The fun never stops. It just slows down to a crawl.

[mrissa]

L'shana tovah to my Jewish friends. I hope you have a very good Rosh Hashanah. Frankly I am glad it's not a new year on the calendar I observe, because I feel like I can manage going on with things, but having to start new today would be more than I have the energy for. I'm not sad or mopey or angry or sick or anything like that. I'm just low on energy.

(Not that this never happens on the new year I do observe.)

I seem to be that level of low-energy where I stare at the half-written lj post and think, "...and stuff. Er somethin'." And then I look around and think, "Now would be a time for doing a useful thing. If I...knew of a useful thing...to do. Um." And then I spotted the cell phone bill that needed paying, and I paid it, and I felt all virtuous until I realized that there is an entire day left to go. So possibly it is not the time to expect great things of me, is what I'm saying. I think my next great and virtuous task will be going to get a glass of juice. Yah, I know, fasten your seatbelts. Always a thrill with me.

I am not reposting the thirty-some question meme some of my friends are posting, but I had a question sparked by it: do you consider yourself an optimistic person? And if so, do you feel optimistic right now? And if so, in what areas of life? Your personal life, or scientific progress, or the upcoming election in the US, or the upcoming election in Canada, or your 9-year-old's progress playing an instrument, or what? Let's hear about optimism. The people who feel optimistic about nothing surely need it.

(I am not among them. I feel optimistic about my PT, and about The True Tale of Carter Hall, and about the Large Hadron Collider, and lo these many other things. Not energetic. But optimistic.)

Comments

[buymeaclue.livejournal.com]

I've found myself, recently, accused of being an optimist. Surprised the heck out of me. I'd have pegged myself as realistic: open to both the possibility that things will go well and the possibility that they won't, albeit generally determined to do what I can to tip them in the going-well direction. But given the company I was in at the time, I guess even that looked like optimism, and since then I've been thinking that, okay, maybe that shoe doesn't entirely not fit.

The thing I'm currently most optimistic about is winter. I know this isn't necessarily how it works, but if it's this cool, this early, that seems to me to bode well for snow, snow, snow. I'm optimistic about the future being something worth looking forward to in all sorts of vague nonspecific ways. I'm optimistic about my chances of eating well for the foreseeable future.

(I am somewhat less optimistic about getting through the week intact, given that I'm already in a state of mild sleep-deprivation and it's only Monday, but we'll see how that goes.)

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

We are big fans of intact Hannahs here. They are the kind of Hannahs we like best.

I think most optimists are open to the possibility that things will not go well. The "EVERYTHING WILL ALWAYS BE GREAT!!!!!" people are not so much optimists as psychotics.

I also have hope of snow. Snooowwwww! I also have hope of good leaves between now and snow. But yesterday sitting at lunch I realized that we have entered the season of the year where my subconscious will leap hopefully to snow if I see tiny white spots on window glass out of the corner of my eye. This is a bit unfortunate, as a lot of people leave tiny white spots somewhere when they clean their windows, but on the other hand, living in hope is no bad thing.

[ckd]

I'm optimistic about work stuff, in that I feel like my bits are going well and the bits other people are working on are coming along also.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

I'm optimistic that the new cameras will do what I bought them for (various things better than the old cameras).

I'm optimistic that the financial system will not melt down. Seems to me most of the at-risk players have already collapsed, and it doesn't seem to have done much harm. There's a short-term effect where the companies are scared stupid, but only time can cure that. (Not so optimistic about the medium-term effects of this much concentration in the banking industry.)

I'm optimistic about private rocket launching, after yesterday's successful orbital launch.

I'm fairly optimistic about Saturn's Children, being about half-way through now.

I'm optimistic that America may escape collapsing into fascism or some equivalent extreme ideology (sometimes I think "optimistic" means "holding firmly on to a hopeful position in the teeth of the evidence).

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

I think there's still room for optimism about avoiding fascism or equivalent extreme. There may be alarming evidence, but it does not look to me like alarming and overwhelmingly inevitable evidence.

Possibly this is because I'm an optimist, too.

Possibly "optimist" means "person with really, really stringent definitions of what counts as inevitable."

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

Obviously we're not "one step" from fascism.

But I don't think that's the time when one first needs to sit up and take notice, either.

Perhaps an optimist is somebody who doesn't give up until the bad outcome is in fact inevitable?

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Also may decide to try to mitigate the badness of the bad outcome as much as possible, once it's inevitable.

There are very few things so bad that I can't improve a small corner of them for somebody.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

I think if you're down to consciously mitigating local badness, without higher pretensions, that you're past what I'd call "optimism".

[aedifica]

I think believing there is anything mitigable about a bad situation is still optimism.

[dd-b.livejournal.com]

Hmmm; I suppose that'd be one view. The thing is, I think falling back to mitigating the little corner instead of digging out the rifles and starting the revolution (which is not mitigating *anything*, though it's certainly taking an optimistic view of the future) is too often the course of least resistance. So I try to resist giving up on the big picture.

[ellameena.livejournal.com]

I feel optimistic today. I feel like I've got a "system" for dealing with Mom's cancer, that I am starting to be able to disengage myself from HER up/down cycles, I have a plan for her future care, and I think I am finally going to be able to keep up an exercise program. Oh, and yes I am optimistic about my nine-year-old's new and old music ventures. :-)

I am fighting off major anxiety about the economy, and having some success with it.

[ellameena.livejournal.com]

Oh, wanted to add I am mostly an optimist, in general, I guess. At times this is probably not very realistic.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

Oh, that is a good thing. I know her care has been an ongoing issue.

[songwind.livejournal.com]

I'm not sure if I am optimistic or not. I think I may be ghoulish instead. I don't really expect the best to happen, but I do tend to find the silver lining. Not sure if that counts.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

"I don't expect the best to happen, but I'll probably enjoy the carnage," is that the difference between optimistic and ghoulish for you?

[songwind.livejournal.com]

I guess ghoulish was too strong a word. It's like I'm Stage II optimistic. Off the launch pad, I'm more pessimistic, but once bad stuff happens I start looking for the bright side.

[reveritas.livejournal.com]

two things i'm optimistic about:

1) tapering off drugs, i think i can, i think i can (not all of them, but some, in small ways)
2) that my color choices in my new house will look fabulous. i have good color instincts and i always have, and now finally i get to practise them on a grand scale.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

We are having some color choice discussions ourselves. Gradually.

[redbird]

I'm definitely optimistic about my personal life: my connections with partners, my best friend, and my mother are all both solid and stable.

[athenais.livejournal.com]

Right now I'm optimistic about changing careers, especially the part where I no longer have to please invisible corporate masters, but primarily I'm looking forward to working with animals on a daily basis.

Plus I am optimistic about Jon Carroll continuing to write excellent columns that amuse and inform me.

And I am especially optimistic that I will be able to afford the new camera I want before Christmas.

[aedifica]

I'm generally an optimist. In particular right now I'm optimistic about us being able to get a house and about the health of someone dear to me (who is having a bad health day but it probably means he's right about what causes some issues, so he can start to avoid that thing).

[pameladean]

The Large Hadron Collector has almost replaced my cherished story of the man who studied altruism in vampire bats by lying with his head up a tree for days on end as an aid to comfort and optimism. But not quite, because bats! Altruism!

I'm optimistic about Vol. 2 of my book. Mind, I haven't started revising it yet, but now, I am optimistic.

P.

[swan-tower.livejournal.com]

I am optimistic about my marriage, which is one year old today and doing nicely.

[evangoer.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the New Year wishes, and may you and your family have a sweet New Year as well.

I'm optimistic about my new job finally settling down and getting all my myriad tasks under control. Optimistic about my relationships. Optimistic about replacing the very-much-on-its-last-legs carpet in the living room. And for the first time in about two years, optimistic about my writing. So life is good.

[rushthatspeaks.livejournal.com]

My marriage is wonderful, the rest of my love life is interesting and very good (and I am optimistic about future trends in it), and I have a lot of friends who are interesting and lovely people. And I like my job, which is a new and unusual experience.

However, it's fairly hard for me to be genuinely optimistic about anything right now, as I am still dealing with the death of my grandfather and feel in several respects as though I have outlived the end of the world. So this is a good thread to read, because it is helpful to remember that I have not actually done so.

[redbird]

Also, right now I am optimistic about my exercise program, because I have been to the gym, and had a good workout despite having had sore quads this morning which were complaining on the exercise bicycle.

[lynnal.livejournal.com]

I am feeling much better about my life now that I have firm plans leading towards having a home again. I have a very nice apartment now, and I love my neighborhood, so that is not the issue. The plan is a three-year plan, maybe longer, and it will not be easy (adjust for Minnesotan). Any plan that involves packing and moving books and household items from three locations to one location, then packing it all up again a year or so later is going to involve a fair bit of work.

By loading up my car with boxes every time I drive back from Ames or Minneapolis I can make things easier for later. Right now I have nine boxes of books and five boxes of assorted sewing stuff in the back of my car. This is my atonment for my packrat tendencies. Some stuff will get sold or donated and the rest will go into storage. I'm looking forward to eventually having all my stuff in one place (all in the same state! the same city! even the same building!), well organized and accessible. Most importantly, at least one of my partners will be in the same place.

[mrissa.livejournal.com]

One of the lovely things about moving home was having the space for all of my books to live with me again, instead of some of them living in my parents' basement.

[cloudscudding.livejournal.com]

I consider myself to be an optimistic pessimist. This basically means planning for the worst, but looking very, very hard for the silver lining. I hunt out things to be optimistic about. I hoard bright moments.

This week, that means the stock market climbed a bit, my husband found out that he's being sent to one of the "grooming for better things" seminars by his corporate masters, how quickly drivers stopped to help a biker in distress, some people will be coming to our sumo party, soon I'll have another delivery of fresh, organic vegetables, and the VP debates will no doubt be hilarious, even if not reassuring about certain candidates' preparedness levels.