As the morning sun rises in the eastern sky, I habitually turn my attention to the kitchen. The mellow aroma from the espresso machine opens the door to multiple memories, just like the aroma of madeleines soaked in tea in Proust's “In Search of Lost Time.
While the toast is toasting, I look out the window, and the words of Heraclitus, “All things are in flux,” come to mind. The ever-changing aspect of the light is reminiscent of Monet's “Rouen Cathedral Series. And it is this eye that tries to capture the beauty of the moment, an aesthetic of transience that the haiku poet Matsuo Basho expressed in “The Sound of Water as a Frog Jumps into an Old Pond”.
At the moment of choosing jam for bread, I am suddenly reminded of Wittgenstein's linguistic game theory. The meaning of the term “strawberry jam” is merely established by social commitments, and its red color and sweet-sour taste may be man's eternal attempt to approach the “strawberry idea” in Plato's Idea Theory.
Sipping coffee and looking through newspapers, it seems as if a modern-day Tower of Babel has been built there. Politics, economics, and culture, each with its own language system, aim high without intersecting with each other. This is reminiscent of the process of disintegration and reconstruction of meaning described in T.S. Eliot's “The Waste Land.
Even as I finish breakfast and get ready for the day, my thoughts continue to wander. The act of choosing a tie reminds me of the correlation between taste and class in Bourdieu's “Distinction,” and the act of polishing one's shoes overlaps with the Zen teaching of “equanimity is the way.
Once outside, the scene is that of a bustling city. While the “loss of aura” as Benjamin calls it is progressing, the advertisements scattered here and there seem to embody Baudrillard's “simulacrum and simulation. The sound of a smartphone notification you hear on the train reminds you of John Cage's “4 minutes and 33 seconds,” and tells you that it is in the noise of everyday life that music can be found.
The moment I arrive at the office and turn on my computer, I realize that I am in the midst of an information society where Toffler's “Third Wave” has become a reality. Drifting in the digital sea, I think of Borges' “Library of Babel. The ability to find what is truly necessary from the infinite amount of information is what is required of us in this day and age.
During a conversation with a colleague at lunch, Sartre's words, “The other is hell,” came to mind. At the same time, however, I also recall Levinas' concept of “the face of the other,” and reaffirm that it is in our relationships with others that we find the meaning of our own existence.
As he immerses himself in his afternoon's work, he feels a sense of immersion, as if embodying Mihai Csikszentmihai's flow theory. And in that sense of fulfillment, I find a touch of what Aristotle calls eudaimonia (happiness).
On my way home, I look up at the sky at dusk and am struck by a feeling like that of Van Gogh's “Starry Moonlit Night. While experiencing Kant's concept of the sublime, I am simultaneously reminded of Kitaro Nishida's “logic of place. We are not looking at the landscape, but existing in it.
Returning home and preparing dinner, I am reminded of Lévi-Strauss's “The Culinary Triangle. I prepare a bowl of soup and three vegetables, conscious of the fact that cooking as a culture is a mediator between nature and culture, life and death.
As I finish my meal and relax, I think of Gaston Bashlar's “Poetics of Space. In the microcosm that is my home, I find a source of infinite imagination.
Before bedtime, lying in bed, I attempt Husserl's phenomenological reduction. I bracket the miscellaneous experiences of daily life and let pure consciousness flow through me. Then, at the moment of slipping into a dream, I feel myself drifting in the sea of Jung's collective unconscious.
Thus, the day ends. It is not merely the passage of 24 hours, but a grand intellectual itinerary in which philosophy, art, science, and literature intersect. Tomorrow will be another day filled with new discoveries and insights. With Nietzsche's eternal return in mind, I close my eyelids.