Jul 27, 2006 18:24
RECLAIM THE BLAME
or
IN DANGER LIKE THIS PAUSE AT FIRST AND WAIT
for the time being let us forget the tale which leads us out of the wilderness, through random industrial towns in North Ontario, through bits of desert, next to various and sundry travel partners of the aggressive male sort - finally plopping down into the very clutches of that very Thing Which Cannot Be Named, teasing it as a skipping stone teases an abyss below (cf. the number 29, for the esotericists in the room)... you get the picture. these events are all apocryphal to this stubborn anti-narrative, the tale can only continue as long as the protagonist still doesn't know where exactly he (and i suppose this one is a "he") is.
so the protagonist: youth, unshaven, still young enough to want to casually indicate something with his appearance - tattoos that can be charitably described as 'pagan' decorate dull sunburned flesh, a t-shirt bearing some hanzi text next to the golden G of the freemasons, oversized polychromatic sunglasses. ergo: if any thesis could be extracted from this flamboyance, it would be 'the self-reVerential irony of the hip youth can still be infused with magick, but today's hip youth balks at the concept even more than at its "misspelling"'.
despite this, he is healthy and attractive, a strapping young lad despite the seething misanthropy -- but if cornered, the HATE (let's not mince words) can be excused as an embarassing rearrangement of the HEAT, and suspicion will be replaced by that unique relief that a conversational byroad into a reconcilable topic can bring.
"yeah, it's a real scorcher!"
and our protagonist is cycling. this should come as no surprise - what else is the hanged man to do in babylon but cycle and sputter? his preoccupations run the usual gamut, but when he is cycling he is mostly interested in thinking about cycling. there is no romance to speak of, but the very absence of such things is often more evocative than a faint presence; the binary feature cannot help but evoke its twin, we know just what is in store for old yin and old yang, etc. he has realized that he is comfortable in his body, but could be more comfortable if he surrendered it completely to whim - why bother denying this urge to repeatedly lift heavy things? questioning his capacity as a cyclist, he reminds himself that if nothing else he always bikes UP the hills that he sees others walking. we tread gently across a few symbolic bridges to the concept of 'masculinity' and dwell there for a while, trying to see past the confusion and the monstrosity...
...and it is at this point when we meet the antagonist of the tale, or rather when we ride by him. an older male, possibly in his early 50s. a manicured silver moustache indicates that he is virile enough to grow thick facial hair, but systematic enough for the quotidian shave. designer sunglasses, spandex cycling wear implying a bodysuit, efficient upscale racing bike with neat and balanced saddlebags, massive calves, the man exudes health and wealth. except: he is stopped at the side of the road, speaking on a cell phone. our protagonist speeds past him, spending a moment to take all of this in.
and perhaps it is the amorphous 'masculinity' in his mind that leads him to think this, but the thought dawns: is this the only way to achieve any personal redemption in babylon (or just any immediate relief), to overtake the wealthy at the innocuous sport of cycling, to use frankenstein hand-me-down beaters to overtake so many schwinns and shimanos? to prove that even on some basic and primitive level there is one queue you cannot buy your way out of...
...and it is at this point that our protagonist passes the rich man again. once more, he is stopped by the side of the road, speaking on a cell phone. this is truly odd; at no point since their last encounter had any cyclists been passed by any others. does this mean that the rich man knew of some shortcut? as well as a quick cyclist who can buy top-of-the-line equipment, he has his wits about him too. nevertheless, he is on the phone and he is passed by once again...
it is easy to think of the rich as inbred libertines, crude grotesqueries mocking pre-Victorian "persons of quality", decorum and empty ritual caked on like foundation covering up so much dullness and ugliness. our protagonist knows this is one of his personal blind spots, but is not particularly troubled by it - he has chosen to live in a world where symbols are absolutely necessary, and sometimes these symbols must subsume people. he can afford to feed the wealthy, so culturally alien, into the forge. nothing will be lost. they are expendable.
but the chase is on, and this man that will be on his tail at any moment is not the phrenology text's drooling duke. this is the athletic yuppie, a beast concerned with efficiency and result. as long as you do not disturb the equilibrium, he will not see you. thoughts no longer deal with triumphant life-hack solutions to the problem of living in babylon, they deal with the very mechanisms of survival therein: how to best outbike this guy? legs pumping with a new resolution, our protagonist soldiers on...
...until he is passed. the other bike darts ahead, the man says "thanks!" as the youth moves aside. so is this a losing battle?
perspective strikes: why has this figure overtaken the cars as the rival out here? why has the unity between cyclists been tossed aside for symbolic aggression? at this point 'cyclist' is the only group that he can claim belonging to with a straight face - anonymous, ambivalent, flexible and more-or-less haphazardly in conflict with the status quo, he can think of no reason NOT to desire participation. this man filling the role of the oppressive archon is not even driving a car, and is likely deliberately deciding not to. the horrors of THAT mode of locomotion are immediately apparent, the very real threat posed to EVERYONE by them cannot be ignored, it is nothing short of cynical for anyone to participate in society as a driver, a lethal convenience junky, etc... this train of thought can go on and on indefinitely (unlike the car, ironically).
so are we so obsessed with conflict that anyone will become the day's rival? can this be a lesson in unity, a chisel-blow against the massive erratic of prejudice? in today's world, in all of its grand and unrivalled absurdity, isn't "non-driver" enough of a reason to LIKE somebody?
...and it is with these thoughts in his mind that our hero cycles past the rich man again. the scene is no different: he has stopped on the side of the road to receive another phone call.
~~~~~~~~
"I was thinking we could have fish and chips for dinner, something quick before the interview."
"Sounds fine, do you want me to pick anything else up?"
...And the punk zooms by. Even before I hang up my phone, I can hear the chain scraping against the derailer with each rotation of the pedals. There are tools he can use if he wants that bike to last. All he would need to do is shift it over a few millimeters - if you know what you're doing, all you need to do is tighten certain screws. Why don't people consider these things?
But he is young. Would I have ridden so recklessly at that age? Listen to me, 'what would I have done?' - am I so old that I am thinking about my youth as a hypothetical situation? Maybe that is easier: to think of it as something that could be rather than something that just -was-. "Used to": I was used by someone to ride a bicycle in a certain way. My role, my agency was my use -- and now I am used to be efficient. I isolate problems, I propose solutions. A chain scraping against a derailer? Screwdriver, Phillips head. I used to be proud of knowing how to make these distinctions.
But still, I can outride him. I am skilled. My bicycle is sleek. I may have passed him by already without notice. The road is made of nothing but moving and stationary objects. The one implies the other.
"I just had a thought, could you get some olive oil too? You haven't reached the store yet, have you?"
"No, not yet. I'll pick some up."
"And maybe some wine? We can have some after the interview."
"Good idea."
And he passes me by again. The scraping sound is gone. I wonder if he would stop riding to answer a phone call? What does he think when he sees this old man stopping along one of the city's best routes to talk on the phone? What would I have thought... there I go again. Why worry about age? I am healthy, attractive, skilled, a good cyclist... a better cyclist than these kids. See, I'm about to pass him again.
"Thanks!"
Is this the only way to achieve immediate relief in the city? To pit myself against these strangers? I wonder if I could do it on a different bike. Am I actually proving anything to myself while I ride this speeder? Of course I am - I worked for this money, I did the research to determine the right bike for me, I ordered it and picked it up. Everything was streamlined. That was all a part of the process of this ride. It will be a part of the process of every ride I ever go on on this bike. And there will be many more.
"I hope you haven't gotten to the store yet. I found some olive oil in the pantry. I didn't know it was there."
"No, it's no trouble, I'm not there yet."
"Really? You're usually past Safeway by now."
"Fish and wine?"
"Fish and wine."
~~~~~~~~
When man comes back to the city in its present state, it is not for his personal satisfaction as a free being, but because he has a material work to do there. The very fact of having escaped the inner possession of the city's mysterious fascination is a serious disintegration of the deepest urban reality. Its only coherent reason for existing is as a spiritul power. When its power is broken, for eternity and in each one of us as inhabitants of the city, the city begins to literally fall apart. And the man who comes back after intelligently separating himself from it works as an acid to decompose the city's bonds.