Ironija On/Off
Konjunkcija u ovom slučaju asocira na ono što je rekao Dario Marković - "mene njemački asocira na dvije stvari - filozofiju i porniće"
So fick mich stärker, mein Hegel! - kažem ja.
Zu-sein Arsch! - kaže on.
Pouka: - Svakih nekoliko stoljeća treba spaliti Aleksandrijsku biblioteku. - Jorge Luis Borges, 'Kongres'
Biblioteketing
Os kombinacije
Živi sutra, jebi danas, misli jučer.
Čovjek bez religije je kao riba bez bicikla. - Vique
Non vitae sed scholae discimus. - Seneka
I have never let my schooling interfere with my education. - Mark Twain
If you want to tell people the truth, make them laugh, otherwise they'll kill you. - Oscar Wilde
Inteligencija je iznenadna iskrsli uvid u suvislo stanje stvari. - Max Scheller
An eye for an eye makes the whole world blind. - Mahatma Gandhi
It is easier to stay out than get out. - Mark Twain
Do not worry about your difficulties in Mathematics. I can assure you mine are still greater. - Albert Einstein
You cram these words into mine ears against the stomach of my sense. - William Shakespeare
He hoped and prayed that there wasn't an afterlife. Then he realized there was a contradiction involved here and merely hoped that there wasn't an afterlife. - Douglas Adams
Never let your sense of morals get in the way of doing what's right. - Isaac Asimov
I hate to advocate drugs, alcohol, violence, or insanity to anyone, but they've always worked for me. - Hunter S. Thompson
I enjoy talking to you. Your mind appeals to me. It resembles my own mind except that you happen to be insane. - George Orwell, '1984'
Man is least himself when he talks in his own person. Give him a mask, and he will tell you the truth. - Oscar Wilde
Tradition is what you resort to when you don't have the time or the money to do it right. - Kurt Herbert Alder
Television is a new medium. It's called a medium because nothing is well-done. - Fred Allen
The significant problems we have cannot be solved at the same level of thinking with which we created them. - Albert Einstein
'To the complaint, 'There are no people in these photographs,' I respond, 'There are always two people: the photographer and the viewer.' - Ansel Adams
You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty. - Mahatma Gandhi
Part of the secret of success in life is to eat what you like and let the food fight it out inside. - Mark Twain
We should take care not to make the intellect our god; it has, of course, powerful muscles, but no personality. - Albert Einstein
I don’t like animals. It’s a strange thing, I don’t like men and I don’t like animals. As for God, he is beginning to disgust me. - Samuel Beckett, 'Molloy'
I say beware of all enterprises that require new clothes, and not rather a new wearer of clothes. - Henry David Thoreau
One is tempted to define man as a rational animal who always loses his temper when he is called upon to act in accordance with the dictates of reason. - Oscar Wilde, 'The Critic as Artist'
Aerodynamically the bumblebee shouldn't be able to fly, but the bumblebee doesn't know that so it goes on flying anyway. - Mary Kay Ash
Today a young man on acid realized that all matter is merely energy condensed to a slow vibration, that we are all one conscienceness experiencing itself subjectively. There is no such thing as death, life is only a dream, and we're the imagination of ourselves. Here's Tom with the weather! - Bill Hicks
I know not with what weapons World War III will be fought, but World War IV will be fought with sticks and stones. - Albert Einstein
The most radical revolutionary will become a conservative the day after the revolution. - Hannah Arendt
An alcoholic is anyone you don't like who drinks more than you do. - Dylan Thomas
A banker is a fellow who lends you his umbrella when the sun is shining, but wants it back the minute it begins to rain. - Mark Twain
Love thy neighbour as yourself, but choose your neighbourhood. - Louise Beal
I'm astounded by people who want to 'know' the universe when it's hard enough to find your way around Chinatown. - Woody Allen
No tyranny is so irksome as petty tyranny: the officious demands of policemen, government clerks, and electromechanical gadgets. - Edward Abbey
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments: love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds. - William Shakespeare, Sonnet cxvi
In every fat book there is a thin book trying to get out. - Anonymous
Moderation in all things, including moderation. - Benjamin Franklin
A synonym is a word you use when you can't spell the word you first thought of. - Burt Bacharach
Success is the ability to go from one failure to another with no loss of enthusiasm. - Sir Winston Churchill
It usually takes 100 years to make a law, and then, after it's done its work, it usually takes 100 years to be rid of it. - Henry Ward Beecher
Television is the first truly democratic culture - the first culture available to everybody and entirely governed by what the people want. The most terrifying thing is what people do want. - Clive Barnes
Many a small thing has been made large by the right kind of advertising. - Mark Twain
Platon je dosadan. - Friedrich Nietzsche
I feel sorry for you 'cause you don't have Jesus in your life. I feel sorry for you 'cause you're forty-five years old and you still have a boogie man under the bed. - Doug Stanhope
I can't understand why a person will take a year to write a novel when he can easily buy one for a few dollars. - Fred Allen
There is not less wit nor less invention in applying rightly a thought one finds in a book, than in being the first author of that thought. - Pierre Bayle
I'm the hand up Mona Lisa's skirt. - John Milton / 'The Devil's Advocate'
We would worry less about what others think of us if we realized how seldom they do. - Ethel Barrett
Unique among the nations, America recognized the source of our character as being godly and eternal, not being civic and temporal. And because we have understood that our source is eternal, America has been different. We have no king but Jesus. - John Ashcroft
I hate mankind, for I think myself one of the best of them, and I know how bad I am. - Joseph Baretti
The release of atomic energy has not created a new problem. It has merely made more urgent the necessity of solving an existing one. - Albert Einstein
Prohibition is better than no liquor at all. - Will Rogers
Nature never makes any blunders, when she makes a fool she means it. - Archibald Alexander
Always forgive your enemies; nothing annoys them so much. - Oscar Wilde
The weak can never forgive. Forgiveness is the attribute of the strong. - Mahatma Gandhi
There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. - William Shakespeare, 'Hamlet'
You are a polymorphously-perverse individual, Mister Data. - Sigmund Freud / 'Star Trek'
A Human Being should be able to:
Change a Diaper,
Plan an Invasion,
Butcher a Hog,
Command a Ship,
Design a Building,
Write a Sonnet,
Balance Accounts,
Build a Wall,
Set a Bone,
Comfort the Dying,
Take Orders,
Give Orders,
Cooperate,
Act Alone,
Solve Equations,
Analyse a New Problem,
Pitch Manure,
Program a Computer,
Cook a tasty Meal,
Fight Efficiently,
Die Gallantly.
SPECIALIZATION IS FOR INSECTS. - Robert Heinlein
As far as the laws of mathematics refer to reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality. - Albert Einstein
Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. - Lord Acton
He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire. - Sir Winston Churchill
To disagree with three-fourths of the British public is one of the first requisites of sanity. - Oscar Wilde
Be careful about reading health books. You may die of a misprint. - Mark Twain
You cannot simultaneously prevent and prepare for war. - Albert Einstein
O, it is excellent to have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous to use it like a giant. - William Shakespeare, 'Measure for Measure'
America is the only country that went from barbarism to decadence without civilization in between. - Oscar Wilde
I find that a great part of the information I have was acquired by looking up something and finding something else on the way. - Franklin P. Adams
Common sense is the collection of prejudices acquired by age eighteen. - Albert Einstein
The radical of one century is the conservative of the next. The radical invents the views. When he has worn them out the conservative adopts them. - Mark Twain
Wenn man von einem unerträglichen Druck loskommen will, so hat man Haschisch nötig. - Friedrich Nietzsche
Tis the good reader that makes the good book. - Ralph Waldo Emerson
I understand a fury in your words,
But not the words. - William Shakespeare, 'Othello'
I have something to tell you non-smokers that I know for a fact that you don't know, and I feel it's my duty to pass on information at all times. Ready? Drumroll ... Non-smokers die every day ... Enjoy your evening. See, I know that you entertain this eternal life fantasy because you've chosen not to smoke, but let me be the first to POP that fucking bubble and bring you hurling back to reality ... You're dead too. - Bill Hicks
Whenever people agree with me I always feel I must be wrong. - Oscar Wilde
It is by universal misunderstanding that all agree. For if, by ill luck, people understood each other, they would never agree. - Charles Baudelaire
It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education. - Albert Einstein
You should just say no to drugs. That will drive the prices down. - Geechy Guy
All the little man on the witness stand had that made him any better than his nearest neighbours was, that if scrubbed with lye soap in very hot water, his skin was white. - Harper Lee, 'To Kill a Mocking-bird'
Never forget what a man says to you when he is angry. - Henry Ward Beecher
Float like a butterfly, sting like a bee. - Muhammad Ali
The difference between the right word and the almost right word is the difference between lightning and a lightning bug. - Mark Twain
I don't like people who take drugs... Customs men for example. - Mick Miller
I don't care what people think. People are stupid. - Charles Barkley
More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly. - Woody Allen
Life is pleasant. Death is peaceful. It's the transition that's troublesome. - Isaac Asimov
I think it would be a good idea. - Mahatma Gandhi, when asked what he thought of Western civilization
To punish me for my contempt for authority, fate made me an authority myself. - Albert Einstein
Three may keep a secret, if two of them are dead. - Benjamin Franklin
Wanting people to listen, you can't just tap them on the shoulder anymore. You have to hit them with a sledge hammer. And then you'll notice you've got their strict attention. - John Doe / 'Seven'
If all the world's a stage, I want to operate the trap door. - Paul Beatty
Often it does seem a pity that Noah and his party did not miss the boat. - Mark Twain
Prohibition goes beyond the bounds of reason in that it attempts to control a man's appetite by legislation, and makes a crime out of things that are not crimes. - Abraham Lincoln
One should always play fairly when one has the winning cards. - Oscar Wilde
The problem with the world is that everyone is a few drinks behind. - Humprey Bogart
I don't really think about anything too much. I live in the present. I move on. I don't think about what happened yesterday. If I think too much, it kind of freaks me out. - Pamela Anderson
In heaven all the interesting people are missing. - Friedrich Nietzsche
Freedom is not worth having if it does not connote freedom to err. It passes my comprehension how human beings, be they ever so experienced and able, can delight in depriving other human beings of that precious right. - Mahatma Gandhi
I've never had a problem with drugs. I've had problems with the police. - Keith Richards
In every age 'the good old days' were a myth. No one ever thought they were good at the time. For every age has consisted of crises that seemed intolerable to the people who lived through them. - Brooks Atkinson, 'Once Around the Sun'
My meaning in saying he is a good man, is to have you understand me that he is sufficient. - William Shakespeare, 'The Merchant of Venice'
Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society. - Mark Twain
Women complain about premenstrual syndrome, but I think of it as the only time of the month that I can be myself. - Roseanne Barr
You don't get anything clean without getting something else dirty. - Cecil Baxter
Fashion is a form of ugliness so intolerable that we have to alter it every six months. - Oscar Wilde
Drugs have taught an entire generation of American kids the metric system. - P.J. O'Rourke
Few people are capable of expressing with equanimity opinions which differ from the prejudices of their social environment. Most people are even incapable of forming such opinions. - Albert Einstein
A classic is something that everybody wants to have read and nobody wants to read. - Mark Twain
To lose one parent, Mr Worthing, may be regarded as a misfortune; to lose both looks like carelessness. - Oscar Wilde, 'The Importance of Being Earnest'
I don't do drugs. I am drugs. - Salvador Dali
Youth would be an ideal state if it came a little later in life. - Herbert Henry Asquith
Jim Fixx
Born: Apr. 23, 1932
author who popularized the sport of running; his 1977 bestseller The Complete Book of Running, is credited with helping start America's fitness revolution; died of a heart attack while running.
Died: July 20, 1984
A lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes. - Mark Twain
I was working on the proof of one of my poems all the morning, and took out a comma. In the afternoon I put it back again. - Oscar Wilde
The man of knowledge must be able not only to love his enemies but also to hate his friends. - Friedrich Nietzsche, 'Ecce Homo'
Whatever you do will be insignificant, but it is very important that you do it. - Mahatma Gandhi
My dad was the town drunk. Most of the time that's not so bad; but New York City? - Henry Youngman
In case you're worried about what's going to become of the younger generation, it's going to grow up and start worrying about the younger generation. - Roger Allen
The creator of the universe works in mysterious ways. But he uses a base ten counting system and likes round numbers. - Scott Adams
All drugs of any interest to any moderately intelligent person in America are now illegal. - Thomas Szasz
History will be kind to me for I intend to write it. - Sir Winston Churchill
The whole history of civilization is strewn with creeds and institutions which were invaluable at first, and deadly afterwards. - Walter Bagehot
The important thing is not to stop questioning. - Albert Einstein
Those who would trade freedom for security deserve neither freedom nor security. - Benjamin Franklin
One man alone can be pretty dumb sometimes, but for real bona fide stupidity, there ain't nothin' can beat teamwork. - Edward Abbey
The most incomprehensible thing about the world is that it is at all comprehensible. - Albert Einstein
You should've been a blowjob ... - Bill Hicks
Drugs are the product of Satan. Drug users need to be saved by the Holy Power of Jesus Christ. - William John Bennett
We wouldn't be here if it weren't for psychedelic drugs. In terms of the role of psilocybin in human evolution on the grasslands of Africa, people not on drugs were behind the curve. The fact is that, in terms of human evolution, people not on psychedelics are not fully human. They've fallen to a lower state, where they're easily programmed, boundary defined, obsessed by sexual possessiveness which is transferred into fetishism and object obsession. We don't want too many citizens asking where the power and the money really goes. Informed by psychedelics, people might stop saluting. Take your political party, your job, whatever, and shove it. - Terence McKenna
It has been said that democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried. - Sir Winston Churchill
In necessary things, unity; in doubtful things, liberty; in all things, charity. - Richard Baxter
The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself. - Oscar Wilde, 'The Picture of Dorian Gray'
The meanest, most contemptible kind of praise is that which first speaks well of a man, and then qualifies it with a "but". - Henry Ward Beecher
I mean really wonderful. In teaching. Personal epiphanies. About life. About different perspectives - help with different perspectives that you have. You know what I mean? Relationships to nature. Relationships with the self. With other people. With events. - Keanu Reeves (on his use of drugs)
What difference does it make to the dead, the orphans and the homeless, whether the mad destruction is wrought under the name of totalitarianism or the holy name of liberty or democracy? - Mahatma Gandhi
Cocaine is God's way of saying you're making too much money. - Robin Williams
It was wonderful to find America, but it would have been more wonderful to miss it. - Mark Twain
Anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job. - Douglas Adams, 'The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy'
Write a wise saying and your name will live forever. - Anonymous
If everything seems under control, you're just not going fast enough. - Mario Andretti
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. - Albert Einstein
We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars. - Oscar Wilde, 'Lady Windermere's Fan'
He that is robb'd, not wanting what is stolen,
Let him not know 't, and he's not robb'd at all. - William Shakespeare, 'Othello'
Sometimes a scream is better than a thesis. - Ralph Waldo Emerson
Even if one takes every reefer madness allegation of the prohibitionists at face value, marijuana prohibition has done far more harm to far more people than marijuana ever could. - William F. Buckley, Jr.
I thoroughly disapprove of duels. If a man should challenge me, I would take him kindly and forgivingly by the hand and lead him to a quiet place and kill him. - Mark Twain
I'm the key figure in an on-going government charade, the plot to conceal the truth about the existence of extraterrestrials. It's a global conspiracy, actually, with key players in the highest levels of power, that reaches down into the lives of every man, woman, and child on this planet. So, of course, no one believes me. I'm an annoyance to my superiors, a joke to my peers. They call me Spooky. Spooky Mulder, whose sister was abducted by aliens when he was just a kid and who now chases after little green men with a badge and a gun, shouting to the heavens or to anyone who will listen that the fix is in, that the sky is falling and when it hits it's gonna be the shit-storm of all time. - Fox Mulder / X-Files Movie
Nekoliko stranica
Richard Rorty: 'Kontingencija, ironija i solidarnost'
Poglavlje 4
Privatna ironija i liberalna nada
__Sva ljudska bića nose uza se jedan niz riječi koje upotrebljavaju za opravdanje svojih akcija, svojih uvjerenja i svojih života. To su riječi kojima se formuliraju pohvale našim prijateljima i prezir prema našim neprijateljima, naši dugoročni projekti, naše najdublje sumnje u nas same i naše najviše nade. To su one riječi kojima mi pričamo, katkad unaprijed a katkad retrospektivno, priču svog života. Te ću riječi zvati "konačnim vokabularom" osobe.
__On je "konačan" u onom smislu da, ako se posumnja u vrijednost tih riječi, njihov korisnik nema više neposrednog argumentativnog utočišta. Te su riječi ono najdalje dokle on može dosegnuti jezikom; iza njih je samo bespomoćna pasivnost ili pribjegavanje sili. Malen dio vokabulara sastavljen je od tankih, fleksibilnih i sveprisutnih termina kao što su "istinito", "dobro", "ispravno" i "lijepo". Veći dio sadrži gušće, rigidnije i skučenije termine, na primjer, "Krist", "Engleska", "profesionalni standardi", "pristojnost", "ljubaznost", "Revolucija", "Crkva", "progresivno", "surovo", "kreativno". Skučeniji termini obavljaju većinu posla.
__Definirat ću "ironista" kao nekoga koji ispunjava tri uvjeta: (1) ona* ima radikalne i stalne sumnje u konačni vokabular koji upravo sad upotrebljava, jer je bila impresionirana drugim vokabularima, vokabularima koji su ljudi ili knjige koje je susretala smatrali konačnima; (2) ona shvaća da argument oblikovan na njezinom sadašnjem vokabularu ne može ni osigurati ni rastvoriti te sumnje; (3) ukoliko filozofira o svojoj situaciji, ona ne misli da je njezin vokabular bliži stvarnosti od drugih, da je u kontaktu s nekom moći izvan nje. Ironisti koji su skloni filozofiranju ne vide izbor između vokabulara kao nešto što se sprovodi unutar neutralnog i univerzalnog metavokabulara, niti kao nastojanje da se kroz pojavno dođe do stvarnosti, nego ga jednostavno smatraju igrom novoga u odnosu na staro.
__Ljude ove vrste zovem "ironistima", jer ih njihova spoznaja da se ponovnim opisom svaku stvar može učiniti dobrom ili lošom, kao i njihovo odustajanje od toga da formuliraju kriterije izbora između konačnih vokabulara, stavlja u poziciju koju je Sartre nazvao "metastabilnom": nikad sasvim sposobni da sebe uzimaju ozbiljno, jer su uvijek svjesni da su uvjeti u kojima sebe opisuju podređeni promjenama, uvijek svjesni kontingencije i krhkosti svojih konačnih vokabulara, pa onda i sebe samih. Takvi ljudi se prirodno okreću onoj vrsti mišljenja koja razvijam u prva dva poglavlja ove knjige. Ako su oni također i liberali - ljudi za koje je (da upotrijebim definiciju Judith Shklar) "okrutnost najgora stvar koja se čini" - onda će se prirodno okrenuti stavovima ponuđenima u 3. poglavlju.
__Suprotnost ironije je zdrav razum. On je, naime, parola onih koji nesamosvjesno opisuju sve važno terminima konačnog vokabulara na koji su navikli oni i njihovo okruženje. Misliti zdravorazumski znači uzimati kao gotovo da su tvrdnje formulirane tim konačnim vokabularom dostatne da se opišu i prosude uvjerenja, djela i životi onih koji upotrebljavaju alternativne konačne vokabulare. Ljudi koji se diče zdravim razumom smatrat će odbojnom vrstu razmišljanja iz 1. poglavlja.
__Kad se zdrav razum dovodi u pitanje, onda njegovi sljedbenici prvo odgovoraju generalizacijama i time što pravila jezičke igre koju su navikli igrati čine izričitima (kao što su to činili neki od grčkih sofista, kao što je to činio Aristotel u svojim etičkim spisima.) No ako ni jedno banalno opće mjesto formulirano starim vokabularom nije dovoljno da bi se odgovorilo argumentiranom izazovu, potreba za odgovorom rezultira spremnošću da se ode dalje od banalnih objašnjenja. U tom trenutku se konverzacija može pretvoriti u sokratsku. Pitanje "Što je x?" postavljeno je sad na takav način da se na njega ne može odgovoriti jednostavno navođenjem paradigmatskih slučajeva x-stva. Pa se može postaviti zahtjev za definicijom, biti.
__Postaviti takve sokratske zahtjeve ne znači još, naravno, postati ironist u smislu u kojemu ja upotrebljavam taj termin. Znači samo postati "metafizičar", u smislu toga termina koji sam usvojio od Heideggera. U tom je smislu metafizičar onaj koji pitanje "Što je unutrašnja priroda (npr. pravde, znanosti, znanja, bitka, vjere, moralnosti, filozofije)?" shvaća tako kako je izrečeno. On pretpostavlja da prisutnost nekog termina u njegovom konačnom vokabularu jamči da se on odnosi na nešto što ima stvarnu bit. Metafizičar je još uvijek privezan za zdrav razum zato što ne dovodi u pitanje opća mjesta koja utvrđuju upotrebu određenog konačnog vokabulara, posebno ono opće mjesto koje kaže da se iza mnoštva privremenih pojava nalazi jedna permanentna stvarnost. On ne radi redeskripciju nego se radije bavi analizom stari opisa pomoću drugih starih opisa.
__Ironist je, nasuprot tome, nominalist i historicist. Ona misli da ništa nema svoju unutarnju prirodu, neku stvarnu bit. Isto tako misli da zbog pojave termina kao što su "pravedan" ili "znanstven" ili "racionalan" u nekom konačnom vokabularu ne treba misliti da će sokratsko ispitivanje biti pravde ili znanosti ili racionalnosti doprijeti mnogo dalje od jezičke igre tog vremena. Ironista brine mogućnost da je bila inicirana u krivo pleme, naučena da igra krivu jezičnu igru. Brine o tome da joj je proces socijalizacije, koji ju je pretvorio u ljudsko biće pruživši joj jezik, možda dao krivi jezik, pretvorivši je tako u krivu vrstu ljudskog bića. No ona ne može dati kriterij tog krivog smjera. Tako da, što god je više prisiljena artikulirati svoju situaciju u filozofskim terminima, to više podsjeća na svoju neukorijenjenost, stalno koristeći termine kao "svjetonazor", "perspektiva", "dijalektika", "koncepcijski okvir", "historijska epoha", "jezička igra", "redeskripcija", "vokabular", i "ironija".
__Metafizičar odgovora na tu vrstu govora nazivajući ga "relativističkim" i insistirajući na tome da ono što je važno nije koji se jezik upotrebljava, nego ono što je istinito. Metafizičari misle da je u prirodi ljudskih bića da žele znati. Misle tako, jer im vokabular koji su naslijedili, njihov zdrav razum, pruža sliku znanja kao odnosa između ljudskih bića i "stvarnosti", i ideju da mi imamo potrebu i dužnost da uđemo u taj odnos. On nam također kaže da će nam "stvarnost", ako je pravilno pitamo, pomoći da odredimo što bi trebao biti naš konačni vokabular. Tako metafizičari vjeruju da su tamo u svijetu stvarne biti, koje nam je dužnost otkriti i koje su disponirane da pomognu pri vlastitom otkrivanju. Oni ne vjeruju da se redeskripcijom išta može učiniti dobrim ili lošim - ili, ako i vjeruju, otklanjaju tu činjenicu i okreću se ideji da će nam stvarnost pomoći da se odupremo takvim zavodničkim iskušenjima.
__Nasuprot tome, ironisti ne smatraju traganje za konačnim vokabularom načinom (čak ni djelomično) da se ispravi nešto što je izvan tog vokabulara. One ne misle da je smisao diskurzivne misli znanje, u bilo kojem smislu koji se može izraziti pojmovima kao što su "stvarnost", "stvarna bit", "objektivno stanovište" i "korespondencija jezika i realnosti". One ne misle da je njezin smisao u tome da nađe vokabular koji nešto adekvatno predstavlja, transparentni medij. Za ironiste, "konačni vokabular" ne znači "onaj koji smiruje sve sumnje" ili "onaj koji zadovoljava naše kriterije konačnosti, adekvatnosti ili optimalnosti". One ne misle da se refleksija rukovodi kriterijima. Kriteriji, po njihovom mišljenju, nikad i nisu ništa više od općih mjesta koja kontekstualno definiraju termine konačnog vokabulara koji je upravo u upotrebi. Ironisti se slažu s Davidsonom da smo nemoćni iskoračiti iz našeg jezika da bismo ga usporedili s nečim drugim, i s Heideggerom oko kontingencije i historicizma tog jezika.
__Ta razlika vodi do razlike u njihovom stavu prema knjigama. Metafizičari vide knjižnice kao podijeljene prema disciplinama, koje odgovaraju različitim predmetima znanja. Ironisti ih vide kao podijeljene prema tradicijama, pri čemu svaki član djelomično usvaja i djelomično modificira vokabular pisca kojega je čitao. Ironisti koriste tekstove svih ljudi s poetskim darom, svih originalnih umova koji su imali talenta za rediskripciju - Pitagoru, Platona, Miltona, Newtona, Goethea, Kanta, Kierkegaarda, Baudelairea, Darwina, Freuda - kao žito koje mora proći kroz isti dijalektički mlin. Metafizičari, nasuprot tome, žele početi time da se točno utvrdi koji su od ovih ljudi bili pjesnici, koji filozofi, koji znanstvenici. Oni misle da je bitno da se uspostave žanrovi - da se tekstovi poredaju u odnosu na prethodno određenu rešetku, rešetku koja će, za što god inače služila, barem održati jasnu razliku između zahtjeva znanja i drugih zahtjeva upućenih našoj pažnji. Ironist bi, naprotiv, htjela izbjeći kuhanje knjiga koje čita uz upotrebu ikakve takve rešetke (iako ona s ironičnom rezignacijom shvaća da je to jedva moguće izbjeći).
__Za metafizičara je "filozofija" definirana u odnosu na kanonski slijed Platon-Kant, pokušaj da se upoznaju izvjesne stvari - sasvim općenite i važne stvari. Za ironistu "filozofija" je, tako definirana, pokušaj da se primijeni i razvije poseban prethodno izabran konačni vokabular - koji se vrti oko razlike pojavnost-stvarnost. Problem među njima ponovo je u vezi s kontingencijom našega jezika - oko toga da li je ono što zdrav razum naše vlastite kulture dijeli s Platonom i Kantom neki nagovještaj o načinu postojanja svijeta, ili je to samo karakteristična oznaka diskursa ljudi koji nastanjuju izvjestan komad prostora-vremena. Metafizičar pretpostavlja da naša tradicija ne može postavljati nikakva pitanja na koja ne može odgovoriti - da vokabular, za koji se ironist plaši da može biti samo "grčki" ili "zapadni" ili "građanski", jest oruđe koje će nam omogućiti da dođemo do nečeg univerzalnog. Metafizičar se slaže s platonskom teorijom sjećanja, u obliku u kojemu je tu teoriju obnovio Kierkegaard, naime da u sebi posjedujemo istinu, da imamo ugrađene kriterije koji nam omogućuju da prepoznamo pravi konačni vokabular kad ga čujemo. Neposredna vrijednost te teorije jest da su naši suvremeni konačni vokabulari dovoljno blizu ono pravom, da bismo mogli konvergirati prema njemu - formulirati premise iz kojih će se izvući pravi zaključci. Metafizičar misli da mi, iako možda nemamo sve odgovore, već imamo kriterije za prave odgovore. On misli da "prave" ne znači samo "upotrebljive za one koji govore kao i mi", nego ima i jači smisao - smisao "obuhvaćanja prave biti".
__Za ironistu traganjima za konačnim vokabularom nije suđeno konvergiranje. Za nju su rečenice kao "Svi ljudi po prirodi teže znanju" ili "Istina je nezavisna od ljudskog duha" jednostavno banalnosti koje se upotrebljavaju da utuve u pamet lokalni konačni vokabular, zdrav razum Zapada. Ona je ironist upravo ukoliko njezin konačni vokabular ne sadrži te pojmove. Njezin opis onoga što ona radi kad traži bolji konačni vokabular od onoga koji upravo upotrebljava pun je metafora stvaranja, a ne metafora nalaženja, diversifikacije i novine, a ne konvergencije nečemu prethodno prisutnom. Ona o konačnim vokabularima misli kao o pjesničkim dostignućima, a ne kao o plodovima marljivog ispitivanja prema prethodno formuliranim kriterijima.
__Budući da metafizičari vjeruju da mi već posjedujemo mnogo od "pravog" konačnog vokabulara i preostalo nam je da samo mislimo kroz njegove implikacije, oni o filozofskom ispitivanju misle kao o otkrivanju odnosa između raznovrsnih općih mjesta koja pružaju kontekstualne definicije termina tog vokabulara. Tako o produbljenju i razjašnjavanju upotrebe termina misle kao o utkivanju tih općih mjesta (ili, kako to oni vole kazati, tih intuicija) u razumljiv sistem. To ima dvije posljedice. Prvo, oni se nastoje koncentrirati na plitkije, fleksibilnije, posvuda prisutne točke toga vokabulara - riječi kao "istinit", "dobar", "osoba" i "predmet". Jer, što je termin plići, to će ga više općih mjesta upotrijebiti. Drugo, oni smatraju da je paradigma filozofskog ispitivanja logički argument - to jest otkrivanje inferentnih odnosa među propozicijama, za razliku od uspoređivanja i kontrastiranja vokabulara.
__Tipična strategija metafizičara jest da ...
*Autor često u tekstu upotrebljava zamjenicu ženskog roda u kontekstu u kojemu se očekuje konvencionalna jezična upotreba muškog roda. Sam autor to objašnjava: "Korištenje zamjenice muškog roda za metafizičara a ženskog roda za ironistu dijelom je samo prikladan način za razlikovanje toga dvoga, a dijelom aluzija na Derridinu tvrdnju da je metafizika u osnovi muška, falogocentrička ideja."
Jonathan Nolan: 'Memento Mori'
"What like a bullet can undeceive!" - Herman Melville
Your wife always used to say you'd be late for your own funeral. Remember that? Her little joke because you were such a slob—always late, always forgetting stuff, even before the incident.
Right about now you're probably wondering if you were late for hers.
You were there, you can be sure of that. That's what the picture's for—the one tacked to the wall by the door. It's not customary to take pictures at a funeral, but somebody, your doctors, I guess, knew you wouldn't remember. They had it blown up nice and big and stuck it right there, next to the door, so you couldn't help but see it every time you got up to find out where she was.
The guy in the picture, the one with the flowers? That's you. And what are you doing? You're reading the headstone, trying to figure out who's funeral you're at, same as you're reading it now, trying to figure why someone stuck that picture next to your door. But why bother reading something that you won't remember?
She's gone, gone for good, and you must be hurting right now, hearing the news. Believe me, I know how you feel. You're probably a wreck. But give it five minutes, maybe ten. Maybe you can even go a whole half hour before you forget.
But you will forget—I guarantee it. A few more minutes and you'll be heading for the door, looking for her all over again, breaking down when you find the picture. How many times do you have to hear the news before some other part of your body, other than that busted brain of yours, starts to remember?
Never-ending grief, never-ending anger. Useless without direction. Maybe you can't understand what's happened. Can't say I really understand, either. Backwards amnesia. That's what the sign says. CRS disease. Your guess is as good as mine.
Maybe you can't understand what happened to you. But you do remember what happened to HER, don't you? The doctors don't want to talk about it. They won't answer my questions. They don't think it's right for a man in your condition to hear about those things. But you remember enough, don't you? You remember his face.
This is why I'm writing to you. Futile, maybe. I don't know how many times you'll have to read this before you listen to me. I don't even know how long you've been locked up in this room already. Neither do you. But your advantage in forgetting is that you'll forget to write yourself off as a lost cause.
Sooner or later you'll want to do something about it. And when you do, you'll just have to trust me, because I'm the only one who can help you.
EARL OPENS ONE EYE after another to a stretch of white ceiling tiles interrupted by a hand-printed sign taped right above his head, large enough for him to read from the bed. An alarm clock is ringing somewhere. He reads the sign, blinks, reads it again, then takes a look at the room.
It's a white room, overwhelmingly white, from the walls and the curtains to the institutional furniture and the bedspread. The alarm clock is ringing from the white desk under the window with the white curtains. At this point Earl probably notices that he is lying on top of his white comforter. He is already wearing a dressing gown and slippers.
He lies back and reads the sign taped to the ceiling again. It says, in crude block capitals, THIS IS YOUR ROOM. THIS IS A ROOM IN A HOSPITAL. THIS IS WHERE YOU LIVE NOW.
Earl rises and takes a look around. The room is large for a hospital—empty linoleum stretches out from the bed in three directions. Two doors and a window. The view isn't very helpful, either—a close of trees in the center of a carefully manicured piece of turf that terminates in a sliver of two-lane blacktop. The trees, except for the evergreens, are bare—early spring or late fall, one or the other.
Every inch of the desk is covered with Post-it notes, legal pads, neatly printed lists, psychological textbooks, framed pictures. On top of the mess is a half-completed crossword puzzle. The alarm clock is riding a pile of folded newspapers. Earl slaps the snooze button and takes a cigarette from the pack taped to the sleeve of his dressing gown. He pats the empty pockets of his pajamas for a light. He rifles the papers on the desk, looks quickly through the drawers. Eventually he finds a box of kitchen matches taped to the wall next to the window. Another sign is taped just above the box. It says in loud yellow letters, CIGARETTE? CHECK FOR LIT ONES FIRST, STUPID.
Earl laughs at the sign, lights his cigarette, and takes a long draw. Taped to the window in front of him is another piece of looseleaf paper headed YOUR SCHEDULE.
It charts off the hours, every hour, in blocks: 10:00 p.m. to 8:00 a.m. is labeled go BACK TO SLEEP. Earl consults the alarm clock: 8:15. Given the light outside, it must be morning. He checks his watch: 10:30. He presses the watch to his ear and listens. He gives the watch a wind or two and sets it to match the alarm clock.
According to the schedule, the entire block from 8:00 to 8:30 has been labeled BRUSH YOUR TEETH. Earl laughs again and walks over to the bathroom.
The bathroom window is open. As he flaps his arms to keep warm, he notices the ashtray on the windowsill. A cigarette is perched on the ashtray, burning steadily through a long finger of ash. He frowns, extinguishes the old butt, and replaces it with the new one.
The toothbrush has already been treated to a smudge of white paste. The tap is of the push-button variety—a dose of water with each nudge. Earl pushes the brush into his cheek and fiddles it back and forth while he opens the medicine cabinet. The shelves are stocked with single-serving packages of vitamins, aspirin, antidiuretics. The mouthwash is also single-serving, about a shot-glass-worth of blue liquid in a sealed plastic bottle. Only the toothpaste is regular-sized. Earl spits the paste out of his mouth and replaces it with the mouthwash. As he lays the toothbrush next to the toothpaste, he notices a tiny wedge of paper pinched between the glass shelf and the steel backing of the medicine cabinet. He spits the frothy blue fluid into the sink and nudges for some more water to rinse it down. He closes the medicine cabinet and smiles at his reflection in the mirror.
"Who needs half an hour to brush their teeth?"
The paper has been folded down to a minuscule size with all the precision of a sixth-grader's love note. Earl unfolds it and smooths it against the mirror. It reads—
IF YOU CAN STILL READ THIS, THEN YOU'RE A FUCKING COWARD.
Earl stares blankly at the paper, then reads it again. He turns it over. On the back it reads—
P.S.: AFTER YOU'VE READ THIS, HIDE IT AGAIN.
Earl reads both sides again, then folds the note back down to its original size and tucks it underneath the toothpaste.
Maybe then he notices the scar. It begins just beneath the ear, jagged and thick, and disappears abruptly into his hairline. Earl turns his head and stares out of the corner of his eye to follow the scar's progress. He traces it with a fingertip, then looks back down at the cigarette burning in the ashtray. A thought seizes him and he spins out of the bathroom.
He is caught at the door to his room, one hand on the knob. Two pictures are taped to the wall by the door. Earl's attention is caught first by the MRI, a shiny black frame for four windows into someone's skull. In marker, the picture is labeled YOUR BRAIN. Earl stares at it. Concentric circles in different colors. He can make out the big orbs of his eyes and, behind these, the twin lobes of his brain. Smooth wrinkles, circles, semicircles. But right there in the middle of his head, circled in marker, tunneled in from the back of his neck like a maggot into an apricot, is something different. Deformed, broken, but unmistakable. A dark smudge, the shape of a flower, right there in the middle of his brain.
He bends to look at the other picture. It is a photograph of a man holding flowers, standing over a fresh grave. The man is bent over, reading the headstone. For a moment this looks like a hall of mirrors or the beginnings of a sketch of infinity: the one man bent over, looking at the smaller man, bent over, reading the headstone. Earl looks at the picture for a long time. Maybe he begins to cry. Maybe he just stares silently at the picture. Eventually, he makes his way back to the bed, flops down, seals his eyes shut, tries to sleep.
The cigarette burns steadily away in the bathroom. A circuit in the alarm clock counts down from ten, and it starts ringing again.
Earl opens one eye after another to a stretch of white ceiling tiles, interrupted by a hand-printed sign taped right above his head, large enough for him to read from the bed.
You can't have a normal life anymore. You must know that. How can you have a girlfriend if you can't remember her name? Can't have kids, not unless you want them to grow up with a dad who doesn't recognize them. Sure as hell can't hold down a job. Not too many professions out there that value forgetfulness. Prostitution, maybe. Politics, of course.
No. Your life is over. You're a dead man. The only thing the doctors are hoping to do is teach you to be less of a burden to the orderlies. And they'll probably never let you go home, wherever that would be.
So the question is not "to be or not to be," because you aren't. The question is whether you want to do something about it. Whether revenge matters to you.
It does to most people. For a few weeks, they plot, they scheme, they take measures to get even. But the passage of time is all it takes to erode that initial impulse. Time is theft, isn't that what they say? And time eventually convinces most of us that forgiveness is a virtue. Conveniently, cowardice and forgiveness look identical at a certain distance. Time steals your nerve.
If time and fear aren't enough to dissuade people from their revenge, then there's always authority, softly shaking its head and saying, We understand, but you're the better man for letting it go. For rising above it. For not sinking to their level. And besides, says authority, if you try anything stupid, we'll lock you up in a little room.
But they already put you in a little room, didn't they? Only they don't really lock it or even guard it too carefully because you're a cripple. A corpse. A vegetable who probably wouldn't remember to eat or take a shit if someone wasn't there to remind you.
And as for the passage of time, well, that doesn't really apply to you anymore, does it? Just the same ten minutes, over and over again. So how can you forgive if you can't remember to forget?
You probably were the type to let it go, weren't you? Before. But you're not the man you used to be. Not even half. You're a fraction; you're the ten-minute man.
Of course, weakness is strong. It's the primary impulse. You'd probably prefer to sit in your little room and cry. Live in your finite collection of memories, carefully polishing each one. Half a life set behind glass and pinned to cardboard like a collection of exotic insects. You'd like to live behind that glass, wouldn't you? Preserved in aspic.
You'd like to but you can't, can you? You can't because of the last addition to your collection. The last thing you remember. His face. His face and your wife, looking to you for help.
And maybe this is where you can retire to when it's over. Your little collection. They can lock you back up in another little room and you can live the rest of your life in the past. But only if you've got a little piece of paper in your hand that says you got him.
You know I'm right. You know there's a lot of work to do. It may seem impossible, but I'm sure if we all do our part, we'll figure something out. But you don't have much time. You've only got about ten minutes, in fact. Then it starts all over again. So do something with the time you've got.
EARL OPENS HIS EYES and blinks into the darkness. The alarm clock is ringing. It says 3:20, and the moonlight streaming through the window means it must be the early morning. Earl fumbles for the lamp, almost knocking it over in the process. Incandescent light fills the room, painting the metal furniture yellow, the walls yellow, the bedspread, too. He lies back and looks up at the stretch of yellow ceiling tiles above him, interrupted by a handwritten sign taped to the ceiling. He reads the sign two, maybe three times, then blinks at the room around him.
It is a bare room. Institutional, maybe. There is a desk over by the window. The desk is bare except for the blaring alarm clock. Earl probably notices, at this point, that he is fully clothed. He even has his shoes on under the sheets. He extracts himself from the bed and crosses to the desk. Nothing in the room would suggest that anyone lived there, or ever had, except for the odd scrap of tape stuck here and there to the wall. No pictures, no books, nothing. Through the window, he can see a full moon shining on carefully manicured grass.
Earl slaps the snooze button on the alarm clock and stares a moment at the two keys taped to the back of his hand. He picks at the tape while he searches through the empty drawers. In the left pocket of his jacket, he finds a roll of hundred-dollar bills and a letter sealed in an envelope. He checks the rest of the main room and the bathroom. Bits of tape, cigarette butts. Nothing else.
Earl absentmindedly plays with the lump of scar tissue on his neck and moves back toward the bed. He lies back down and stares up at the ceiling and the sign taped to it. The sign reads, GET UP, GET OUT RIGHT NOW. THESE PEOPLE ARE TRYING TO KILL YOU.
Earl closes his eyes.
They tried to teach you to make lists in grade school, remember? Back when your day planner was the back of your hand. And if your assignments came off in the shower, well, then they didn't get done. No direction, they said. No discipline. So they tried to get you to write it all down somewhere more permanent.
Of course, your grade-school teachers would be laughing their pants wet if they could see you now. Because you've become the exact product of their organizational lessons. Because you can't even take a piss without consulting one of your lists.
They were right. Lists are the only way out of this mess.
Here's the truth: People, even regular people, are never just any one person with one set of attributes. It's not that simple. We're all at the mercy of the limbic system, clouds of electricity drifting through the brain. Every man is broken into twenty-four-hour fractions, and then again within those twenty-four hours. It's a daily pantomime, one man yielding control to the next: a backstage crowded with old hacks clamoring for their turn in the spotlight. Every week, every day. The angry man hands the baton over to the sulking man, and in turn to the sex addict, the introvert, the conversationalist. Every man is a mob, a chain gang of idiots.
This is the tragedy of life. Because for a few minutes of every day, every man becomes a genius. Moments of clarity, insight, whatever you want to call them. The clouds part, the planets get in a neat little line, and everything becomes obvious. I should quit smoking, maybe, or here's how I could make a fast million, or such and such is the key to eternal happiness. That's the miserable truth. For a few moments, the secrets of the universe are opened to us. Life is a cheap parlor trick.
But then the genius, the savant, has to hand over the controls to the next guy down the pike, most likely the guy who just wants to eat potato chips, and insight and brilliance and salvation are all entrusted to a moron or a hedonist or a narcoleptic.
The only way out of this mess, of course, is to take steps to ensure that you control the idiots that you become. To take your chain gang, hand in hand, and lead them. The best way to do this is with a list.
It's like a letter you write to yourself. A master plan, drafted by the guy who can see the light, made with steps simple enough for the rest of the idiots to understand. Follow steps one through one hundred. Repeat as necessary.
Your problem is a little more acute, maybe, but fundamentally the same thing.
It's like that computer thing, the Chinese room. You remember that? One guy sits in a little room, laying down cards with letters written on them in a language he doesn't understand, laying them down one letter at a time in a sequence according to someone else's instructions. The cards are supposed to spell out a joke in Chinese. The guy doesn't speak Chinese, of course. He just follows his instructions.
There are some obvious differences in your situation, of course: You broke out of the room they had you in, so the whole enterprise has to be portable. And the guy giving the instructions—that's you, too, just an earlier version of you. And the joke you're telling, well, it's got a punch line. I just don't think anyone's going to find it very funny.
So that's the idea. All you have to do is follow
HE CAN HEAR THE BUZZING through his eyelids. Insistent. He reaches out for the alarm clock, but he can't move his arm.
Earl opens his eyes to see a large man bent double over him. The man looks up at him, annoyed, then resumes his work. Earl looks around him. Too dark for a doctor's office.
Then the pain floods his brain, blocking out the other questions. He squirms again, trying to yank his forearm away, the one that feels like it's burning. The arm doesn't move, but the man shoots him another scowl. Earl adjusts himself in the chair to see over the top of the man's head.
The noise and the pain are both coming from a gun in the man's hand—a gun with a needle where the barrel should be. The needle is digging into the fleshy underside of Earl's forearm, leaving a trail of puffy letters behind it.
Earl tries to rearrange himself to get a better view, to read the letters on his arm, but he can't. He lies back and stares at the ceiling.
Eventually the tattoo artist turns off the noise, wipes Earl's forearm with a piece of gauze, and wanders over to the back to dig up a pamphlet describing how to deal with a possible infection. Maybe later he'll tell his wife about this guy and his little note. Maybe his wife will convince him to call the police.
Earl looks down at the arm. The letters are rising up from the skin, weeping a little. They run from just behind the strap of Earl's watch all the way to the inside of his elbow. Earl blinks at the message and reads it again. It says, in careful little capitals, I RAPED AND KILLED YOUR WIFE.
It's your birthday today, so I got you a little present. I would have just bought you a beer, but who knows where that would have ended?
So instead, I got you a bell. I think I may have had to pawn your watch to buy it, but what the hell did you need a watch for, anyway?
You're probably asking yourself, Why a bell? In fact, I'm guessing you're going to be asking yourself that question every time you find it in your pocket. Too many of these letters now. Too many for you to dig back into every time you want to know the answer to some little question.
It's a joke, actually. A practical joke. But think of it this way: I'm not really laughing at you so much as with you.
I'd like to think that every time you take it out of your pocket and wonder, Why do I have this bell? a little part of you, a little piece of your broken brain, will remember and laugh, like I'm laughing now.
Besides, you do know the answer. It was something you learned before. So if you think about it, you'll know.
Back in the old days, people were obsessed with the fear of being buried alive. You remember now? Medical science not being quite what it is today, it wasn't uncommon for people to suddenly wake up in a casket. So rich folks had their coffins outfitted with breathing tubes. Little tubes running up to the mud above so that if someone woke up when they weren't supposed to, they wouldn't run out of oxygen. Now, they must have tested this out and realized that you could shout yourself hoarse through the tube, but it was too narrow to carry much noise. Not enough to attract attention, at least. So a string was run up the tube to a little bell attached to the headstone. If a dead person came back to life, all he had to do was ring his little bell till someone came and dug him up again.
I'm laughing now, picturing you on a bus or maybe in a fast-food restaurant, reaching into your pocket and finding your little bell and wondering to yourself where it came from, why you have it. Maybe you'll even ring it.
Happy birthday, buddy.
I don't know who figured out the solution to our mutual problem, so I don't know whether to congratulate you or me. A bit of a lifestyle change, admittedly, but an elegant solution, nonetheless.
Look to yourself for the answer.
That sounds like something out of a Hallmark card. I don't know when you thought it up, but my hat's off to you. Not that you know what the hell I'm talking about. But, honestly, a real brainstorm. After all, everybody else needs mirrors to remind themselves who they are. You're no different.
THE LITTLE MECHANICAL VOICE PAUSES, then repeats itself. It says, "The time is 8:00 a.m. This is a courtesy call." Earl opens his eyes and replaces the receiver. The phone is perched on a cheap veneer headboard that stretches behind the bed, curves to meet the corner, and ends at the minibar. The TV is still on, blobs of flesh color nattering away at each other. Earl lies back down and is surprised to see himself, older now, tanned, the hair pulling away from his head like solar flares. The mirror on the ceiling is cracked, the silver fading in creases. Earl continues to stare at himself, astonished by what he sees. He is fully dressed, but the clothes are old, threadbare in places.
Earl feels the familiar spot on his left wrist for his watch, but it's gone. He looks down from the mirror to his arm. It is bare and the skin has changed to an even tan, as if he never owned a watch in the first place. The skin is even in color except for the solid black arrow on the inside of Earl's wrist, pointing up his shirtsleeve. He stares at the arrow for a moment. Perhaps he doesn't try to rub it off anymore. He rolls up his sleeve.
The arrow points to a sentence tattooed along Earl's inner arm. Earl reads the sentence once, maybe twice. Another arrow picks up at the beginning of the sentence, points farther up Earl's arm, disappearing under the rolled-up shirtsleeve. He unbuttons his shirt.
Looking down on his chest, he can make out the shapes but cannot bring them into focus, so he looks up at the mirror above him.
The arrow leads up Earl's arm, crosses at the shoulder, and descends onto his upper torso, terminating at a picture of a man's face that occupies most of his chest. The face is that of a large man, balding, with a mustache and a goatee. It is a particular face, but like a police sketch it has a certain unreal quality.
The rest of his upper torso is covered in words, phrases, bits of information, and instructions, all of them written backward on Earl, forward in the mirror.
Eventually Earl sits up, buttons his shirt, and crosses to the desk. He takes out a pen and a piece of notepaper from the desk drawer, sits, and begins to write.
I don't know where you'll be when you read this. I'm not even sure if you'll bother to read this. I guess you don't need to.
It's a shame, really, that you and I will never meet. But, like the song says, "By the time you read this note, I'll be gone."
We're so close now. That's the way it feels. So many pieces put together, spelled out. I guess it's just a matter of time until you find him.
Who knows what we've done to get here? Must be a hell of a story, if only you could remember any of it. I guess it's better that you can't.
I had a thought just now. Maybe you'll find it useful.
Everybody is waiting for the end to come, but what if it already passed us by? What if the final joke of Judgment Day was that it had already come and gone and we were none the wiser? Apocalypse arrives quietly; the chosen are herded off to heaven, and the rest of us, the ones who failed the test, just keep on going, oblivious. Dead already, wandering around long after the gods have stopped keeping score, still optimistic about the future.
I guess if that's true, then it doesn't matter what you do. No expectations. If you can't find him, then it doesn't matter, because nothing matters. And if you do find him, then you can kill him without worrying about the consequences. Because there are no consequences.
That's what I'm thinking about right now, in this scrappy little room. Framed pictures of ships on the wall. I don't know, obviously, but if I had to guess, I'd say we're somewhere up the coast. If you're wondering why your left arm is five shades browner than your right, I don't know what to tell you. I guess we must have been driving for a while. And, no, I don't know what happened to your watch.
And all these keys: I have no idea. Not a one that I recognize. Car keys and house keys and the little fiddly keys for padlocks. What have we been up to?
I wonder if he'll feel stupid when you find him. Tracked down by the ten-minute man. Assassinated by a vegetable.
I'll be gone in a moment. I'll put down the pen, close my eyes, and then you can read this through if you want.
I just wanted you to know that I'm proud of you. No one who matters is left to say it. No one left is going to want to.
EARL'S EYES ARE WIDE OPEN, staring through the window of the car. Smiling eyes. Smiling through the window at the crowd gathering across the street. The crowd gathering around the body in the doorway. The body emptying slowly across the sidewalk and into the storm drain.
A stocky guy, facedown, eyes open. Balding head, goatee. In death, as in police sketches, faces tend to look the same. This is definitely somebody in particular. But really, it could be anybody.
Earl is still smiling at the body as the car pulls away from the curb. The car? Who's to say? Maybe it's a police cruiser. Maybe it's just a taxi.
As the car is swallowed into traffic, Earl's eyes continue to shine out into the night, watching the body until it disappears into a circle of concerned pedestrians. He chuckles to himself as the car continues to make distance between him and the growing crowd.
Earl's smile fades a little. Something has occurred to him. He begins to pat down his pockets; leisurely at first, like a man looking for his keys, then a little more desperately. Maybe his progress is impeded by a set of handcuffs. He begins to empty the contents of his pockets out onto the seat next to him. Some money. A bunch of keys. Scraps of paper.
A round metal lump rolls out of his pocket and slides across the vinyl seat. Earl is frantic now. He hammers at the plastic divider between him and the driver, begging the man for a pen. Perhaps the cabbie doesn't speak much English. Perhaps the cop isn't in the habit of talking to suspects. Either way, the divider between the man in front and the man behind remains closed. A pen is not forthcoming.
The car hits a pothole, and Earl blinks at his reflection in the rearview mirror. He is calm now. The driver makes another corner, and the metal lump slides back over to rest against Earl's leg with a little jingle. He picks it up and looks at it, curious now. It is a little bell. A little metal bell. Inscribed on it are his name and a set of dates. He recognizes the first one: the year in which he was born. But the second date means nothing to him. Nothing at all.
As he turns the bell over in his hands, he notices the empty space on his wrist where his watch used to sit. There is a little arrow there, pointing up his arm. Earl looks at the arrow, then begins to roll up his sleeve.
"You'd be late for your own funeral," she'd say. Remember? The more I think about it, the more trite that seems. What kind of idiot, after all, is in any kind of rush to get to the end of his own story?
And how would I know if I were late, anyway? I don't have a watch anymore. I don't know what we did with it.
What the hell do you need a watch for, anyway? It was an antique. Deadweight tugging at your wrist. Symbol of the old you. The you that believed in time.
No. Scratch that. It's not so much that you've lost your faith in time as that time has lost its faith in you. And who needs it, anyway? Who wants to be one of those saps living in the safety of the future, in the safety of the moment after the moment in which they felt something powerful? Living in the next moment, in which they feel nothing. Crawling down the hands of the clock, away from the people who did unspeakable things to them. Believing the lie that time will heal all wounds—which is just a nice way of saying that time deadens us.
But you're different. You're more perfect. Time is three things for most people, but for you, for us, just one. A singularity. One moment. This moment. Like you're the center of the clock, the axis on which the hands turn. Time moves about you but never moves you. It has lost its ability to affect you. What is it they say? That time is theft? But not for you. Close your eyes and you can start all over again. Conjure up that necessary emotion, fresh as roses.
Time is an absurdity. An abstraction. The only thing that matters is this moment. This moment a million times over. You have to trust me. If this moment is repeated enough, if you keep trying—and you have to keep trying—eventually you will come across the next item on your list.
Valovi
