---Henry Miller
...all that rose to the surface was more surface. What he had instead of a being, I thought, is blandness.
--Roth
Anyone could be anyone else in most ways. Face the facts..
I can't bear all the complications, and long for something that is facades-only.
That would be enough for me, just the natural playing out of the pleasing present...
Some life is only life..just as to some questions there are no answers. Just nothing to say.
---Richard Ford
All life is the way we escape life. I can't remember who said that. It doesn't matter. You can pile up all the quotations you want, read your little "philosophical" books and pretend to sound profound. And it won't make a jot of difference. It was all fake. "It"? A con of the first order. The false pieties of a sad and accountable life. The truth? You can't handle the truth.
Plough on. But don't take it to the end. Circles are good. Get up. Sleep through the day in a dull stupor. Contempt for the bloodless, soul-destroying respectable families with their incessant mind-numbing prattle and cliches, their fenced-in existence. Clench your fists, roll your eyes. But then you relax. You relax! And it's got you. Doesn't suffocate you any more. You are what you choose. Comfort, your god. Even your polite little rebellions, your irony, were so predictable, scripted.
It was interesting. Yes, in a way it was. The surface, I mean. But don't kid yourself. That's all there ever was. Smile, now. Grin and bear it. Even your empty moments weren't really genuine. 'Cos you thought there was a road out, a way to redemption and grace and ease.
12 comments:
Hmm...don't be so hard on...? Someone? Yourself?
It is what it is.
"it is what it is"
love the irony, fl! please do tell me that that's what you were being.
It's not about any one particular person..more about whether anyone can recognize this in themselves. I think most people can-to one degree or the other.
It's to be expected, i guess. that's the deal that was done: passive citizenship and sedation via consumerism in return for security. Picket fences and apple pie (or suburbia, if you're in old Blighty). Same thing:ground zero.
What's wrong with apple pie? As long as it's warm a la mode. Sedition? If only things could be more simple. And what's all this talk of money? No. It's the innocents.
We're all interchangeable? Yes, at a fundamental level. (ie DNA) But, we are not interchangeable in truth. If we were there would be no poetry. You know that b. Why would I write my letters?
I forgot to tell you I saw Elvis at the movie theater. The King lives! I hope that makes you smile.
-fl
oh, I've got nothing agianst it..as long as it is with ice-cream. But apple pie as an ideology or way of life? no!
Sedation,not sedition, fl.
why is DNA a 'fundamental level'?
I think the horror (of the film) is this idea that we are all the same, with the same drab lives.
more later, electricity is about to go.
sorry. It's back now.
you saw Elvis? I don't believe you! I was having lunch with him just yesterday.
i dunno. there'll always be poetry. I don't think that's really it. I think it's really about the levelling down that goes with capitalism, the flatlands of the spirit when we live only in secular time and the necessary impersonalization that goes with the development of any modern society. And this sense that in terms of work, we're just a cog in the machine, with one unit of labour being replaceable by another.
b., didn't you get the generator I sent? Must've had the wrong address. That's strange. Hm
And, one of the following is true: 1-Elvis lives (and dines with you) or 2-You're dead (and that would explain your ESP)...(except if your dead, that's not really extra-sensory...are you cheating?)
I'll have to watch the movie before I make any more comments. Kind of like going to a book club before reading the book. I should just smile and nod in agreement.
But, I'll throw my BS in anyway. We all gotta go to work each day and earn a living, right? So, what's the big deal. Those people who don't want to become cogs, then don't. Buy a farm and raise goats. Or teach or travel. I understand your definition of interchangeableness, as a member of society. Moving as a part of the machine. But, how I was interpreting the word, was on a personal level. I look at my marriage, and I see I could be married to a lot of different people (not at once though, that's a lot of work...) and be content.
Maybe, no matter our situation, we still have the same issues. Maybe, I will never be truly happy, until I decide to let myself be. I dunno. See, now I hope I'm not sounding like a self-help book. The horror!
I guess there are certain "samenesses" that we all have with one another. So, then if we want to be unique, we've got to create it.
not so strange. the carrot cake didn't make it here either. Hmm...and you said you could control karma! :-)
Oh, elvis lives, but what he calls "life" you mortals call death.
"learn to work each day"??
Jesus! That's blasphemy to a Kashmiri! Sounds like more of that protestant work ethic nonsense.
It's not so much about working or not working , though; it's more about how work is connected to one's life.."vocation" (in the old sense of the word). I think Ruskin and Morris were on to this.
Well, yes,each to their own. I'm sceptical of the 'truly' in 'truly happy', I've got to say.
But yes, n, I think your last line is spot on and I think that's what the film is really about: the inability to create it or have the courage to try and create it.
Well, perhaps both my packages were returned to sender? I should talk to someone at the post. Makes no sense. But, oh well. I guess you'll have to enjoy the virtual gifts for now.
So, why of you skeptical of truly? You don't think I can be truly happy? Why not? I think you can be.
There was something else I was going to tell you, but now I forget. I'll have to post something, if I can remember.
Keep warm.
dunno, n, I think the small acts of kindnss, the small happinesses we get are worth clinging on to; this notion that there will be a time when we are "truly" happy, "truly" be ourselves *can* lead to all sorts of problems...as if there will be a moment when there is happiness without egret, sadness and all the other things that go up to make a life.
okay, a virtual goodbye for now!
b.
hmm...and now I'm sceptical that you actually sent those things at all!
I need to rephrase. What I'm getting at is the desire to feel whole. To accept choices. To see what there is to learn each day. And yes, I agree, we should be able to experience whatever genuine emotion we feel at that moment. Happy, sad or indifferent.
Yes, kindness is what counts. And that includes being kind to ourselves. That's the kind of happy I want to feel.
oh...and I absolutely did have those things delivered. Maybe I had the wrong postage?
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