sometimes, the simple things are more fun and meaningful than all the banquets in the world

1. Are you living a meaningful life?

    I don't know. I'm not even sure I know what that means. Meaningful to me? To someone else? To some subjective ideal? The alternative—believing that life is pointless, heedless, and without purpose—is untenable. My meaning might be (is) different from other peoples', but it's all I've got.

2. What’s the one thing you cannot live without? 

    learning, which sometimes takes the appearance of reading, or writing, or talking to people with knowledge and skills and interests different from my own, rather than just "taking a class" or some other clearly educational event

 3. When is it acceptable, if ever, to break the law?

    I don't think there's a hard and fast limit there. My freshman Philosophy classes taught me to consider the obvious problems along this line—is it acceptable to steal a loaf of bread to feed a starving family? Is it acceptable to kill one bad person to save one good person? Is it acceptable to steal money from someone who doesn't need it, to give it to someone who does? 

    Humans want black and white. They want rules and laws to define, and constrain, their own and others' behavior. Unfortunately, life is messy. Boundaries are fuzzy. Circumstances change. Priorities shift. People are inexplicable. 

    The truth (at least, my version of that concept) is that it is sometimes acceptable to break the law. It gets complicated when you start to forget that, justified or not, it's still against the law.

4. What do you want your final words to be?

    "good night, sweetheart"

5. What do you think are the five most beautiful things in the world?      

    • water when you're thirsty

    • the secret smile on the face of the man who loves you

    • sunset in the country

    • a kitty running to greet you

    • older people holding hands

6. What makes you feel empowered? 

    sweat

7. Which is more important—what you say, or how you say it?     depends what you're saying, and how you say it

8. Do you live to work, or work to live? 

    if you actually know me, you know how ridiculous this question is to me. I actually told a former boss that I don't live to work but work to live, and he looked so askance at me that I realized he would never understand that "philosophy." But I truly cannot imagine living that fucking "life" where everything revolves around fucking work. 

9. How do you think the world will change in 10 years? 50? 100? 

    isn't that the beauty of it? Whatever I think is going to happen will be blown away by what really would happen. And if I could prognosticate this sort of thing, I'd be rolling in money accrued from having invented or invested fruitfully.

10. What is something you’re certain you’ll never experience? 

    childbirth. It's funny (in a purely sad way) to finally know someone with whom I would like to have a child, when neither of us can and it's a moot point anyway.

11. What one responsibility do you wish you didn’t have? 

    cooking and eating. It's so tangled up. I wish I had a personal chef, someone who knows what I need to eat, what I like, and when I would like it. And I wish it was free, of course.

12. What is something you’re embarrassed that you’re so good at? 

    knowing the rules. Some people believe you're a rule-follower when you simply happen to have a terribly good memory.

13. What’s the one thing you most want to achieve before you die? 

    effectively wearing a miniskirt

14. What’s something that offends you? 

    food containers that are designed to be inaccessible. Why, in this modern era, does peanut butter still come in a jar that has ridges and grooves and spots that seem to purposely hide the product? Why can't it come in an open container like whipped cream? 

15. What makes you most angry about the country? 

    at the moment? Rules. Stupid, absurd, cold rules, with no sense of the people they're affecting.

 

[from here; the title quotation is by E.A. Bucchianeri, from Brushstrokes of the Gadfly]