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November 14, 2006
Skyway
I am always wondering why people don’t just flip out, or start staring into empty space and then erupt in long screams, over the existential situation they are in. You wonder what people are doing with themselves during the gaps, when they have nothing scheduled, and how they can possibly stand their thoughts, when alone. But then if you hang around with anyone you see how they do it; you see that actually their life is cluttered with chores they are always just getting accomplished, in order to clear space for entertainments they don’t even have the time to fully enjoy, before they are tired or hungry. If you see people in their regular lives you witness their situation is virtually crowded out with running around, and they have no time for contemplating the drastic existential situation they are in. They are constantly busy, and much of the time they are busy doing something that is making up for something they did before, or getting ready for something they are going to do. They not only have no time for thinking about the mystery of life itself, they have virtually no life, since they are always making up for the occasion, or recovering from the occasion. They don’t seem to have any headlong experience with events and occasions themselves, and no ability to deal with each other, either, so much of the time they are clearing up misunderstandings, or outright being stunned, or humbled by the behavior of others. They hardly ever do what you, or even they themselves, would call living, plain and simple. It is always preparation, and then maybe a little wondering. Therefore the scene that I constantly worry about them in, where their is a clear space, that can’t be accounted for, and the dread question of their own existence descends upon them like it were really time to address the truth, or the lack of truth--well that . . . never happens! It's never skyway in our thoughts, who are so earthbound. Is it?
Posted by mortimer at November 14, 2006 01:08 AM