& decide to enter the public world
When we arrived there were fairy lights strung in the trees and someone had made latkes. But also there were many pamphlets, and leaflets. This particular demonstration was designed to encourage a new way of relating to each other, a digital project to promote exchanges of little acts of kindness. There were movements like this everywhere – libraries in tents and other inventions. And I did approve of this desire for a larger community. All of us were trying to divest ourselves of our power. If we had discovered that we were occupying powers, we were very regretful, and I think that’s noble. We wanted to create different loyalties, and it meant that often I would argue with my mother and my father. They tended to see the right community as our general ethnic group, and I disagreed.
ME
They are not my people!
MY FATHER
They are your people. Your people are your ancestors –
ME
I’m not so sure.
MY MOTHER
Not so sure? You think in the last century they were not so sure? You think in a pogrom you would be so –
ME
That is not a right comparison!
MY MOTHER
So who are your people? Tell me.
ME
Whoever I choose to be among –
MY MOTHER
Nonsense.
ME
I think it’s true.
MY MOTHER
You have no idea what’s true or what isn’t.
My mother, folks! I wanted to gesture to the TV studio audience. Always I have thought that I never knew my mother well enough, even though I love her so very much. Always there is this imbalance, and difficulty of communication. Perhaps I should have met her as an adult, except that then we would have had the friendship of two adults, which is not at all the same. For what did we have in common with the immigrants and kibbutzim, the learned scholars and the crazed politicos? I could not see it at all, among the barbecues and swimming pools. But while therefore in theory I did sympathise, definitely, with Tiffany and her dreams for a better society, whenever I was there among the revolutionaries I always found it difficult to feel as one with a crowd. It’s much more difficult than it seems. If I saw just one activist with a pet squirrel or new ideas as to how to signal agreement or disagreement, such things bothered me. It didn’t seem to me to look like true revolution. Not that I want barricades and blood, but ideally we would at least form some giant transport system for the sick, and escalators in favelas, but we tended to talk instead. If we were like a monk who righteously sweeps the path in front of him, it was only if that monk mostly does the sweeping in his mind, which is probably not so good. But then, this was how we lived: the world was multicoloured. There were palm trees in among the monkey-puzzle trees, and monsoons in the summer. Parakeets descended in the parks. In the gentle rain, kids were out drinking on the sidewalks. Probably in the tea rooms the more furious boys were eating tea cakes and planning a future coup d’état. Others just played ping pong. At least, I suppose, it was an idealistic time. The global project was for demonstrations and occupations and I knew that in some of these my friends were filming and writing slogans, including Candy and Romy and Tiffany, but also other friends like Bjorn and Shauna and Trey, and I tried to follow their progress intently, even while I was preoccupied. They had their stories too, my friends out there in the world. The story of Bjorn is that he went to take part in the occupation of a bank. He arrived one night and realised that although his hunger was intense he was too scared to go back outside in the illuminated dark to find a chilli dog or shrimp taco or cheese slice. So very hungry he went to bed. That was his story of life among the occupiers, or so he told me later. In general, people’s stories were getting smaller and smaller and were ever so toy-like, which was not, perhaps, the exactly perfect size. Tonight however I had no opinions of any kind, all I wanted was to be with people who were safe and did not want to harm me. Although also I knew that this current mood was not a good mood in which to see Romy. For a while now we had not seen each other on our own, just increasingly sent each other messages or emails that were very difficult to gauge, sometimes full of love and devotion, sometimes curt and only information. And now there she was, talking politics and when she does that often we do irritate each other, we can’t help it.
ROMY
No let me tell you why there will be no revolution –
ME
OK –
ROMY
Because if you are one of the people who owns an iPhone or likes to pizzatweet and so on then in any rightful revolution you will be a target –
ME
Uh?
ROMY
Sure, the ones who have multiple private bank accounts and speak fourteen languages can get the fuck out and will be safe on Mustique. But the happy person who just happens to have enough to live on but not, let’s say, escape, will be hunted. They will be hunted down and massacred. And the happy people know this – they know this very well which is why they stay very quiet and why there will never be a revolution in our lifetime.
The problem is that such conversations can so quickly be conversations about other things. In some way, I knew, if she was talking about the lack of revolution then there was a way in which this was not exactly what she was saying. And I did think also that I possibly understood the implications.
where Romy separates from our hero for ever
For of course in the end Romy was tired of this, and tired of us. I understood that and I was tired, too. I would have liked to propose that maybe we could all live together, in some commune reminiscent of the orgy which now felt so long ago, but it seemed not the ideal moment to make such a proposition.
— You understand me, yeah? she said.
— I think I do, I said.
— This has to stop, she said. — I’m not waiting any more.
It was very obviously the opposite of any commune proposition, and yet I was surprised to discover not only a wild sadness in me but also possibly a sense of relief, not because this situation was now over but that in some way it was simpler. Very neatly therefore I replaced my vision of a commune with a vision of private happiness. Perhaps, I was thinking, this would mean that I could become a new thing with Candy, a way of being that would renew our vows and make the entire past different. Perhaps utopia had all along been present, but in a different way. This was also possible.
— But we can still be friends, I said.
And Romy looked at me.
— I don’t know, she said. — Like, maybe we shouldn’t talk for a while.
— For how long? I said.
— I don’t know, she said.
I was trying very hard to think because perhaps she was not as definite as she seemed, in which case I could at least keep in some form of communication with her, and if we could communicate then possibly my sadness would be less, and that was very important to me at this time. But also I did have no idea, because the problem is that people are often very nice, especially when they are saying things that are hurtful and causing harm, which only means that the harm then takes much longer to be understood, and therefore is maybe more hurtful.
— I mean, I’m supposed to rescue you, is that it? Or you’re supposed to rescue me? she said.
— I never said that, I said.
— Look at you, she said. — Just look at you.
It was a very difficult moment, when suddenly everything I thought I cared about just vanished. I could see the living room of my parents’ house and my dead dog and I wanted to tell Romy this, I wanted her sympathy and understanding but I suddenly realised that in fact we would never talk again. Darkness was descending everywhere. It’s baffling when you consider how trivial you might seem, just by imagining your future self considering your own past. I was trying to remember only a few days before, when I was considering growing a moustache that could be ideally Mexicano but maybe more realistically one of those Sichuan g
lamour moustaches from the early twentieth century – just a slick line like a kid’s drawing of a wave or the flourished squiggle of mustard on a hot dog. I mean a moustache like a cubist quotation. That had been my pastime, and now these pastimes seemed just old and very fragile. Like also I’d been listening often to pirate radio on the Internet, which was very absorbing until the DJ at the end of his show explained that he was going to be lonely, with no one to talk to at home until his mother got back from work – and that, machacho, I thought, is what is meant by sadness, when it turns out that even the DJs still live at home with their parents – or so I had wanted to tell Romy, or Candy, or anyone who would listen. Whereas now such reflections seemed rendered insubstantial.
— Well, how long? I said. – Like a week?
— Yeah, maybe, she said.
— Well, OK, I said.
Because I did think that maybe this would be OK. I could understand if she only wanted a week in which to spend some time apart.
— Or maybe longer, she said.
— OK, I said.
— I mean, a week it wouldn’t feel real, or maybe any definite time, she said.
— You mean for ever? I said.
— Yeah no I think so, she said.
And I was just about to howl or yelp or yowl – because the discovery that everything is temporary, or that everything can be made temporary by the will of another person, that’s a terrifying discovery, however much you know it is always possible – when Candy arrived with Tiffany, with boxes of manifestos and declarations that required immediate sorting, and so I could not howl because that is not how these things happen. Instead the conversation continued, and we talked about other things, and Romy was gone, for ever, the way a marble sculpture might have been lost in the more classical times – just tipped overboard from a trireme in the process of some shipjacking by a bored and overworked Viking.
& so in his anguish he tries to talk about suffering
To watch her disappear like that was a terrible experience. I wanted to talk it over very fast with Hiro, in very deep breadth, but instead we had the wider distraction of a conversation, and to have your attention divided in this way is never a restful situation. It creates a small persistent sense of difficulty. Nevertheless, I tried to understand the general tone – while around us accordions were being played and a stage for lectures was being constructed out of cardboard. How will we help people at a distance? Tiffany was saying. Because that really is a major problem, perhaps the major problem of our time. How will we think about the suffering that we are causing every day? And I did, of course, agree with her concern.
— Like what? said Hiro.
And Tiffany took out her phone and showed him a movie, for everywhere on the Internet were these cameraphone movies from our war zones – and they were total snuff movies, absolutely, except not in the manner of hutong violence with people’s nails ripped out or eyes made into jelly. I mean if your idea of gore-fest is when you see a man bite out his tongue or there is brain on somebody’s brogue, then this was nothing. The scene that Tiffany showed us was more like one of those ski slopes beside the autoroutes, if you also allow that this particular slope was inside a concrete hut. Four men were practising their skiing technique, with their arms outstretched and invisible sticks in their hands. They were just practising but with real goggles on. Also beside them were two other players who had given up the game, and were now lying on the concrete floor – and what was strange was how familiar it all looked, this scene, with these two people lying down exhausted. It was like twilight at a music festival, or the horizontal soccer players of a tragic penalty shootout. Possibly if you looked very hard then the neckline of a man’s white vest was really red but it was difficult to see. And then among these men a soldier moved, encouraging them with a helping hand or cheering backslap to resume their skiing position, but instead he only seemed to manage to transform them into an atonal avant-garde choir – emitting sad whimpers and groans, small noises, the way our dog would whisper like an elf throughout the night. It was very disturbing, the way these movies on the one hand showed nothing at all, and on the other hand you knew that this seemingly innocent surface was also total pain and suffering. It meant you found yourself asking crazy questions like you might ask about a sex scene in the old movies, e.g. Are they really doing it or not? Yes, the whole real thing was very unclear. And according to Tiffany, the only way to refuse this was to make the audience part of the picture. For we really are all film critics and in a mute parenthesis I considered Dolores and our conversations, and wondered what she might say. Because in the end, Tiffany added, the basic problem is how to live in a community. And of course, absolutely, I agreed. I thought that this project was magnificent. But I was not so sure that large-scale projects were always possible. Even politics, when you think about it, is so much smaller than you first assume: it is you in a public square, with a megaphone and a felt-tip placard, or one person in a suburban apartment being tortured, handcuffed in a bath, sprayed with a handheld shower. Or not even that. I mean, I continued – trying not to think about Romy or about Candy, and yet only thinking about them both – because I was starting to lose the noble line of my reasoning, and wanted to resume it – the world you ever inhabit is very small and limited.
— Can I interrupt? said Candy.
I was kind of glad, because I definitely was worrying that I was not expressing myself correctly, and was interested to listen to Candy always, and in particular to her theory that she now proceeded to outline, according to which we would all have to accept the possibility that the best you will ever do in imagining the suffering of other people is to imagine it as garish, with very gruesome blood effects. Whereas the real truth of suffering, in Candy’s opinion, as she described it, was so much more everyday and dull and difficult and inescapable. But that was much harder to imagine and so we tended not to do it. And I wanted very much to show that I agreed with Candy, that the lurid is the best the cute can do in imagining such suffering, and one way you can show your agreement in a conversation is to extend another person’s reasoning, and so I tried to do that. It seemed to me, I added, that the problem of what to think about should be much more personal. Like often I sit there thinking how I only have one life and do not know precisely what to do with that.
— Darling, said Tiffany. — It’s not about you.
Always, I thought, I am fated to be the one who is not understood! But still, I carried on. Here we all are, I said, in a panic about suffering, but what about death too?
— I do not see you, said Tiffany, — being currently scythed down.
— The currently, I said, — is not the point!
For I could not understand, I tried to explain, in my own private panic, at what point you can think about both suffering and death – I mean think about them equally, with equal weight. It’s like you cannot concentrate on both, and both seem worthy of my full attention. If you concentrate on the suffering, then obviously you must tender to the needs of other people. But if you concentrate on the death, and the fact that every single person in this gathering right here is going to be a corpse, and possibly very soon, then the urgency of suffering perhaps disappears, and the more imposing question is the one about you, and how much pleasure you should get before you die.
ME
Like maybe the severest question you can ask is whether you are in a happy marriage.
CANDY
You really want to talk about this?
ME
I’m only saying.
CANDY
OK then, OK.
I could see that she was smiling despite herself, and that she was possibly angry or on edge. It would have been useful to determine the precise depth of her irritation, but I felt unsure as to how to go about that, and in company. Always it’s important to be as gentle as possible with other people, and in Candy I often felt that it was also important to acknowledge this giant pressure all around her, that was not of anyone’s making. It
was the atmosphere in which perhaps everyone now lives, a giant weariness – considering how many demands were being made on everyone’s time, not just developing the correct sex life and career but also needing to know the right crèche or massage place in a curious out-of-town location. How in this time will anyone ever be blissfully lazy again? And so once more I felt a tenderness for Candy that was like a burden I carried with me, and I would have liked to say this to Candy but to say it in front of all these people seemed impossible or improper, so instead I came out with something wilder and more general.
ME
I mean: what’s destitution?
CANDY
I’ll tell you what destitution is. It’s when a person is watching some daytime soap where two women are arguing over a parking space – and this spectator cannot comprehend such a situation – a situation where there are too many cars.
even if he is no expert on the subject
It wasn’t that I disagreed with our grand desire for justice – I just doubted how to change the situation. Definitely it’s noble to want to divest yourself of your colonising power, but to do this might need much more drastic schemes. To care so much about the people far away! And with such limited achievements! The problem with these kind of woes is that they’re basically as otiose as the single honest policeman inside a giant police state. Just look at me, and my utopias! Certainly if people wanted to accuse me of black crimes, I would not resist – and not only for the obvious crimes that were now occupying my conscience. To think of the money spent on my education! On the paints and paper I liked to play with, and on my toys! It just seemed natural never to think about the factories and the workers in those factories who produced such things. Most of life I think is like being in the restaurant of your dreams, where the waiters are attentive yet invisible. That’s basically how we want our world to be run, and it’s amazing to what extent it really is. You are always spared the oil extraction and other tasks. I used to be told off by my mother for telling people how easy I found everything, at school, or in my job in the city. My mother seemed to think that if I pointed this out too much then I would maybe be detested, or possibly even worse – that I was giving away a secret which should be kept among ourselves. For the problem is that to live in this way is totally delicious. That’s why, I think, to abdicate your power is so much harder than it seems. However much you might have beliefs and consciences, it turns out you only have them in the way you own anything else: they’re very easy to ignore. It’s so much more difficult giving up what you already possess. For many are the princes who wake up in the favela suburbs – but if they have a choice they do go back to the palace they once enjoyed. It’s in their nature, to prefer the vaporetto and the dawn satsuma sky.
Lurid & Cute Page 23
