The Status Quo (現状維持)

The status quo is an interesting word from Latin that means keeping the same status, and it has an equivalent phrase in Japanese.

Status quo is a nice thing to have: it means consistency, it means predictability, it means being able to feel safe and focus on other things. Have too much status quo, though, and it feels like others are passing you by, and instead of staying level with others you feel like you're falling behind. That's what I feel like sometimes in the age of technology and rapid societal changes: I feel like the 1990s were the best decade in the history of modern civilization, and that we cant go back to those times: if only, if only it could be the 1990s forever: I could forever be a teenager, the economy would be at an all time high and even producing a surplus, and there would always feel like there were brighter days ahead, which was awesome if we can anticipate them tomorrow, not awesome if the future suddenly arrives, goes past, and you realize you've already used it up like wasted youth or a free coupon to your favorite restaurant, and now there's nothing to look forward to anymore except machines and artificial intelligence taking over everyone's job, people choosing emojis and short text messages over real conversations with other people, and social inequality up the yin yang with a slow dissection of the middle class. That's not exactly the status quo society I want to live in .

Status quo can be achieved by having place at home, to know where one is going to go home for the night every night. For a few years now, I've been what's called "a nomad," going from place to place. But now with MJ, we've created a home where we can achieve a status quo. It's nice, but it also requires lots of furniture, which I hadn't really needed for a while.........say hello to IKEA! IKEA apparently has a similar reputation (and in-store feel) as Costco. A huge warehouse in Burbank with apparently all the things one would ever need to furnish a home, including beds, sofas, chairs, bookcases, even fake flowers and artwork. There's so much stuff that it becomes difficult to keep the STATUS QUO in your bank account/ funds.

IKEA's furniture assembly is complicated and a bit time consuming ( I was not able to maintain my status quo of watching Amazing Race episodes - still going on in Season 29! Unbelievable!) this week but was able to assemble all our furniture. It's actually kind a like of puzzle with an instruction manual: not terribly difficult to understand the directions, nails and screws included, and the general end product is depicted on the packaging.

Come to think of it, moving into a new place is like a puzzle: It's fun to have the pieces lying around indicating possibilities and the potential thrill of putting all those pieces together ONE DAY, but at some point it's nice to put'em all together into an end product status quo and enjoy the full picture after awhile.