What is Jason Cao’s Place In This World?
Is it just me, or does the pattern on his tie remind you of apple slices?
NOTE TO READER: Drink a shot (of your choice beverage) for every use of the words ‘define’ or ‘definition’.
. . .
People are put into boxes that define who they are and what they can achieve within their lifetimes. Some are defined by the superficial factor of their appearance, or the divisiveness of their political views, or the meaningless number of Instagram followers they have amassed. Regardless of whether this is a natural social phenomenon or a practice used by society to make sense of the world in an easier fashion — the categorization process is happening.
I, myself, am defined by my high level of animosity towards anything serious. I use humour as my ship, my cannon, my shield, and my medicine; sometimes, I use humour for all those purposes at the same time. I am sure that there are more impressive, scholarly and perhaps world-shattering components that make up who I am, but the aforementioned one supersedes everything else. It’s the most obvious and life-defining one, and I believe that many, if not a supermajority of those who know me, would agree with the meaning I have deduced.
The definition of Jason Cao, unfortunately, has never been clear-cut — and I think I know why. You see, what differs my self-definition from Jason’s is that I base mine off on a deep, personal truth that was within me. For Jason, he derives his meaning through exterior ideas, objects and experiences, latching closely onto things he thought were “kind of cool” and “interesting” at the time.
It’s very much a revolving door of interests, as he explained:
“First, it was dinosaurs that were cool, and then it was whales. And then afterwards, it was human history to a certain extent. And after that, nothing much except for fictional books because I started [reading] Harry Potter and Percy Jackson and fandom stuff. Afterwards, Star Wars again in Grade 6. Aside from that, I started defining myself as the guy who liked superheroes and fictional media. I was such a huge fanboy, as well as the guy who could ‘do all this’. And then afterwards, when some of the appeal of that stuff started [to] wear off, I started getting into Anime and started to define myself with the new stuff I did like.”
I know Vespasian, Tiberius, and Hadrian, but I have never heard of “Jasonius Caosar."
I know it’s a bad joke, but leave me be.
It’s a rather long laundry list, but that didn’t even include the other items on Jason’s plate. The extended list includes the run-of-the-mill (and perhaps very vanilla) music history lessons on Brahms and Vivaldi, or the sweat-inducing hell called basketball, or the passionate work as the President of his high school’s LEO Club. I have to give a shout-out to his participation in fencing, though. The idea of a sport where you win through sharp poking is quite intriguing.
Some, if not most, of these interests could have possibly been the ones that explained the meaning of Jason’s life. He could have been the Moscrop Secondary School student who lives vicariously through Dumbledore quotes or the Burnaby kid who dressed up as a Stormtrooper at least once a week. At the beginning of Jason’s pursuits of these extracurriculars, those end games could have been possible with the initial “high” and passion he felt.
“I always feel like whenever I start something, I come off really strong,” Jason told me. “I feel super passionate about it. I want to get this done and show everybody that ‘Hey, I wanna do this,’ ‘Hey, I’m this kind of guy.’ Like, ‘I define myself based on this.’” In this scenario, he’s “high” on the exciting prospects of what could come out of his ventures.
This “high” is not limited to Jason or his situation. It’s a “high” that everyone feels through varying degrees and circumstances. For instance: when you see twelve-year-olds showing the world their public displays of affection through cringe-worthy, overly-filtered Instagram posts, you’ll have to think of the fact that they are experiencing an all-too-powerful strand of the “high” for the first time: being “in love”. I’m not sure, however, what that means at the stupid age of twelve.
You could also be experiencing another strand of this “high” when sitting through your first few classes in college (which will later be forgotten when you realize that they’ll cost you at least two organs), or when walking your Rottweiler out on a stroll for the first time (which will later be clouded by the upsetting amount of time you’ll have to pick up the dog’s crap in public). Regardless of what the thing is, the beginning of doing/owning/being that thing will always be as sweet as a Vanilla Bean Frappuccino with extra whipping cream.
The problem, however, is the instance when you run out of the sweet Frappuccino — as Jason himself realized. “After a while, when the initial hype goes away, you feel kind of deflated,” Jason confessed. Then, he explains the aftermath. “Afterwards, you try looking for something else that gives you the same high.”
I bet you fifty bucks that this is France…It’s not?! It’s the Vatican?
Wow, scamming billions of people does have its benefits!
It’s quite an unfortunate situation for him to be in a constant cycle of finding what he thought would define him, only to be left disappointed in the end. It does, however, give him several opportunities to deeply think about what he could be. The pandemic was certainly one of those opportunities, which offered him time for introspection to figure out what kind of “high” can be sustained for the rest of his life.
That high could be connected to Jason's religious faith; during the 2020 spring-summer lockdown (which Jason defined as the time when he mostly watched anime), he started to question what he was doing at the time and reflected on the possibilities he could have pursued. One of them would be to become a “better Christian”. Jason told me of his Christian background that was present in his younger years but then lost touch with his faith as he got older. The renewed interest in his Christianity was perhaps a new path back to his roots.
“I consider myself to be a Christian. But the way I see it right now, I’m more of a ‘CINO‘: a Christian in Name Only.” He told me that his devotion to his religion and God was “on-and-off,” feeling somewhat devoted to the faith in a few instances. Then, he would “relapse” and revert back to the habits one may consider as off the beaten path for Christianity.
Eventually, when he realizes that he needs to better himself again, he reattempts to regain what he lost from the relapse. Similar to his path towards self-discovery, it is yet another cycle with no end in sight.
This phenomenon, however, is not limited to his faith. This repetition of rising and falling, he said, was notably present through his time in high school. “Ever since Grade 9, I say [to myself], ‘I don’t like what I’m doing here right now. I’ll stop. I need to do better.’ And then afterwards, after a certain point, it doesn’t matter if it’s one month, two weeks, or just one week, I’m just like ‘Yeah, you know? Screw this. I’m just gonna do [something else].’”
The reasoning for why he wrecked his plans ranges from his anticipation for the newest season of his favourite anime show to the piling pressure from his school and extracurricular obligations. Regardless, it seems as though that there will always be something that forces him out of progression, leaving inconsistencies in his personal development.
Another inconsistent, or rather unclear, part of Jason is his views. After my first few conversations with Jason, I assumed that he politically leaned to the right of centre. Think of Ben Shapiro, but a lot more considerate. Lucky for me, my assumptions were pretty spot on back in the day. As Jason and I talked more about his political views now, however, I discovered that my assumptions could be heading towards the wrong side. This is based on the uncertainty of his political beliefs.
“I realized that especially looking back at my Grade 10 year, a lot of the stuff I supposedly thought of myself [as] were from what other people thought of first, especially with a lot of the right-wing ideas.”
Here’s Jason, looking as pensive as a professor from MIT.
He then used his changing views on the issue of refugee migration. The Jason from Grade 10 may have been more so stringent on their entry to Canada; but now, he’s attempting to appreciate the rationale and views of the other side. “Now, I kind of understand that, like, it’s not entirely their fault for leaving.”
What came as a surprise to me was when he tried to limit his share on what he thinks about the issue. He then reassured me that he isn’t making “conspiracy theories”, which was basically about placing blame on foreign military intervention into conflicts like in Syria and Central America, which he believes are politically motivated actions that have caused several refugee crises. “That's how I’m kind of seeing things now. Like, I’m not just [saying] like, ‘Oh, we should ban them.’”
To me, this may be a sign of his increasing willingness to explore other ideas. “I’m trying, at this point, to see the nuances behind things rather than just adhering to one narrative or another, I guess.”
This is what Jason was actually thinking:
“I can smell eggs right now…and I like that fact.”
Even with such new understandings, Jason still feels as though he is still not making his own path in terms of his political opinions. What was stopping him? Himself.
“I still feel like I’m kind of just following someone else’s narrative rather than discovering my own. At the same time, I’m kind of lazy, you know? I’m not willing to [discover]. It just seems like so much work.”
With so little clearness in who Jason Cao is, it is rather difficult to pinpoint a direction towards the answer. There are little pockets of information that could aid Jason; but even then, the tidbits won’t be enough. His casual listening of melancholy Chinese break-up songs or the fact he fences won’t cut it. There must be something about him that he could use as the starting point of his self-discovery.
There is, but it’s not a great one, to be honest.
I have always thought of Jason as someone who is socially misunderstood, where people chose to distance themselves from him since they can’t connect with him. Before the interview, I didn’t know him well enough to know if that was the case, but I had a gut feeling that the social misunderstanding of Jason Cao was true.
Whenever I talked to him, he didn’t have the suave to hold a compelling conversation with someone. The long-winded answers and the rapid speed of his talk would sometimes create an awkward atmosphere. Jason may not have sensed it, but the other person in the conversation would have.
That’s not to say that these qualities are necessarily the ones to chuck away. In fact, I found them as essential parts of Jason. The awkwardness can be forgiven when you listen to what he’s saying. The arguments he made about contentious issues, the philosophical questions he posed to me, and the accomplishments he was somewhat embarrassed to say made up the sometimes unintelligible speech.
Unfortunately, not everyone is as open-minded (and fantastic). Due to this misunderstanding, those around Jason may have kept him out of the loop. They were socially distancing from him, but not in the COVID sense. “People don’t actually hate me, I guess; however, it’s gotten to the point where I’m essentially socially irrelevant, the way I see it.” Afterwards, he channelled those who made him socially irrelevant. “‘Why invite this guy here when he’s either gonna reject your offer or not be any fun to hang around with anyway?’”
The strained and fading relationship between Jason and the people he used to consider friends may have also `12stemmed from his desire to achieve academic excellence. On one hand, the fact he focused his time more on his studies has benefitted him in the long run. He was able to get a fantastic SAT score and achieve good grades, then getting accepted into the University of California, Berkeley (arguably the best public university in America). Along with those high feats were his extracurricular accomplishments such as his business capstone project of selling and donating used clothes, as well as his participation in Model United Nations and AP classes.
Despite those accomplishments, Jason could only see what he lost in the process of attaining success. Ever since Grade 10, he thought that losing friendships were not things worth focusing on; but then, he contradicted himself by acknowledging that those fading friendships were hard to fathom. “I’d say I’ve gotten better in that aspect,” Jason told me. “But even then, it does still come up here and there. It is something I kind of regret, but it’s not like I can do much to improve them.”
At the time of this interview, we only had two months left until we move onto college, so the thought of possibly regaining what was lost was “futile” to him. “So from this point onwards, I’ll do what I can to not repeat the same mistakes in uni. I’ll try better to retain my relationships with those I still consider close.”
Jason is officially done. Just look at his face.
Throughout most of Jason’s time in high school, Jason has had hapless social circumstances that are, at this point, almost unresolvable. There may be small avenues of possible reconciliation, but any attempts will have little chance of success. However, Jason can make this circumstance into an opportunity for renewal and learning. He could lean into the problem and press it head-on, possibly finding his true self. I suppose his now-ending time in high school is not the venue to do so, but I would suggest that this opportunity could be explored at Berkeley.
When we discussed what we are excited about when it came to college, Jason lists off some reasons one would expect from any person going to university (the new environment, new connections, etc.) He then later admitted to one specific reason, which was related to his social situation during his time in high school. “The reason for applying [to the] US was because I kind of [want] to leave everything…the social situation was kind of deteriorating. I was like, ‘You know what? I’m gonna leave. Hope everyone forgets about me — except, maybe, for people who I care about.”
I cannot be certain what the result of Jason’s investigation into his social life, or his identity in general, will look like. I am certain, however, that he will try. Given his time succeeding and failing in figuring out who he is, he has come to understand concepts many people have yet to know about, such as the idea of letting go and regretting what was lost. In Jason’s case, it was the regret of losing those friendships.
But in a way, this wrinkle in his time before college could be the impetus of his burgeoning identity in the future. I do not know how to define Jason Cao yet, but I look forward to seeing the end game.
Recommended Song: A Place In This World - Taylor Swift