Thursday, October 07, 2004

Of the Epistemology of Toilets

Today I started reading The Undertaking: Life Studies from the Dismal Trade by Thomas Lynch. In the course of his meandering commentary on life and death from the perspective of an undertaker, Lynch makes the interesting observation that at the same time the advent of the automobile was ushering birth, childhood, courtship, marriage, sex, old age, and death out of the modern home and into the hospitals, daycares, cinemas, wedding chapels, hotels, nursing homes, and funeral parlors (respectively) of the outside world, the advent of the flush toilet was bringing urination and defecation inside. What a tradeoff.

He also points out that the tidy disposal of human waste made available by these same flush toilets has left us moderns with no regular, tangible reminder of death and corruption. As a result we are unaccustomed to unpleasantness on any real level, and are therefore generally unprepared to address death or any of its lesser cousins when they invariably confront us.

So I guess my having been a nurse aide makes me more prepared for death than most of the general populace.

posted by Jeremy at 10:00 PM
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Tuesday, October 05, 2004

Of Not Being a Contrarian

The motto of New St. Andrews is Numquam bella piis, numquam certamina desunt ("For the faithful, wars shall never cease"). The motto of "Old" St. Andrews is Dum spiro spero ("While I breathe, I hope"). Now which of these mottoes is the more optimistic, forward-looking, postmillennial?

posted by Jeremy at 12:28 AM
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Of Some Thoughts on Children

I am repeatedly amazed that sex and children are so inextricably linked. Personally, I am at a loss to decide which of these I desire more, and it seems wholly gratuitous that the two are a package deal (albeit presently withheld from me). Certainly my perception of their respective pleasures is naive, overlooking the pain, labor, and responsibility of each, and yet it seems undeniable that in making one the prerequisite of the other God has surely dropped the ball, let slip the mask, and shown himself for the hedonist he is. Sexual reproduction: it's like God forgot that you can't eat your cake and have it.

At Dave and Alisha's wedding reception I was able to hold Israel Cummings long enough to rock him to sleep, despite his protestation. Permit me to wax sentimental. There is something so wholly real, and wholly impossible, about rocking an infant to sleep, that for that brief period it was to me the one sole function of the universe; the telos of reality itself. For forty or so minutes I was in the warm belly of the world, the umbilicus mundi, the cosmological core, and the motions and undulations of the party round about were simply emanations of that central reality. In all honesty I cannot call up from memory an image of the child I carried (newborns are generic to those not yet parents), but rather a physical recollection of hard and soft places, a map of texture and form: the warm lump of a head under my chin, the coolness of awkward limbs, the uncertain strainings of a tiny homunculus. In that moment I knew what it was I lived for.

"And I saw visions of God," writes Ezekiel.

posted by Jeremy at 12:26 AM
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Monday, October 04, 2004

Of Prolegomena

Last night I watched Meet Joe Black for the first time, smoked a cigarette on the balcony, read Jeremy Huggins' blog, and decided to get my life together.

I'm exaggerating. In truth I only decided to begin writing regularly as a discipline, though that in itself is for me no small resolution. I am utterly undisciplined, especially when it comes to writing. My excuse to myself has been that I don't write because I can't think of anything worthwhile to say. This is a lie, not because I can in fact think of something worthwhile to say, but because it is not why I don't write. I don't write because I'm a "perfectionist," which is a technical term meaning "a lazy bastard."

So I will write, if needs be poorly. I will aspire to pseudo-profundity. I will be unoriginal, derivative, plagiaristic. I will be a navel-gazing wanker and I won't give a damn.

And you few, you happy few, will be the victims of my stab at a meaningful writing life. Feel free to set your email filters accordingly. I only ask that you filter by subject line, which will always begin with the phrase "Climbing the tree with the lights in it", rather than filtering all email from this address. Who knows? I may have something important to write to you at some unimaginable date in the future. Also, the substance of these letters will be posted on my new blog. Yes, a blog. See the preceding paragraph.

Tomorrow I will write something attempting substance, but for tonight this notice must do. Two small profundities, as a downpayment: today I bought a coaster, black, inscribed with the motto "Love Like You'll Never Get Hurt"; also I found the Sangreal.

posted by Jeremy at 1:50 AM
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