A Strange Feeling

Getting up before dawn yesterday and today and getting through the days, I feel worn out, whether from tiredness or from meeting a lot of new people. Something feels unreal, like I'm floating. Is it because I caught up on a backlog of webtoons for the first time in ages? A review video of a webtoon I used to love came up on YouTube, and of course it was fun. But let me not look for more; I'd feel bad after. On the way back from Cheongdam-dong, I biked along the Han River. Partly because the heaters on the subway and bus on the way there were stifling, and partly because spending four hours listening to something close to a sermon? was stifling too. It turned out to be the worst choice, though: the headwind was brutal and the Ttareungyi bike was in bad shape. I've ridden that route plenty of times, and this was twice as hard.

I recently made a build guide. I asked an AI to make one based on the how-to I'd spilled out over the last two entries, and the result was genuinely amazing. Oh, and I finished preparing for the exhibition at Seoul Station. It opens tomorrow, and I hope people's reactions aren't bad. Using exhibition prep as an excuse? I upgraded my AI plan again. For a few days I'll get by with the cafeteria's 1,000-won breakfast as brunch, I guess. I think I'm addicted to AI. The cost will only ever go up from here, never down… hm.

There's something worth thinking about. Or is it pointless? Can I say something I made using AI like this is something I made? I must have felt not, because when I introduced it to someone, I went out of my way to point out that AI made it. Would it have been better not to say? Anyway, by the old way of thinking… ah, I don't know, maybe in the future this too will count as something a person made. All I did was tell it to try once, then ask again to raise the detail. No, wait, there's all the material and context I've built up, so couldn't I say I made it? But others could easily have produced nearly the same result. They didn't. Is it just the doing that matters? I can't swear it wouldn't have happened without me, but from what I've seen so far, nobody would have touched it. People modify fragments like features to their own taste, but the sense that Patternflow has a separate head would have gotten in the way. And they'd have no reason to. As for me, well, I'm thinking ahead and preparing in advance.

I've been doing Patternflow for a really long time, and I think I'll keep doing it. Why can I? Normally I'd have gotten bored and quit after three months or so. Maybe because there's still so much I haven't tried. Sound… adding a speaker, laser cutting, there's still a lot I want to try. But the bigger reason, obviously, is recognition. Getting praise and thanks for the project directly, or even without that, chasing views and likes on reels keeps me going. Without it, wouldn't I have given up fast? Shouting into an empty space isn't fun. Is it less about fun and more that I want to be recognized through the work? Ah, did I write something like this before?

These thoughts multiplied today probably because of the four-hour sermon. He seems like a good person, and there were some surprising parts along the way. Anyway, he too told me to be humble, to do something that shares love with the world rather than chase money, to try anything… what was a bit awkward is that he kept bringing up church. There was no reason to provoke him, but I didn't want to lie, so I said I probably wouldn't go just because I was told to, and talked back with some pointless opinions on religion too. Which made that part of the conversation longer. He said the human heart matters, that it takes the shape of two wheels turning, and that it's good to widen the space between them. Why does it have to be two? Wouldn't many of them, bundled together, roll even better?

Someone once gave me a metaphor like this. Each person has a spring, like a vessel, and how much water flows from it differs. The timing differs too… somehow or other, you're supposed to ignore the leaves drifting down from above and head for the sea, something like that… I am curious where metaphors like these come from. When people say them, it's with eyes and gestures full of conviction, as if stating some truth. Picturing the images is definitely fun. I don't know whether I could find an image or metaphor of my own and believe in it. Or whether I need one. Would it be useful to build a concept that gives absolute faith even in unstable moments? Maybe. Or maybe it'd be more fun to just like and dislike things as the mood and feeling take me.