The Mechanically Perfect Lie
A loud noise outside my window brings back a memory from 2002. The night I truly could have died.
https://my-notes.dragas.net/2026/01/11/the-mechanically-perfect-lie/
life
"...the first rebellious act that a man can perform (is) refusing to sleep. That's the real #rebellion against #life and the generative process. That's the real #human idea: I refuse to sleep. I'm going to protest the idea of #sleep by turning night into day. I'm going to revel and drink and womanize all night. In this way, I show #time, #death, the natural process of destruction, decay, and regeneration - I show it all that with my mind, my will, I, #man, triumph."
#LeonardCohen on #night owls
Edited 303d ago
The garden is a place of peace a tranquility, filled with many gifts that we are welcome to gather in our arms and share.
Child of Eden canvas print -- https://www.pictorem.com/2636647/child-of-eden/
Free shipping in the U.S. and Canada.
#art #artwork #mastoart #fediart #buyintoart #ayearforart #garden #radishes #plants #nature #naturelover #childhood #green #earth #decor #fedigiftshop #summer #life
- 10s: teenager craziness
- 20s: we spend a lot because we finally have our own money!
- 30s: you care about social and work justice
- 40s: you regret spending a lot in your 20s + you no longer care about justices, you just want to work in peace
- 50s: body pains
- 60s: the government wants you to retire even if you don't want to
- 70s: you finally realize you're a senior citizen
- 80s: you reminisce the world back then
- 90s: you're praying to reach your centennial
1/2
Every #Morning I start my day with my favorite #Songs (sometime old sometime new)& a #Glass of #Water. What a #Beautiful #Life to #Live..... 😎
Edited 226d ago
YOU’RE LOOKING
AT THE WRONG PARTS 💎
I sometimes wonder what people imagine is going on inside the life of someone with a visible disability.
I walk very strangely. My left arm doesn’t work at all. My hand is contracted into a claw. I do everything one-handed, and that clearly wasn’t covered in this model’s original operating instructions.
From the outside, I suspect it can look like a life dominated by disability.
“Poor bugger.” “What a tragedy.” “Everything must be so difficult?”
Meanwhile, inside my actual life, I’m usually wondering whether the coffee is ready, what ridiculous thing I can write on Mastodon, whether the dogs have been fed, or why everyone on the internet has suddenly gone mad again.
The disability is there, obviously. I cannot drive, and there are many things I cannot do unaided. Other things just take longer, because much of the world appears to have been designed by someone who assumed every human comes with two fully operational hands.
And most people are remarkably unhelpful.
That sounds like a complaint, but it has an unexpected benefit. If you’re disabled, you become bloody good at finding another way. You have to.
Eventually, you stop wondering how something is supposed to be done and work out how you can do it.
That doesn’t make accessibility unnecessary. Quite the opposite. But disabled people often become extremely skilled at adapting because the world gives us plenty of practice.
Disability is not the central event of my consciousness.
I don’t wake up thinking, “Good morning. I am disabled.”
I wake up thinking, “Coffee.”
Most of the time, I’m not experiencing myself as a tragic medical story. I’m just living.
I’ve had decades to become extremely competent at being this particular slightly damaged model of human being. Sometimes other people seem considerably more concerned about my disability than I am.
It’s sweet.
But unnecessary.
The odd thing about a visible disability is that people often see what doesn’t work before they notice the enormous amount that does.
And from inside here?
It’s mostly just Friday.
_____________________
@DigitalCoup
#Fediverse #OpenWeb #BigTech
@economics_that_works
#Economics #Housing #CostOfLiving
@meditation
#Meditation #Breathwork
#Disability #DisabledLife #Accessibility #Hemiplegia #Stroke #Life #coffee #human #medical #instructions #tragedy #Mastodon
DEATH, GOD, &
A VERY SMALL SPIDER 💎
I am increasingly aware that I will leave this world. I don’t know when. I don’t know how. Perhaps within the next decade. Perhaps sooner. Who knows.
And strangely, there is less fear in that now. Most of the fear seems to belong to what I imagine is unknown.
If death is simply the end of Robin and the end of this consciousness, then there will be nobody there to be bothered by it. It will simply be over. And if there is something beyond this life, another realm, another dimension, another form of consciousness, then I suppose I will recognise it when I get there.
I don’t know. And I am quite happy not knowing.
Human beings have created manifold books, religions and pictures of God, spirit, heaven, continuation and eternity. Perhaps some of them point towards something true. Perhaps some are simply beautiful ways of comforting ourselves in the face of death.
But every picture I can make of what comes next is still a picture being made here.
I don’t want to manufacture comfort. I want clarity. I want to meet whatever happens without having already decided what it is supposed to look like.
Maybe there is something. Maybe there is nothing. Either way, reality does not require my opinion.
And while I am sitting here contemplating this enormous mystery, a tiny spider appears beside me. He is absurdly small. I stop, look at him, laugh, and decide he can stay.
And suddenly, there it all is. Death. Consciousness. God. Eternity. And a tiny spider wandering across my morning.
The fire is on. The coffee is good. People are interacting with things I have written. The spider is minding his own business.
Life has not stopped being ordinary just because I know it ends. I rather like that.
None of it means anything until I give it meaning. And this morning, the meaning I choose is very simple.
Gratitude.
@DigitalCoup
@economics_that_works
@meditation
@3goodthings
#death #mortality #afterlife #consciousness #spirituality #ACIM #clarity #gratitude #presence #ordinarylife #mystery #life #openweb #human #person #spider #Economics #Housing #CostOfLiving #Meditation #Breathwork #Fediverse #OpenWeb #BigTech
Edited 91d ago
I published “I No Longer Tell People I Probably Have ADHD or AuDHD” at
https://www.ii.com/not-telling-i-have-audhd/
#adhd #audhd #neurodiversity #asd #autismspectrumdisorder #procrastination #health #life
#InfiniteInk #Byℵ #ByNM
The more the world changes, the more life follows and so, too, the music projects from Stan Stewart. Here's the story.
#changes #Life
https://muz4now.com/2026/changes-to-world-life-and-music-projects/
Un paso tras otro, sin prisa, observando y aprendiendo de lo que me muestra el camino… #Photography #BlancoyNegro #Tintype #Life
AND THEN THERE
IS EVERYBODY ELSE 💎
Today I'm thinking about AI, LOL, again, and I think there are actually three quite distinct groups forming around Artificial Intelligence.
There is a small group so frightened by it that they have decided they want nothing at all to do with it. And an even smaller group that has gone further and decided that anyone who uses AI is somehow morally suspect, deserving of abuse and bullying for their choice to use the technology.
AND THEN THERE IS EVERYBODY ELSE.
Most of us are not marching around waving AI banners.
WE’RE WATCHING.
We are trying things. We’re asking where it helps and where it doesn’t. We’re learning what it can do for disability, accessibility, education, writing, research, communication, creativity, work and ordinary daily life.
Some of us will use AI a lot. Some will barely use it at all. Some will remain deeply sceptical, and that seems perfectly healthy to me.
WHAT'S NOT HEALTHY IS FEAR OF A TECHNOLOGY TURNING INTO HOSTILITY TOWARD THOSE WHO USE IT.
AI is still very new. None of us knows exactly where this is going. But I suspect the future will not belong to the people shouting loudest either for it or against it.
It will belong to the much larger group quietly discovering where it adds value to human life. And where it doesn’t.
@3goodthings @DigitalCoup @meditation @economics_that_works @startrek
#AI #Accessibility #Technology #Fediverse #ArtificialIntelligence #value #human #healthy #research #education #communication #creativity #work #WAR #EVERYBODY #life
Edited 79d ago
QUIETLY, KEEP WALKING 💎
At seventy, I sometimes wonder what I would want an elder to have told me when I was young.
Probably this:
Don’t take anything too seriously. You will not solve every dilemma you encounter anyway. Try new things. Try new ideas. Try different ways of living. Meet lots of different people. Travel and have different experiences in unknown places. When something stops working, move on.
QUIETLY.
There's no great drama you ever need to contain. No need to prove that you were right or that the other person was wrong. No need to turn every ending into a battle, or even some of them.
I spent a lot of my life believing certain things were so terribly important; they weren't, but I defended them anyway. I argued endlessly for them. Above all else, I wanted to be right. I wasted a lot of time on meaningless details. Now I can’t even remember half of what they were about. That tells me something. Perhaps life isn’t about getting it right.
Perhaps it’s about fully experiencing life and knowing when it’s time to let something go and keep walking.
@3goodthings @DigitalCoup @meditation @economics_that_works @disability @pwd @joinin
Due parole su "Germinal" di Emile Zola.
Edited 55d ago
Scientists Calculated How Long a Moon City Could Survive. The Results Aren’t Great. https://www.byteseu.com/2385634/ #astronomy #Life #Moon #News #Science #Space
Dateless Lively Heat Still To Endure
This ground..
an uneven place
Near the mountain
Jagged rocks like teeth
Naked
Scarred and scorched
Soaks up the drought
Though all is still,
all moves
See those clouds above the mountain?
Like memories
When we walk here, we must dance
With careful choreography
past and present
Or fall, still, still, still
–
Remember?
The boys in the neighborhood
Smashing my face into the ground
Pounding me into the dirt
Searching to find whatever
Wounds I owned
Or could offer up.
I looked at the powder on my hands
Scuffs, reddened with red streaks and
The brown stuff of soil.
They kneed me in the back
Spitting on what must have appeared
To them, a stiff unliving body
A shape familiar to them
–
Then on some other day
When my curly hair shined
kissed me
With candy breaths
And bacon and egg lives
As if nothing had ever transpired
As if time did not exist
As if memories were lost
As if the earth would dance
Like a child
heal itself
As all believed it would
If left to its own ways
–
August is crueler than April
Bare ground reveals
Dryness, truths, & harshness
the collective abjective gait
Our gangly limbs move
gather, acquire.
“You know now, you understand
That’s the way you’re supposed to walk.”
And this haze, this smoke
From the myriad fires
we kindle
We nurse
We attend to
Creeps into our lungs
“Oh, do not ask what is it”
Etherizes everyone
Into a dull wade
through shallow air.
And
Thick late summer
only promises
An upcoming layer of snow
Prayers to western rivers
–
And while dancing
In this present or past
I turn my palms upwards
Blood and dirt and all
feeling the sun’s heat
Scraping the surface
Like a reader of braille
On its way to its most
orange of hues, setting
on hills
The wavy horizons of
our furthest view
Wandering in sober desire
To be filled In,
by night..
A night…
Any night
Cobalt to licorice
–
Then
To the cool morning
Speaking
with eloquence, still
Still, still
#Art #Life #Love #Nature #Photography #Poetry #Reading #Relationships #Writing
A ¥500 coin gets you a capsule toy. But what happens when collecting turns into an obsession? Japan has a whole vocabulary for it — and things can get surprisingly costly. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2026/09/22/language/gacha-chiikawa-vocabulary-plushie/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #life #language #nihongo #vocabulary #chiikawa #kurasushi #gashapon #gachapon
My Goldilocks Moments
How you dream of places when you’re not there! It’s hard to remember that this moment right now is just right. This is a future memory, make the most of it.
It’s like kids trying on clothes in the morning before school:
“These joggers are too big.”
“These joggers are too small.”
“These joggers aren’t just right, but they’ll do!”
“Wait a minute! These new joggers just became my favorite!” my gymnast kid proclaims. And then does a cartwheel, the ultimate test. Yes, they do the trick!
His brother has trouble dressing for the weather, as his mind is always in a different season.
The same kid who, in perfectly nice Finnish summer weather of 26°C, says it’s too cold to swim and wants to dress in layers then happily goes out to play football in 14°C rain wearing shorts and a tshirt. Do kids get cold? It depends on what the day’s plan is!
My mind drifts back to the Antibes of my photos. Dreamy moments. My gymnast kid’s mind goes in another direction:
”I saw a snake so small that he probably thought he was a worm. He was in the city. The small city snake politely waited before crossing the road.” (The End.)
I love storytelling and Goldilocks is definitely based on real life! The bears represent the family members that go with the flow, while Goldie is a Star and deserves no less than the princess who slept on top of a pea. But these things happen in real life, too. We are all Goldilocks at some point.
Every time I take the tram, I have to buy a ticket at the tram stop. There are no paper tickets: it’s done on an app that directs you to another app where you pay using your Face ID. As you can imagine, this is extremely slow (takes multiple seconds!) and usually I can see the tram coming while I anxiously wait for the electronic ticket to appear on my phone, accompanied by a reassuring swish sound.
But the Face ID is very “Goldilocks.” For it to recognise me, I have to tell myself, “Look alive!” and put on a neutral expression. No smile, no sunglasses, no squinting at the sun, no visible distress from the process or from seeing the tram getting closer and closer, and definitely no double chin. The angle of the phone must be just right! The eyes must be as open as possible! Look directly at the camera and hold! When all the circumstances are just right, the magic happens and I get my ticket.
Meanwhile, the Antibes of my memories continues its eternal summer.
The photos are from Antibes, France, June 2026.
#Antibes #Childhood #France #Life #Musing #Photography #Random #TravelPhotosCountry Life: The farm photographer who captured a changing New Zealand https://www.byteseu.com/2388042/ #captured #Changing #country #farm #Life #new #NewZealand #Photographer #round #sally #the #who #zealand
6 International Places That Will Pay You to Move There, From Italy to Japan https://www.byteseu.com/2388125/ #BusinessInsider #CharmingPlace #country #DifferentWay #heritage #Incentive #Ireland #ItalianIsland #Italy #Life #mover #part #people #program #SmallTown #World
CanCambria Energy Announces $5.0 Million Brokered LIFE Offering to Accelerate High-Impact Shallow Oil Project, Complementing Deep Gas Strategy in Southern Hungary Amid Soaring European Energy Prices https://www.byteseu.com/2389044/ #accelerate #amid #brokered #cancambria #DEEP #Energy #European #Gas #highimpact #Hungary #Life #million #oil #prices #project #shallow #southern #Strategy
https://www.europesays.com/3267288/ Family remembers Cheryl Macy, grandmother killed in Iowa Hill #AddisonDowling #america #BrittanyDowling #ChaseDowling #CherylMacy #download #family #FavoriteThing #grandmother #GrandmotherKilledIowaHill #IowaHill #IowaHillVictim #life #love #macy #memory #PlacerCounty #PlacerSpencerVictims #time #UnitedStates #UnitedStatesOfAmerica #US #USNews #USA #USANews
What I’ll Miss After Returning Home From a Year in Japan https://www.byteseu.com/2391477/ #BusinessInsider #Canada #DozenCity #goodbye #hometown #InfiniteAmount #Japan #Kumamoto #Life #Osaka #time #Tokyo #town #version #year
Forget the designer washrooms and convenience stores. A different Japan is having a moment: faded resorts, kissaten, neon bars and the maximalist style of the Showa Era are drawing a new generation of fans. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2026/09/24/travel/atami-showa-travel-japan/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #life #travel #atami #shonan #ito #shizuokaprefecture #showaera #tokyo #design
Good morning. 🌞🌳🦆
24 September 2026
I remember when I thought people in their 40s were old and anyone in their 50s was practically ancient. From that perspective, someone in their 70s might as well have been a living mummy. Perspective changes, doesn’t it? Somewhere along the way I started prefacing stories with, ‘When I was a young man in my 50s…’ Mostly I said it to get a chuckle out of someone in their 20s. Unfortunately, I have a deadpan delivery, so people often struggle to tell when I’m joking. It’s a gift and a curse.
These days, when I look at the people running things — soldiers, police officers, teachers — so many of them look too young to be doing what they’re doing. I’m tempted to ask their age just to make sure they’re not playing hooky from school. And then the opposite hits me: while I’m still the same person looking out through the same two eyes I’ve had for decades, my appearance has aged exactly the way it’s supposed to. That’s part of the deal. If you live, you age. If you’re lucky, you live past the point you once thought you’d never reach when you were twenty.
And really, all things considered, we’re lucky to have been born at all. The odds are practically zero. When mathematicians try to calculate it, they end up with numbers like 1 in 100,685,000. It’s a statistical miracle.
“In the end, reaching this age feels less like decline and more like improbable victory — a reminder that every day we wake up is another win against impossible odds, and worth savoring.
“To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.” — Oscar Wilde
The soul becomes dyed with the color of its thoughts.” — Marcus Aurelius
“Do not regret growing older. It is a privilege denied to many.” — Unknown
#photo #photography #photographer #photographylovers #wildlife #nature #bird #birds #birding #birdwatching #birdphotography #morning #silhouettes #shadows #sunset #lake #perspective #life
