The War on Error

My One-Eyed Mother

My mom only had one eye. I hated her, she was such an embarrassment. My mom ran a small shop at a flea market.She collected little weeds and such to sell, anything for the money we needed she was such an embarrassment.There was this one day during elementary school. I remember that it was field day, and my mom came. I was so embarrassed. How could she do this to me? I threw her a hateful look and ran out. The next day at school..."Your mom only has one eye?!" and they taunted me.

I wished that my mom would just disappear from this world so I said to my mom, "Mom, why don't you have the other eye?! You're only going to make me a laughingstock. Why don't you just die?" My mom did not respond. I guess I felt a little bad, but at the same time, it felt good to think that I had said what I'd wanted to say all this time.
Maybe it was because my mom hadn't punished me, but I didn't think that I had hurt her feelings very badly.

That night...I woke up, and went to the kitchen to get a glass of water. My mom was crying there, so quietly, as if she was afraid that she might wake me. I took a look at her, and then turned away. Because of the thing I had said to her earlier, there was something pinching at me in the corner of my heart. Even so, I hated my mother who was crying out of her one eye. So I told myself that I would grow up and become successful, because I hated my one-eyed mom and our desperate poverty.

Then I studied really hard. I left my mother and came to Seoul and studied, and got accepted in the Seoul University with all the confidence I had. Then, I got married. I bought a house of my own. Then I had kids, too. Now I'm living happily as a successful man. I like it here because it's a place that doesn't remind me of my mom.

This happiness was getting bigger and bigger, when someone unexpected came to see me "What?! Who's this?!"... It was my mother...Still with her one eye. It felt as if the whole sky was falling apart on me. My little girl ran away, scared of my mom's eye.
And I asked her, "Who are you? I don't know you!!!" as if I tried to make that real. I screamed at her "How dare you come to my house and scare my daughter! Get out here now!" And to this, my mother quietly answered, "oh, I'm so sorry. I may have gotten the wrong address," and she disappeared. Thank good ness... she doesn't recognize me. I was quite relieved. I told myself that I wasn't going to care, or think about this for the rest of my life.

A Love Letter by Franz Kafka

Last night I dreamed about you. What happened in detail I can hardly remember. All I know is that we kept merging into one another. I was you, you were me. Finally you somehow caught fire.

Remembering that one extinguished fire with clothing, I took an old coat and threw it on you .

But again the transmutations began and it went so far that you were no longer even there, instead it was I who was on fire and it was also I who beat the fire with the coat.

But the beating didn't help and it only confirmed my old fear that such things can't extinguish a fire of love .

In the meantime, however, the fire brigade arrived and somehow you were saved.

But you were different from before, spectral, as though drawn with chalk against the dark, and you fell, lifeless or perhaps having fainted from joy at having been saved, into my arms.

But here too the uncertainty of transmutability entered, perhaps it was I who fell into someone's arms, maybe in yours .

15 things you probably never thought about....

1. At least five people in this world love you so much they would die for you.

2. At least fifteen people in this world love you in some way.

3. The only reason anyones would ever hate you is because they want to be just like you.

4. A smile from you can bring happiness to anyone, even if they don't like you.

5. Every night, someone thinks about you before they go to sleep.

6. You mean the world to someone.

7. If not for you, someone may not be living.

8. You are special and unique.

9. Someone that you don't even know exists loves you.

Unreliability and Insensitivity of the Senses

Everyone depends on senses for
information and awareness.
When we want to know what
the world is like, we look around
us, listen, taste, smell, touch. 

Even scientific experiments depend on the senses. 

We mix two chemicals and observe what
results, or we let some ball bearings drop 

and observe how they behave. 

Descartes would like this heavy reliance on
sensory observation to stop. 

He admits that for some knowledge
the senses are required. 

For example, I could not know what
books were on my desk if I did
not use my eyes to check.

However, he does not believe that we need sensory input
when doing science. 

In fact, he is convinced that the senses only
mislead us in scientific endeavors. 

Science, he feels, should proceed strictly by
tracing logical connections between ideas of the intellect and
not by observation. 

The senses do not even practically provide us
with the ideas that we use in this reasoning. 

We are born with them already in our minds.
Descartes, therefore, begins the Principles with two skeptical
worries meant to undermine our faith in the senses. 

He points out, first, that our senses systematically mislead us. 

For example, when we view a straight stick through water, it
looks bent; when we view things from a distance we tend to see
them as much smaller than they are, or even as a different shape.

Not only are the senses periodically unreliable, however,
they are also constantly and stubbornly unbelievable. 

When we sleep we often have sensations indistinguishable
from those that we have when we are awake. 

We admit that those dreaming sensations do
not correspond to reality, so why are we any more certain of
our waking sensations? 

our fallen star

they would never understand
what you wanted to do
instead they chose to
ridicule you


when you got weak
they loved the sight
of your dimming
and flickering starlight

how could they understand 

what was so intricate
to be loved by so many,

so intimate

BestFriend til the END

Her name was Bea
She was only five
This is what happened
...When she was alive

Her dad was drunk
Her mom was an addict
Her parents kept her
Locked in an attic

Her only friend
was a little toy bear
It was old and worn out
And had patches of hair

She always talked to it
When no one's around
She lays there and hugs it
Not a peep of sound

Until her parents
unlock the door
Some more and more pain
She'll have to endure

A bruise on her leg
A scar on her face
Why would she be
In such a horrible place?

The Paradox of Our New Millennium

We have taller buildings, but shorter tempers,

Wider freeways, but narrower viewpoints.

We spent more, but have less.

We but more, but enjoy it less.

We have bigger houses, but smaller families.

More conveniences, but less time.

We have more degrees, but less common sense,

More knowledge, but less judgment.

More experts, but more problems, 

More medicine but less wellness.

We spend too recklessly, laugh too little,

Drive too fast, get angry too quickly,

Stay up too late, get too tired.

Read too seldom, watch T.V. too much,

and pray too seldom.

We have multiplied our possessions,

but reduced our values.

We talk too much, love too seldom

And hate too often.

We learned how to make a living, but not a life.

We have added years to life, not life to years.

We've been all the way to the moon and back,

But have trouble crossing the street to meet the new neighbor.