Wednesday, December 28, 2005

 

Incommunicado

- Have you ever thought of wearing a mask or a Burka like those women in Afghanistan and Iraq? Go about incommunicado like?
You know you could hide your creativity under the robe, protect yourself from the personal jibes and misunderstandings that you say people are making about you.

- Are you trying to be funny!

- No, no. You could go onto the streets and yet still at the same time hide away and retain your dignity, that’s all.

- Oh yeah, a cross-racial, cross-dressing introvert with extreme religious beliefs, I’d be shot on the spot!

- True, you would stand out a bit, what about wearing just the hood?

- What, a hoody, Then they’d probably restrain me with a truncheon at my throat first and then they'd shoot me. Anyway I don’t want to become an even bigger object of curiosity; I get enough ridicule as it is.

- Well, er… how can you go into the street expressing your personal ideas without getting shot or manhandled by special police...mmn... you don’t half make life difficult for yourself don't you.

- I think expressing yourself in any way is getting more difficult now.

- Can’t you go out in just your normal bog standard Christio/Capitalist outfit, just once in a while?

- I can’t, I’ve tried, I get too jittery. When I’m confronted by the people I find then I have to rush down into the underground and dive onto an empty train, one that runs to a disused platform, where there are no guards on duty. Then I just sit there and wait for an hour or so, then I step onto the next empty train going back to the surface. Again and again I do this before it becomes so tiring that I stumble off somewhere in Zone four, hours later, exhausted. And so much work time wasted! I know all the stations by now, because You have to know the places, to keep away from those people.

- Well that’s because they know, they know the kind of work that you do. There must be something else you can get involved in like Taxidermy or Military modelling, something practical and inoffensive yet retains some of the same structures and innate impracticalities of what you're doing now.

- Military Modelling!?

- Well OK then…Scrabble, That’s becoming like chess these days, or maybe stamp collecting, that could be a good one - people get really into that now you know.


- Do you realise how hostile you are being to my beliefs, do you? Just don’t understand do you… oh what’s the point, I need to find real people with real interests, who are sympathetic to my work. Maybe I could put an Ad in the paper or something. There must be other people out there with similar beliefs and ideas. Maybe I need to emigrate to a different culture, one that takes their religious beliefs seriously.

- Are you not interested in western culture at all then?

- Of course I am, in some ways.

- Then why do you hold such extreme views? Everybody knows you need to compromise just a little, to get along in life.

- You can't believe only half heartedly in something?

- Yes but you don’t have to spend all day long doing it, like you know, split your time up between doing this and doing something a bit more socially active. You are not going to be able to carry on doing this much longer anyway, where are you going to get the money? Have you ever tried selling some of your work, to see if there genuinely is a market out there for it?

- I suppose you think that I should put myself out on the stock market, and rent myself out in shares so that each person can take a pick at me. This is not simply a commodity that I’m making here; I don’t want my work to be associated with this bloody craze for pragmatism and free racketeering. You have to build your strict set of principles, a set of codes to counter the constant pressures to give up and join in. And anyway I’m not very good at anything else, what do you want me to do meat packing, join a gnome making factory?

- I don’t say give up you beliefs completely, I wish you wouldn't take things so personally, it's just I don’t think that you are doing yourself any good with this self sacrificing lifestyle, it’s just not healthy, you need to think about yourself a bit more.

- Here we go again, this insane culture of the self. That’s what the government relies upon, just think of number one, and of course there is a criteria surrounding your notion of the self, what the self should consist of, what we have to do in order to think of ourselves as valued individuals, independent, a part of the community, respectable, mature, important. All these aspirations pushed onto us so that we feel a little bit included in the world, so that we can feel a little bit a part of society, it's all soul distroying. But if we could resist those pressures, just imagine the possibilities, the creative potential.

- Yes, and the despair and the anxiety?

- Only if you are worried about what people think, you have to be your own boss.

- Well don’t you want your work to be a part of society, aren’t you interested in attracting interest in your work in this terrible society.

- We call it a society but what does it really consist of, what is the glue which holds us together; No religion, no respect from the politicians, no set of values that people can look to and hold up. Politics is increasingly about control and managing the effects of global market forces, what ever works. They've divided us up in order to rule us, each of us in our own little box.

- All the artists that you like are in that market and are propped up by it.

- Yes but they have been able to resist the pressures to sell out and are usually determined people who have held on to there principles in the face of market forces encouraging them to do otherwise. In fact I've joined a group.

- Aren't you going against all your principles?

- This is different, we’re holding a rally in London on Saturday.

- You? Have you forgotten what happened the last time you joined a social gathering?

- Er, Well, We've decided that We're going to act, at last.

- We, what do you mean we? You don’t know anybody.

- There are people, I think. I don’t know who’s going to turn up, but you have to start somewhere. We're hoping for about a thousand people turning up.

- I bet they're just a bunch of extremist outsiders who feel rejected by society so they have to make up some religion that serves their anti social needs.

- Look, we didn't choose this religion, it chose us, I've been talking to some and we all seem to have the same you know, desire.
We've always known that this god existed really, intuitively, subconsciously, but only now has it becoming really clear in our minds. Funny really isn’t it how a person can exist their whole life without realising that some one is out there, watching over you, saying "that George, he has followed my preaching in the truest sense and has sacrificed himself in a way that no other follower has."

- I bet you see yourself as above everybody else, what with your creativity and stuff. One day you are you going to climb down from your mountain or up from out of your deep chasm to join the rest of us?

- Who? You? Rubbish, I can do what I like. You are either with us or you're against us. My fellow believers and I are trying to start a community based upon new economic and social ideas, the details of which I shall let you know of if you wish when I come back from the meeting.

- A meeting?

- God, I've got to get ready for it now actually, the meetings in half an hour, God, I forgot (starts taking clothes out of cupboard).

- So where abouts is this meeting?

- A secret location, somewhere in London, gotta keep stum.

- You're not wearing that are you?

- What's wrong with it, I always wear this into town. It kind of gives me extra protection.

- You're not going to put the zipper up, how are you going to navigate around?

- Oh, you get used to it. It gets a bit hot in the summer in the Tube rush hour but it does the job. I have inserted a webbed grill, see, on the side for looking left and right, it's clever don't you think. Loads of hidden pockets, it's great.

- It looks about four sizes too big, the hem's nearly touching the ground.

- It can get very chilly in the Tube at night.

- You look like you're going to treck across the south pole or something.

- Are you discriminating about my choice of dress? Most people wear such boring stuff, at least I got a bit of imagination. Anyway, got to go, just check the street, hang on...OK, all clear...see you then.

- Bye then. Remember I want full details when you get back.

- Right you are.


Tuesday, December 27, 2005

 

Psychiatrist

She wanted me to say in a very sincere way that I was victim material.
Ripe for the investigating
Wanted to know just enough to suggest, to imply, to present gaps that she could fill in with her academic archaeology.
Her eye contact was very good, so was mine.
She sounded Canadian but I found out that she was actually Irish by blood.
Did you have a happy childhood?
Um, no.
I am not required to ask for details if you don’t want to give them - pause.
They don’t need to know, it just helps with getting some kind of background so that I can help you.
What do you think of all this.
This what.
Being sent here, by work. What is your attitude, I’d like to know, what you think about it.
Well they told me that they thought that is was a good idea, that they wanted to help me, that it was good, for my own good.
What do you think?
Well I had no choice really, I feel that if I didn’t go that they would think that I wasn’t willing to deal with the situation. And anyway I’m only going to go through with this unless 'She' does it as well. 'She' is doing it as well isn’t she.
She? Um, er, well that hasn’t been sorted out yet, er I am trying to find time in her timetable to fit her in, I'll check on that, yes, yes.
Well I was led to believe that 'she' was doing this as well.
Yes, 'She', I see.
I’m not doing it if 'she' isn't doing it, you see.
I’ll get in touch with the college in the morning.
I mean, as far as I am concerned I mean it's really not my fault really.
So how are you finding your job at the moment?
What do you mean, is there a problem. I don't see any problem. I mean I really don't know what this is all about...

Monday, December 26, 2005

 

Just a Minute

- Just a minute, I'm a bit confused, do you do your work and therefore you have to believe in your god or do you believe in your god and therefore you have to do your work?

- My god and my work are inseparable; I haven’t got a clue what you’re talking about.

- Alright then let’s try another way; do you do your work, or believe in your god, because you are not social or are you unsocial because of your god-work or whatever.

- Eh, but I’m not unsocial. What you say implies that I have an aversion to socialising. I have no aversion to socialising. In the right context, with the right people, I have no problem. It’s hard to find the right people who believe in the same things that you do.

- There are others who believe and still manage to get out, aren't there?

- Yes but they can't be doing any interesting work can they. To me and those like me, we have no argument. And it does say that followers must not seek to be distracted from their faith.

- And what else does your god not allow you to do then?

- Well, I don’t celebrate Christmas, that’s not strictly a religious thing just my personal choice really.
Er, and um…

- And?

- let me see…I don’t participate in sports… but that’s mostly because of the dodgy leg really.

Anything else?

- Hang on! Hang on!… Well relationships can be difficult.

- Yeah, but you're safely tucked away in a steady, ongoing, potentially child rearing, public partnership aren’t you?

- Finished.

- What, completely, dead, gone, buried, finished completely?

- Yep, I'm afraid so.

- Well you didn't tell anybody.

- You didn’t ask.

- I thought you were getting on so well, since when?

- Friday, she’s moved to my mothers for training in advanced gold digging and man bating, having now been adopted, it seems, as the hoped for daughter my mother never had. She now phones me up just to let me know that it's all my entire fault, my mother that is.

- Well maybe this is the final shove you need to get out ther and mingle. You must start right away. No hesitation.

- they'll be trapping some other unsuspecting male by Monday you’ll see.

- Look you’ve got to get out and face the world. How are you ever going into another relationship if you don’t make the right steps?

- She’s after a certain kind of lifestyle; all she wants a secure and safe income, that’s the only thing that matters to her, she has never considered me and my beliefs.

- Hey, have you got any staff parties to go to. Now, you’ll need to spruce this place up a bit. Urgh…what’s all that dark stuff in there…urrgh!

- She owes me money actually, god I’m so glad I got out of that trap, oh the claustrophobia!

- Hey listen to me! Where’s the brush and pan. Have you ever thought of employing a cleaner, this place is a mess.

- Can’t afford it.

- Sure you can, with your…

- I’ve quit.

- Eh, what, quit, Nooo…?

- I’ve been thinking of doing it for some time, it's like a huge weight off my mind.

- But how are you going to survive? That's all you had left. You can’t just throw your life in the bin just because of a hiccup in relations, are you mad?

- I just feel like is a complete break, you know get back to concentrating fully on my work. Angie, that was never going anywhere, we were just wasting each others time. From now on I am going to be very careful what I get myself involved with. No messing about at all from now on, I’m going to give myself up fully to my beliefs, I think it’s time.

- But George, the way you’re going you’ll end up like that tramp guy who runs around town scribbling abstract marks on the roads. You’ll disappear off the radar, for a few principles and you’re so called religion. Look, George all that really matters in life is happiness, to achieve happiness, that’s all people really need.

- But this is happiness, I am happy, look at my smile, look, see. Well anyway happiness is overrated, if happiness requires being consigned a list of duties that have to be performed unless you are not considered officially ‘happy’ then I can’t see the attraction, and anyway you can make your own equivalents you know.

- Well society just knows now what happiness generally requires, after hundreds of years of sifting through millions of peoples lives for nuggets of joy they are now having the highest yield percentage ever. Happiness is now stamped down. I mean what do we know; we’re always messing about and changing our minds, we need the external structures to guide us.

- What if you don’t happen to fall into that percentage, what do you do then?

- Well you make believe you are happy when you’re not really. Either that or you go out there and find it, in people, things, objects, it’s amazing the things that you can buy these days.

- Yes you try and fit the pattern.
Or else you can find it in your beliefs, you can set up your own structures, after all people are only made happy if they are given a stamp of approval, well then I can invent my own stamp, with my own special mark on it, like a signature.
After all, I know when I’m happy and when I’m not.

- You might be able to get yourself into a position, you know, where there is all kinds of potential, you know, if you meet the right person, and a job using your skills you could rise from out of this precipice of anxiety and doubt. Then you will realise what life really has to offer.

- I am happy, I am happy, I'm bloody happy OK! So just stop it with the lecture will you. I like it here. What do you know anyway? Everything is going in the right direction now, I’m on the right road now with what I’m doing, I have a good feeling about all this, everything is going to be fine. All that was needed was probably the time and lack of distractions to really have a good go at it.

- You have to think of the community as a whole and not just think of yourself. Think of all those people working their fingers to the bone, toiling away on forty eight hour shifts with families to provide for and debts to pay off and here's you with your fantasy schemes not willing to do your bit. Don't you feel in the slightest bit guilty or anything.

- Enlightened is more like what I feel. People need to turn around and look about them and try to be open to alternative lifestyles. Jobs can really tie you down you know. People need to think less about acquiring money and status and more about developing spiritual wealth, something that is not so visible to the community, it is not acquired in the shops, it requires time alone with your self to open up more space for contemplation and creative thought.

- Like you, now, in here, doing this? Is this what it all comes down to? Sitting around in a room fiddling with pens in little squares?

- You just don't understand the language I'm working with. Hey, don't look to close, I haven't finished that yet, it's personal.

Friday, December 16, 2005

 

Oh God


- Why don’t you wash George?

- Because it is not required by my god and in any case I am too busy at my work.

- Your work?

- Yes the work that I do for my god.

- Who is this god of yours that is so important that you do not see to your daily needs and slave away for night and day?

- In my religion we believe that every day should be taken individually and we shall not look into the future but keep closer to the present, not wandering very far from the work at hand.
The work we should do should have no singular practical aim but should open up the mind to endless possibilities and potential interpretations. Inevitably this type of work will require the utmost concentration and will allow no other type of occupation, to prevent the work from being corrupted or lead astray into practical or commercial considerations.

- Your clothes, your clutter, the floating hairs onto the beaten up sofa, you believe in a god that lets you live like you’re in the gutter?

- These things are the sacrifices that the god says that you must make in order to cleanse yourself of the world and its distractions.

- What is so important about this work that you do anyway? All you do is sit down at that computer all day, like a monk tapping away at his tablet. Is this god such a sadist that it has his subjects forfeit themselves to repetitive strain syndrome? What about life, the world outside, air brushing through the trees and the smell of -------- in Spring time.

- That’s all well and good but what meaning is there in all that. We are but flesh and bone, our senses of trivial enjoyments have no meaning besides the flow of history and time. One day we will be dead and gone and then there will be nothing. We must seize the moment and not let trivial distractions get in our way.

- Who is to say what is trivial and what is not. Meaning can only be established in the context of society and people. How can you hide away and at the same time say that what you do has meaning and authority, god or no god.

- I believe in a secular society where individuals can choose their own path and construct their own sense of meaning in the world and seek out those with similar interests. We have to be strong and independent to forge new meaning in the world. Our sense of existence in the world is only truly realised through continuous recreation of meaning, of reinterpretation of the world around us. In order to do this one needs quiet and solitude and of course it helps my concentration.

- So in order to truly exist you have to retreat further and further from the world. It doesn’t seem very appealing to me.

- Well nobody asked you to join me, did they? In fact I didn’t invite you over here really did I.

- Hey, but didn’t you phone me last night. Said you hadn’t talked to anybody in weeks.

- Ah, yes, so I did.

- Said the lady at the supermarket had trouble interpreting your speech when you asked how to get a trolley as you had no money for the slot.

- Yes, yes. Well, I couldn’t understand a word she was saying either. I had to climb over the barrier to grab a loose one.

- Well, you know, I think you’ll have to practise your social skills a bit more.

- I try to get out regularly and integrate with people. It's good for my work, for stories and that. It’s just that sometimes I feel like a fox that has to duck from the farmers gun all the time, it becomes a bit stressful after a while having to keep up the appearances. I just want to do my own thing without having to feel as though I am being watched all the time.

- I did wonder why you had all the curtains closed. You can't hide from the world you know.

- People are always watching and having opinions and bumping about on the ceiling, you can never fully escape. I don't think that I'd be able to survive all this without my god to give life meaning.

- But there is meaning out there, natural meaning, just as many rich layers of complexity out there than in anything you could create by yourself in this room.
You could live it and breathe it, be a part of it.

- I am being a part of it, just in a non participating kind of way. The world is about psychology and interpretation. What do you think about the world out there, how do you communicate what you feel? I'm just as much a part of the world in here as you are out there. I am building a language that can communicate how I feel. A person can travel to all the countries in the world and still essentially know nothing more than they did when they started out. I look into my cauldron filled with the bubbling froth of techniques and tools and ideas swirling around and if I look hard enough and concentrate, sometimes, out pops a bit of magic, which energises me much more than any 'socialising' could possibly do.


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