I haven’t been writing anything lately because I’ve finished putting all my messages in bottles. But today I woke thinking: Creating for no clear purpose is exactly what attracted you to this realm – why stop ever? So I’ll try to keep writing new entries, despite being worth-free.
Horrors occur at points in space and time. Let’s say that a
murder happens: I don’t want to be present at that particular intersection of spacetime.
But it’s interesting to consider how I feel about a murder taking place in a
faraway space yet at this very moment, versus a murder being committed in this
very room yet at a time in the past. For some reason, I think the former is
worse. That’s why I’m presently disturbed about world events; for there are massive
atrocities occurring at this instant, elsewhere on earth.
(I’ve said all this before – it’s an obsession of mine; bear
with me while I get the repetition out of my system, and then I’ll start this
entry over.)
People talk of the Two World Wars, plus an up-and-coming Third
World War, but there’s really just a single giant ongoing ULTRAWAR, which will
never stop unless humankind permanently renounces organized violence or else finally
offs itself. Sometimes there are lulls in the continuous destruction, these relatively
peaceful spans lure fools like me to dream that brute force has become passé,
and we therefore begin to indulge in creative writing. Then, during periods
like the present surge in mayhem, it feels ineffective and irresponsible to sit
at one’s desk and simply scribble words on paper… But that ineffectiveness and
irresponsibility is also why I find the act attractive. Moreover, aren’t the
humanities the apex and central point of existence? And isn’t there a hint that
putting these messages in bottles might be the most effective and responsible
thing that one can do? (I can’t stop trying to justify myself.)
§
It’s raining this morning. It rained hard all night. But I
slept soundly through it. So, if I was asleep, then how do I know that it rained hard? I really don’t; I just inferred it – I guess I just lied to you.
Yet I did sincerely feel that I was telling the truth.
§
What have I been doing lately? The same old stuff: reading
and watching movies. That’s all there is to do in the Age of Isolation –
everything else is either immoral or illegal. Everything that one can get paid
to do in the U.S. is immoral, and every act that could remedy the immorality
has been made illegal. I like the concept of good laws. We have bad laws.
I need to get away from caring so deeply about right and
wrong, though; because I have no power to amend anything, and it’s tedious to grouse
and carp like this…
Grouse and carp – both of these terms can mean “to grumble
or complain” but I like better when they refer to living creatures: the primary definition
of grouse is “a large
game bird with a plump body and feathered legs”; and carp is “a deep-bodied freshwater fish,
typically with barbels around the mouth.” Let me remember to
keep matters animalistic.
§
I ate all my chocolate cookies that I recently baked. I also
finished the apple crisp. In the past few months, I’ve been trying to get in
the habit of making desserts, because I like how they taste. I’ve never cooked
much – that’s an understatement: the most work I’ve ever done to prepare food
is pouring breakfast cereal out of a box into a bowl. So I’m expanding my
horizons and transforming myself into a Renaissance Man by learning to create
things like pies and muffins. The most recent dessert I made is called “Bonnie
Butter Cake.” I just follow the directions from an old Betty Crocker Cookbook. You
can decide what type of frosting to spread over the top – I chose French silk
chocolate. To make this, I mixed confectioner’s sugar and cocoa powder, among
other ingredients. My opinion, now that I’ve eaten it all, is that it’s too
fluffy – I like frosting that is heavy, dark, spiky and rocklike. Crisp and
crystally, rather than greasy.
I’m still bad at cracking eggs, but I’m getting better.
So I need to replace all these desserts that I have devoured.
To replenish the cookies, I’ll make a different type of cookie that is officially titled “The
Ultimate Chocolate Chip Cookie”: it has dark and light brown sugar (I’ve
learned that I prefer these to white granulated sugar) and claims to be “a
cross between a chocolate chip cookie and a chocolate croissant.” Then, in
place of the butter cake, I’ll make carrot cake that uses pineapple in its cake
and cream cheese in its frosting. Also I’ll make cranberry-cheese bread to
replace the banana bread.
Nacre is another word for mother-of-pearl. I use a nacre
spoon to spread caviar on blinis.
§
But like I said, the only other way I’ve been spending my time is
watching books and reading movies. There’s nothing else to do, where I live – there’s
no square dances, no church services, no tractor pulls… (Truck and tractor
pulling is a form of a motorsport competition in which antique or modified
tractors pull a heavy sled along an 11-meter-wide track, with the winner being whoever
pulls the farthest.) ...So I’ve been reading Leo Tolstoy’s War and Peace,
which strikes me as the very best book ever written. Also I think I
mentioned starting this in my last post, but I now finished screening the filmography of Jean Renoir, which I found extremely rewarding.
And last night I re-watched Luis Buñuel’s 1969 film The Milky
Way, which is one of my favorite movies. I wish I could force my parents
and your parents to watch it, and also the neighbors down the street from us
who are Catholic. I would like to get their reaction, listen to their opinion.
I wish people would view and discuss motion pictures more
often. Or any artworks. Gather to talk about anything: any thoughts or
observations. There should be a zone at the center of town where folks can philosophize.
The intellectual exchange could become so heated that some people who cannot
stand mental interchange would resort to physical violence.
§
When I was in high school, I recorded a rap track where I ridiculed all my classmates – the content of my lyrics was like a so-called comedy roast: I made fun of each individual by saying generic insults about their person (“X stinks, he should take a bath”; “Y’s feet are too big”; etc. – I thought that this was what rappers were supposed to do: brag about oneself and “diss” everybody else); and the audio cassette that contained my rap got passed around so that everyone in school could hear it… Then, later that week, a group of these fellow students who had been targets of my recorded ridicule followed me out of school, as I walked home one day; and, right when I was almost to my house, they circled around me and gave me a beatdown. This was presumably my punishment for mocking them on my rap record. But I noticed that, although they were technically all kicking and punching me, their fists and boots were not making very firm contact – in fact, secretly, they were all only pretending to give me a beating; perhaps they all were uncomfortable with committing actual violence, yet none of them was willing to admit this reservation to the others, so they nevertheless continued acting out their disapproval in this symbolic way. So each of my enemies thought that his fellows were truly harming me, and that he himself was the only one feigning his part in the mob attack – pantomiming participation – whereas, in reality, every single member of the entirety was holding back individually, thus rendering the event a fake beatdown; and I, the intended target, received no physical pain – no blood or broken bones, not even a bruise – because my aggressors’ hearts were made of gold. But, after all, the psychological effect of being ganged up on like this was so distressing that I cried genuine tears, as if I’d been bodily injured.
No comments:
Post a Comment