The Curtain Falls, And So...
Hey, empty world out there,
Before I provide an update for this month, I wanted to show you all - that is, all of you who are aware, listening and furthermore who care (this is a real stretch I'm asking for, right ?) - something I was going to post in July or early August that is now pointless. This is to say, that, in discursive terms at least, it is worthless.
"Well, there's some updates for whoever's listening on the edges of this wilderness.
I've got my dad near to me, in Dumfries. Naturally, the parasites are crawling around his bedside any chance they get. Some people come for my mum, which is really nice of them, I suppose. Hanging around like the Grim Reaper doesn't do our dad any good. I'm well past the point where I'd have been angry - I'm even past the point of wanting a time-machine. Unlike the hangers-on and no-gooders who've abused my dad's confidence over the years, I have a clear conscience, because I know what I have to do for him; I've got to look after my own and keep them strong, catch them when they fall - I've got to be there to prop them up where they might falter. Really, I'm left with not much else which could keep me here. I don't think Hannah Arendt even scratched the surface of the 'banality of evil'.
The only person I really spent time with, could share my complaints with, could actually look up to unashamedly, is missing. And why ? What's going to be done about it ? I'm waiting for a dual miracle - the first and most important is biological (for my dad), and the second is juridical (against the little bastards who caused this) - a big, fat, custodial sentence.
Life seems to be moving on, but it's not - not really, I mean. I re-live that night when I'm lying in bed at night..."
============
On Friday the 15th of August, in the year 2008, at around ten to eight in the morning (c. 7.40am-7.50am), the only man I truly, fully, lovingly respected - the only one I would ever call "the Chief", the only one to whom I would kneel and whom I would follow even if it were through the gates of Hell itself - passed away. Verily, he was murdered on the 11th of May, but it took him this long to finally let go. The catastrophic injury caused by the murderous attack upon him was such that his brain was not allowing the rest of his body to take in sustenance or hydration. We were told that the fact he lasted as long (i.e. over two weeks) without the water which he could no longer tolerate indicated that he must have been an extremely, inordinately fit man. I don't mean like some pussy who goes to the gym to become artificially 'built', but someone who was made fit through hard work all over the country and elsewhere, along with regular, moderate activity around our home - as well as, of course, other contributing qualities which could only be described as innate. Indeed, lesser men would have died at the scene, or at least on the same day, without a doubt. As it is, he fought and groped for life over a period of fourteen weeks, until he quite simply couldn't go on.
The only person who, to me, was actually heroic is now gone. - And with him, so too the things that give me a care are gone. I mean to say that I am no longer bound by the civic, traditional, social and pathological forces which imprison and diminish other men. I bemoan my condition, for it is a cruel freedom.
I lost the only person to whom I could genuinely look up to and I have, in subsequence, ascended to such a level as to look up to - myself. The tragic mood which rises in me is compounded by the fact that all my anger, sadness, disbelief and grief are mixed with this ascendant feeling to which I have just referred.
What can I say which will communicate the joyous comfort surrounding me that whole night leading up to the greatest robbery which could ever be committed against my family, the greatest injury which could ever be perpetrated against my person ? How am I supposed to feel when the same night I had proven that I didn't need my dad to protect me, the night I demonstrated that I wouldn't be cowed by anyone or anything, was the very night my father himself ceased to be able to protect me in a conventional, physical sense ?
The truth is that some time before this great cruelty of fate my father had bestowed upon me gifts such as no-one in this pathetic town has received hitherto or, perhaps more importantly, could ever understand. My father had instructed me with such a complete education in manhood that I shall never again ask the total protection of - and thus be totally protected by - another. Rather, I have become myself a shield, a shroud, a bastion and a darksome plain. My 'nature', such as we believe ourselves to have 'solid states', is undergoing the most painful and confused transformation it could ever conceive, and so I am - finally - myself.
(A note aside: The pangs and regret-tinged twists of this situation are that I could never return the gifts granted. Instead, I must take upon myself the mantle of responsibility crafted and borne by my father - and by him, left behind (through no fault of his own, of course) - in such a way that none of the others will at first realise or even suspect it, for they shall be inevitably too dumbfounded by even the very possibility of this assumption on my part.)
What else is there for me ?
Signing off duty,
Scott J. Irving
============
To my father: Michael Irving, Esq., you shall never see completed the creations of mine with I sought to impress, comfort and honour you; Dad, you will never know the great scale on which I will repay you, nor will you know my mother as lives on in years to come, with my consolation, devotion and protection, nor will you know my brothers as one lives through his thirties and the other approaches his with the passing of time, with my guidance, assistance and steadfast support to them both. In short, you left the richest boon and the most considerable challenge to your youngest, strangest son. Yet, I would never call you or your legacy a burden, nor have things any other way in your wake: perhaps this is your final, most everlasting gift to me, Dad.
I'll miss our late-night conversations, watching films with you and, quite simply, your full and genuine friendship, for you were the best friend I ever had. Dad, I love you so much. I hope I'm wrong and that there's a Heaven, or some kind of afterlife at least, and that you're there with your folks and with Mum's mum (my Nanna), having tea, and that you're looking after my Uncle Kenny. God, I miss you so much already. I wish I could see you again some time.
Despite these unachievable aspirations, that I'll be strong for you and do my best for myself. You should know that I love you and that your love has carried me into this world, invincible.
Michael Irving (or, wee "Mick"),
Rest In Peace
With incomparable love,
Scott Joseph Irving, your son
----------------
Now playing: John Mayer - Say
via FoxyTunes
Before I provide an update for this month, I wanted to show you all - that is, all of you who are aware, listening and furthermore who care (this is a real stretch I'm asking for, right ?) - something I was going to post in July or early August that is now pointless. This is to say, that, in discursive terms at least, it is worthless.
"Well, there's some updates for whoever's listening on the edges of this wilderness.
I've got my dad near to me, in Dumfries. Naturally, the parasites are crawling around his bedside any chance they get. Some people come for my mum, which is really nice of them, I suppose. Hanging around like the Grim Reaper doesn't do our dad any good. I'm well past the point where I'd have been angry - I'm even past the point of wanting a time-machine. Unlike the hangers-on and no-gooders who've abused my dad's confidence over the years, I have a clear conscience, because I know what I have to do for him; I've got to look after my own and keep them strong, catch them when they fall - I've got to be there to prop them up where they might falter. Really, I'm left with not much else which could keep me here. I don't think Hannah Arendt even scratched the surface of the 'banality of evil'.
The only person I really spent time with, could share my complaints with, could actually look up to unashamedly, is missing. And why ? What's going to be done about it ? I'm waiting for a dual miracle - the first and most important is biological (for my dad), and the second is juridical (against the little bastards who caused this) - a big, fat, custodial sentence.
Life seems to be moving on, but it's not - not really, I mean. I re-live that night when I'm lying in bed at night..."
============
On Friday the 15th of August, in the year 2008, at around ten to eight in the morning (c. 7.40am-7.50am), the only man I truly, fully, lovingly respected - the only one I would ever call "the Chief", the only one to whom I would kneel and whom I would follow even if it were through the gates of Hell itself - passed away. Verily, he was murdered on the 11th of May, but it took him this long to finally let go. The catastrophic injury caused by the murderous attack upon him was such that his brain was not allowing the rest of his body to take in sustenance or hydration. We were told that the fact he lasted as long (i.e. over two weeks) without the water which he could no longer tolerate indicated that he must have been an extremely, inordinately fit man. I don't mean like some pussy who goes to the gym to become artificially 'built', but someone who was made fit through hard work all over the country and elsewhere, along with regular, moderate activity around our home - as well as, of course, other contributing qualities which could only be described as innate. Indeed, lesser men would have died at the scene, or at least on the same day, without a doubt. As it is, he fought and groped for life over a period of fourteen weeks, until he quite simply couldn't go on.
The only person who, to me, was actually heroic is now gone. - And with him, so too the things that give me a care are gone. I mean to say that I am no longer bound by the civic, traditional, social and pathological forces which imprison and diminish other men. I bemoan my condition, for it is a cruel freedom.
I lost the only person to whom I could genuinely look up to and I have, in subsequence, ascended to such a level as to look up to - myself. The tragic mood which rises in me is compounded by the fact that all my anger, sadness, disbelief and grief are mixed with this ascendant feeling to which I have just referred.
What can I say which will communicate the joyous comfort surrounding me that whole night leading up to the greatest robbery which could ever be committed against my family, the greatest injury which could ever be perpetrated against my person ? How am I supposed to feel when the same night I had proven that I didn't need my dad to protect me, the night I demonstrated that I wouldn't be cowed by anyone or anything, was the very night my father himself ceased to be able to protect me in a conventional, physical sense ?
The truth is that some time before this great cruelty of fate my father had bestowed upon me gifts such as no-one in this pathetic town has received hitherto or, perhaps more importantly, could ever understand. My father had instructed me with such a complete education in manhood that I shall never again ask the total protection of - and thus be totally protected by - another. Rather, I have become myself a shield, a shroud, a bastion and a darksome plain. My 'nature', such as we believe ourselves to have 'solid states', is undergoing the most painful and confused transformation it could ever conceive, and so I am - finally - myself.
(A note aside: The pangs and regret-tinged twists of this situation are that I could never return the gifts granted. Instead, I must take upon myself the mantle of responsibility crafted and borne by my father - and by him, left behind (through no fault of his own, of course) - in such a way that none of the others will at first realise or even suspect it, for they shall be inevitably too dumbfounded by even the very possibility of this assumption on my part.)
What else is there for me ?
Signing off duty,
Scott J. Irving
============
To my father: Michael Irving, Esq., you shall never see completed the creations of mine with I sought to impress, comfort and honour you; Dad, you will never know the great scale on which I will repay you, nor will you know my mother as lives on in years to come, with my consolation, devotion and protection, nor will you know my brothers as one lives through his thirties and the other approaches his with the passing of time, with my guidance, assistance and steadfast support to them both. In short, you left the richest boon and the most considerable challenge to your youngest, strangest son. Yet, I would never call you or your legacy a burden, nor have things any other way in your wake: perhaps this is your final, most everlasting gift to me, Dad.
I'll miss our late-night conversations, watching films with you and, quite simply, your full and genuine friendship, for you were the best friend I ever had. Dad, I love you so much. I hope I'm wrong and that there's a Heaven, or some kind of afterlife at least, and that you're there with your folks and with Mum's mum (my Nanna), having tea, and that you're looking after my Uncle Kenny. God, I miss you so much already. I wish I could see you again some time.
Despite these unachievable aspirations, that I'll be strong for you and do my best for myself. You should know that I love you and that your love has carried me into this world, invincible.
Michael Irving (or, wee "Mick"),
Rest In Peace
With incomparable love,
Scott Joseph Irving, your son
----------------
Now playing: John Mayer - Say
via FoxyTunes