Monday, February 24, 2014

A library, a pterodactyl and a communist walk into a bar

All hands on deck, front and centre (except you guys on the right and left), double time. Threat level: Cold War. All of it. Yes, the whole war. Just imagine you're under attack by capitalists or communists or global warming for you kids - whatever works. The crisis: I. 'I' am the crisis. 'I' am a crisis on the scale of the Cold War, capitalism, communism and global warming, and you are asking inane questions. Like, whether the Cold War and global warming are related. Kids. Psssht.

Just be glad I have put aside the d_st_pi_n fiction long enough for one post. Big Brother is hiding behind that lamppost next to my car and monitoring every piece of communication, except telepathy, and I need to throw them off the scent. Metaphorically.

Yes, I am kidding. You kids, you're a crisis all on your own.

This 'I' is the rabbit that philosophy pulled out of a hat a few hundred years ago. Or so they teach us in varsity. (Useful information, this.)

So apparently, before Shakespeare (yes, there was Chaucer) people did not have a concept of their 'selves'. They were part and parcel of their environments, like a child, whose selfishness is linked to the fact that they think the world is an extension of themselves. I'd hate to be you (again), kid, when you find out the truth. This explanation is a glorious mash-up, but that's why Google exists. True story. Only this last bit and not the rest.

I'm confusing myself just trying to write this. Revert to metaphor.

So this rabbit is easy to catch but difficult to hold. Nonetheless various philosophers manage to get hold of Rabbit and label him (with non-toxic paint, don't worry). The rabbit is labelled ontology and metaphysics and existentialism and Picasso - hey! - and other labels I can't read because they're in point 2 font and this rabbit is, as I mentioned, difficult to hold. And no I didn't label him with my name. Run free, Rabbit!

I want to be a library. Sorry, I couldn't find a solid foothold down from the metaphor's ledge, so I jumped. In the past, I have wanted to be a spreadsheet, a data capturer and a municipal grass cutter, so on the bright side, this is an improvement. As you have noticed (I assume nothing less of you), all are passive sponges whose water is instruction (my metaphors are mixing again - they get out too much).

The aforementioned improvement is that this option is more possible. Right? C'mon, you have to admit that being a library is far more possible than being a spreadsheet. Unless there is a reverse process of machine to AI and Pinocchio to little human kid (heavens above do I dislike that story). I mean, I could sew the books to my clothes, for example, but I would probably fall and get a hundred papercuts. Or I could learn the words of every book as in Fahrenheit 451.

Who am I? What am I (review on Neuromancer pending)? And more practically (apparently; personally, I'm in favour of the previous question so don't cry on my shoulder when you wake in the underbelly of the earth wearing scratchy clothes and AI thingimabobs are on your tail, because Descartes and I, we beeen dere), who do 'I' want to be?

Darn these books. The ones I have read and haven't and never will read, but not the ones I don't want to read because, well, I don't care enough to darn you. They really mess with your head. Although, mine was a little messy to start with. Nya nya I never make my bed so there. These books (pssssht) had me convinced that being a grown-up meant sailing through life and over bumps with elegant prose flowing from one's mouth. My mouth at least.

I had written my book of life: I had a goal and a plan and both involved books because, you know, if I were allowed to, I'd build a fort out of books and only come out once every two weeks to go to the library. I distinctly remember having a goal and a plan, but I've tippexed over them so many times I've forgotten them both now. But on the acknowledgements page of my book, it says: books do not teach you how to live; they teach you how to live in a book. Which I would do, if one would offer.

Two paragraphs later and I know what I can't be: a spreadsheet, a library or myself in a book. And don't tell me everything is possible, you, unless you want to show me how to physically morph into a tabby pterodactyl or be a library!

Life teaches you how to live life - a pity the librarian didn't read over the terms and conditions with me. I mean, I was like six. I doubt I could spell library. Don't defect! My fort of books is still standing. In here, life is elegant (unless you count Michel Houllebecque or Aryan Kaganov), even the bumps, which are more like speedbumps than the fins of mako sharks. A school of them. Have I mentioned that I dislike the ocean?

How about this: if I stop posting about That Kind of Fiction, can I be a pterodactyl? C'mon, I live in a literary fantasy, so all you need to do is write a character who morphs into a giant leathery bird into my book of life. I'll throw in my laptop.

No comments: