how to disappear completely

you know, life is really quite fun. you meet people, you laugh, you discuss deep far-out philosophical ripostes as if you understood them just for the heck of it. then of course, there's also the not-so-fun parts, where the challenge is really to just get thru with them as though they were fun too.

now, back to living my life.

no so long ago, when i was in secondary school, i had a thought experiment. instead of spending all that effort trying to enjoy life, making sense of things, looking for a reason to wake up tmr, why not find a way to disappear?

which brings me to radiohead's obscure song, "how to disappear completely". i don't even remember much about the song, other than rating it 4 stars in my mediamonkey, most likely for the title. in one decade, i have yet to think of a way to disappear completely, without a trace, without affecting anyone else who still wants to continue existing. i mean, if you just 一走了之, many ppl would be quite affected lar. how irresponsible! wanna disappear, should at least do it in such a way which minimally impacts others, especially those who love you. the effort would most likely involve one of those dystopian erase-all-traces kinda thing, but that is unfortunately unachievable for most of us. "eternal sunshine of the spotless mind" gave me a glimmer of hope too, but making everybody forget about me is just as tough eh? not like the mind-tampering technique even exists.

so now i realise one thing: there's no way (at least with our current technology) to disappear completely. which leaves us with either continue living or dying (which is excessively messy). to conclude, it is because of this mildly coerced choice which leaves most of us living, attempting to find some value in taking the next breath, commissioning the next thought with some grand meaning.

is this the root of all anthropic perspectives? the dilemma of being stuck with an easy choice which requires a lot of effort and constant exposure to insecurity, and a difficult choice with no security at all. thus, we force some sensibility out of this absurd reality. we invent logic. we create science. we worship gods. if not... what would we do? either way, you're stuck with life.

with reality already created and so strongly in place, "how to disappear completely" becomes a dream, a mere song for commercial profit. why bother fighting established principles of life? why, life is already full of difficulties as is - leave it alone. let go. let someone else do the thinking. feeling indignant about choicelessness is little more than being brash and emotional. you may not agree, but everyone thinks you should have better things to do.

and without so much as a sigh, i go back to living the life imposed.