Chapter Two: Present Pleasure vs. Future Gain

Present pleasure as opposed to future gain is an interesting concept.

To put off something desirable in the present with only the promise of something supposedly more valuable in the future is an action inherently tied to psychology. Academics study this phenomenon, looking for the point of preference reversal. Where exactly is it that animals, including humans, start to see the value in denying oneself immediate gratification because of the promise of, or hope for, a better future?

We see this phenomenon in our everyday lives too, though we may not immediately notice it. Have you ever gone to bed with the intention of waking up early to exercise, and then found that when it came to be six o'clock in the morning and your alarm was blaring obnoxiously that your pillow and an hour's more sleep suddenly seemed a lot more important?

Yes?

Well then, you've experienced preference reversal.

This is not just something that happens in the short term.

It's quite common to put off immediate gratification in the present to focus on a future achievement. All parents that push their children to study hard in order to gain entry into a good college are encouraging this mind-set. When people skip lunch so that they can 'save room' for food at a buffet, they are engaging in this mind-set. When people choose to work longer hours so that they will have more money at the end of the week, they are behaving in a way that demonstrates this concept.

Choosing future gain over present pleasure is not a bad thing. The result of always choosing present pleasure can be impulsivity, rashly just taking everything that comes one's way without any thought for the future. Buying a concert ticket with your last $100 and casually ignoring the fact that without that money you are going to have to live on instant noodles for the next two weeks is arguably not a good thing.

However, too much focus on future gain can lead to one neglecting oneself in the present. If all you ever think about, and all you ever focus on, is the future, then what do you have left in the present? Sometimes, someone can come to neglect themselves in the here and now, out of a desire to improve their future.

But what value will that future have if the price you pay to get there is losing yourself?

So – balance. The quintessential element to almost every human endeavour. As soon as you move too far towards either end of this continuum, you can begin to experience difficulties.

There is not a magic formula for maintaining this balance, either. It is an incredibly fine line that we all strive to stay on. Often, the only way one can discover that they have gone astray is through experience. Unfortunately, by the time one notices that one has gone astray it is often too late.

When we get to the point where it is too late to easily fix the problem we have created by placing our focus on either the future or the here and now, it is often a long, hard road back. Fixing a detour of this nature can require hard work, dedication and suffering. This is the kind of experience that changes your outlook on the world. This kind of experience makes you see life differently; it makes you think carefully about who you are, where you are, who you want to be, and your mortality.

Blaine was only just beginning to realise that he had fallen away from the delicate balance between present pleasure and future gain.

He did not yet know how difficult the journey back would be.

/\*/\*/\

For Blaine, this concept had begun to form in his mind in high school.

Lord of the Flies, by William Golding. His sophomore year book project.

The teacher he had been assigned at Dalton for English that year had been nothing short of inspiring. He guided them through the book with elegance, understanding and patience.

Like many teachers fresh from teacher's training college, Mr Stewart had taken a thematic approach to guiding his students through this text.

The main theme he had emphasised throughout the year was the idea of the balance between present pleasure over future gain.

Mr Stewart had also encouraged his students to form their own opinions about the message contained in the book. Blaine had come to believe that, ultimately, future gain was more important than present pleasure. After all, would the island have become as feral, had the boys been able to focus more on the future?

In some ways, Mr Stewart had done his students a disservice. In encouraging them to examine a theme with the potential to be so polarised, and in allowing them to form their own opinions without necessarily encouraging them to take a more complex 'shades of grey' approach, he had fallen prey to allowing his students to view these two opposites as a dichotomy. This was only encouraged by the story itself – juvenile minds analysing juvenile minds will rarely lead to anything other than an understanding displaying little maturity.

Not everything is shades of grey. But the interaction of present pleasure versus future gain must be, for it involves a choice between the present and the future. If you are forced to choose between the two, then they simply cannot remain separate.

Blaine had always thought of himself as mature in high school. As such, it was no surprise that he found himself drawn to the idea of future gain being preferable to present pleasure.

He was convinced that he finally understood the rationale of goal setting. He began to place increasing emphasis on the here and now, and less on the future.

This mind-set followed him through high school, informing his study habits, extra-curricular choices and life choices.

Blaine wanted to be successful. He wanted to compose scores for movies for several years, before completing a teaching qualification so that he could pass on some of the knowledge he had amassed to future generations.

To be successful in the music business, you have to be the best (and lucky, of course).

So, Blaine focused everything he had on his work.

After three years at college, he had fairly decent grades and spent most of his time working on his classes.

What Blaine was missing was a social life.

He had two friends – Wes and David. Although the extent to which they could be considered friends was debatable. Beyond that though, he had only colleagues and acquaintances. He felt lonely a lot, and his emotions were usually all over the place, but he had convinced himself that this was the sacrifice he was willing to make to achieve his goals.

Blaine had fallen from that fine balance. He had neglected his present in favour of a future goal. He had realised this when he handed in his final essay for the previous semester and realised that he had nothing to look forward to other than his goal.

He had shut himself in his room for most of the summer, only coming out to work, drink coffee, and play every gig he could get his hands on at the local bar. Now, going into the new academic year, he had decided that he would work on 'him' for a while.

That decision was easier made than carried out.

/\*/\*/\

"Hey, Blaine, what's up?"

This loud statement announced the arrival of Wes and David. They had been Blaine's best friends ever since they had taken him under their care upon his arrival at Dalton Academy.

Blaine looked up from the essay he was writing, a brief smile ghosting his face.

"Hey, guys. Not a lot is up; I've just got to finish off writing the paper for Smithson's class".

At that, both Wes and David let out hearty chuckles.

"Honestly, man, why do you even both with Music History as a minor? You don't need a minor in a performance degree, and we all know you're going to be famous anyway, regardless of what a piece of paper from NYU tells you."

"That's very nice, guys, but I'm only two papers away from finishing anyway. Besides, you know that my father would literally have a cow if I didn't at least finish with a 'complete degree'."

"I'd love to see a grown man literally give birth to a cow, Blaine. Would you like to describe for me how that might work," interjected David.

"You know what I mean!"

"Do I? Why don't you explain?"

"You science majors are all the same".

"I too would be interested in hearing how that might work… Gory details, please," cut in Wes.

"English majors too," muttered Blaine.

He attempted to return his attention to his essay, but could already feel the futility.

After composing themselves (a task that did not come easily for Wes and David), both of Blaine's friends leaned across to read over his shoulder.

"Public viewing of Operas in pre-Revolutionary France: A Show or a Shadow," mused Wes.

"Right, well, that's not going anywhere," contributed David.

"Exactly. So, Blaine, we thought we might hit up a pub-quiz tonight. They're meant to be pretty fun, you know. Maybe you'll even learn something about Music History."

Blaine opened his mouth to say 'maybe next time, guys', he really did. But then, he paused for a second.

Isn't that what I always do – put off fun for study? The essay isn't even due for two weeks. They are right, too, a quiz could be quite fun…

"Who's going with us?"

Both Wes and David paused for a second, gobsmacked. They had both been completely ready to launch into a lengthy justification regarding why, exactly, Blaine should be coming to the pub quiz with them.

"Well, there are meant to be four to eight competitors to a team," started Wes.

"So we thought you, us, Nick, and Jeff?" finished David.

Nick and Jeff had also been Warblers, back in the day at Dalton Academy.

Blaine smiled. "Sounds good, guys. Let me just sort my hair out," he said, gesturing to the untamed mop of curls situated on top of his head.

"Blaine…" began Wes, "you really don't need to use an entire bottle of hair gel tonight. We're just walking down the block; your hair won't escape your head in that short time."

"I'll just be a minute," called Blaine, already locking his bathroom door behind him.

/\*/\*/\

Less than half an hour later, Blaine and his friends were settling themselves down for the pub quiz.

It turned out there were plenty of teams that had studied quite a lot for this pub quiz. It was not one of Wes and David's best plans, as the theme of the evening had been Law and Politics.

"Wes," moaned Nick, "why are we even here? This is, like, the one thing that none of us knows anything about!"

"Umm well, to be honest I didn't even think we would make it, I was expecting Blaine to say that he was too busy working on his essay, and then I was expecting to spend the next two weeks persuading him that he needed to come out with us."

"It's true," put in David, "that would have had us right on schedule for competing in the 'Music Through the Ages' quiz coming up in a couple of weeks."

"So you lot just wanted me to help you win a $200 bar tab?" questioned Blaine, with a hint of amusement playing at his voice.

"Well… we wanted your company too!" defended Wes.

Fortunately for Wes and David, the line of questioning was cut short by the commencement of the quiz.

The next two hours reminded each of the boys vividly of why they were not at university to study law or politics.

/\*/\*/\

"And, our winners are: 'The Law Reviewers'," called the MC for the evening.

"YUS," screamed a girl with make-up caked on her face and, in Blaine's opinion, a skirt about three sizes too small. She seemed fairly typical of about a quarter of those jammed into the pub that evening.

She dragged a couple of her team mates up to the microphone to claim the bar tab voucher.

"Til' next time, suckers," she screeched, clearly having consumed slightly too much alcohol.

"Oh my goodness," whispered David, "I've never even met her, and she's annoying."

"Agreed," murmured Wes, "surely there will be some cooler people next time for the music quiz."

"Yeah," added Jeff, "we might even find some man-candy for Blaine!"

"Guys! I'm right here."

There was a slight sheepish pause from his companions.

"Besides, I think our score of one might actually be the lowest score ever obtained in a pub quiz," continued Nick, "I'm fairly certain we would have to do better than that to make him appear attractive to anyone."

"We should also make him leave off the hair gel – some ideas might be able to make their way out of his head, then".

"Guys!"

"Oh, sorry, Blaine," said Wes.

"I think it's time we headed home, anyway," added David.

"Let's head out then".

With that, the five boys, including one slightly drunk Jeff, headed towards the exit of the bar.

They walked in silence for a few minutes, until they reached the intersection where they would all part ways for another evening.

Across the street, Blaine heard that unmistakable groaning of a door being pushed open. He glanced across the street to that little chrysalis of light that the open doorway revealed. He watched a young man slip into the building. Somehow he could tell, just from his posture, that he had had a bad day. It looked like he was carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders, and he could imagine that, if he were close enough to see the man's face, it would look drawn, perhaps exhausted, underneath the chestnut hair that was partially obscured by his hat.

At that moment, a very happy Jeff grabbed Blaine's shoulders. "Dude," he began, "that was so fun. Imagine how awesome it will be when we actually know the answers to the questions."

Blaine chuckled and turned around, somehow managing to hand a slightly inebriated Jeff off to his boyfriend, Nick.

"That's true, Jeff. But I think a couple of beers might actually be your limit".

Nick nodded, wrapping his arm around his boyfriend's waist.

"Well, we're heading off this way. We'll see you guys in a couple of weeks for the Music quiz?"

Wes and David paused, looking expectantly at Blaine.

Blaine smiled, "Yeah, I think so. Let's get going, guys."

Wes and David had mixed looks of surprise and shock on their faces, but they quickly masked them, each grabbing one of Blaine's arms and setting off on the walk home.

/\*/\*/\

When Blaine arrived home, feeling happy and just light for the first time in as long as he remembered, he decided to quickly check his emails. After reading through a few standard announcements – assignment due times, drop box locations, requests for notes after missed classes – be came across an invitation to a special seminar.

Dear Music 372 Students,

From tomorrow, every second week on Wednesday at 6pm there will be a 30 minute lecture for all Music students given by a prominent member of the music industry. The purpose of these seminars is for you to be given some idea of the opportunities available for you to gain valuable experience during your final two years of study.

All students enrolled in Third Year and above music courses are strongly encouraged to attend these seminars. Non-alcoholic beverages and nibbles will be provided.

I look forward to seeing you,

Professor F. Smithson.

Course Convenor Music 372 – Music Consumption in Europe c.1600-1900