Communication
Of late I’ve
become a bit obsessed with the difficulty of communication. I’m not sure it’s
what the postmodernists have been banging on about, I think it has ancient
precedents. Part of the issue is individualization. We are cut away from the
cloth of humanity each by the uniqueness of our own hands. We are each
different, separate and opposing. It starts young, they teach you at home, they
teach you in school. Under the spirit of competition. The ego is born in
battle: I am not you. In love then, one attempts the impossible: to make a
truce, to speak as if you and I are the same. Sometimes it holds. But of course
truces strain and the warrior ego can easily spring back, sometimes completely
unexpectedly. I love you except for this one thing. To some this is
understandable, but nowhere is it acceptable. Any reservation in a declaration
of love is perceived by the other’s ego as an act of war. You and I are not the
same, which the ego takes to be a declaration of war. Things quickly accelerate.
Franz Ferdinand goes down and the ruling egos are badly wounded. Eventually the
dust settles and the losses are counted. The two go into hiding, separately,
until they are able to face each other with their changed faces. Little happy
from the earlier years is remembered. But at least the carnage is over.
Sometimes a world war is skipped over and a cold war is declared. Sometimes the
truce is easier, but it is always a truce and truces strain. We pray for a jazz
age when two can join in an ecstatic dance. The lubricated life is the good
life, when wars and truces can be forgotten and the two can live in a shared
present and lick one another’s wounds back to health.
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