Several years ago, through hubris, foolishness, and lust I brought upon myself a disaster: my financial position suffered a severe set back, I became ill and severely depressed. In that darkest hour, I turned for help to friends and they all, to a man, refused. (Good honest friends, perfectly sensible logic: one does not back a losing horse).
Gradually, laboriously, I worked my way up from the depression; my health improved; and then, in the recent panic, I staked all on a wild opportunity. Like a hero in French nineteenth century opera, with blood-shot eyes and a sweaty brow, I gambled all -- and I won -- all.
O Fortuna, Imperatrix! Following on my darkest days, my best days have come. My health is not what it once was, but my life is comfortable, beautiful, and happy. It is a life of leisure in a beautiful place with a breathtaking view in one of the world's most magically beautiful cities; I eat and drink deliciously; surround myself with art and culture; and, in the afternoons, sit in stylish cafes amid blooming trees talking about love to young pretty things. Sometimes I pinch myself: am I not perhaps dreaming? But the pinch smarts: I am awake.
The best of it is this: had my old honest friends come to my aid in my darkest hour, I would now owe them in proportion to my subsequent success, ten or twelve-fold, a hundred-fold. But they didn't and I don't and my fortune is entirely my own.
I am unencumbered.
I am debt-free.
Oct 26, 2009
Oct 20, 2009
Mystery solved
One has always known that the IQ distribution in the society follows the Gaussian curve, but not knowing the size of the sigma, one didn't realize just how steep the curve is. It's steepness isn't much publicized, wikipedia for instance says nothing about it. Perhaps because it is a politically-correctly charged topic: wikipedia authors fall, I would guess, by and large in the 120+ bracket and simply don't want to be seen stating what that means. Perhaps, even, they don't want to even be reminded of it.
Well, I now realize why: because it turns out that it means rather a lot. The 120+ make up 2.5% of the population, which is small enough. But now, get this, the curve keeps falling from there: the 145+ are deemed 0.1% of the population. This means that by the time you reach 146, you have excluded 96% of all those who rank over 120. If you are 146, 96% of all over-120's are dumber than you.
Think about it.
Well, I now realize why: because it turns out that it means rather a lot. The 120+ make up 2.5% of the population, which is small enough. But now, get this, the curve keeps falling from there: the 145+ are deemed 0.1% of the population. This means that by the time you reach 146, you have excluded 96% of all those who rank over 120. If you are 146, 96% of all over-120's are dumber than you.
Think about it.
Oct 17, 2009
Some cultural news from the BBC
Some East End gallery specializes in up and coming artists (buy it for a penny, sell it for a pound); some of these artists are then interviewed: one makes large installations of planes locked up in ice which then slowly melts (yeah, duude, cool, pass the sheesha); the interviewer asks her: you wear a chador (‘conservative’) but you make such modern works! She doesn’t have a damn clue, does she?
Meanwhile at the White House the What's-their-names are assembling a collection of borrowed art; it’s all modern (i.e. post-1950) of course, and American (probably has to be), including someone’s mediation on the square (!); except a DAY-ga (American enough when you pronounce it that way); except this last is judged risque (shhh… legs); but the former first lady was also cultured, we are told: she owned a de Koenig (along with hyper-realist representations of West Texas landscape). Ah, the uncultured me: who de hoeck was de Koenig?
Ah... upon consideration, don't tell me, I don't want to know.
An Algerian band in France plays, lousily, electric oud. You play such a mix of traditional and modern! gushes the interviewer. Huh?
Sorry, I don’t understand this language, though everyone around me seems to speak it.
Here, for instance, is Florian Zeller (who?) invited to speak at a kind of book fair in Egypt (probably because no one better would go), offering his cultural gems:
Freedom, fantasy, complexity, the ambiguity of all truths and the suspension of moral judgement? Has Zeller ever read any archaic poetry, either Islamic or -- European? And if so, which part of his anatomy does he use to think (and speak) about it?
The terrible thing: he thinks this drivel actually means something; and – oh, emperor’s new clothes! -- his Egyptian colleagues believe him! How's that for conversation: you pretend you say something meaningful, they pretend they make a meaningful response.
How do you explain to these grunts that the language they speak –which happily interchanges modern, western, good, inevitable, free, and sexually liberated is incoherent, that it is broken, that it means nothing, that it is impossible to say or think in it anything that makes any sense at all and that by speaking it they just bury themselves in some horrendous dark hole of the mind?
But then -- why would anyone even try to explain?
Meanwhile at the White House the What's-their-names are assembling a collection of borrowed art; it’s all modern (i.e. post-1950) of course, and American (probably has to be), including someone’s mediation on the square (!); except a DAY-ga (American enough when you pronounce it that way); except this last is judged risque (shhh… legs); but the former first lady was also cultured, we are told: she owned a de Koenig (along with hyper-realist representations of West Texas landscape). Ah, the uncultured me: who de hoeck was de Koenig?
Ah... upon consideration, don't tell me, I don't want to know.
An Algerian band in France plays, lousily, electric oud. You play such a mix of traditional and modern! gushes the interviewer. Huh?
Sorry, I don’t understand this language, though everyone around me seems to speak it.
Here, for instance, is Florian Zeller (who?) invited to speak at a kind of book fair in Egypt (probably because no one better would go), offering his cultural gems:
if the Islamic world generally had difficulties with the novel, it was because it was living to a large extent in an era that belonged to the period before modern times, bogged down in archaisms that were by their essence incompatible with the foundations of the novel: freedom, fantasy, complexity, the ambiguity of all truths and the suspension of moral judgement. In this respect, the novel could easily become the battle ground between two civilisations.
Freedom, fantasy, complexity, the ambiguity of all truths and the suspension of moral judgement? Has Zeller ever read any archaic poetry, either Islamic or -- European? And if so, which part of his anatomy does he use to think (and speak) about it?
The terrible thing: he thinks this drivel actually means something; and – oh, emperor’s new clothes! -- his Egyptian colleagues believe him! How's that for conversation: you pretend you say something meaningful, they pretend they make a meaningful response.
How do you explain to these grunts that the language they speak –which happily interchanges modern, western, good, inevitable, free, and sexually liberated is incoherent, that it is broken, that it means nothing, that it is impossible to say or think in it anything that makes any sense at all and that by speaking it they just bury themselves in some horrendous dark hole of the mind?
But then -- why would anyone even try to explain?
Oct 11, 2009
*
We have not seen each other two and a half weeks. When she asked how I have been, lost for something to say, I told her about Salwa, what a huge impact her book had had on me: the emotional turbulence I feel when I read her; the long pensive silences into which I fall when I do not. I spoke the truth: everything else which has happened in the last two and a half weeks has been by comparison -- irrelevant, immaterial.
She asked me why and only then I realized that I cannot explain it to her; and that therefore I should not have mentioned it in the first place.
She asked me why and only then I realized that I cannot explain it to her; and that therefore I should not have mentioned it in the first place.
Oct 6, 2009
salwa dit
le penseur m'a ecrit une lettre. une lettre d'amour. je me suis dit: comment peut-il employer le mot amour? je l'evite autant que je peux. avec lui comme avec les autres. je ne connais pas l'amour, je connais le desir. l'amour appartient a un au-dela qui me depasse, et je me refuse a lui courrir apres. le desire, le mien et celui de l'autre, je le connais, je le touche, je le vois, je le sens, je vis ses effets et ses metamorphoses. lui seul me prend par la main pour me conduire par vers mes espaces inexplores.
Oct 4, 2009
Lying about sex
Salwa al Neimi is the first woman I come across to speak the voice of Nehadeh; which is also my voice. (Perhaps Marguerite Duras also does, but I have not read her). Al Neimi likes sex, finds fulfillment in it, seeks it, and does not let other things interfere -- her whole life seems to be lived so as to maximize her sexual pleasure. (Love -- she says -- I don't understand what that word means; but desire, yes, I understand it).
(This does not mean that she's a slut: people like us -- sex-maniacs -- have a such a hard time finding good partners that we tend to want to hang on to the ones we have found -- firmly, and loyally, if not always exclusively. I know).
My past attempts to speak this kind of language with my lovers have invariably led to trouble: even with the really good lovers -- those not only adept but also clearly fulfilled in the act; they often seemed to have had that amazing frame of mind in which their ability to do it well and enjoy it somehow cohabited with the strong belief that the sex was not important, merely a means to an end, the end being e.g. lazy afternoon walks in the sun to nowhere in particular, for instance (i.e. comfort of being together). Hearing me speak that language, the language of Al Neimi, they were usually offended: I was somehow not respecting -- perhaps even castrating -- a part of them that was to their minds the truer and more important part of them -- the non-sexual part. Not to mention, also, that I was proving myself base, vulgar, and -- of course, the usual -- typically male.
Beh.
It is of course preposterous to me: lazy walks in the park can be done with a dog, one does not need a well-matched lover for it. I don't want a woman for lazy walks in the park; in fact, I do not want any woman who does not want me first and foremost in that way.
Stumbling upon Al Neimi has a perverse result on me: instead of delighting me with the discovery that there do exist other people who think, feel and talk like me, I am overwhelmed by the stifling, depressing, crushing majority of those who do not; with whom one cannot be honest; with whom one has to dissimulate.
(This does not mean that she's a slut: people like us -- sex-maniacs -- have a such a hard time finding good partners that we tend to want to hang on to the ones we have found -- firmly, and loyally, if not always exclusively. I know).
My past attempts to speak this kind of language with my lovers have invariably led to trouble: even with the really good lovers -- those not only adept but also clearly fulfilled in the act; they often seemed to have had that amazing frame of mind in which their ability to do it well and enjoy it somehow cohabited with the strong belief that the sex was not important, merely a means to an end, the end being e.g. lazy afternoon walks in the sun to nowhere in particular, for instance (i.e. comfort of being together). Hearing me speak that language, the language of Al Neimi, they were usually offended: I was somehow not respecting -- perhaps even castrating -- a part of them that was to their minds the truer and more important part of them -- the non-sexual part. Not to mention, also, that I was proving myself base, vulgar, and -- of course, the usual -- typically male.
Beh.
It is of course preposterous to me: lazy walks in the park can be done with a dog, one does not need a well-matched lover for it. I don't want a woman for lazy walks in the park; in fact, I do not want any woman who does not want me first and foremost in that way.
Stumbling upon Al Neimi has a perverse result on me: instead of delighting me with the discovery that there do exist other people who think, feel and talk like me, I am overwhelmed by the stifling, depressing, crushing majority of those who do not; with whom one cannot be honest; with whom one has to dissimulate.
Aug 24, 2009
Amore nella vecchiaia
"Non faccio tanto come essere cresciuta", Akhila ha detto a me sopra una bicchiera di qualcosa nella tonalità scura e scura di grande albero di bo: un albero di bo enorme e silenzioso come una chiesa.
(Albero di bo, pensa appena!)
"Perche -- anche se la mia madre (chi ora ha 57 anni) dice a me 'che desidero avevo conosciuto alla tua età che cosa conosci a la tua' -- la verità è che questa conoscenza -- è una... tragedia . La verità è, il mio vecchio amico, che la saggezza prematura è… amara..."
"Sì, è utile conoscere con chiarezza perfetta appena che cosa motiva tutto intorno me... e così come premere i loro tasti… e così come maneggiarli efficientemente nel fare che cosa voglio... il me rende efficace allo sguardo di affari… guarda: la mia casa tutto pagata prima de eta di 32 anni… E sì, è buono da sapere per non attendersi dalla gente qualche cosa più di tanto -- da se conservare così tanto disappunto non intrattenendo le aspettative sciocche…
"Ma, è -- deludendo, dopo tutto, suppongo -- noioso -- con acuto -- per sapere che la gente è tali creature semplici; che tutto nella vita è così -- prevedibile; così -- non-romantico; così -- meccanico; così -- mercenario… tutti di esso… Che tutto è appena come tutto altrimenti… quel tutti vogliono le stesse cose… e che si può fidarsi di nessuno affatto e mai mai sperano affinchè chiunque li sorprendano…"
"Quando ora penso a questo proposito, realizzo appena quanto non lo gradico: ci è una parte di me quale desidera non ho conosciuto; una parte di me quale desidera de essere sorpresa, a occhi spalancati, stupida. Voglio credere che la vita sia un mistero. Voglio essere nell'amore -- sì, suppongo che voglio essere nell'amore -- quale è, alla mia mente, ad una sensibilità del darsi a qualche cosa di più grande e migliore di me… di credere nella bontà e nell'amicizia e -- pozzo! -- amore."
"Ma, naturalmente, tutto questo è impossibile; alla nostra età sappiamo più meglio... abbiamo la conoscenza perfetta... la visione perfetta... abbiamo illusione -- zero."
Le parole della signora Akhila non me sorprendono.
Anche loro sono prevedibili: sono parole del medio evo.
Joe Campbell ha detto la stessa cosa: "quando avete quaranta anni, conoscete che cosa una persona sta andando dire prima che la apra la sua bocca; conoscete tutto; tutto lo incontrate avete incontrato già in un'apparenza differente… tutto qualcun'altro dica avete sentito… siete pronto per -- un intero nuovo filme."
E, naturalmente, questa è stata la mia esperienza, ugualmente: lo stesso-vecchio; stessi-vecchi; ancora e ancora e ancora.
E sono io, come Akhila, stanco ed annoiato di esso.
La differenza è che Joe Campbell ha avuto 52 anni quando lui pronunciato quelle parole; ed io o avuto quaranta quando le ho capite; ma Akhila ha… trentadue! Come terribile deve dovere essere disillusa alla sua età.
Io, alla sua età, ero ancora abbastanza stupido da cadere nell'amore -- per che cosa sarà, certamente spero, l'ultima volta.
Ci sono, dico a lei, due sensi di affare con il problema.
Il primo non è di diventare cinico.
Cinico, pensano i miei amici, è non credere chiunque che ci incontriamo; ammettere loro assolutamente il più male; ed allora soltanto attendendere per vedere quanto abbiamo raggione nella nostra valutazione iniziale; aspettanderli per rivelarsi de essere appena che cosa abbiamo pensato che erano in primo luogo.
Ma quello non è corretto; quello non è il significato allineare dell'essere cinico. Quello soltanto sta essendo realistico, pratico, allineare alla nostra conoscenza di natura allineare della gente e del mondo. La gente è difettoso; la gente è merde assolute.
Questo è la propria verità del dio.
È un fatto di vita.
Ma essere cinico non è conoscerla, ma è accosentiree da essere come loro.
Che è la unica cosa che non dobbiamo fare. Soltanto perché X è una merda, perché dovrei io essere lo stesso? Se X viene a mancare come amico, perché dovrei io venir a mancare? Il mondo è una cosa de merda, certamente; ma quello non significa che anche io dovrei la essere.
Così i miei amici possono contare su me anche se io non posso -- e non faccia -- contare su loro. Sono merde; merde quadrati, spesso; ma io -- io sono un cavaliere nobile, in armatura brillante, su un cavallo bianco.
Nessuno lo interferiranno mai che sono una merda.
Ed il secondo senso di affare -- e probabilmente il migliore -- poche preoccupazioni per i rapporti ed il carattere tra persone in esso, certamente pochi disappunti -- è interessarsi all'arte.
Ogni tecnica artistica -- se sta tessendo, o terraglie, o pintura, o la metallurgia -- è un genere di lotta contra le limitazioni tecnologiche del mezzo; all'interno di ciascuno ci sono numerosi racconti storici dei progetti di ricerca multigenerazionale dirette al raggiungimento di un risultato particolare. Nella pintura, questa può essere la lotta per rappresentare lo spazio tridimensionale su una superficie piana; o per rappresentare la superficie stessa-- vetro di luccichio, pelliccia lanuginosa, stoppia; in terraglie cinesi, tali progetti hanno compreso la ricerca per il colore di sangue de boeuf; o per il crackle perfetto del celadon.
A seguito di questi progetti di ricerca è intellettuale affascinante; ma la loro obiettivo è sempre fresca e nuova: lontano è rimossa dal usuale lo stesso-vecchio-stessi-vecchi; quale è perché gli artisti le hanno seguite in primo luogo, io suppongo. Anche loro hanno trovato il ciclo infinito della seduzione e del tradimento doloroso; estremamente doloroso. Anche loro hanno provato fugare della mancanza di speranza di vita... e ringraziamenti a loro ora anche noi possiamo fugare, quanto seguiamo i loro percorsi.
(Albero di bo, pensa appena!)
"Perche -- anche se la mia madre (chi ora ha 57 anni) dice a me 'che desidero avevo conosciuto alla tua età che cosa conosci a la tua' -- la verità è che questa conoscenza -- è una... tragedia . La verità è, il mio vecchio amico, che la saggezza prematura è… amara..."
"Sì, è utile conoscere con chiarezza perfetta appena che cosa motiva tutto intorno me... e così come premere i loro tasti… e così come maneggiarli efficientemente nel fare che cosa voglio... il me rende efficace allo sguardo di affari… guarda: la mia casa tutto pagata prima de eta di 32 anni… E sì, è buono da sapere per non attendersi dalla gente qualche cosa più di tanto -- da se conservare così tanto disappunto non intrattenendo le aspettative sciocche…
"Ma, è -- deludendo, dopo tutto, suppongo -- noioso -- con acuto -- per sapere che la gente è tali creature semplici; che tutto nella vita è così -- prevedibile; così -- non-romantico; così -- meccanico; così -- mercenario… tutti di esso… Che tutto è appena come tutto altrimenti… quel tutti vogliono le stesse cose… e che si può fidarsi di nessuno affatto e mai mai sperano affinchè chiunque li sorprendano…"
"Quando ora penso a questo proposito, realizzo appena quanto non lo gradico: ci è una parte di me quale desidera non ho conosciuto; una parte di me quale desidera de essere sorpresa, a occhi spalancati, stupida. Voglio credere che la vita sia un mistero. Voglio essere nell'amore -- sì, suppongo che voglio essere nell'amore -- quale è, alla mia mente, ad una sensibilità del darsi a qualche cosa di più grande e migliore di me… di credere nella bontà e nell'amicizia e -- pozzo! -- amore."
"Ma, naturalmente, tutto questo è impossibile; alla nostra età sappiamo più meglio... abbiamo la conoscenza perfetta... la visione perfetta... abbiamo illusione -- zero."
*
Le parole della signora Akhila non me sorprendono.
Anche loro sono prevedibili: sono parole del medio evo.
Joe Campbell ha detto la stessa cosa: "quando avete quaranta anni, conoscete che cosa una persona sta andando dire prima che la apra la sua bocca; conoscete tutto; tutto lo incontrate avete incontrato già in un'apparenza differente… tutto qualcun'altro dica avete sentito… siete pronto per -- un intero nuovo filme."
E, naturalmente, questa è stata la mia esperienza, ugualmente: lo stesso-vecchio; stessi-vecchi; ancora e ancora e ancora.
E sono io, come Akhila, stanco ed annoiato di esso.
La differenza è che Joe Campbell ha avuto 52 anni quando lui pronunciato quelle parole; ed io o avuto quaranta quando le ho capite; ma Akhila ha… trentadue! Come terribile deve dovere essere disillusa alla sua età.
Io, alla sua età, ero ancora abbastanza stupido da cadere nell'amore -- per che cosa sarà, certamente spero, l'ultima volta.
*
Ci sono, dico a lei, due sensi di affare con il problema.
Il primo non è di diventare cinico.
Cinico, pensano i miei amici, è non credere chiunque che ci incontriamo; ammettere loro assolutamente il più male; ed allora soltanto attendendere per vedere quanto abbiamo raggione nella nostra valutazione iniziale; aspettanderli per rivelarsi de essere appena che cosa abbiamo pensato che erano in primo luogo.
Ma quello non è corretto; quello non è il significato allineare dell'essere cinico. Quello soltanto sta essendo realistico, pratico, allineare alla nostra conoscenza di natura allineare della gente e del mondo. La gente è difettoso; la gente è merde assolute.
Questo è la propria verità del dio.
È un fatto di vita.
Ma essere cinico non è conoscerla, ma è accosentiree da essere come loro.
Che è la unica cosa che non dobbiamo fare. Soltanto perché X è una merda, perché dovrei io essere lo stesso? Se X viene a mancare come amico, perché dovrei io venir a mancare? Il mondo è una cosa de merda, certamente; ma quello non significa che anche io dovrei la essere.
Così i miei amici possono contare su me anche se io non posso -- e non faccia -- contare su loro. Sono merde; merde quadrati, spesso; ma io -- io sono un cavaliere nobile, in armatura brillante, su un cavallo bianco.
Nessuno lo interferiranno mai che sono una merda.
*
Ed il secondo senso di affare -- e probabilmente il migliore -- poche preoccupazioni per i rapporti ed il carattere tra persone in esso, certamente pochi disappunti -- è interessarsi all'arte.
Ogni tecnica artistica -- se sta tessendo, o terraglie, o pintura, o la metallurgia -- è un genere di lotta contra le limitazioni tecnologiche del mezzo; all'interno di ciascuno ci sono numerosi racconti storici dei progetti di ricerca multigenerazionale dirette al raggiungimento di un risultato particolare. Nella pintura, questa può essere la lotta per rappresentare lo spazio tridimensionale su una superficie piana; o per rappresentare la superficie stessa-- vetro di luccichio, pelliccia lanuginosa, stoppia; in terraglie cinesi, tali progetti hanno compreso la ricerca per il colore di sangue de boeuf; o per il crackle perfetto del celadon.
A seguito di questi progetti di ricerca è intellettuale affascinante; ma la loro obiettivo è sempre fresca e nuova: lontano è rimossa dal usuale lo stesso-vecchio-stessi-vecchi; quale è perché gli artisti le hanno seguite in primo luogo, io suppongo. Anche loro hanno trovato il ciclo infinito della seduzione e del tradimento doloroso; estremamente doloroso. Anche loro hanno provato fugare della mancanza di speranza di vita... e ringraziamenti a loro ora anche noi possiamo fugare, quanto seguiamo i loro percorsi.
Aug 23, 2009
Love in old age
I do not much like being grown up and wise, Akhila said to me over a glass of something in the dark, dark shade of the great Bo tree: a Bo tree as huge and as silent as a great gothic church.
(A Bo tree, just think!)
For, although my mother, now 57, says to me "I wish I had known at your age what you know at yours", the truth is that this knowledge is -- a burden. The truth is, my old friend, that premature wisdom is... bitter.
Yes, it is useful to know with perfect 20/20 clarity just what motivates everyone around me, and thus how to press their buttons... and thus how to manipulate them efficiently into doing what I want. It makes one effective at business... look at the house all paid off at 32... And yes, it is good to know not to expect from people anything beyond that -- one saves herself so much disappointment by not entertaining silly expectations...
And yet, it is -- disappointing, after all, I suppose -- tiresome -- dull -- to know that people are such simple creatures; that everything in life is so -- predictable; so -- unromantic; so -- mechanical; so -- mercenary... all of it... That everyone is just like everyone else... that they are all after the same things... and that one can trust no one at all, and never ever hope for anyone to surprise us...
When I think about it now, I realize just how much I do not like it: there is a part of me which wishes I did not know; a part of me that wishes to be mystified, wide-eyed, amazed. I want to believe life is a mystery. I want to be in love -- yes, I suppose I do want to be in love -- which is, to my mind, a feeling of giving oneself to something bigger and better than oneself... of believing in goodness and friendship and -- well -- love.
But, of course, it is impossible; at our age we know better; we have the perfect knowledge; the 20/20 vision. Zero illusion.
My lady Akhila's words do not surprise me.
They, too, are predictable: it is the voice of the middle age.
I once hard Joe Campbell saying the very same thing: by the time you are forty, you know what a person is going to say before they open their mouth; you know everything; everyone you meet you have met already in a different guise... everything someone else says you have heard... you are ready for -- a whole new movie.
And, of course, this has been my experience, too: same old, same old.
And, like Akhila, I am tired and bored of it.
The difference is that Joe Campbell was 52 when he pronounced those words; and I was forty when I understood them; but Akhila is... thirty-two. How terrifying it must be to be disillusioned at her age.
At her age I was still stupid enough to fall in love -- for what will be, I certainly hope, the last time.
There are, I say to her, two ways to cope.
The first is not to become cynical.
Cynical, think my friends, means not believing anyone we meet; assuming absolutely the worst about them; and then merely waiting to see how right we were in our initial estimation; waiting for them to prove themselves to be just what we thought they were in the first place.
But that is not correct; that is not the true meaning of being cynical. That is merely being realistic, practical, true to the our middle-age knowledge of people and the world. People do suck; they are absolute shits. It's god's own truth, it is.
A fact of life.
But being cynical is not about knowing it, but about agreeing to be like them.
This we must not do. Merely because x is a shit, why should I be the same? If x fails me as a friend, why should I fail him? The world sucks, surely; but that does not mean I should suck, too, does it now?
So my friends can count on me even if I cannot -- and do not -- count on them. They are shits; often shits squared; but I -- I am a noble knight, in shining armor, on a white horse.
No one will ever catch me being a shit.
*
And the second way to cope -- and probably the better one -- fewer concerns with interpersonal relationships and character in it, certainly fewer disappointments -- is to take an interest in art.
Every artistic technique -- whether it is weaving, or pottery, or painting, or metalworking -- is a kind of struggle with the technological limitations of the medium; within each there are numerous histories of multigenerational research projects each directed at the attainment of a particular result. In painting this may be the struggle to represent three dimensional space on a flat surface; or to represent texture -- glistening glass, fluffy fur, stubble; in Chinese pottery such projects included the quest for the color of sangue de boeuf; or for the perfect celadon crackle. Following these research projects is intellectually fascinating; but their ends are always fresh and new: they are far removed from the usual same old same old; which is why the artists followed them in the first place, I suppose. They, too, found the endless cycle of seduction and betrayal painful and -- dull. They, too, tried to get away -- and thanks to them now we can, too, by following them down their paths.
(A Bo tree, just think!)
For, although my mother, now 57, says to me "I wish I had known at your age what you know at yours", the truth is that this knowledge is -- a burden. The truth is, my old friend, that premature wisdom is... bitter.
Yes, it is useful to know with perfect 20/20 clarity just what motivates everyone around me, and thus how to press their buttons... and thus how to manipulate them efficiently into doing what I want. It makes one effective at business... look at the house all paid off at 32... And yes, it is good to know not to expect from people anything beyond that -- one saves herself so much disappointment by not entertaining silly expectations...
And yet, it is -- disappointing, after all, I suppose -- tiresome -- dull -- to know that people are such simple creatures; that everything in life is so -- predictable; so -- unromantic; so -- mechanical; so -- mercenary... all of it... That everyone is just like everyone else... that they are all after the same things... and that one can trust no one at all, and never ever hope for anyone to surprise us...
When I think about it now, I realize just how much I do not like it: there is a part of me which wishes I did not know; a part of me that wishes to be mystified, wide-eyed, amazed. I want to believe life is a mystery. I want to be in love -- yes, I suppose I do want to be in love -- which is, to my mind, a feeling of giving oneself to something bigger and better than oneself... of believing in goodness and friendship and -- well -- love.
But, of course, it is impossible; at our age we know better; we have the perfect knowledge; the 20/20 vision. Zero illusion.
*
My lady Akhila's words do not surprise me.
They, too, are predictable: it is the voice of the middle age.
I once hard Joe Campbell saying the very same thing: by the time you are forty, you know what a person is going to say before they open their mouth; you know everything; everyone you meet you have met already in a different guise... everything someone else says you have heard... you are ready for -- a whole new movie.
And, of course, this has been my experience, too: same old, same old.
And, like Akhila, I am tired and bored of it.
The difference is that Joe Campbell was 52 when he pronounced those words; and I was forty when I understood them; but Akhila is... thirty-two. How terrifying it must be to be disillusioned at her age.
At her age I was still stupid enough to fall in love -- for what will be, I certainly hope, the last time.
*
There are, I say to her, two ways to cope.
The first is not to become cynical.
Cynical, think my friends, means not believing anyone we meet; assuming absolutely the worst about them; and then merely waiting to see how right we were in our initial estimation; waiting for them to prove themselves to be just what we thought they were in the first place.
But that is not correct; that is not the true meaning of being cynical. That is merely being realistic, practical, true to the our middle-age knowledge of people and the world. People do suck; they are absolute shits. It's god's own truth, it is.
A fact of life.
But being cynical is not about knowing it, but about agreeing to be like them.
This we must not do. Merely because x is a shit, why should I be the same? If x fails me as a friend, why should I fail him? The world sucks, surely; but that does not mean I should suck, too, does it now?
So my friends can count on me even if I cannot -- and do not -- count on them. They are shits; often shits squared; but I -- I am a noble knight, in shining armor, on a white horse.
No one will ever catch me being a shit.
*
And the second way to cope -- and probably the better one -- fewer concerns with interpersonal relationships and character in it, certainly fewer disappointments -- is to take an interest in art.
Every artistic technique -- whether it is weaving, or pottery, or painting, or metalworking -- is a kind of struggle with the technological limitations of the medium; within each there are numerous histories of multigenerational research projects each directed at the attainment of a particular result. In painting this may be the struggle to represent three dimensional space on a flat surface; or to represent texture -- glistening glass, fluffy fur, stubble; in Chinese pottery such projects included the quest for the color of sangue de boeuf; or for the perfect celadon crackle. Following these research projects is intellectually fascinating; but their ends are always fresh and new: they are far removed from the usual same old same old; which is why the artists followed them in the first place, I suppose. They, too, found the endless cycle of seduction and betrayal painful and -- dull. They, too, tried to get away -- and thanks to them now we can, too, by following them down their paths.
Aug 22, 2009
Versuch Eins
Liebe B
Ich kann's nicht in meinem Herzen finden, um Sie, zu lieben zu stoppen, obwohl offensichtlich wenn Stoß komm zu schieben, ich Sie nicht überhaupt zählen kann.
Weil ich Sie für so viele Jahre geliebt habe, können wir fortfahren zu entsprechen, folglich; und Sie können auf mir immer zählen -- obwohl ich nie auf Ihnen zählen soll.
(Sicher, ist Ihr Ausfall kein Grund, damit ich auch ausfalle).
Weiter, können Sie im sicheren Wissen auch dich entspannen, dass ich nie noch einmal versuchen sollte, um eine Bevorzugung von Ihnen zu bitten.
Ich sollte auch zuschprechen, daß unsere neue Erfahrung von allen meinen Erfahrungen mit Ihren Landsmännern typisch gewesen ist. O, wie ich wünsche, daß meine Eltern die Vernunft gehabt hatten, ein anderes Land auszuwählen, um mich dort zu verbannen -- irgendein anderes Land, wirklich. Dann nach 25 Jahren, konnte ich Freunde dort haben; wer weiß, möglicherweise ich konnte erlernen sogar (apage satanas) den Platz mein Haus zu nennen?
Jetzt, muss ich das schwerste und schwierigste Vermächtnis meines Eltern beschäftigen: die Sprache. Ich bin kaum in sie in der literarischen Richtung vernarrt -- abgesehen von Shakespeare mag ich nicht wirklich irgendwelche seine Literatur lesen; jedoch, trotz dies, habe ich von ihr mein Hauptwerkzeug vom Gedanken und vom Ausdruck hergestellt.
Nun, als Werkzeug des Gedankens, ist es nicht ein schlechtes Mittel; aber als Werkzeug des Ausdrucks trägt es eine Hauptbeeinträchtigung: indem ich es verwende, bin ich pro Kraft zu an Leute wie Sie sprechend; welches, selbstverständlich, eine Zeitverschwendung ist: Sie Amerikanern weder konnten verstehen noch wunschten verstehen; noch möchte ich besonders von Ihnen verstanden werden. Wenn solch ein Wunder geschieht -- sehr selten -- Sie Amerikanern gewinnen etwas, aber ich -- ich gewinne nichts.
Die idiotische Anmerkungen, die ich vom Besten von Ihnen auf meinem ehemaligen Blog empfangen habe, sind der lebende Beweis der Tatsache. Ich benötige eine andere Sprache: fast jede mögliche andere Sprache würde vorzuziehend scheinen.
Aber dies wird an meinem Alter hart sein; und es wird Zeit nehmen. Und die Sprache -- es sein sollte... was?
Deutch?
***
Nah, Deutsch does not work.
Either French or Italian then.
Ich kann's nicht in meinem Herzen finden, um Sie, zu lieben zu stoppen, obwohl offensichtlich wenn Stoß komm zu schieben, ich Sie nicht überhaupt zählen kann.
Weil ich Sie für so viele Jahre geliebt habe, können wir fortfahren zu entsprechen, folglich; und Sie können auf mir immer zählen -- obwohl ich nie auf Ihnen zählen soll.
(Sicher, ist Ihr Ausfall kein Grund, damit ich auch ausfalle).
Weiter, können Sie im sicheren Wissen auch dich entspannen, dass ich nie noch einmal versuchen sollte, um eine Bevorzugung von Ihnen zu bitten.
Ich sollte auch zuschprechen, daß unsere neue Erfahrung von allen meinen Erfahrungen mit Ihren Landsmännern typisch gewesen ist. O, wie ich wünsche, daß meine Eltern die Vernunft gehabt hatten, ein anderes Land auszuwählen, um mich dort zu verbannen -- irgendein anderes Land, wirklich. Dann nach 25 Jahren, konnte ich Freunde dort haben; wer weiß, möglicherweise ich konnte erlernen sogar (apage satanas) den Platz mein Haus zu nennen?
Jetzt, muss ich das schwerste und schwierigste Vermächtnis meines Eltern beschäftigen: die Sprache. Ich bin kaum in sie in der literarischen Richtung vernarrt -- abgesehen von Shakespeare mag ich nicht wirklich irgendwelche seine Literatur lesen; jedoch, trotz dies, habe ich von ihr mein Hauptwerkzeug vom Gedanken und vom Ausdruck hergestellt.
Nun, als Werkzeug des Gedankens, ist es nicht ein schlechtes Mittel; aber als Werkzeug des Ausdrucks trägt es eine Hauptbeeinträchtigung: indem ich es verwende, bin ich pro Kraft zu an Leute wie Sie sprechend; welches, selbstverständlich, eine Zeitverschwendung ist: Sie Amerikanern weder konnten verstehen noch wunschten verstehen; noch möchte ich besonders von Ihnen verstanden werden. Wenn solch ein Wunder geschieht -- sehr selten -- Sie Amerikanern gewinnen etwas, aber ich -- ich gewinne nichts.
Die idiotische Anmerkungen, die ich vom Besten von Ihnen auf meinem ehemaligen Blog empfangen habe, sind der lebende Beweis der Tatsache. Ich benötige eine andere Sprache: fast jede mögliche andere Sprache würde vorzuziehend scheinen.
Aber dies wird an meinem Alter hart sein; und es wird Zeit nehmen. Und die Sprache -- es sein sollte... was?
Deutch?
***
Nah, Deutsch does not work.
Either French or Italian then.
Aug 21, 2009
Prova I
Mia Cara B
Non posso trovarlo nel mio cuore per smettere di amarla, malgrado il fatto che, ovviamente, quando la spinta viene a spingere, non posso contarla affatto. Poiché ho amatola per tanti anni, oggi possiamo continuare a corrispondere, quindi; e voi potete contare sempre su me -- benchè non conti su voi.
(Certamente, il vostro guasto non è qualcuno motivo affinchè me venga a mancare).
Più ulteriormente, potete anche distenderla nella conoscenza sicura che io ne dovrei provare mai ancora a chiedergla un favore.
Dovrei aggiungere che la nostra esperienza recente è stata tipica di tutte le mie esperienze con i vostri connazionali. Ohime, come desidero che i miei genitori avévano avuti il buon senso selezionare un altro paese per esiliarmi -- qualunque altro paese, realmente. Allora, dopo 25 anni, potrei avere amici là; chi sa, forse io persino impara (apage satana!) denominare il posto una casa mia?
Nel frattempo, devo occuparmi dell'eredità più pesante e più difficile della questa scelta di miei genitori: la lingua. Sono a malapena affettuoso della nel senso letterario -- oltre a Shakespeare realmente non gradico leggere de la letteratura inglese o americana; ma, tuttavia, malgrado questo, ho fatto di esso il mio attrezzo principale di pensiero e dell'espressione. .
Ora, come attrezzo di pensiero, non è un mezzo difettoso; ma come attrezzo dell'espressione ha uno svantaggio principale: lo usando, per forza mi rivolgo alla gente come voi; quale è, naturalmente, una perdita di tempo: voi Americani nè potreste capire; nè volere capire. Né voglio io particolarmente essere capito da voi. Quando un tal miracolo accade -- molto raramente -- voi Americani guadagnate qualcosa, ma io -- io guadagno niente nel ritorno.
Le osservaizoni stupide che ho ricevuto dal meglio di voi sul mio blog precedente sono la prova vivente del fatto.
In breve, ho bisogno di un'altra lingua: quasi qualunque altra lingua sembrerebbe preferibile. Ma questo sta andando essere duro alla mia età; e sta andando richiedere tempo.
E che la lingua dovrebbe esso essere?
Italiano?
Non posso trovarlo nel mio cuore per smettere di amarla, malgrado il fatto che, ovviamente, quando la spinta viene a spingere, non posso contarla affatto. Poiché ho amatola per tanti anni, oggi possiamo continuare a corrispondere, quindi; e voi potete contare sempre su me -- benchè non conti su voi.
(Certamente, il vostro guasto non è qualcuno motivo affinchè me venga a mancare).
Più ulteriormente, potete anche distenderla nella conoscenza sicura che io ne dovrei provare mai ancora a chiedergla un favore.
Dovrei aggiungere che la nostra esperienza recente è stata tipica di tutte le mie esperienze con i vostri connazionali. Ohime, come desidero che i miei genitori avévano avuti il buon senso selezionare un altro paese per esiliarmi -- qualunque altro paese, realmente. Allora, dopo 25 anni, potrei avere amici là; chi sa, forse io persino impara (apage satana!) denominare il posto una casa mia?
Nel frattempo, devo occuparmi dell'eredità più pesante e più difficile della questa scelta di miei genitori: la lingua. Sono a malapena affettuoso della nel senso letterario -- oltre a Shakespeare realmente non gradico leggere de la letteratura inglese o americana; ma, tuttavia, malgrado questo, ho fatto di esso il mio attrezzo principale di pensiero e dell'espressione. .
Ora, come attrezzo di pensiero, non è un mezzo difettoso; ma come attrezzo dell'espressione ha uno svantaggio principale: lo usando, per forza mi rivolgo alla gente come voi; quale è, naturalmente, una perdita di tempo: voi Americani nè potreste capire; nè volere capire. Né voglio io particolarmente essere capito da voi. Quando un tal miracolo accade -- molto raramente -- voi Americani guadagnate qualcosa, ma io -- io guadagno niente nel ritorno.
Le osservaizoni stupide che ho ricevuto dal meglio di voi sul mio blog precedente sono la prova vivente del fatto.
In breve, ho bisogno di un'altra lingua: quasi qualunque altra lingua sembrerebbe preferibile. Ma questo sta andando essere duro alla mia età; e sta andando richiedere tempo.
E che la lingua dovrebbe esso essere?
Italiano?
(Il mio dio! poichè una letteratura italiana, questa, io sono sicuro che deve essere il literaratura più difettosa mai scritta; ma ascolti appena esso, mai non si occupano di che cosa dico: non è la lingua che suonante la più bella che abbiate sentito mai? che gioia per produrre questi suoni incredibili da nostra propria bocca, che gioia per sentirsi sentire!)
Aug 20, 2009
Essai I
Chere B
Je ne peux pas le trouver à mon coeur pour cesser de vous aimer, malgré le fait que, évidemment, quand la poussée viennent pour pousser, je ne peux pas vous compter du tout.
Puisque je vous ai aimé pendant tant d'années, nous pouvons continuer à correspondre, donc ; et vous pouvez toujours compter sur moi -- bien que je ne compte pas sur vous.
(Sûrement, votre échec n'est pas aucune raison de moi d'échouer).
De plus, vous pouvez également étendre que je devrais jamais encore essayer de demander une faveur de vous.
Je devrais ajouter que notre expérience récente a été typique de toutes mes expériences avec vos compatriotes. Comment je souhaite mes parents avaient eu le bon sens de sélectionner un autre pays pour m'exiler -- tout autre pays, vraiment. Puis, après 25 ans, je pourrais avoir des amis là ; qui sait, peut-être apprenner moi même (apage satana!) à appeler l'endroit une maison de moi même?
Pendant qu'il est, je dois traiter le legs le plus lourd et le plus difficile de la choix de mes parents: la langue. Je ne suis à peine fanatique d'elle dans le sens littéraire -- indépendamment de Shakespeare, je n'aime pas vraiment lire de sa littérature ; mais, néanmoins, en dépit de ceci, j'ai fait de lui mon outil principal de la pensée et de l'expression.
Maintenant, comme outil de pensée, ce n'est pas un mauvais milieu; mais comme outil d'expression il porte un inconvénient principal: en l'employant, je suis par force s'adressant aux gens comme vous; ce qui est, naturellement, une perte de temps: vous Américains ni ne pourriez comprendre ni vouloir à ne comprendre; ni je veux particulièrement être compris par vous. Quand un tel miracle se produit -- rarement -- vous gagnez quelque chose, mais je -- je gagne rien en échange. Les commentaires idiots que j'ai reçus du meilleur de vous sur mon ancien blog sont la preuve vivante du fait.
Donc, j'ai besoin d'une autre langue : presque n'importe quelle autre langue semblerait préférable. Mais ceci va être dur à mon âge ; et va prendre du temps.
Et qui la langue devrait il être ?
Français ?
Je ne peux pas le trouver à mon coeur pour cesser de vous aimer, malgré le fait que, évidemment, quand la poussée viennent pour pousser, je ne peux pas vous compter du tout.
Puisque je vous ai aimé pendant tant d'années, nous pouvons continuer à correspondre, donc ; et vous pouvez toujours compter sur moi -- bien que je ne compte pas sur vous.
(Sûrement, votre échec n'est pas aucune raison de moi d'échouer).
De plus, vous pouvez également étendre que je devrais jamais encore essayer de demander une faveur de vous.
Je devrais ajouter que notre expérience récente a été typique de toutes mes expériences avec vos compatriotes. Comment je souhaite mes parents avaient eu le bon sens de sélectionner un autre pays pour m'exiler -- tout autre pays, vraiment. Puis, après 25 ans, je pourrais avoir des amis là ; qui sait, peut-être apprenner moi même (apage satana!) à appeler l'endroit une maison de moi même?
Pendant qu'il est, je dois traiter le legs le plus lourd et le plus difficile de la choix de mes parents: la langue. Je ne suis à peine fanatique d'elle dans le sens littéraire -- indépendamment de Shakespeare, je n'aime pas vraiment lire de sa littérature ; mais, néanmoins, en dépit de ceci, j'ai fait de lui mon outil principal de la pensée et de l'expression.
Maintenant, comme outil de pensée, ce n'est pas un mauvais milieu; mais comme outil d'expression il porte un inconvénient principal: en l'employant, je suis par force s'adressant aux gens comme vous; ce qui est, naturellement, une perte de temps: vous Américains ni ne pourriez comprendre ni vouloir à ne comprendre; ni je veux particulièrement être compris par vous. Quand un tel miracle se produit -- rarement -- vous gagnez quelque chose, mais je -- je gagne rien en échange. Les commentaires idiots que j'ai reçus du meilleur de vous sur mon ancien blog sont la preuve vivante du fait.
Donc, j'ai besoin d'une autre langue : presque n'importe quelle autre langue semblerait préférable. Mais ceci va être dur à mon âge ; et va prendre du temps.
Et qui la langue devrait il être ?
Français ?
Aug 19, 2009
On switching languages
Dear B
I cannot find it in my heart to stop loving you, despite the fact that, obviously, when push come to shove, I cannot count you at all. Because i have loved you for so many years, we can continue to correspond, therefore; and you may always count on me -- though I shall not count on you (surely, your failure is no reason for me to fail); further, you can also relax in the secure knowledge that I should never again try to ask a favor of you.
I should add that our recent experience has been typical of all my experiences with your countrymen. How I wish my parents had had the good sense to pick another country to exile me to -- any other country, really. Then, after 25 years, I might have friends there; who knows, perhaps I'd even learn (apage satanas) to call the place a home?
As it is, I have to deal with the heaviest and most difficult legacy of my parents' choice: the language. I am scarcely fond of it in the literary sense -- apart from Shakespeare I do not really like reading any of its literature; yet, despite this, I have made of it my principal tool of thought and expression.
Now, as a tool of thought, it is not a bad medium; but as a tool of expression it carries one major drawback: by using it, I am per force addressing myself to people like you; which is, of course, a waste of time: you Americans neither could understand nor want to; nor do I especially want to be understood by you. When such a miracle happens -- rarely -- you fellows gain something, but I -- I gain nothing in return. The idiotic comments I have received from the best of you on my former blog are the living proof of the fact.
I need another language: almost any other language would seem preferable. But this is going to be hard at my age; and it is going to take time.
And which language should it be?
French?
I cannot find it in my heart to stop loving you, despite the fact that, obviously, when push come to shove, I cannot count you at all. Because i have loved you for so many years, we can continue to correspond, therefore; and you may always count on me -- though I shall not count on you (surely, your failure is no reason for me to fail); further, you can also relax in the secure knowledge that I should never again try to ask a favor of you.
I should add that our recent experience has been typical of all my experiences with your countrymen. How I wish my parents had had the good sense to pick another country to exile me to -- any other country, really. Then, after 25 years, I might have friends there; who knows, perhaps I'd even learn (apage satanas) to call the place a home?
As it is, I have to deal with the heaviest and most difficult legacy of my parents' choice: the language. I am scarcely fond of it in the literary sense -- apart from Shakespeare I do not really like reading any of its literature; yet, despite this, I have made of it my principal tool of thought and expression.
Now, as a tool of thought, it is not a bad medium; but as a tool of expression it carries one major drawback: by using it, I am per force addressing myself to people like you; which is, of course, a waste of time: you Americans neither could understand nor want to; nor do I especially want to be understood by you. When such a miracle happens -- rarely -- you fellows gain something, but I -- I gain nothing in return. The idiotic comments I have received from the best of you on my former blog are the living proof of the fact.
I need another language: almost any other language would seem preferable. But this is going to be hard at my age; and it is going to take time.
And which language should it be?
French?
Aug 18, 2009
Giorgiana
I suppose this is supposed to be based on this.
But anyone who has read the book would be astonished to hear so.
Giorgiana, you see, was a socialite, a celebrity, a queen of fashion, a salon mistress, and an important political figure (even if she could not vote or become an MP herself). But the film presents her as nothing other than -- a wronged wife. I suppose this is what we have to expect from Hollywood - more of the same-old-same-old -- a narrow focus on sexual relations -- as if they were the only relations we ever had, and this in turn reflects the audience, I suppose (Hollywood being very good at serving the demand) -- the audience does not care whether Giorgiana was a queen of fashion and a huge influence on party politics in London, it cares only for one thing: did she have good sex and was there sufficient after-play?
Now, look around you: the people in the street -- the woman who has just past you (Hollywood clients are 70% female) -- care for only one thing: getting laid well.
Gaad.
But anyone who has read the book would be astonished to hear so.
Giorgiana, you see, was a socialite, a celebrity, a queen of fashion, a salon mistress, and an important political figure (even if she could not vote or become an MP herself). But the film presents her as nothing other than -- a wronged wife. I suppose this is what we have to expect from Hollywood - more of the same-old-same-old -- a narrow focus on sexual relations -- as if they were the only relations we ever had, and this in turn reflects the audience, I suppose (Hollywood being very good at serving the demand) -- the audience does not care whether Giorgiana was a queen of fashion and a huge influence on party politics in London, it cares only for one thing: did she have good sex and was there sufficient after-play?
Now, look around you: the people in the street -- the woman who has just past you (Hollywood clients are 70% female) -- care for only one thing: getting laid well.
Gaad.
Aug 16, 2009
Not sleeping with Akilah
Do you want to sleep with me? she asked.
It's the usual woman-question, of course, even if it is usually framed differently, such as "what do you want from me?" or "who am I to you?", or some other the like. Its point is not to put us men on defense by brutally exposing our embarrassing, duplicitously veiled, filthy carnal intents -- even if it is bound to feel that way to us folks -- because, in fact, women don't really mind sleeping with us, and sometimes actually want to anyway, regardless of our answer.
The question is really about everything else: how much do I invest fin this, what more can I expect from you beyond x, etc.
Etc.
Old hat.
*
Now, some men would probably lie here. But I don't: years of practice have given me the opportunity to develop an established formula for answering the question and it almost always works: no love and no marriage, darling, but friendship forever, yes, willingly, till death to us part, etc.
(Besides, I do not lie in these matters... for the simple reason that to lie would be a sign of weakness; a condescension of power to the person lied-to; invariably, people lie out of fear, and, I suppose, I am either not especially fearful or too proud to admit/recognize my own fear).
In any case, what I say is no lie because I always mean it. (Like Genji, I mean to, and do, take care of my women).
Most women accept this line, though many, perhaps most, only on the face of it, hoping, perhaps not consciously, in time to turn no love into love after all.
Duplicitously, that is.
Etc.
Etc.
No matter.
*
No matter because -- because the way the question was asked set me on another train of thought altogether, and it is my topic here.
For indeed --
-- indeed
-- indeed
-- indeed
-- do I want to sleep with her?
...
Hmmm...
I suppose the answer could be yes -- she's good looking; and, being temperamental and adventurous, probably would not be a disappointment in bed.
Besides, why would a man say "no" to a woman he genuinely likes and whose company he enjoys this much? Friendship and sex slip into each other for men without mutating; I suppose that was the nature of the Greek gymnasium homosexuality. (We're friends, well, yes, we do, er..., but no, we are not gay, etc.)
(Not that I would know the first thing about it; I have never played team sports; aged 9 and 10 I played with girls, earning from the boys the jeering title of "women's king" -- I wonder if those boys have had since then the chance to -- er -- realize that we pick up no girls in the rugby field).
All true, old man, but -- a man of Zobenigo's age is not the sexual omnivore he once was.
(If ever he was? Even aged twenty-two Zobenigo turned down so called opportunities on various grounds -- honor, self-respect, etc., thinking beforehand, with hesitation, is not a new development to him at all; and perhaps is an evolved mechanism, as it has its genetic uses: do not risk an encounter whose potential genetic benefits are low -- i.e. do not sleep with women who are not at least close to being your equal and therefore a good genetic bet).
So, old man, indeed, do I want to sleep with her?
*
Until she asked the question, it did not really exist in my mind: I merely enjoyed being in her company. If I gave the possibility any thought, it was always brief: a remote possibility, too remote to entertain. It might happen, yes, I thought, but there was no plan to make it happen.
If it does, I thought, it will; but if it does not, well, no amount of planning will make the least bit of a difference.
*
Yet, I answered her -- somewhat sheepishly perhaps -- "yes, I would like to".
Without much conviction, I am afraid -- and mainly because it seemed too rude to say something like "I am not sure"...
You see...
I was too afraid to offend.
"There is no greater sin, says Zorba the Greek, than when a woman calls a man to bed and he does not come".
And in Wharton's Reef, the well-bred, virtuous heroine resents that her suitor does not try to take advantage of her. "Who am I to him?", she asks herself, thinking that somehow she must be to him less than the women he has actually pressed himself upon; and her pride is wounded as a result of his demurrement to make an assault on her honor; and all the while, of course, he thinks the precise opposite -- that she is more to him than all the women he has ever slept with and that -- precisely -- is why he does not press himself upon her.
Weird... Do we -- men and women -- really have this thing on backwards and upside down? Is it the women who want to get laid and us, chickens, who look for relationships?
*
Now, Akilah is certainly my equal; her genes are as good as mine (if not better). The benefits and risks of a coitus are therefore, genetically speaking, in favor of my DNA. The risks are small -- she's probably healthy, her husband is probably not dangerous, she has money of her own; and the potential payoff is phenomenal: there are her beautiful, sensitive, intelligent boys to prove what her womb can do.
That is not the issue, then.
The issue is -- well -- for one...
age?
Fifteen years ago I would have enthusiastically gone to bed with her. But today I am riven by doubts.
Such as: would she be good in bed?
I mean, would it be hedonistically worth it? or would I discover seven -- or thirteen -- or thirty -- minutes into the act that I would rather not, after all? For, although I firmly hold (as a sort of feminist) that a woman's performance in bed is a function of the man's skill at leading her where he wants her, half the women in the world aren't... trainable, it seems.
This gives a whole new meaning to the old Polish saying -- dating back to our horseback days -- "if you fall off a horse, make sure it's a white one".
(A moment of reflection here on the duties placed upon us by our glorious past
and our more than glorious ancestors: noblesse oblige).
and our more than glorious ancestors: noblesse oblige).
*
Further, and more importantly:
Am I exposing myself to the usual unpleasantness which inevitably follows any (relatively short, in my opinion) sequence of sexual encounters -- that I do not live up to, or have commitment issues, or do lot long sufficiently ardently, or do not call often enough, or do not write, etc., nor otherwise wither while she is absent, thinking about her all the time, and such.
And: we are such good friends; and we talk so well -- six hours at the last meeting -- six hours, now -- what is up with that? -- would I really want to ruin that? It seems so much easier to continue being friends, no?
It is so dangerous to play with that fiery stuff -- a danger younger men have not had the chance to learn. The danger that -- it is never free.
So, why not have a bottle of Borba D.O.C. 2008 instead? The pleasure is perhaps not as great as good sex, true, but the downside is minimal: a little headache in the wee hours.
The risk-return odds are just better stacked.
Aug 1, 2009
On giving it up for free
My dear
You say that what you have given me during the last visit -- the sex, that is -- was your free, unencumbered gift, given without calculation, merely because you felt like it.
That is a very beautiful and moving interpretation placed on what happened, and, of course, in line with the official womens-lib interpretation of sex, which is: a woman, being exactly and in all ways like any man, may feel lustful and indifferent about the object of her lust. As long as men are free to indulge their lust, therefore, so should the woman be free to do the same. You pass the femdom test with your colors flying.
Or do you?
I am of course flattered to hear that you should have been driven by nothing other than lust to take me. Repeatedly, too -- and at my age, this is quite a recommendation. (I'd like to put that in my CV).
But is it quite true?
I am very suspicious of all claims of un-mercenary-ness: my mother used to say that she loved me wholly, completely, and without any concern for a pay back; she said it repeatedly, over the years; and in the end -- it proved a dirty lie. And so in this case, too, I think the suspicion is well founded: when the sex was all finished and done with, you became angry with me because I would not huddle and kiss afterwards; or fall asleep in your arms; or promise everlasting love or propose cohabitation; or otherwise resort to any of the million other tricks of subterfuge resorted to by cheap Don Juans over the centuries.
Which means only one thing, my dear, that the afterplay is what you wanted in return for the play itself. Which means that there was a price after all.
And what may thar price be if it is not -- a quid pro quo?
The truth is, my dear, that you, ladies of the west, live in denial of the basic facts of life, which are that everything in it is done for a price, in expectation of reward. This is a blindlingly clear fact to anyone -- really, anyone -- who is, not in the throes of ideological need to uphold feminism -- and condemn prostitution. Love of God is offered in exchange for something, too, you know (i.e. heaven). (This has often made me wonder why God shoud want to be loved).
Prostitution, is the official party line, is bad because in it women sell sex; selling sex is bad; therefore we - the enlgihtened modern women -- may only have sex under circumstances in which it is absolutely clear that nothing at all is expected in return.
This seems silly to me. How is it supposed to be good for the gender to offer for free what has been its strongest asset over the millenia? To deprive it, that is, of its single greatest asset?
Not to mention that the requirement seems to put an extraorinary psychological demand on you ladies: to deliver goods for nothing. I should say, that not suprisingly in my experience, none of you has come out well under this challenge (though, to be fair, some have come out better than others). It is hard to give anything for free.
And, for crying outloud, why should we?
At any rate, the truth of what happened to us -- you and me -- during your last visit seems to me to be this: you gave it, but in the end found yourself short-changed: instead of hugs and kisses -- a lie, a pretense, a false promise of something impossible -- i.e. love -- which was your true aim -- you got good dinners, evening walks, rides on tram 28, views of the sea at sunset, and some forcks and baubles.
Your complaint, therefore, would appear to be not that I have treated you like a prostitute - giving you things and experiences bought with money -- but that I did not pay you as much as you had wanted; not that I paid, in other words, but that I paid not enough.
Quod erat demonstrandum.
You say that what you have given me during the last visit -- the sex, that is -- was your free, unencumbered gift, given without calculation, merely because you felt like it.
That is a very beautiful and moving interpretation placed on what happened, and, of course, in line with the official womens-lib interpretation of sex, which is: a woman, being exactly and in all ways like any man, may feel lustful and indifferent about the object of her lust. As long as men are free to indulge their lust, therefore, so should the woman be free to do the same. You pass the femdom test with your colors flying.
Or do you?
I am of course flattered to hear that you should have been driven by nothing other than lust to take me. Repeatedly, too -- and at my age, this is quite a recommendation. (I'd like to put that in my CV).
But is it quite true?
I am very suspicious of all claims of un-mercenary-ness: my mother used to say that she loved me wholly, completely, and without any concern for a pay back; she said it repeatedly, over the years; and in the end -- it proved a dirty lie. And so in this case, too, I think the suspicion is well founded: when the sex was all finished and done with, you became angry with me because I would not huddle and kiss afterwards; or fall asleep in your arms; or promise everlasting love or propose cohabitation; or otherwise resort to any of the million other tricks of subterfuge resorted to by cheap Don Juans over the centuries.
Which means only one thing, my dear, that the afterplay is what you wanted in return for the play itself. Which means that there was a price after all.
And what may thar price be if it is not -- a quid pro quo?
The truth is, my dear, that you, ladies of the west, live in denial of the basic facts of life, which are that everything in it is done for a price, in expectation of reward. This is a blindlingly clear fact to anyone -- really, anyone -- who is, not in the throes of ideological need to uphold feminism -- and condemn prostitution. Love of God is offered in exchange for something, too, you know (i.e. heaven). (This has often made me wonder why God shoud want to be loved).
Prostitution, is the official party line, is bad because in it women sell sex; selling sex is bad; therefore we - the enlgihtened modern women -- may only have sex under circumstances in which it is absolutely clear that nothing at all is expected in return.
This seems silly to me. How is it supposed to be good for the gender to offer for free what has been its strongest asset over the millenia? To deprive it, that is, of its single greatest asset?
Not to mention that the requirement seems to put an extraorinary psychological demand on you ladies: to deliver goods for nothing. I should say, that not suprisingly in my experience, none of you has come out well under this challenge (though, to be fair, some have come out better than others). It is hard to give anything for free.
And, for crying outloud, why should we?
At any rate, the truth of what happened to us -- you and me -- during your last visit seems to me to be this: you gave it, but in the end found yourself short-changed: instead of hugs and kisses -- a lie, a pretense, a false promise of something impossible -- i.e. love -- which was your true aim -- you got good dinners, evening walks, rides on tram 28, views of the sea at sunset, and some forcks and baubles.
Your complaint, therefore, would appear to be not that I have treated you like a prostitute - giving you things and experiences bought with money -- but that I did not pay you as much as you had wanted; not that I paid, in other words, but that I paid not enough.
Quod erat demonstrandum.
Jul 29, 2009
Bye 2
A rising market lifts all boats and -- since importance of social networks is inverse-proportional to one's bank account -- deflates relationships. As in any bear market, the bear market in social networks means that the beta-trades -- the more iffy, more junky, more dangerous, more speculative stuff -- falls more precipitously than the alpha stuff; and some can now be gotten rid of at no expense at all.
I have been getting rid of -- left and right.
Here is a fragment of a letter to an acquaintance of twenty years -- twenty years! -- American, of course, how else -- who has refused to hold my mail presumably because doing so would expose her to all sorts of legal liabilities (how does it feel to live in a police state?):
Strong words?
Not as strong as the offense. The woman is half-Asian, was raised in Korea, a Confucian nation par excellence, and speaks Chinese fluently. It is impossible for her not to understand what 朋友 means. Which means that she knows what it means but excludes me from the category. Severing all ties is the least punishment she deserves for having misled me to think otherwise.
Facebook is an interesting case. Facebook -- as i understand it -- is where one signs up in pursuit of people who agree to be one's "friends"; there is a kind of competition for having the largest number of friends. ("I don't quite remember who he is, but he is my friend.")
Bill Gates has recently tried it and given up: "Ten thousand people wanted to be my friend," he confessed, "and I found myself asking myself: do I know this person? do I know this person?"
Note the repeat of the question. Do you know why he repeated it? He repeated it because he was actually going to say: "do I know this person? do I want to know this person?" but as he began to mouth the second sentence he realized that it would be perceived in America -- the land of friends -- as not nice: an American wants to be nice and friendly (i.e. friends) to all; to refuse to be friends with anyone is deemed a hostile act; Bill Gates has enough image problems as it is; he is too smart to offend the official party line, even if he does not practice it himself.
But clearly, Bill Gates did not want to be friends with the ten thousanf Facebookers who accosted him; and -- why? -- could it be possible? -- being smart as he is -- could it be that he did not want to be friends with them because he realized that there was no benefit to having "friends"?
Which makes an interesting point about the millions upon millions who sign up for Facebook in prusuit of that very asset -- "friends"; they are fools chasing after fools' gold. It has always been thus: the rich getting richer and the poor staying poor. For a reason, I might add: clearly, the poor are not especially smart.
A friend -- not a Friend -- and a friend no more (see Bye 1) did ask when I will finally get on Facebook. I said never.
I have been getting rid of -- left and right.
Here is a fragment of a letter to an acquaintance of twenty years -- twenty years! -- American, of course, how else -- who has refused to hold my mail presumably because doing so would expose her to all sorts of legal liabilities (how does it feel to live in a police state?):
As I see it, we are either Friends (朋友) or we are nothing. As my Friend, you would know that when I ask you a favor and say that this is very important to me and that you must help me, then I really do mean it - and there is no need to find out why; and also you would know that as your Friend I would not ask you to do anything that could possibly expose you to any sort of liability as a result of doing so. Further, as my Friend, you would do as asked immediately, no questions asked. But none of the three applies here, which means to me that we are not Friends but -- friends, which is an American category, and a very cheap one at that: tens of thousands of friends can be had by merely signing up on Facebook. I have never wanted to have friends, because friends are a useless waste of time; and if anything has changed in my life in the last twenty years it is that I want to have friends even less now; and since you are clearly only my friend, not my Friend, then, I am afraid, this is the end of the road for us, and a much belated one at that.
I shall not be calling you on August 7th, or any other August. Have a nice day.
Strong words?
Not as strong as the offense. The woman is half-Asian, was raised in Korea, a Confucian nation par excellence, and speaks Chinese fluently. It is impossible for her not to understand what 朋友 means. Which means that she knows what it means but excludes me from the category. Severing all ties is the least punishment she deserves for having misled me to think otherwise.
*
Facebook is an interesting case. Facebook -- as i understand it -- is where one signs up in pursuit of people who agree to be one's "friends"; there is a kind of competition for having the largest number of friends. ("I don't quite remember who he is, but he is my friend.")
Bill Gates has recently tried it and given up: "Ten thousand people wanted to be my friend," he confessed, "and I found myself asking myself: do I know this person? do I know this person?"
Note the repeat of the question. Do you know why he repeated it? He repeated it because he was actually going to say: "do I know this person? do I want to know this person?" but as he began to mouth the second sentence he realized that it would be perceived in America -- the land of friends -- as not nice: an American wants to be nice and friendly (i.e. friends) to all; to refuse to be friends with anyone is deemed a hostile act; Bill Gates has enough image problems as it is; he is too smart to offend the official party line, even if he does not practice it himself.
But clearly, Bill Gates did not want to be friends with the ten thousanf Facebookers who accosted him; and -- why? -- could it be possible? -- being smart as he is -- could it be that he did not want to be friends with them because he realized that there was no benefit to having "friends"?
Which makes an interesting point about the millions upon millions who sign up for Facebook in prusuit of that very asset -- "friends"; they are fools chasing after fools' gold. It has always been thus: the rich getting richer and the poor staying poor. For a reason, I might add: clearly, the poor are not especially smart.
A friend -- not a Friend -- and a friend no more (see Bye 1) did ask when I will finally get on Facebook. I said never.
Jul 28, 2009
Regarding a business opportunity
Dear Grammaticus:
Sorry, I guess it is me who is late replying now; surely you wont hold that against me.
I understand perfectly well that you do not have the time to engage in substantial correspondence.
As my friend, i am sure you will understand me in return: search myself far and wide, can't seem to want to find the time to engage in less than substantial correspondence. I don't know about you, but i get a sufficient supply of hihowareyouiamfines in what is sometimes referred to as rl -- real life -- neighbors, bakers, contraband booze mongers, etc. -- and don't especially care for them here, either. Why go out to internet to get more?
Socially, internet and blogging have been a bust up for me: perhaps there is something to the medium -- perhaps it attracts a certain kind of mind only -- back when i ran my blog, the net result was that my comment box and my mail box were full of hihowareyouaimfines -- half of them from single females wishing to be otherwise -- and mad when i refused to oblige -- which, in the end, i have decided was too much of a waste of time to attend to.
But perhaps this is not the fault of the internet; perhaps such are the only minds that exist?
It so happens that i have lately been refused an ordinary favor by a long standing friend: I have asked her to hold my mail for me, her response to which was to go online and look up USPS regulations and discover that it opened her to all sorts of legal liabilities under the patriot act. I therefore google-searched and discovered a commercial service which will do it for 10.99 a month, or 100 a year.
The point is this: is it not wonderful abut the US how everything one might expect from a friend can be obtained at a reasonable price from a commercial provider? I wonder if thoughtful and intelligent correspondence may be procured that way. Do you reckon there is a business opportunity in that? Shall we say, 59.99 per letter?
Well, I have read The Maias, thank you for sending the book; and I have had tremendous fun with it, but do you have the time to discuss it, or should we just do the wave?
Cheers, old fellow.
Sorry, I guess it is me who is late replying now; surely you wont hold that against me.
I understand perfectly well that you do not have the time to engage in substantial correspondence.
As my friend, i am sure you will understand me in return: search myself far and wide, can't seem to want to find the time to engage in less than substantial correspondence. I don't know about you, but i get a sufficient supply of hihowareyouiamfines in what is sometimes referred to as rl -- real life -- neighbors, bakers, contraband booze mongers, etc. -- and don't especially care for them here, either. Why go out to internet to get more?
Socially, internet and blogging have been a bust up for me: perhaps there is something to the medium -- perhaps it attracts a certain kind of mind only -- back when i ran my blog, the net result was that my comment box and my mail box were full of hihowareyouaimfines -- half of them from single females wishing to be otherwise -- and mad when i refused to oblige -- which, in the end, i have decided was too much of a waste of time to attend to.
But perhaps this is not the fault of the internet; perhaps such are the only minds that exist?
It so happens that i have lately been refused an ordinary favor by a long standing friend: I have asked her to hold my mail for me, her response to which was to go online and look up USPS regulations and discover that it opened her to all sorts of legal liabilities under the patriot act. I therefore google-searched and discovered a commercial service which will do it for 10.99 a month, or 100 a year.
The point is this: is it not wonderful abut the US how everything one might expect from a friend can be obtained at a reasonable price from a commercial provider? I wonder if thoughtful and intelligent correspondence may be procured that way. Do you reckon there is a business opportunity in that? Shall we say, 59.99 per letter?
Well, I have read The Maias, thank you for sending the book; and I have had tremendous fun with it, but do you have the time to discuss it, or should we just do the wave?
Cheers, old fellow.
Jul 26, 2009
Bye
PRK writes to apologize for having dropped the ball, as he says, that is -- not corresponding; too busy, he says. Certainly he is too busy to keep up with the level of correspondence I have dictated -- I have given him too much to chew.
But if he is too busy for that type of correspondence, then, surely, I am too busy for his. I am not interested in jokes and weather and family doings; my life is too short for it.
For me, it's intellectual partnership or it is nothing. And since generally speaking, of course, it is never any sort of intellectual partnership, it is -- generally -- nothing.
But if he is too busy for that type of correspondence, then, surely, I am too busy for his. I am not interested in jokes and weather and family doings; my life is too short for it.
For me, it's intellectual partnership or it is nothing. And since generally speaking, of course, it is never any sort of intellectual partnership, it is -- generally -- nothing.
Jul 23, 2009
To Anthante -- concerning mental hygiene
Dear Anthanante:
I am very sorry, of course, to hear that your visit with me was so very unpleasant to you.
But I must confess to having the impression that your current memories of that visit, and the facts of the visit do not quite coincide. You see, you seemed fine to me at parting, which was on good terms. I even asked you whether you thought that I had taken good care of you and you said yes. Now your write to tell me that your visit was an unending chain of relentless awfulness and you could not wait to leave. This would strike most people as possibly paradoxical.
The only explanation for this sudden change of perception is that something has happened between the time you left and now, and that that something has colored your memories. It is perhaps unkind to speculate on what that something was, but I suspect that returning to the indifferent misery which is your every day life -- consider the nasty architecture and the awful climate as just two depressing elements which obviously are much worse there than they are here -- I suspect, I repeat, that returning there from her would have been perfectly sufficient to throw anyone into a fit of depression.
For this I may seem to you to bear some responsibility: the real problem with your visit, I suppose, was that I did not invite you to prolong it and thereby, indirectly, obliged you to return home. I can see how my decision could be perceived as an act of cruelty; how it would be hated, and resented; and how it would seem to call for revenge. Which is perhaps what your words really are.
I am saddened to see this mental process take place in you, but am not really surprised by it. I have seen it work often. It offers an important benefit: it certainly helps you adjust yourself to your former life if you are able to say to yourself that the place where you had just holidayed (and were not invited to stay longer) was really too awful to live and that, bottom line, it is far better to be home, whatever its obvious shortcomings.
The problem with this technique is, of course, the resentment that you manage to produce in yourself for your supposedly terrible experiences and my mistreatment of you while here. To be perfectly honest, I suppose that most people would consider what I have given you a pretty generous gift, and would therefore consider your resentment a gross injustice. But I neither wish to dwell on my virtues, nor make an argument which I know is not going to work.
What I wish to do is help you with your current emotional turmoil because I empathize with your suffering. So perhaps you will not mind if I share with you some mental hygiene techniques which I have developed over the years, in the hope that you find them useful in your current predicament.
First, I find that it is essential to keep a good journal. By which I do not mean to say the sort of place where one writes "sunny, dry, lunch with johnsons, walked the dog in the afternoon", but a place where one notes important observations about life's events and one's resolutions about them. This is important because memory is a pliable medium and we can convince ourselves to remember anything (psychology is familiar with such amazing things as planted false memories, etc.); and not merely often, but usually do; as you do now.
But since memory is also the data-base which we use to evaluate our present-day and future choices, false memories lead us to false choices. They are therefore an important cause of suffering. Thus, it is important to note to ourselves our mental states as they happen so that we have a record of them for the future. And, secondly, and as importantly, it is important for us to reread that journal on regular basis to force ourselves to reevaluate the current state of our memories and compare them to the written record.
Writing down one's resolutions is also important: things resolved but not written down are not really resolved; they lack a sense of finality. Writing them down, seems to do the trick. (Carving them in stone would be even better, but not practical). Also, things unwritten are readily and frequently forgotten. So I actually write to myself notes like: never again... and hence forth, always... and because I frequently reread my journal, I tend to remember my resolutions.
Second, it is important to exercise thought control: one must constantly and consciously choose to dwell on the good memories of people and places over bad ones; and, if there should be people and places about which no good memories are possible, then one should suppress all reflection on them altogether. Note that I am not recommending forgetting about the bad aspects of things: that would amount to memory manipulation which I was just advising that we do our utmost to prevent. Indeed, it is important to be very clear-minded about all the things that were bad in our life so that we can avoid them in the future.
No, what I mean is: we must not dwell on bad things; we must learn a way to compartmentalize unpleasant thoughts -- set them aside, put them in a drawer and close the drawer, so to speak -- in order to prevent riling ourselves with feelings of regret, anger, vengefulness, etc.
Many people find this impossible on ideological grounds, reasoning, with the romantics, that our feelings is what is authentically us, and that, therefore we must honor them, by which they mean that we must slavishly submit to their dictates. I disagree. To my mind, our emotions are only a part of us; and ought to play no more than subservient function, just as our thumbs do: we must learn to manipulate them for our purposes so that we can achieve our ends.
(The ideal is well expressed in a Sienkiewicz short story in which Zeus signals Thanatos, the brother of death, to come and let him sleep. What we should strive at is a mastery of our emotions which would allow us to signal contentment, for example, so that we may be content. I am not there, yet, but that is the central idea of my pursuit).
Which all amounts to a recommendation that you try to perform a very difficult trick: dwell on the good aspects of your visit with me without simultaneously regretting that that visit is over and that you have had to return home. The trick amounts to learning not to grieve that something has ended; but to be glad that it happened at all. It requires great intelligence to see it; and a great strength of will to execute it. You are a smart girl and you can be pretty determined: there is no reason why you should not succeed.
It would be too bloody American to say "I wish you all success in this endeavor", and ergo, I do not. But I do wish it all the same.
I am very sorry, of course, to hear that your visit with me was so very unpleasant to you.
But I must confess to having the impression that your current memories of that visit, and the facts of the visit do not quite coincide. You see, you seemed fine to me at parting, which was on good terms. I even asked you whether you thought that I had taken good care of you and you said yes. Now your write to tell me that your visit was an unending chain of relentless awfulness and you could not wait to leave. This would strike most people as possibly paradoxical.
The only explanation for this sudden change of perception is that something has happened between the time you left and now, and that that something has colored your memories. It is perhaps unkind to speculate on what that something was, but I suspect that returning to the indifferent misery which is your every day life -- consider the nasty architecture and the awful climate as just two depressing elements which obviously are much worse there than they are here -- I suspect, I repeat, that returning there from her would have been perfectly sufficient to throw anyone into a fit of depression.
For this I may seem to you to bear some responsibility: the real problem with your visit, I suppose, was that I did not invite you to prolong it and thereby, indirectly, obliged you to return home. I can see how my decision could be perceived as an act of cruelty; how it would be hated, and resented; and how it would seem to call for revenge. Which is perhaps what your words really are.
I am saddened to see this mental process take place in you, but am not really surprised by it. I have seen it work often. It offers an important benefit: it certainly helps you adjust yourself to your former life if you are able to say to yourself that the place where you had just holidayed (and were not invited to stay longer) was really too awful to live and that, bottom line, it is far better to be home, whatever its obvious shortcomings.
The problem with this technique is, of course, the resentment that you manage to produce in yourself for your supposedly terrible experiences and my mistreatment of you while here. To be perfectly honest, I suppose that most people would consider what I have given you a pretty generous gift, and would therefore consider your resentment a gross injustice. But I neither wish to dwell on my virtues, nor make an argument which I know is not going to work.
What I wish to do is help you with your current emotional turmoil because I empathize with your suffering. So perhaps you will not mind if I share with you some mental hygiene techniques which I have developed over the years, in the hope that you find them useful in your current predicament.
First, I find that it is essential to keep a good journal. By which I do not mean to say the sort of place where one writes "sunny, dry, lunch with johnsons, walked the dog in the afternoon", but a place where one notes important observations about life's events and one's resolutions about them. This is important because memory is a pliable medium and we can convince ourselves to remember anything (psychology is familiar with such amazing things as planted false memories, etc.); and not merely often, but usually do; as you do now.
But since memory is also the data-base which we use to evaluate our present-day and future choices, false memories lead us to false choices. They are therefore an important cause of suffering. Thus, it is important to note to ourselves our mental states as they happen so that we have a record of them for the future. And, secondly, and as importantly, it is important for us to reread that journal on regular basis to force ourselves to reevaluate the current state of our memories and compare them to the written record.
Writing down one's resolutions is also important: things resolved but not written down are not really resolved; they lack a sense of finality. Writing them down, seems to do the trick. (Carving them in stone would be even better, but not practical). Also, things unwritten are readily and frequently forgotten. So I actually write to myself notes like: never again... and hence forth, always... and because I frequently reread my journal, I tend to remember my resolutions.
Second, it is important to exercise thought control: one must constantly and consciously choose to dwell on the good memories of people and places over bad ones; and, if there should be people and places about which no good memories are possible, then one should suppress all reflection on them altogether. Note that I am not recommending forgetting about the bad aspects of things: that would amount to memory manipulation which I was just advising that we do our utmost to prevent. Indeed, it is important to be very clear-minded about all the things that were bad in our life so that we can avoid them in the future.
No, what I mean is: we must not dwell on bad things; we must learn a way to compartmentalize unpleasant thoughts -- set them aside, put them in a drawer and close the drawer, so to speak -- in order to prevent riling ourselves with feelings of regret, anger, vengefulness, etc.
Many people find this impossible on ideological grounds, reasoning, with the romantics, that our feelings is what is authentically us, and that, therefore we must honor them, by which they mean that we must slavishly submit to their dictates. I disagree. To my mind, our emotions are only a part of us; and ought to play no more than subservient function, just as our thumbs do: we must learn to manipulate them for our purposes so that we can achieve our ends.
(The ideal is well expressed in a Sienkiewicz short story in which Zeus signals Thanatos, the brother of death, to come and let him sleep. What we should strive at is a mastery of our emotions which would allow us to signal contentment, for example, so that we may be content. I am not there, yet, but that is the central idea of my pursuit).
Which all amounts to a recommendation that you try to perform a very difficult trick: dwell on the good aspects of your visit with me without simultaneously regretting that that visit is over and that you have had to return home. The trick amounts to learning not to grieve that something has ended; but to be glad that it happened at all. It requires great intelligence to see it; and a great strength of will to execute it. You are a smart girl and you can be pretty determined: there is no reason why you should not succeed.
It would be too bloody American to say "I wish you all success in this endeavor", and ergo, I do not. But I do wish it all the same.
Jul 22, 2009
An item of Jesus lore
Forgive those who trespass against you, it is explained, because by doing so you prove your moral superiority over your foolish enemies: you are greater than they, closer to god, more enlightened, more noble, more selfless, etc.
The truth is that the reason to forgive those who trespass against us, or, at any rate, to forget that they did, is entirely and wholly practical and selfish: this is because the feelings of anger and revenge are more damaging to us than they are to their objects.
In truth, revenge is rarely possible: most people trespass against us only when they feel they can do so with impunity; most trespasses against us are therefore unavengeable. What could possibly be the point of boiling with fury in such a situation?
A taxi driver nearly ran me -- and a lady walking alongside me -- over at a pedestrian crossing today and, into the bargain, showed us the finger. She was riled beyond all belief, boiled over with anger, yelling, and -- gasping for air (a heart condition?).
I wasn't. If I had a gun in my hand, and knew I could use it with impunity, I would have killed the unwed-mother's-son on the spot, of course, out of a sense of duty -- we all have the duty to punish the uncouth whenever we can. But I would not have done it in anger: I don't hate him. In truth, I don't have any feelings for him: he is like air to me.
You see, unlike my lady companion, I was not riled.
I suppose this means that, after all these years of working at it, I have at last reached the point of uppeka -- equanimity -- what was in the seventeenth century Europe called (after Seneca) costanza: an emotional indifference to the idiocies of the world.
Like all lessons in life, I learned this one from engagement with women.
A certain lady early in life caused me a great amount of grief. When we have parted, I was very angry at her for her irrational, cruel, inconsiderate behavior and considered ways in which I could punish her. Then, upon reflection, I realized that it was unnecessary for me to punish her at all: that, because of the way she thinks (or rather doesn't) and behaves, she is miserable herself; and that she will continue to be miserable for as long as she is alive; and that, in short, she will be her own punishment. It was her fate to be with herself, in her own company, every day of her life until the day she dies. I on the other hand was free to walk away from that disaster.
My feelings calmed, I did. I have been much happier since. Some years later, friends reported to me that some pretty awful things happened to her. By then, fully in command of my uppeka, I managed to express a few honest, if not really heartfelt, words of pity for her. I was right. I had seen it coming.
Poor thing, actually.
In a sense, I owe her a great deal, it would seem. But I think I have paid that tuition bill already with the pound of flesh she had extracted while we were together. We are therefore even.
The truth is that the reason to forgive those who trespass against us, or, at any rate, to forget that they did, is entirely and wholly practical and selfish: this is because the feelings of anger and revenge are more damaging to us than they are to their objects.
In truth, revenge is rarely possible: most people trespass against us only when they feel they can do so with impunity; most trespasses against us are therefore unavengeable. What could possibly be the point of boiling with fury in such a situation?
A taxi driver nearly ran me -- and a lady walking alongside me -- over at a pedestrian crossing today and, into the bargain, showed us the finger. She was riled beyond all belief, boiled over with anger, yelling, and -- gasping for air (a heart condition?).
I wasn't. If I had a gun in my hand, and knew I could use it with impunity, I would have killed the unwed-mother's-son on the spot, of course, out of a sense of duty -- we all have the duty to punish the uncouth whenever we can. But I would not have done it in anger: I don't hate him. In truth, I don't have any feelings for him: he is like air to me.
You see, unlike my lady companion, I was not riled.
I suppose this means that, after all these years of working at it, I have at last reached the point of uppeka -- equanimity -- what was in the seventeenth century Europe called (after Seneca) costanza: an emotional indifference to the idiocies of the world.
Like all lessons in life, I learned this one from engagement with women.
A certain lady early in life caused me a great amount of grief. When we have parted, I was very angry at her for her irrational, cruel, inconsiderate behavior and considered ways in which I could punish her. Then, upon reflection, I realized that it was unnecessary for me to punish her at all: that, because of the way she thinks (or rather doesn't) and behaves, she is miserable herself; and that she will continue to be miserable for as long as she is alive; and that, in short, she will be her own punishment. It was her fate to be with herself, in her own company, every day of her life until the day she dies. I on the other hand was free to walk away from that disaster.
My feelings calmed, I did. I have been much happier since. Some years later, friends reported to me that some pretty awful things happened to her. By then, fully in command of my uppeka, I managed to express a few honest, if not really heartfelt, words of pity for her. I was right. I had seen it coming.
Poor thing, actually.
In a sense, I owe her a great deal, it would seem. But I think I have paid that tuition bill already with the pound of flesh she had extracted while we were together. We are therefore even.
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