Thoughts on Politics

Politics is the attempt to reconcile theory with practicality.

Unum

Where would you feel more alone?

Alone on a deserted street?

Or on a crowded street in a sea of strangers?

Hell, I'd welcome a deserted street once in a while. With the damn traffic in Manila now because of the holiday season, it takes ages to get anywhere.

Hmm, going shopping tomorrow with Princess. Not sure if that's a good idea with all the Christmas shoppers out there. Rawr.

Miles Militis

Picture by ~leonard-ART
http://browse.deviantart.com/?qh=&section=&q=chess#/dcweaa

Chess.

To a computer or maybe a Vulcan, it is merely one of the most set-piece strategy games known. There are exactly 6 types of pieces each with their own unique allowed set of moves. Once battle has been joined, any one move by White would have a corresponding single response from Black and so on and so forth.

Yet I've come to see chess as more than just a mechanical ratio of actions and reactions. There's a bit of philosophy to be seen once you take on a new perspective in looking at this age old sport.

There is a God in chess. There is a prime mover in the life of the pawns, the knights, the rooks, the bishops, and their kings and queens. As was told in the Bible how the universe came into being out of nothing and how the ancestry of man allegedly traces itself to Adam and Eve, so does White lead the first move the whole series of moves, blunders, and mishaps to follow. Almost as if that King side pawn was a way of saying "Let there be light."

Every grandmaster knows the meaning of loss and sacrifice. I believe that there is not every sacrifice means a loss. Many a chess game have necessitated the offering of a sacrificial pawn for an advantage in the ensuing exchange or for a step closer to check-mating the opposing King. All of us have our own styles of play. Some, like myself, favor the use of Knights over Bishops and I would early on use my own Bishops to take out the enemy Knights.

But of all the pieces in those black and white pieces that piques me most, it is the lowly Pawn.

Most of the games I played began with that poor little guy making the first move. Heck, more often than not, it's not just once step ahead, but one great stride of two paces. Have you ever looked at the Pawn at a different light? Rather than that negligible grunt for cannon fodder, he is like the Achilles leading the Myrmidons on the charge!

While many a novice has been quick to commit Pawns to the exchange of pieces, relishing in the figurative bloodbath that would ensue (eh Jedrick?), masters like the pawnmaster Philidor saw the Pawn as like a chain. Each individual holding up the other. Think the phalanx of Spartans in 300. One of the finer points of the lowly Pawn is that it really shows how one man can truly make a difference.

Yet the most inspiring of all is how the Pawn defies determinism, as proven by a watch I won just recently to defend my 1700 public skill rating on the internet.

Are we all set, from the moment of our birth, on a course set by fate?

Are we already chosen to be the one to sacrifice our life?

Are we already decided upon by the greater powers to be the ones to advance, to kill, to die before we even have an opinion on the matter?

Are we damned only to play the part on the script of life?

Look at the Bishop. Trapped to but one color. Narrow-minded, dogmatic folk are the clergy eh? Appropriate how one is trapped forever on the black and the other to the white.

The Knights? Forever jousting about. Leaping in and out of the fray. Their mighty steeds proving unique flexibility yet its unreliability also the chink in their armor.

The Pawn, ahhh oh-so-expendable and numerous. But what other piece in the chessboard has a chance to be something else? What other piece has a choice on what it becomes in the end?

Additional:
After a brief online conversation with a buddy of mine, I've come to look at the Pawn as particularly badass! What other piece doesn't look back? When a Pawn takes a step forward, it never looks back... like it doesn't regret whatever it is it's going to do on the battlefield!

PS
Teh King is a pussy!

In hoc signo vinces

Blogging is a lot like life. Rather than living through our actions and words, we live through this digital life through our posts. We can't exactly speak, hear, or reach out and touch others for communication. But we speak and listen through 'Times New Roman' and the only thing being touched is our hearts and minds.

I'm typically a man of few words in real life as I believe actions will always be decisive where words are easily vague and ambiguous. But in this world, where one's actions is often limited to merely typing words, vagueness and ambiguity are even more virulent as semantic logic all seems to be thrown out the window.

Life plugged into the internet is a helluva lot like quantum physics. A lot doesn't make sense.

And isn't that just the beauty of it all? The challenge. The trolls. The lolz...

---

And that's about enough random gibberish ramblings for yet another insomnia bothered night.

Ahhh insomnia. The ever present curse and companion of many a college student. Someone should make a social networking site for people who can't sleep at night. It's not that I'm looking to waste time. Trust me, I've gone through 3 novels and some class readings in attempts to bore myself to sleep at night. Sometimes they work. Sometimes they don't.

Tonight appears to be one of the instances of the latter.

I do believe my bad case of being a nocturnal creature of the night is due to excessive daytime napping due to futile attempts of studying at the college library, hour long lectures from monotonous old coots, and passing out on a bench after a few cocktails right before PolSci150 class.

Thing of Beauty by John Keats

A thing of beauty is a joy for ever:
Its lovliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
Therefore, on every morrow, are we wreathing
A flowery band to bind us to the earth,
Spite of despondence, of the inhuman dearth
Of noble natures, of the gloomy days,
Of all the unhealthy and o'er-darkn'd ways
Made for our searching: yes, in spite of all,
Some shape of beauty moves away the pall
From our dark spirits. Such the sun, the moon,
Trees old and young, sprouting a shady boon
For simple sheep; and such are daffodils
With the green world they live in; and clear rills
That for themselves a cooling covert make
'Gainst the hot season; the mid-forest brake,
Rich with a sprinkling of fair musk-rose blooms:
And such too is the grandeur of the dooms
We have imagined for the mighty dead;
An endless fountain of immortal drink,
Pouring unto us from the heaven's brink.