i happen to have a few moments to write today. gosh where do i start, it's been such a hectic week.

i think i'll start from yesterday. the impact of the moment has gone, but basically sky tv showed a person killing himself by sipping a cocktail of drugs, at a charity dignitas. this is basically a swiss charity designed to allow people to kill themselves before it becomes physically impossible to do so themselves. the cocktail is one of barbiturates, which basically send you to sleep and then stop your bodily functions. he chose to die to beethoven's ninth symphony. this person had motor neurone disease.

anyway, whatever you feel about whether such a moment should be private or public, he basically wanted to put this video out to remove such a stigma about death. i think it's pretty telling that this is really the first time i've seen a deathbed, with the person due to die in a few moments. i've been pretty insulated from that so far, as far as i know, people all die peacefully in their sleep. true, i don't know him, but i guess i have the capacity to imagine in a very abstract way. everything seemed so real, from him choking on the bitterness of the cocktail ("do i really have to finish it?") to the final i love you's. to me it still seems so tragic that someone can choose to die a moment earlier than they have to. but yet seeing this there is some socratic nobility in it. that he was able to make a rational decision that marked him out as man. "either i do this, and die now, or i don't have the strength to go through it, and then i suffer and put my family through suffering, and then die." that must mark someone out as human.

"i suppose i must feel like a pilgrim heading to america back in those days. i don't know what's on the other side, and i know i'm probably not coming back"

on the other hand, they also showed someone else registering for dignitas' service. this person was far more cavalier : "no more golf, no more wine" might as well go now.

and so the debate continues.

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sometimes people randomly come up to ask me if i'm alright, such is my sulky image. i always tell them, i'm alright. i'm the happiest i've been in years. with that comes an implicit promise that i tell them whenever i'm unhappy.

i might be crossing that line now, so in many ways i might be in need of the break.

this is very strange, because every day i am doing what i like. there is a little stress, but not too much. i love standing up and being on my feet, and i like worrying over data.

but i think i'm putting a lot of pressure on myself. i am afraid of competence and i am afraid of mediocrity. but that might just be my fate. i'm afraid of my future. maybe i'm just doing what i should have been doing as a teenager, when i perhaps kicked my feet back too much. i worry about all this in the shower and i wonder whether the guy above accomplished what he wanted to. sorry, it's not my fault i'm born to worry about such things. i have to get up every day and think them, and then put them aside because they are not productive. but that doesn't mean i don't worry about them, and right now, if you ask me, those forces are stronger.

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