I do not remember where I got this from but it’s really a very sound advice. DON’T be like tofu, absorbing all flavors but having none of its own.
By no means however does this mean we go around judging some people by likening them to tofu or whatever. Everyone has a story, true and we should all respect that. It’s just this, I cannot just help but notice sometimes that, humans as we are, we meet people who figuratively need some adding of soy sauce to taste.
Take the case of this one acquaintance of ours, not yet a friend by anyone’s standards, but one who just manages to stay within the fringes, offering a tidbit or two of whatever rumor, conspiracy theory and useless knowledge that could be had on the internet. For one, you could say, it’s still a blessing she qualifies as a very wide reader.
In the beginning, it may have been out of politeness that I would diligently open every link she sent my way so we could make small talk out of it. No more. My old android (a birthday gift from my beloved first-born) conked out, and when I took it to those cellphone repair gods at Gaisano Hall for checkup, reportedly suffered severe malware infestation and couldn’t be un-corrupted (not my term, but theirs) anymore. So that was it, cellphone sematary. Got a new one (though it’s older now) and turned myself into a doubting Thomas every time she opened her mouth. Blocked her too, by the way.
It goes without saying I respect she has a story like everyone else, but how I would have liked to appreciate it all the more if the stories were truly her own and not recite or babble other information like the web’s myna.
The same goes for those indulged the arts. In music for instance, except maybe for classical music, interpretation is perhaps the most noble of all goals. As such, any original piece, once performed by another artist, should at least carry whatever hint of ID that interpreter has. As one friend loves to say, I could copy John Lennon to a T and even sound like him, but what’s the point, I can never be John Lennon.
So in the end, what a drag it must be, not to be one’s self, with no sense of me. Even as when applied to the many other aspects of life, blending with all the others yes-men out there is a matter of survival, a certain rawness of self must surely breathe within. The least anyone could do is nurture that, however a tiny bit at a time, so that, unlike the net’s myna we can fly free from our self-imposed cages.
