get a handle on it–I turned to my friend for help. “That’s just horrific”, she said. “Yeah, horrific”, the other friend added. I agreed.

Some ten minutes later, we left.