Writing: Poetry
November 5, 2007
Wounded by the wicked
Too often insulted
Disarmed by her smiles
Mesmerized by her style
I found myself threaten
Smashed down and beaten
I wish I could respond
But find myself astond
By her matchless beauty
Her unique singularity
So I chose to depart
And play my best part
To forsake the one
And her glittery crown
What else should I have done?
Like her, lie, steal and then some?
But we are so different,
I'm a man, her? Just an infant
February 19, 2007
A lace falls down her left shoulder
Stops for a second half way
A second that feels like an hour
Then end its course and stay
A transition, a moment, a line
Her breast half skin, half silk still
The light thru the window
Partially opened illuminates
Her visage, her silhouette
A transition, a moment, a line
Part shadow, part delight
Telling the promise of a night
A half glow in her smile
Is it glee? Seems too fragile...
A transition, a moment, a line
Facing her, not standing
Not quite lying, just seating
On blankets and soft pillows
Her half body to me exposed
A transition, a moment, a line
Always after and before
The possibility of choices in our core
Bringing the fear of tomorrow
Tell me; from here, where do I go?
A transition, a moment, a line
Space. I need space these days.
She got up and after a small pause turned back at me smiling...bad sign.
"I have to go to the bathroom but I think we should talk..." she says. I grab my phone and call the cab company; speed dial #1 on my cell phone; convenient really.
I'm still putting my clothes back on when she comes back... She takes my hand and leads me to the living room where we sit down. After a small silence she asks; "What do you think of me?" Two days and she's asking me this...I'm screwed.
In all seriousness (as much as I'm capable of anyway) I reply; "Well, you have nice breasts. I like your breasts really..." She smiles. She must think I'm kidding. Fuck.
I met her in a bar...I was actually hitting and her girl friend - who happens to be a cute nurse. The nurse didn't care much for me so I asked her out instead. Anything not to be alone...
"Come on, be serious for a moment...I need to know what you think of me, as a person, seriously, can you stop focusing on my body for five minutes...I'm a doctor after all."
I hate when people ask me to be serious. I don't think they understand what that might bring. As the joke goes, most people are not happy when they get what they deserve...
She's a doctor. Right. I guess I'm supposed to be impressed or something...
"Well, if I were sick, your ability to tell my esophagus from my dick would be helpful but for now I'm just horny so I guess I'll stick to you having nice breasts...final answer."
"Get out! Now!"
I got up, took my jacket and got out. I'm sitting on the staircase outside. The cab shouldn't be too long now...
I find some irony in the fact that each year that passes by brings me one more reason not to fear death.
I have mixed feelings to say the least whenever someone asks me for help. Sure I feel some pride and maybe I feel a bit superior realizing that my words can have some impact on someone else's life...on the other hand, looking at myself, looking at this absolute waste, what does it say about those desperate enough to look up to me?
The last drop falls into my glass. I hold the bottle for a few second...then put it down; one more day, one more bottle. Red Breast; my favorite whiskey. I feel numb. I feel empty. Neither sad nor happy...my last expectations are long gone and I find some relief in that. I saw my doctor earlier today. He left me alone in his office, went out for a while to get my file, came back and sat down. I didn't even trust the silence while he was going thru my file...how am I supposed to trust his words then? After a few minutes he dropped the file and looked at me gravely; - "I have to be honest with you M. Fernandes" he starts... A pause. I think I'm supposed to care here or something...I'm supposed to be grateful to my own physician for actually not lying to me...how fucked up is that? Realizing that I'm not going to say anything he continues... - "Alcohol is destroying you. Even now, it might be too late. I mean, obviously we need to run more tests...I don't want you to lose hope because, you know, there is always hope but at this pace...well. I'd like you to understand how serious this is..." He kept talking for a while...I stopped listening for a while. There was something about my liver, about my life and things like that...I'm not sure. He said my name again... I looked up. I think he was done talking. I got up and thanked him...that's what he wanted I guess. So here I am, later the same day, finishing that glass, wondering how I could tell him. How can I explain that time is not the unit I use to measure life? How can I tell him that whiskey has already brought me more than modern medicine? From his own perspective alcohol is killing me. From my own, alcohol has postponed the end...buying me time really.
Was that life?
February 10, 2007
And now it's a tie...Final score is 2:2
Sorry, I was summing up the number of people, a handful really, who have successfully hurt me and the one who have helped me. It's a draw. Although I'm not being fair here; they didn't really help me and they certainly did not hurt me; I let them do that in both cases. I bear the entire responsibility really...
A Sushi restaurant in the Paris' suburb
That's the location. Time? About eighteen years ago. She said something to me and her words helped me for ten years. It doesn't get any better than that. I'm not sure she realized what she was doing and I'm not even sure these words were entirely intended to me. I like to think that she was talking for herself. That's really the way to help others if you ask me; to set an example by our actions, our choices, our words, allowing others to observe, even from a safe distance, to perceive our reality, our predicaments and the way we handle things. Allowing others to see the problem in its full; causes and circumstances, reflection, decision...and the consequences; both for ourselves and those surrounding us.
Paris
Time? Four years ago and a year after that. One killed me and the other changed my life. No, actually I have to take those words back again. One led me to suicide and the other gave me the key to immortality. You know what's funny? I loved the first one better. I wish I could forgive her but I'm the only one to blame and forgiveness is just not something I'm ready to reward myself with...not for committing such a crime.
I barely knew the other. I met her in an Irish pub...Chatted with her a few times. We hung out for a while. She was kind of crazy...who talks about literature in an Irish pub anyway? But to quote Yeats, I will turn the talk by hook or crook until her praise should be the uppermost theme. She made me understand that, in fact, I was Howard Roark.
The character is from a novel called "The Fountainhead".
Howard Roark is an architect. He wasn't born that way though. Every single decision he ever made brought him there. He owes everything to himself. He is the most selfish man who's ever walked this earth. Howard is both the means and the end to his own happiness. Others are allowed to watch...or turn around. Some have decided that Howard needed to be destroyed. Among them most did not understand Howard Roark but his fiercest opponents are the ones who understand his character too well; Ellsworth Toohey is one of them.
Howard Roark's last creation - A temple dedicated to the greatest Men - is destroyed and the architect is pushed away from the city...a swindle - and the consequential trial that follows - organized by Ellsworth himself brings Howard Roark down for a few years...at least from Ellsworth's point of view. Most likely Howard Roark didn't even notice that he as lost everything; from his own perspective, HE his everything.
The scene takes place several months after the trial. Howard Roark faces the Temple (that has since been redesigned by several other architects) for the first time. Ellsworth comes out of the temple and walk towards his enemy in order to have a taste of his personally victory. What he wants is quite obvious; he wants Roark to acknowledge the fact that he has been hurt, the prerequisite being that, in fact, both men are part of the same universe, the same dimension.
- "M. Roark, we're alone here. Why don't you tell me what you think of me? In any words you wish. No one will hear us."
- "But I don't think of you."
I have been pushed around a few times myself. I have never cared much. Why should I care if someone pushes me? The distance makes me feel safer. How could I be an example to the idiots and the blinds anyway?
The reality is that I feel the same whenever I face emptiness, whether a piece of white paper or a flashing cursor on an empty screen. I don't feel small. I feel incredibly powerful. I don't really see the emptiness, the blank page. I see the possibilities of what can be.
It started about sixteen years ago I think. I was alone in an office, facing my computer, looking at the monochrome screen, a small cursor blinking on the left. No one around, no one to turn to for advice, not book to consult, no internet, the empty page, me alone with one goal in mind; the creation of a video game. Not something out of nothing, something out of me. That something could be everything I wanted it to be. I could have looked away, I could have walked way. I could have felt small, I could have felt powerless. Others did. If my view of Men had been different, most likely I would have. My view of Men is that they are powerful; they can do everything they set their mind to. I'm not talking here about the six billion of them, no...unfortunately no. I'm talking about the handful who carry the world - our civilization really - on their shoulders; I'm talking about the greatest and the few. The most selfish ones whose creations have been used by all...By all I mean the plebian crowd "who has been crawling around for a century without saying thank you or please".
It is Gail Wynand speaking now "I would give the greatest sunset in the world for one sight of the New York's skyline. Particularly when one can't see the details. Just the shapes. The shapes and the thought that made them. The sky over New York and the will of man made visible. What other religion do we need? And then people tell me about pilgrimages to some dank pesthole in a jungle where they go to do homage to a crumbling temple, to a leering stone monster with a pot belly, created by some leprous savage. Is it beauty and genius they want to see? Do they seek a sense of the sublime? Let them come to New York, stand on the shore of the Hudson, look and kneel. When I see the city from my window - no, I don't feel how small I am - but I feel that if a war came to threaten this, I would like to throw myself into space, over the city, and protect these buildings with my body."
Men can't really hurt others. Some might choose to let others hurt them. Those are not victims; they are criminals. By their actions, they set quite a miserable example of Men.
I was a criminal earlier today; I let her hurt me. The fourth one I mean. I should have known better. I hope I will forgive myself for this...one day.
February 7, 2007
Reading these lines and pages, one might get the feeling that there are no people in my life...with good reasons. I don't talk about people, I never do. I talk about individuals sometimes but only in respect of their relations to society. I talk about people, one or six billions. I don't talk about the one, or the ones.
There is no "one" really (that I know of anyway)...there are plenty of "ones" on the other hand.
I'm looking for a concept that could be applied to "The ones"...otherwise I'm afraid that little text won't be comprehensible. I could go with "Friends" I guess...although I'm not a big fan of that concept...too many expectations attached to it. But "Acquaintances" might offend some...so I'll just use "Friends" while refraining from my strong desire to affix to it a set of double quotes.
Naming names...why? I don't really feel comfortable doing so. I don't like prying and it seems to me that if total strangers, while reading these lines, were to link names and stories, well...this would almost be voyeurism, don't you think?
But really, do names matter anyway? Would Stacey be different if she was named Marissa? I'm sure there are interesting studies on how our names can influence our behavior and participate to some indefinable extent to who we are...I shall discard these, as I would discard any attempt (literary or otherwise) stating that, somehow, Men are something else that the sum of their - free obviously - actions. To anyone who would disagree with that last statement, I would just ask one highly rhetorical question; do you want to be judge for what you are or for what you do assuming that, from your own perspective, these are two different things? To restate it in a different manner; knowing that you are - again from your own perspective - the product of a society, of a civilization, of a class system, what would you think if someone were to say those simple words to you; "I love you". What would be the meaning of such a strong statement if you truly believe that the very essence of your soul as nothing to do with your actions as a Man? To sum-up; Do you want to be judge and possibly loved for something you are, in fact, responsible for or for something that "just happens to be there", some random idiosyncrasies? And even in the sad case where your sell-esteem unfortunately reached this unlikely low level, what would that really mean about the person who actually utter the lovely statement; "You love me? So what? I'm not responsible for what ‘me' is anyway..."
To be honest, I have never met a person who would go as far as making this statement. On the other hand I met many people who had such a view of life, both for themselves and for others - but were not honest enough to push the analysis to its gloomy conclusion.
Don't get me wrong, I am not claiming here that others don't have any influence whatsoever or that their thoughts and beliefs should be discarded as irrelevant; I am only stating that there ought to be a priority between the sources of influences; first, our own will THEN only, others'.
Existentialism states that our consciousness changes when one is looked at. It is a mistake that created an unfortunate error.
The mistake is in the choice of words; Consciousness. This is a quality of mind that pertains to self-awareness. It doesn't change in any circumstances. Whether I'm alone for several days or in a stadium with sixty thousand other human beings, the awareness that "I am" doesn't change. What might change is my behavior. But regardless of the circumstances, I still am responsible for my actions and my consciousness has nothing to do with it.
The error generated by this statement is that it removes Man from the responsibility of its own actions. Man, inside society, becomes a slave to its own consciousness, cursed to follow a behavior arbitrarily enforced by an ever-changing surrounding. Since to be free implies "To be the source of your own actions" the statement is also in absolute contradiction to the existentialist philosophy who supposedly emphasizes freedom as one of its main attribute. No wonder Sartre thought he was in hell.
The one thing that might actually change when one is looked at is not one's consciousness but one's behavior but that fact remains a matter of personal choice. This choice might take into account our surroundings, family, society, civilization and other influences (and thru those influences, our knowledge and prejudices) but the priority here is still the same; 1) my choice 2) others'.
Sorry, I guess I got sidetracked again...
Names? What for really? Enough to say that THEY are. They are everything.
They are women or men, writers, photographers, painters or musicians. They are students or workers or both. They are married or single, have kids or not. Some drink and party as much as they can, some don't. Some smoke weed and/or do ecstasy...it doesn't matter really. I guess they all have at least one thing in common; little me. For some unknown and certainly different reasons they appreciate my company. For this I thought I would say thanks today.
So yes, thank you Marissa, Stacey, Alison, Shannon, Annalisa, Claire and Maria. Thank you Valerie, Megan "baby girl", Micah and Megan. Thank you Bryan, Brent, Enzo.
January 27, 2007
Working out
About nine month ago I started working out for the first time ever in my life. Why? No particular reason really. Just circumstances. The company I work for have had a good year so they offered all their employees a membership to a gym...a very nice one. So I thought "Why not?"
The thing I wanted to know is this; Is that difficult to lose some weight?
In the US more than in France there's some sort of trend to victimize permanently the "weak" while blaming the "strong" regardless of their respective responsibility in any matters. Arguably, this is not a American exclusivity, but I feel it quite strongly here for some reason.
Anyway, as can be expected, the "overweight" are also considered victims; Victims of the food chains, fast food and others, victim of their metabolism... you see the picture.
Since I was only a few pounds away from being myself considered as overweight (at least from the rather strict American standards) I decided to lose some weight.
Soon enough I ended-up going seven days a week for about two hours each time, then I slowed down a little, now by doing about three or four sessions of a minimum of two hours each day.
Result after nine months? Lost thirty pounds of fat and gain about 5 pounds of muscles.
The only downside is that I need new pants.
On the plus side I weight barely 140 pound and I can hike in the mountains more easily.
This just really confirmed what I already knew. Losing weight is only a matter of two things; How much you eat Versus How much you burn. The rest is (excuse my French) absolute bullshit.
Truth be told; that's about the easiest thing I've ever done in my life.
January 18, 2006
No more coffee for me. As an experiment (no health reason) I am quitting caffeine. Starting today.
December 29, 2006
Lost
Day one
It's been a great day I must say. I've been driving around for many hours in the colorful mountains of Utah, around Capitol Reef. Mainly dirt roads known as jeep trails. It's winter okay and sure, there's some snow on the ground but nothing I can't handle. I let the car slide and enjoy the view, as it deserves. The road crosses a stream - or maybe the stream crosses the road...who knows? I enter the water making a strong right turn driving now along the riverbank. I hear the water hitting the bottom of the car...it's all good. Fifty feet later I make a strong left turn and exit the stream on the other side. It is below freezing temperature and the sky is a pale blue as winter skies are often. This is certainly not the best conditions for photography but I really don't care...I'm just glad to be driving around, away from the malls of Denver, Colorado. Away from the crowds of people making their late Christmas shopping...away from the frenzy...away from the fools.
As I drive thru the northern part of the park, the snow gets thicker. I finally end-up facing a sign telling me that the trail is closed a bit farther west; I won't be able to make the complete loop as I was planning to. I could turn around of course but who wants to do that? Certainly not me. Those who've met me know that the last thing on earth I would do is drive on a road I've already driven...that's just not what I do. I decide then to drive north, for twenty-five miles to reach the highway...somewhere. I pass along a butte called the Salomon temple...getting out of the car to take a few shots I notice a snowstorm, miles away, coming from the south. I keep driving, now on a heavy blanket of snow that covers everything. I reach a colorful mesa. The road turn left and right a hundred times...going up and down...it's like a giant roller coaster. The landscape is beautiful. It reminds me of the badlands in South Dakota...except for the snow.
I finally reach the highway in mid afternoon.
I must say here that this driving totally built up my confidence. There is really nothing I cannot do today and I decide to go back, south in the midst of these roads as soon as I can. After a few miles going east on the highway I exit and turn right. A quick look at my map and I'm on my way...this 4x4 road should keep me busy for a couple of hours really; nothing big...or so I think.
I reach the intersection I expected to see and keep going east...after a few miles, going up a small hill, it becomes obvious that I'm not on the right track...this is definitely not a road...or a trail for that matter or anything I would want to be on with something that is not a snowmobile. I turn around for just a few miles and turn north in order to reach the highway...enough playing for today. Time to reach a safe haven for the night. Soon the road turns east...then southeast. It must be for a short distance I think...this trail has to go north. Another look at my map tells me what I already know; that there's just no trail going southeast anyway. I keep driving for an hour going left and right amidst the dunes. Now, two things are becoming obvious every minute that goes by. The first is that I have no idea where I am or where this trail - if it is one - is going. The second is that I'm pretty much heading towards a snowstorm in the middle of a desert somewhere in Utah.
I keep driving. The temperature falls as the weak winter sun slowly disappears away, behind the mountains. The trail soon becomes a wash...the wash a trail...and so on...for one more hour. I drive...I keep driving, my arms turning the wheel right and left almost mechanically now, my full attention dedicated to the trail...to the snow...to the ice. After a strong left turn I see a huge patch of ice a few feet in front of the car...too late to stop. I let the car slides, touching nothing. There's nothing I can do now anyway but hold my breath. I know that the slightest mistake will cost me my jeep, at least. The car slides...luckily in the direction of the trail...I made it.
In the midst of all these turns I'm not realizing that the trail has been going up slowly for a miles. Now it goes down strongly in barely two hundred feet distance with only one switchback in the middle...first part is clear but there some snow after the switchback. I barely have time to take a mental note that this passage would be impossible if it was covered with snow as I see a sign on the right telling me that from then on the road is no longer maintained by the county...So the pure hell I've been going thru for the past hours? That was it? That was on a road being maintained??? Nice...
A hundred feet farther I stop the car and see the reason of the sign; sand. The trail makes a strong right turn and the turn is covered by enough sand to sink anything that as wheels. I stop the car, get out and start walking around to assess that new difficulty. On the left, in the middle of the turn, lies an old pickup truck from the 70s...a carcass of rust really. On the ground I see a bunch of flat rocks, most of them broken. This tells me that some people got stuck...and got out. I go back in the car, drive a few feet forward...stop and get out again...I can't do it. After a few minutes pacing around I realize that the sand seems less fluid on the inside of the curve. If I can put two wheels in there...maybe...
I take my chance. The left side of the car gradually sinks as I slowly progress toward the middle of the curve but the car doesn't stop...I pass.
After a while the trail has totally disappeared. It's only a wash now, a wash following blindly the deserted landscape. I jump suddenly on the brakes. The car stops reluctantly. I get out and contemplate dumbfounded the half trail in front of me...yes, a half road only. The left part of it that is...the rest has fallen about ten feet below ground level. I stay there looking at it for a few minutes. This doesn't bode well.
I park the car, trying to get it leveled as I always do when I sleep in the back. Tomorrow will bring me some answers I think as I lay down for a cold night sleep watching the first snowflakes slowly falling on the car, slowly covering the windows...
Day two
Silence. Darkness. After what feels like a sleepless night, morning comes. My eyes are opened but I can't see a thing...I already know what that means. I put my shoes on and slowly open the door of my car. A huge block of snow falls right in front of me...some of it in the car. I couldn't care less. What I care about is not inside the car but outside, in front of me or, to be more precise, everywhere around me...a white blanket of snow covers everything...even the sky it seems. White sky on white snow. A white trail in a white desert. It's 8am. The dim light of the morning sun, barely piercing the clouds and too weak to create any shadow, gives a surreal impression of the surroundings. I waste a few minutes, in the cold, trying to heat up some water for my morning "instant coffee"...in vain. The watery coffee will be tedious this morning. I don't care. Sadly there's nothing I care much about this morning; the cold, the snow, the mountains all around or even the fact that I don't have the slightest idea of my location. I know I should shake myself up, wake up for Christ sake and do something; make plans, ACT.
After a few minutes I made up my mind. I will let the car here and hike the trail in front of me...see where it goes. Maybe I will find something, a sign, some tracks, something that helps me figure out how the hell I'm gonna get out of that one...seriously, what's happening here? Does it actually make any sense? I'm not in a third world country here! I'm in the freaking United States! Who get lost in...calm down...I must think...I must focus, focus on my primary goal. Suddenly something strange happens...everything changes in my perception of things. The time stops. There's no yesterday, no tomorrow, only now...NOW is what matters.
I start hiking. The trail parts in two somewhere in front of me...for now I will go north. I follow an imaginary line on the left side of what I believe is a trail, trying to pack the snow as I walk, imagining the place where I should put the left wheels of my car later on...in case I decide to take my chances on this path. Soon the trail goes up, heading towards the top of a mesa. The rock formations, followed by the trail, form some sort of staircases, first going up...then going down. Soon it becomes obvious that this represent a dead end for my car. I wouldn't want to travel that path in summer time on a clear afternoon...it would be insane to bring the car in here...I keep walking anyway. After a few hours, with no sign of life anywhere around, I have no choice but to turn around. The wind blows gently but when I reach the car at around noon, the traces of footstep I left in the morning are almost gone...
I'm tired. Beyond that? Not much...I'm not cold....maybe a little but who cares. I'm not hungry, I'm not sad. I'm nothing really. I force myself to eat something and I leave the car again, this time trying to follow the second part of the trail that goes somewhere east. I hike...walking like a zombie now, trying not to think of my condition, convinced that there isn't one thought, one idea, that could help me now...only walking. That's what I need to do. A howl somewhere, I don't know where it comes from. The snow creates a strange acoustic and makes it impossible to locate the source...some wild animal I think. I realize that I should probably carry a knife or some sort of weapon with me but what is the use of making a list of the thing I should do? Of the things I should have done? Even the question seems silly to me now...because NOW is the only thing that matters. That's what I keep telling myself...as I walk. At around 3pm I reach a clearing...it is a huge open space and I can see miles away in front of me. It's a figure of speech of course because what I see is...nothing. A giant patch of white lies in front of me, the horizon and the ground welded together somewhere in the distance...colorless. There's a mound on my left that catches my attention for some reason...there's something about it. The small knoll is covered with snow on one side but not so much on the other...it is of a bluish color, cracked by decades, maybe centuries, of absolute dryness...save for the few snowstorms I guess. A few blocks of yellow boulder are scattered around the mound. There is something...something about this place that...that...suddenly it strikes me; this is a cemetery! A cemetery of old rocks. As crazy as the thought might sound in something that I would consider to be another reality, there is now just no doubt in my mind...At this instant, the picture is just too striking. The giant rocks are skeletons. Head, torsos, dismembered bodies in decay...sensing the end of their lives they came here, to that remote place, to die. I shake my head and look away, trying to get the insane vision out of my mind...in vain. I feel cold and suddenly realize that I fell on my knees...somehow. I'm exhausted. I stay here, in the snow, with no strength left, miles away from any living soul, from any manmade objects of any sort. Who's gonna care anyway? It's not like someone is waiting for me...Nobody home, worrying. I stay there.
I don't know why I stayed there and I don't know why I finally got up...I wish I could tell. I wish I could pretend that I, myself, was in control but if I know one thing is that this would just be a lie...the reality is that I really know nothing about the nature of the force driving me at that particular moment.
It's a powerful force really. That's all I know. That's all I can tell. The light is fading as I walk back - hopefully to my car, in that gray immensity. I don't know for how long I walked; I'm not watching the time. My eyes are fixed on something that looks less and less like a series of footsteps and more and more like...nothing. It's about 8pm now and it's dark...I keep walking as the snow starts to fall again.
Luck maybe? Chance? Fortune? Call it what you will but I finally see a silhouette in front of me...that's the jeep.
I prepare myself for another night in this place.
Day three
Cold. There's a good sixteen-inch of snow everywhere. The sky is clear and the thermometer tells me it is five degree Fahrenheit this morning. I don't bother trying to heat up some water for the coffee and instead start scrapping the frost from the windows...inside the car. That wakes me up ok.
I will turn the car around and drive back to an intersection I remember crossing two days ago. I will try to follow the road turning right at the intersection I tell myself...who knows?
I turn on the ignition; switch the car to low gear and start driving on first gear...the snow reaches to the bottom of the car almost continuously. I drive at five miles an hour...sometime almost ten, hoping for the best. A left turn. I'm being a bit optimistic and the car slides toward a giant boulder outside the curve...I brake; that's stupid. The car slides then finally stops a few inches before hitting the damn thing. A good wakeup call...I cannot afford any mistake I tell myself again and again. From now on, I take all the turns by putting the wheels as close to the inside of the curve as possible...just in case. Works fine...so much so that I even pass the sandy curve with the rusty truck without noticing it this time...I stop the car right after though.
I'm facing a twenty-percent climb on snow with a switchback in the middle...and a cliff on the left side. I try to think about what I will have to do to get to the top; first launch the car fast enough so it doesn't get stuck in the middle of the ascent, then a small left turn toward the cliff and then a strong right in order to put the wheels in the direction of the second part of the climb while stepping on the gas...I repeat the movement a few times...then launch the car.
Arriving in the middle of the slope, as the car slides now almost perpendicular to the trail, I step on the gas to the full. For what seems to be an eternity the car keeps sliding, and then literally jumps toward the top of the hill in a deafening roar...I reach the summit in barely two seconds before I stop.
I stay at the wheel for a minute, trying to breath, my heart pounding at 160 a minutes. I get out of the car and look back down the slop, looking at the tracks on the snow; ten inches from the cliff. I've never been so angry with myself. I pave around the car asking myself why? Why would I do that? Why take such risk, now, here? I'm so mad; I turn back to the car and without thinking for a second put all my strength in a giant kick at my front left wheel...the pain - and the fact that I just broke something - immediately calm me down. I bury my right foot in the snow hoping that the cold will numb the pain...for a moment at least. After a few minutes I go back in the car and take three Advil one after the other; a broken toe is not that painful but I don't need the distraction on top of the rest I think.
The rest of the drive is uneventful. I don't know if it's the fatigue, the lassitude, the cold or the Advil...I drive mechanically for hours in a dream of white snow. I'm so out that when I finally notice the highway half a mile in front of me I'm actually surprised. I stop the car, looking at the sign on the side of the road, looking at the trucks passing by, looking at the first signs of actual life for three days. One would think I'd smile...I'm not smiling. I am not smiling.
Seems to me that the hardest part of the writing process is to sit down at my desk.
The French talks as if they knew everything and act as if they knew nothing; For the Americans, it's the other way around.
Denver, May 8th 2006
I punched her in the face.
I don't even know why.
That was three months ago or so
But even then I had no idea what took me
It's just one of these things I guess
One of these fucking days where
Everything turns to shit.
I got home early, poured myself a drink
Then another, and another...why not?
What else could have gone wrong
after such a fucking day?
As soon as she got home we started arguing
for no reasons...The usual I call it.
We used to do that a lot.
That's just the way it was.
One of these relationships you know
It kept it alive...or so I thought.
Still it doesn't look like me...it's not. It can't be.
One word. One pick that I can't swallow,
My hand turns to a fist and it's done.
She fell back on the couch. I sat there few feet away.
So we stayed, I don't know how long
Looking at each other. Still. Silently.
I remember wondering what would be the worst;
Either hearing the first word or uttering it.
This word would be a sentence
And this sentence would be the end.
I just couldn't, you know? End it I mean.
She's the one who finally had the guts
She got up, said "bye" and walked thru that door.
That was the last time I saw her.
I thought I would never hear from her again
...Until earlier this week.
She OD'd a few days ago I was told
Her brother called me. He came into town.
To take care of things you know...
He didn't know anybody so he just went
Thru her cell phone directory and called everybody
For some reason she had kept my number
I didn't know what to say...so I shut up
Always the best thing to do
That's why I'm here, among these people
A few black suits, a few black dresses,
A few tears...some probably sincere.
I didn't know what to say...so I said "bye".
I guess I owe her that much.
____________________________________________
It's my spot. There, right beneath the tree.
I don't come here much but the guys know my name.
I could get closer to the wall, closer to the heat
But I don't care about it that much.
Unlike these guys I have a place to go...
If I wanted to that is...if I wanted to.
A few cardboards, a few newspapers...
A bottle of cheap booze. That's all it takes.
I know I'm not one of them but I just don't care
They know it too and that's all that matters.
That club is as closed up as any other.
I come here from time to time
when I don't feel like going home...
It lasts a few days or a few weeks.
I stay there; hang out with the guys,
Buy them a few rounds...less I can do.
Makes me feel like I belong...
Like I'm part of something a bit bigger
than me...just for a while at least...
He's name's Felix.
He's the dude lying over there.
Jeez the guy stinks...looks like shit.
He's been sick for a while.
If he could walk he would have kicked
Me away for some time...instead he's
Just bitching about random stuff.
I know he just wants me to leave.
That's how they protect each other;
By distancing themselves
when thing's are going badly...
I guess it's almost time now.
I'll get up, buy a bottle of jack,
A burger to go...maybe put a few
Ones in the paper bag you know,
and drop everything by his side.
This should fix him right up...
Modern medicine never came even close
to helping him than this evening treats.
Denver, February 26th 2006
After reading Charles Bukowski...
My glass lights up suddenly
Someone has turned the lights on
I pray my gods, the demons and the whores
To help me. I gather my strength
And raise my head
I see the chairs up side down
I empty my amber glass
and put it down noisily
The waitress says something
About calling a cab for me
I'll walk, I say, getting up
A blond girl sitting near the door
Laugh as I pass by and leave
The streets are empty and cold
It feels just like home I think
wondering why I should go back
The sound of broken glass wakes me up
I turn in my bed trying to hang on
To the last remnants of unconsciousness
And pass out for a few more minutes
The bitch storms in and yell something
About getting the hell up and leaving
She sounds pissed off and,
I gather, probably broke something
As the arrogant rays of the morning light
Filter from the drapes, blinding me,
I realize that it's her place and not mine.
I hear the water running in the bathroom
I get up as fast as I can ignoring
the pain of my aching body
I gather my clothes and get dressed
In the kitchen, I empty her cup of coffee
And slam the door on my way out.
I wonder how she looks like...
She's been working her way up
at the bar for the past two hours
From the end, near the stage
I'm sitting on the opposite side.
I have been working too I guess
For a bit longer though
My drink is getting old so to speak.
She finally reaches the sit next to mine.
After getting dump by the entire aisle
She can't expect much; my kind of girl.
I ask for another whiskey
and whatever the girl is having
She says her name's Stacey as if I cared.
I let the silence settles for a few minutes
Looking straight at Jill on the stage
Playing something from Ani DiFranco
I finally recognize the song after a while
Too bad her guitar is more accurate than her voice.
Stacey leans over and asked me if I'd like
To fuck her; Jill that is. Jealousy I guess.
I reply that I can't perform on stage
Get up and leave for the bathroom.
I won't lock the door, I know she will.
As I face the wall watching my drinks passing by
She sits on the trash at the opposite corner
And sniffs something out of a silver bullet
Do you want to get high? She asks
I have my own way if you don't mind
I say, turning, facing her now
She comes closer and as I stand there
Starts giving me a hand job.
I find it easier not to look at her
And notice how ugly this room is
I'm done before Jill stars her next song.
I leave the room and let her clean up.
I throw ten bucks passing by the counter
The waitress looks nicer than I first thought
Never mind her piercing and tattoos
Stepping out on the sidewalk I think
Stacey deserves the two drinks I've left behind
I light a small cigar and start walking
toward the next bar. The night is young.
She called me this morning.
I haven't heard from her for months.
I thought about telling her to fuck off
But to tell you the truth, I've spent
The last few weeks locked up in my den
Not a big fan of people these days
So I guess I could use the excuse to go out
She wanted to have dinner;
said it's important that we talk...
She always talked too much if you ask me.
So here we are, facing each other
In a overly priced restaurant.
I always choose great restaurants when
I don't know what to expect from them...
That way if the conversation is boring
I can still enjoy the food. I always do.How have you been? She asks...
Good. Why did you call?
I needed to talk to you about something...
Well, go ahead. You probably have five
Or ten minutes before they brink my steak.
It's about your writing, the latest I mean...
Since when do you care about that?
You've never read anything from me.
Why in hell would you start now?
I needed to know if it's true...
Words always are. How do you mean?
Did it really happen? I mean...your stories...
Is that really who you are?
We lived together for six months and you're
Trying to get a picture of me thru my writings? Now?
Well...It's like I don't really know you.
You never did. And it's not like you've tried anyway...
I don't like your writing but I need to know!
Sorry honey, time's up. My steak has arrived.She tried a couple times to ask again
While we were eating...in vain.
I always thought that truthfulness should
Remain the least important aspect in any
Literary work. Theme? Style? Logic?
Characterization? Yes. Yes. Yes and yes.
Whether a story is true or not has always
Been a question I found utterly irrelevant.
Not too long ago I went to the Arches, Utah
I took some sunset shots of one of them
And decided to stay there a few hours more
I knew I didn't have my flashlight with me
The view of the milky way was so nice at present
That I didn't really care about things to come
The moon had not arisen yet and I couldn't see
more than a few feet in front of me on my way back
I must have lost the trail a hundred times
The uncertainty of what lies ahead
My total inability to know for sure what to expect,
where I stand and where I'm going,
This helplessness made me think about relationships.
As I get older, I find it harder to trust others
Maybe it's the complexity of the world around us
Leading people to compromise and lose themselves
Maybe it's their self-consciousness, their will to please
Everyone, their unwillingness to take a stand
Overall, their total inability to deal with reality
That I find the most deceiving in nearly all people
They seem to have forgotten this old adage
One should hate his enemy as much as he loves his friends
What are they after when they show themselves so complaisant?
Sugar? I've never cared that much for dogs.
I think that's why I like drunk people. They can't lie.
If someone had enough to drink; what you see is what you get.
The only people who remain the same whether they're sober or drunk
Are the most honest ones; the one with nothing to hide.
I always find it amusing when someone uses drunkenness
As an excuse for a particular deed or a rather inappropriate remark.
Denver, February 25th 2006
On photography as an art...
I always look at other people's work with admiration. Probably more than their work actually deserves I guess...One of my hope is that , some day, I will take a good photo. A photo that could qualify as Art. Not just a nice photo that is. I took plenty of this latter kind. So much so that I'm getting tired of it. Or at least I try to slow down a bit...To take less photos and think more about how to take photos. I'm still not sure if this whole thing makes sense. Lately I think I made a step forward in my understanding of Art in the field of photography.
I should probably explain here that my goal is absolutely and totally selfish. I certainly don't care about other people ideas on photography and I couldn't care less about selling "my work".
That being said I really am attracted to artistic photos and I do feel the need to understand how to create one. This led me to ask myself this almost naïve question; what is a work of art?
If I was a mystic of some kind I would probably be happy with answers such as; "It's a work that touches the soul...."
Sure. Why not?
I'm not a mystic. I only believe in things that exist and discard the rest. I also discard the ones who actually believe in things that don't exist as people who do not exist. I find it comforting.
Anyway. I came to think about how we - humans that is - come to grasp concepts. From Ayn Rand theory, concepts are always - either directly or indirectly - related to reality. That is to say they are related to our perception of reality (Mystics tend to make a difference between the two...I don't). Our senses represent the link between reality - things as they are - and our understanding of this reality. Which might be - and arguably most of the time is - an approximation. In order to grasp a new concept a child needs two or more occurrences of the same object. Only one occurrence would lead the child to associate later the new concept to a "proper name" not to a "common name" ("THE chair" instead of "A chair" for instance). In order to grasp the possible plurality, one needs more than one occurrence. The upper limit is defined by our perceptual limitation; how many objects of a same kind at a given time. This limit is for most people rather low and numbers (another concept) is what we use in order to brake the limitation of our perception. The different phases of the understanding of a new concept are therefore the following; 1) Something is. 2) Things that are, share in some extent a certain number of attributes. 3) These things are different from other things.
Lastly, we associate a message (either auditory or/and visual) to finalize our concept.
Perception, Dissociation and Association.
Our ability to "wisely" choose to what extent a given difference is relevant enough to justify the creation of a new concept is what I would call intelligence.Coming back to what a work of art is, I came recently to the conclusion that it was a work that most and foremost "talk" to our perception level. Our intellect - that is our ability to manipulate and call for well-known and existing concepts in order to understand what we perceive - is left aside at least for a certain time. If we are dealing with abstract art, our intellect will always remain at the door. In the case of macro photography, we might need a certain time to understand - that is to associate the new object to existing conception to - the object of art. Macro photography is also a paradigm of what art should be from the very words of Ayn Rand; A selective reproduction of reality.
How is that helping? Here's why I believe the idea is relevant;
I took a photo of a tree recently. To sum up, I saw a tree on the side of the road while driving in Utah. I parked, walk around the tree for ten minutes before I decided that the photography would be valuable (to me obviously).
The finale photography was absolutely and totally ugly.
Why is that?
I believe that my first vision of the tree (from the road) was "correct" as far as photography is concerned. However, what I had in mind after ten minutes walking around was not the tree as I perceived it but instead was the tree as I understood it. Photography can reproduce - and more importantly restate - our perceptions. Photography can not however reproduce our understanding of things (other type of media might actually be able to do just that but I've never cared much about movies)Some people probably call this "instinctive" photography. I think I understand a little better what they mean.
Denver, August 8, 2005
De bon cœur, j'ai plongé dans cette avalanche
qui a recouverte mon âme ;
lorsque je ne suis pas le bossu que vous apercevez
Je dors sous les collines dorées
Vous, qui aimeriez vaincre la douleur
vous devez apprendre, apprendre à me bien servir
Vous me bousculez par accident
en allant extraire votre or.
Cette infirme que vous habillez et nourrissez
n'a pas froid et n'est pas affamé
il ne demande pas votre compagnie
pas au centre, au centre du monde.
Lorsque je suis sur un piédestal,
ce n'est pas à vous que je le dois.
Vos lois ne me contraignent pas
à m'agenouiller, grotesque et désarmé.
Je suis, moi, le piédestal
de cette bosse hideuse que vous regardez fixement
Vous, qui aimeriez conquérir la douleur,
Vous devez comprendre ce qui me rend aimable ;
Les miettes d'amour que vous m'offrez,
sont les miettes que j'ai laissées derrière.
Votre douleur ne vous procure aucun droit ici
Elle n'est que l'ombre, l'ombre de ma blessure
J'ai commencé à me languir de vous
Moi, qui ne suis pas avide ;
J'ai commencé à vous solliciter,
Moi, qui n'est aucun besoin
Vous dites vous être éloignée de moi
Mais je peux encore sentir votre souffle.
Ne vous habiller pas de ces haillons pour moi,
Je sais que vous n'êtes pas pauvres ;
Vous ne m'aimez plus si violemment
Maintenant que vous êtes pleine de doutes,
C'est votre tour, amour,
C'est de votre chair que je m'habille.
Translation of "Avalanche" - Leonard Cohen..
Denver, July 28, 2005
What would you think if you had my mind?
What would you say?
What would you feel with my heart? Pain.
What would you do? What would you have done?
Some things have changed and some have remained
The pain is gone; still I'm the same.
Tell me what has changed? Tell me what is gone?
What's left behind is I, alone.
Denver, July 20, 2005
Time, my Judas, my old friend, will you betray me?
Soon I'll have to go. But not tonight.
Denver, April 18, 2005
Photography is a selective process. Whether a certain set of shapes or a particular combination of lights and shadows triggers an emotion worth remembering is the first choice. From here, photos do exist. To choose which will be published - whatever type of media or the size of the potential audience - is a huge responsibility. Somehow, what has just been created must be destroyed so that the living remaining ones, the few, will shine brighter without ever being tarnished, sank, by the mediocrity of the majority.
Not a pretty thought really. This should lead me to be more selective, that is to say more aware of my goals whenever I take a picture.I found it rather difficult to take photos and, at the same time, to discover the city while I was in Prague. I could easily blame it on the richness of the city, on the difficulty, almost impossibility, to be selective, on the fact that so much beauty is almost overwhelming and that I can achieve nothing by trying to "capture" (what an awful word really) the beauty of the city...
I think there was something else that differentiated the action of viewing and the discovery in itself of this incredible city. Maybe it lies in the fact that each photography, in order to be even slightly successful (I obviously mean the achievement of its purpose, certainly not the validation or the agreement of a plebian crowd) needs to carry a global view, a part of the whole, of the city; view that I obviously didn't have during this first visit.
Denver, April 6th , 2005
I love this song...
"I know you have to go
you have gone before
we are fighting on two different fronts
of the same war
but no matter what else
I will do
I will wait for you" Ani DiFranco, The Waiting Song
Denver, March 27, 2005
Most people become numbers. Only a few are given the honor of keeping their name. When they die, men no longer have the last word; the media have. They receive a final orison, lying forever still, covered by a statistical shroud. Here? One disaster; A few hundred thousand victims. There? A war; twenty five thousand odd victims...but who's counting really? The dead don't count. Only the livings do. The livings count and are counting. Counting the bodies. Transforming lives into lies disguised as numbers. The world loves victims more and more ever since it stopped creating heroes. For the first time lately I got scared. I realized that I, too, could end up on a list that would transform everything I ever undertook, every word I've ever uttered, or written, into a lie. Transforming me into a victim. A victim; that is, someone unaware of the risk he takes by living. Unaware of the possibility of his own death. Innocent; that is, ignorant and childish. An irrational, unreasonable man.
Is there such a thing as an innocent civilian victim in time of war - that is in all times? I don't think so. Even less so in a democracy where by definition the people bear/share the responsibility of the idea, the image of its own country abroad. By accepting the label of citizen, a person makes a strong statement. The strongest of all.
I got scared realizing that the moderation of my words could be misleading. I felt the need to reiterate my position. Maybe it is my clothes that had you awfully mistaken, I should probably wear some sort of uniform instead. Maybe it is my keyboard...I should probably bear a gun. I wouldn't want anybody to misinterpret my words. My statement as a Frenchman living in the United States. Well aware of the fact that his new homeland can be in turn the theatre of the most brilliant achievements or the deadliest failure. Whether it's a drunkard crashing into my car, whether it's a earthquake tearing the ground apart under my feet, whether it's a stupid pothead emptying his gun in the room I happen to stand or a freaking terrorist blowing out his worthlessness few feet away from here, I will always refuse the right to anybody to classify me as a victim. I'm a soldier. I fight, defending my ideas, my convictions and my life. With a pen, not with a gun. I don't see how it's different? I refuse the difference. I refuse this line, this chasm built by the cowards who choose to put the blame of their own failure into the arms of an army corps while keeping the product of their few achievements to nourish their personal fame.
Extreme capitalism. What is that? Extreme? What does it mean? Is it supposed to be bad because it is extreme? The color of my shirt is extreme too. It's black. Is it bad as well? From what standard?
How can they be so naïve? So ignorant and so blind. So far left as to see the most moderate - and the only - application of capitalism as "extreme". Maybe I should start talking about neo-socialism. It would be rather easy to make the case that the "real" socialism actually died around 1923. On the pretence of protecting its people against external economic threat, socialism gives birth to - and feed - nationalism. By feeding nationalism, it isolates its people. This isolation shrinks the field of vision of the people, annihilates its potential to create, destroys its mind and finally leaves it there, empty, starving, craving hopelessly for some changes, ready to jump on every crumble left here cynically by its master.
I found it incredibly reassuring to think that someone in its early twenties could stand up somewhere in the Soviet Union of 1926 and say "No. I refuse to be a slave. I refuse to give up my mind for the good of others". Having socialism for only reference, Ayn Rand swore to spend the rest of her live fighting against socialism and its red monster. Fighting for free will. This ability to imagine an alternative to what is shown as the only possible reality is the greatest tribute to creativity.
"To the extent that an individual is rational, independent, uncompromising, passionate - to the extent that he tries to act according to his own mind and value judgments, his life under the rule of physical force becomes unendurable..." Ayn Rand, We The Living
Denver, February 19th , 2005
Tired. Exhausted. Craving for something new. Is that too much to ask? Hell I would settle for just a few words, even for one single thought that would not be incredibly boring. So hard to find someone who can utter a few words in a row that would not for once be full of obvious contradiction or bored me to death. I take long showers drinking coffee. The more I'm bored the longer the shower, the colder the coffee gets. Coffee has been so cold lately...I'm so tired. So exhausted. Did I mention that? There's a dime on the front seat of my car. Who cares? It's been here for weeks but I can't convince myself to remove it , that would require an act even less significant than the fact itself...so bored. So empty... I wish I could find a way to let it all out. I took some photos but I feel like I can't really bring anything to nature...barely bring nature to others. But others don't really care...they don't really read...don't really see don't understand. I use small simple words but still...I was thinking, drinking cold coffee that we should classify words by size...not alphabetically. First the numbers, only ten...then the vowels and only then small words...so meaningless. Small talk I mean. So full of nothing. Why do we need to write numbers with letters I wonder...I wouldn't try to write letters with numbers I guess. We could probably associate a few sentences to numbers; something like:
0) hi! 1) bye! 2) how are you? 3) very good 4) thanks
These verbal exchanges would be shorter...less painful, less boring...just a few numbers...and maybe an escape number; 9) Help.
I say 9...my interlocutor looks at me incredulous, thinking he must be mistaken...his eyes begging me to take it back...9... what did you say? 9...Why? I don't know...I thought...he looked at me, he didn't understand the verb I guess...he turned back and left hoping nobody had witnessed the dramatic scene. So tired...so exhausted. Did I mention that? I sneeze...hopefully it's pneumonia. I wish I could go but where? Cursed. Cursed to have ideas, thoughts...I wish I could be blind, deaf...dumb...numb. No that's a lie. I can't even wish that. That's how far the curse goes...Cursed to see, to understand...Why should I bother to talk? It's not like anybody's listening...it's not like anybody's thinking. I wish I could just drive...move. Action not words...always on the edge, the car would fall and I would bleed to death slowly. I know the body would get cold; like my coffee I think and laugh ...They always do. The bodies I mean. They get cold and they leave. I should do that in summer I guess. Escape. 9. So tired...so exhausted. Did I mention that? Is that all there is? Do I need a hand...maybe just a "end"...and I think about the fields of Somalia. Maimed hands everywhere on the ground, segregated from the rest; bloody left hands and right feet scattered everywhere. I remembered the act but couldn't find the meaning. Bloody ends...or is it? Maybe just a beginning but then why am I already so tired...so exhausted? I breath. Sorry, I know I should stop doing that. I apologize, will you forgive me?
It's probably time to go but there are so many ways. They told me they could not understand me...It's sad but I'm glad to see them acknowledge the limit of their intelligence.
Denver, February 10th , 2005
Running away, still.
I love words. Except some of them. I hate "Friend" or "Friendship" or the like...the binding kind. These bring expectation...Why would I call someone my friend? If I want to act a certain way, with a certain person, I want to do it because I wish to; not because I'm obligated to. Not because the audience expect me to... I don't expect anything from anyone...far too disappointing. Why should I allow anyone to expect something from me? I would see it as a violation of my freedom. I love to hate and hate to love.
To get married or not; to have kids or not; these are among the most important decisions a man will ever have to make in his life. I find surprising that these decisions are usually made following the most irrational of all feelings...I can't help but think that somewhere in the history of men something went terribly awry.
Fuck. There's a big misunderstanding about the F. word. Not only because words have only the meaning we attribute and that the interpretation is as much the responsibility of the listener than the speaker's, but also because it's not really a word; more an element of punctuation. Fuck is the "emphasizing mark" of the American language. Let's take an example: "What are you doing?" is a rather common question. The speaker expect an answer from the listener. However, in the sentence: "What the fuck are you doing?" we can pretty much guess that the speaker know damn well what the listener is doing and that he - the speaker - rather disagree with his audience. That much information in four letters is rather unbeatable. Why would someone wants to limit the usage of it is beyond me.
Denver, October 2004
Hopefully the next big update is for next week (Oct 24th) - will include photos from London, Paris, as well as Colorado, California and also Mexico.
Atlas Shrugged translation is not going too badly...check this out.
Just found this from Aristotle:
"Ce n'est pas un ami que l'ami de tout le monde."
"He who's the friend of all is not a friend"
Just to piss people off - eh eh eh...I'm really good at that: Cabo San Lucas, Baja California
Denver, October 2004
About the page "Text of the week"; Supposedly, this page should be updated every week. In a perfect world that's true. Unfortunately I have other stupid things to do like work and other stuff so I update it when I can. And I have a social life too (that's how I call the long term relationship I have with a twelve year old scotch strangely named Red Breast). Someone who's always there for you and does not change, ever, is really reassuring to have at your side in time of crisis. I think people who never drink are extremists. I don't like extremists too much. I think one needs moderation in all things. I'm not talking about jumping out of a bridge with rubber bands attached to your feet every morning...just once in a while. Moderation is the key. I never understood how someone could convince himself not to do something, ever.
I keep changing my mind about translation. First I thought translation was a stupid and incredibly boring thing to do. Then for a few months I thought it was the most fascinating thing, a whole new world. Cast into the unknown, between two worlds, the translator has to fight his way through from one to the other endlessly.
The truth is, translation is a very frustrating thing to do. No perfect solution. No straight lines between two languages. Between two simple words; a immense chasm to cross. And beside, how can I even dare to translate something when I have so much respect for the original author? I'm so much in awe of some of them...Few months ago I started to translate a few pages of Ayn Rand's "Atlas Shrugged". It wouldn't be accurate to say that this book changed my life but instead it actually confirmed my deepest beliefs in freedom and independence. I had my doubts before. Reading this book convinced me that I was right, that the ground I was standing on was the strongest. It convinces me that, yes, right and wrong DO exist. That it is our only duty to learn how to tell them apart. That men are free and not meant to be the slaves of any; their neighbors, their gods or their governments. I always knew it somehow and I believe the search for freedom, for happiness and independence is endemic to human nature. Each man is his own master.
It's actually not to bad to make a first translation; almost literal and then forget about the original and work on the translation to "clean" the whole thing. Cleaning being everything from simple punctuation change to a complete re-ordering of a specific phrase for either grammatical or esthetic reason. As usual I preach something I don't do; the current version (October 2004) is a first draft.I always despised the French Republic. More and more I think this republic holds the true France prisoner and has been doing so for the past one hundred and thirty odd years; since the murderers of the third republic killed the last revolutionaries, the last French men of the true France. I've found my own way to fight back. Hitting where it hurts; money. I stopped financing the very ones who wanted to destroy me. I left. I would encourage everyone to do the same but not everyone is ready; As Morpheus said "...And many of them are so inured, so hopelessly dependent on the system that they will fight to protect it". It's fine. We have time. We've been waiting for so long, by we and beside myself, I mean Louise.Michel, Elisabeth Dmitrieff, Gustave Flourens, Charles Delescluze, Raoul Rigault, Gustave Paul Cluseret and even Louis Rossel. Some politicians are so arrogant that they think they won't have to pay for their crimes. That's insane. Everybody does. The time will come when others will terminate this parody of democracy. This time, as Lenin so well understood, there will be no mercy. And don't ask for any legitimacy. Revolution doesn't need legitimacy. It is its own legitimacy.
Can't wait for the barricade. But watch out reader, we might end up on different sides. No hard feelings but I'm gonna have to terminate you.
I started to work again on the translation of Atlas Shrugged some while ago. Part of it actually; a speech found inside the book under the name "THIS IS JOHN GALT SPEAKING" / CHAPTER VII. It will be available in the so-called "Text of the week" section.
The book is not available in French. I can't even imagine how censorship can be as deeply anchored in the French literary world as to have such a incredible book out of the shelves for several decades knowing that the book was called in the 50s the second most influential book after the bible.
I always found the idea of opposition between the man of spirit and the man of power fascinating. There are a few words on that in Hermann Hesse's novel "The Glass Bead Game : (Magister Ludi)". Or in H. L. Mencken words..."The most dangerous man, to any government, is the man who is able to think things out for himself, without regard to the prevailing superstitions and taboos. Almost invariably he comes to the conclusion that the government he lives under is dishonest, insane and intolerable, and so, if he is romantic, he tries to change it. And if he is not romantic personally, he is apt to spread discontent among those who are."
I guess I'm not a romantic after all.
Denver, June 2004
I tend to see words, written or spoken, as light rays; once uttered, around forever. That's why we should be very careful with them. But we should never forget that unspoken words always leave us in the dark.
Denver, April 7th, 2004
True Colors.
Green of the first hopes, of the endless field of possibilities. Infinite and scary.
Yellow time of the harvest, surprises, good and bad. Setting sun of a day, ranging from the shyest smile of complicity to the swallowed tears upon the eyes of treachery.
Blue of the seas, of the earth. Blue of the infinite sky. Time of responsibility. Music and nostalgia.
Red of the suffering, of the terrible pain, of the living and the dead and those in between; waiting for their time. Brightest, crimson relief and unpredictable reversal of a life who refused to be.
Black, darkness of the closed wood, of our most secret thought and most vivid hatred. Dark silence of the doubts, of the unanswered questions.
White, of the finale light, of the forgiveness. Pale, inexpressible white, that would seem fair to the common souls seeing it for the first and the last time.
But not to me.
Denver, April 6th, 2004
Here again, fighting the invincible. Fighting myself too. Not knowing if I can help or if I'm actually the one that seems to always be in the way, slowing me down, out of breath; panting, aging, always older than I think. Broken English. Not quite so maybe. Shattered pieces of a precious but broken vase that I wish to see completed before my last hour. First the obvious, biggest pieces; easy, in the front, hit by a direct light. So obvious, nobody would expect them to be missing. Still, I had to go through all of them.
"Hi, how are you?"
From the first clumsy steps to the first inspiration.
Going round. Smallest. Not too obvious now. Faded sometime, inconspicuous pieces maybe. But how can we live without them? Pallid and distorted, quaint surely but essential."Am I still writing in the vernacular?"
Too far already, between two worlds who reject each other. Hidden pieces now.
How? How am I expected to sort them out? Alone? And since most of the pieces are not to be seen, why should I care about the invisible and the unknown?I read; "Photography wrest aesthetic representation from the debilitating consequences of auratic uniqueness, and cultic traditionalism is replaced with a secular reception by the masses who become the agents of speech and criticism."
I already know I won't stop, I always knew it but the question remains; Shouldn't I?
I killed the pain and killed the friend, killed the sorrow, killed the joy.
Denver, September, 30th 2003
Falling. Not a sound. Just the wind, sometimes, when I face it. Just the wind and the voice behind me, guiding me to the landing field. Cold. I'm cold as I fall trying to understand what's just happened. Trying to put names on these sensations I've never felt. It might sound a little cliché to say that it's a reborn but that would be the only way to explain it as even our first and so natural instinct, breathing, becomes a conscious exercice. Being able to feel everything without being able to put a name on these things, without any valuable experience, my mind trying to catch up with reality. I remember, sitting on the bench in this airplane, looking back at the door, I tried for a few seconds to picture myself making that one step into the void; It made me sick and I had to look away.
Some might say it doesn't look like me. They must be wrong. It made me realize how much identity is a lie, a safe box, with our nametag on it, where we hide ourselves by fear of the truth, our truths, allowing others to know where we stand, always, allowing them to see through us. I realize now how much I want to remain out of reach, invisible to their eyes and their mind, invisible to their fears, hopes and expectations and even to their love.
"For once you have tasted flight you will walk the earth with your eyes turned skywards, for there you have been and there you will long to return."
Denver, September 12th
"We hold these truths to be self-evident; that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness..."
Thomas Jefferson did a lot for the United States and for Europe there's no doubt. Though I have a problem with this "bill of right"...A word just doesn't fit; Equal. There's no doubt that men are not equal. No matter what, if you were born in Sierra Leone there's a good chance that you can't read this lines because you're dead. That's unfortunate, I agree, but nonetheless true. If you live in Luxembourg, more likely you're rich. If you live in China and you're a writer...well, sorry, you're screwed. Do bad you were not born in the United States, you could have written anything you want. First of all because it's a free country and second of all because nobody cares about one more book; there are several thousands of new books coming out each year anyway...
Equal is just not true anymore in our global market. Comparison is - and couldn't be - no longer national.
Though a lot of countries wouldn't want their citizens to make any comparison, citizens just can't help it. And be honest, if you compare, whether or not you're blinded by nationalism, the first word that comes to your mind is not equality. It would be a good thing maybe this equality thing, though life would lose a lot of its interest for a lot of men.
The thing that strikes me is this: if we take for granted this equality, how can we expect any change in our everyday life, which, in the real world, is mainly about inequality?
The university of Michigan has a very surprising admission policy: race is used as a factor in the admission of a student. They have been sued for years because of this policy and, when I first heard about it about a month ago, my first reaction was of course to be against this policy, because I had, like everyone probably, this equality thing in mind.
Well, truth is, though it is indeed a nice idea, when you look at any kind of chart, it's rarely about equality. I was looking at the list of the French deputies few weeks ago and, believe me, something's wrong in there: it's not even close to be representative. I'm really glad they didn't dare call it the "house of the representatives" but I wish they would do something about it.
The main idea of the University of Michigan's policy is to agree on the fact that, right now, there are some racial inequalities in this university (it's of course true for all universities and surely not only in the United States). We can either do nothing about it and wait a couple of centuries to see how it goes or try to do something about it in order to straighten things out a little bit quicker.
This statement has become a brake to our societies because it excuses our governments in their policies. It allows them to do nothing about inequality and to let things go their ways.
I would welcome a new constitution that would bind our representatives to do whatever it takes to guaranty equality among their citizens instead of expecting it from god.
Readings:
Ayn Rand - Atlas Shrugged
Being able to think is a common gift. Everybody can. Well, almost everybody. Being able to express, to translate our personal thoughts in a common language to be understood by others is a less common gift.
It's always a great pleasure and unfortunately too rare a chance to read a book that matches our thoughts, that states what we always knew yet without finding the right words to express and communicate them to our friends.
Atlas Shrugged is one of these books.
Atlas Shrugged. What a title! The first thing that came to my mind when I was first told about this book is this: what a powerful title. You hear it and you want to know about it. First you want to know what's next. Well, we could say "Just open your eyes, look around and you'll find out." The truth is, it's not that easy. All men can't see it, which maybe is a good thing. Not that easy to see our own decline. When does it start? And if it has already started, how far are we from our own end? Ayn Rand has seen it and she wrote a thousand pages about it. Lucky us!
Then you want to know why. Why? Why, when you are that powerful, when you carry the world on your shoulder, why would you give it up? To what end? Knowing that you might be signing your own death, how can you possibly say "no, I won't do it anymore"?
Well, the truth is, even when you're on the top of the world, sometime you want to hear something as simple as "thanks". Not always, just from time to time. Did we say thanks to the one who are responsible for carrying the world on their shoulders? I don't think so. Instead we pretty much do everything we can to see them failed. We are fighting them, every single day even though we need them. We're like a beggar with an empty hand begging for food while grabbing a knife in the other hand and one thought in his mind "murder". Why being so hateful against the people who have the ability to make money? How can we be so jealous? And if money is not what we live for, why do we even care about these people? Can't we grant them the freedom to choose their own goal?
I read somewhere that this book was about capitalism. Well, not directly. This book is about freedom. Capitalism comes next. For some reason, when you put six billion people on the same planet, they have different need, they have different things in their hands and guess what, they want to trade to match their needs with what they have in theirs hands. Here comes money. It's as simple as that. Of course it's not true when they're not allowed to trade. That's why freedom comes first.
Any Rand built a world where the industrialists are that powerful. This world revolves around the simple idea that there are such a things as moral, justice and virtue, that it's the goal of men to dedicate their lives to this simple goal: doing the right thing. To use its ability, whatever it may be, for the purpose of happiness.
These industrialists represent the backbone of their country - it happens to be the United States but it could have been another free country, I'll get back to you when I find one - Unfortunately, they are surrounded by incompetent people, jealous of the wealth of their genius employers, that will do everything to get their undeserved share of the treasure. They will vote an incredible amount of laws in order to starve the workers. In this world, the looters become powerful enough to reverse what we all usually regard as justice. The right becomes wrong. The looters considering that they shouldn't have to pay for their own incompetence and should get their share of the wealth while the powerful should give up everything save the pleasure they get from their own achievement.
Well, they gave up. What would you have done?
Definitely the most appealing, interesting book I ever read. One funny thing though, I can't find a French translation of this book. The version edited in 1958/1959 is no longer available. I really, really hope I'm wrong.
From the book:
"If you ask me to name the proudest distinction of Americans, I would choose the fact that they were the people who created the phrase "to make money". No other language or nation had ever used these words before; men had always thought of wealth as a static quantity - to be seized, begged, inherited, shared, looted or obtained as a favor. Americans were the first to understand that wealth has to be created. The words "to make money" hold the essence of human morality."
"Do you really think we want these laws to be observed? We want them broken. We're after power and we mean it. There's no way to rule innocent men. The only power any government has is the power to crack down on criminals. Well, when they aren't enough criminals, one makes them. One declares so many things to be a crime that it becomes impossible for men to live without breaking laws. Who wants a nation of law-abiding citizens? What's there in that for anyone? But just pass the kind of laws that can neither be observed nor enforced nor objectively interpreted - and you create a nation of law breakers - and then you cash in on guilt."
"We never demanded the one payment that the world owed us - and we let our best reward go to the worst of men. The error was made centuries ago, by every man who fed the world and received no thanks in return. You don't know what is right any longer? This is not a battle over material goods. It's a moral crisis, the greatest the world has ever faced and the last. Our age is the climax of centuries of evil. We must put an end of it, once and for all, or perish - we, the men of the mind. It was our own guilt. We produced the wealth of the world but we let our enemies write its moral code. We never accepted their code and lived by our own standards? We paid ransoms for it! Ransoms in matter and in spirit - in money, which our enemies received but did not deserve, and in honor, which we deserved, but did not receive. That was our guilt - that we were willing to pay. We kept mankind alive, yet we allowed men to despise us and to worship our destroyers. We allowed them to worship incompetence and brutality, the recipients and the dispensers of the unearned. By accepting punishment, not for any sins, but for our virtues, we betrayed our code and made theirs possible. Theirs is the morality of kidnapers. They use your love of virtue as a hostage. They know that you'll bear anything in order to work and produce, because you know that achievement is man's highest moral purpose, that he can't exist without it, and your love of virtue is your love of life. They count on you to assume any burden...your enemies are destroying you by means of your own power. Your generosity and your endurance are their only tools..."
Lafayette - Harlow Giles Unger, Edward Knappman, Giles Harlow Unger
There are countless books about the French Revolutions and countless book about the American Revolution. There are also a lot of French books about the good influence of France on the American Revolution and American books about the influence of the United States on the French Revolutions...
This one is particular though. The reader is invited to follow the step - sometime day after day - of the marquis de la Fayette through the American Revolution and through the endless failure*** of the two first French Revolutions of 1789 and 1830. Except for the last page of the book, the author save us from their own point of view. Instead, the book is mainly built around the huge correspondence of Lafayette; Letters to G. Washington, T. Jefferson and many others. It recounts their actions and their thought, their mistakes and their dreams on a daily basis.
Highly recommendable to better understand the origin of the bound and conflict between the two nations.
***Yes I really do think so. Whether it ends with a psychotic and paranoids freak at the head of the country killing hundreds of thousands innocent people or a Corsican dwarf starting the First World War (the real first one) or again another Monarch from the Bourbon family, one can hardly call that revolution a success...But of course that's just my opinion I could be wrong.