the bringer of jollity

warning: The follow contains dangerous references to the horrifyingly outdated music genre of classical.

I've had it in my head all day, so I decided to drop by youtube for a listen.

With a name like "The Bringer of Jollity" that evokes a vague image of Santa Claus and Christmas, it's easy to expect a light hearted, jingle-bell-themed affair.

Instead what you get is something solemn and majestic, something more befitting Jupiter - The Bringer of Jollity by Holst. You can feel the swollen planet rotating slowly on its axis, second after second, since the beginning of time, and you are humbled by a wisdom far greater than mere human intelligence.

I'm not sure why it's so immensely popular for others, but for me, it feels like an old man is telling me that he understands that life is hard and sometimes you may suffer, but in the end, it is all worth it. It feels like he's at the end of his life, and I'm watching his life pass by with him.
There is so much I don't know at my point in life, and he has known so much, and when I desperately ask him for advice, he just smiles and tells me that the process of learning what he has known is the whole point in life.

There is a certain beauty and mysteriousness in the Universe that all of science and its microscopic detailing can't capture, a sense of existential absurdism, in knowing that whilst there might be inherent meaning in the Universe, human beings are philosophically limited in their ability to comprehend it, and thus that certainty in life itself, is absurd.

I feel like all the suffering in the world is on my shoulders, yet he gives me the courage to bear it.It gives you a sense that humans really know nothing.

Doesn't hurt either that the conductor is amazing, his performance takes my breath away.


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3B49N46I39Y
Skip to 3:08, until 4:52

2011-08-24
11:28 p.m.

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