Life is about stakes. What is at stake? There is always something at stake. Always. No matter how hard we try, everyone of us is always already committed--entrenched--circulating--within a world of significations, meanings, and networks. On top of that, we are always responsible for our stakes--our stake.
A man Heidegger taught me that. He was a Nazi.
Disappointment comes from staking in something that didn't want your stake, or wasn't worth it. Sometimes we are sad because the one--the thing--the something--doesn't want us. Other times, we are sad because what we thought was worth our stake is actually not worth our stake.
The Old Man was shaking his head and looking out the window. I don't know what was on his mind, but something was on his mind. His crossword puzzle was on his lap in front of him, but it was just a poor disguise for his pensive involvements.
I think stakes were the problem between myself and the semi-hippy woman. I don't know where her stakes were--or are. I don't think she thinks of that too consciously.
The Old Man got up to take a piss. He almost walked into the women's bathroom despite having been in the shop everyday for months.
Nothing changes when there is nothing at stake. For her, fucking held no stakes. It was fun. It was amazing. She loved it—I know she did. But, she wasn't looking for anything there—those encounters weren't a place where she expected to find something, discover something, hear something. Those times weren't a place she expected to dig deep at the limits of our possibilities—to fucking defy all our bodily limits in order to stretch into some other realm; to be taken elsewhere somehow.
I guess I can't blame her. I guess for most people fucking is fucking—some people love it, some people love it and are horrible at it, some people think it is nice once in a while, or a good way to feel close to someone, or nice way to show someone they love them. That all sounds great. That all sounds ordinary. It is ordinary—it accepts the fact that fucking is nothing more—nothing beyond—nothing extraordinary; like our bodies don't have secrets pent up in hidden, seemingly inaccessible places that can't be unlocked by words. It accepts that fucking is controlled by words just like every other aspect of life. We talk while we wait for the bus. We text each other at every goddamn minute of the day. We update our personal pages to tell everyone when we are eating dinner, changing clothes, and taking a shit. We talk during dinner. We talk at work.
Even those times we don't speak—when we listen—the words are in charge. Films talk to us. Music speaks to us.
Words. Words. Words. Words. Words.
The words are ubiquitous.
Words. Words. Words. Words. Words.
Always words.
Even silence is just a momentary ignoring of words—it doesn't cancel them, surpass them, or provide anythig more than the opposite (and thus the same) as the words. It is a band-aid, not an elixir.
We are born into words. We are born into a situation in which words have been developed into a languge that has labeled the vast network of things we encounter in the world—from trees to traffic signs to the moon—with a signficance. The network is already mapped out—we just jump into it—or are thrown into it. The world already exists, and each and every fucker here showed up without a choice in the matter. If we are to manuever the crossing, complex networks of the human world—well, we have to use the fucking words. Words are the lifeblood. Words are the only way you can think. You can't think without words—you don't have the means. Words are us. We are words. floating—moving--changing--being pushed and pulled perpetually by the flows of words—signifiers—meanings--apellations--nominations--accusations. You are not, apart from words.
I have always felt them following me. I have always loved words and hated them. I know life is meaningless. I know life is a random grouping molecules thrown into fucking deep fryer. I know life is a balmy, unforgiving trek through time's hell. And, the words are time's foreman—the SS Officer standing at the top of the tower watching over the camp.
I know that politics, or good deeds, or humanitarian acts are all useful. But, they are also all meaningless. Most of the time, I accept it. I don't want to sit around thinking about this bullshit. Do you? Nietzsche did and he ended up fucking a horse in the street and going mad (at least, that's what someone told me). That sounds terrible. I don't want to cut my ear off, or commit suicide, or even worse, start a revolution. No, I don't. I like people. I enjoy things at times. But I have no grand illusions. They all collapsed long ago in a heap of adolescence and optimism.
She just didn't get it. Fucking is a chance to escape the words--even for seconds, or a second. Fucking is one of the few realms where there is a chance that for a minute the words will disappear—the world will disappear—time will stop. There aren't many chances in this world to experience something—sometime--when your stream of consciousness is literally halted by a wave of overwhelming darts to your self. There are not many times when you literally cannot think because your body won't let you. There are not many times when the world—when the context of all of it—the bed, and the nightstand, and the house, and the sweat, the tits, the legs, ass, feet, toes, fingers, forearms, shoulders, quadriceps, hamstrings, eyebrows; when the breathing, the glancing, the uttering, the showing, the trying, the performing; the wondering, hating, worrying; when the time and the space disappear into an abyss of nothingness and you exist nowhwere. There are not many times you can be nowhere. It is like trying to forget something, it just doesn't work. There are not many times, you see, when you can be dead without dying.
I'm not a freak. I know there are times you fuck before bed, enjoy it, and then say goodnight. I know there are times you fool around a little on a Saturday morning and then go make breakfast. I don't want to spend my life at swinger parties or sex clubs. I'm just saying, there is more at stake in fucking than a hobby. Fucking is a more existential phenomenon than darts, gin rummy, knitting, flying kites, kayaking, or your local book club.
There is a chance to communicate with another—to communicate in a way that doesn't require words. There is a chance to strip down to nothing—to bodies—to sensations—to let the secret part of yourself—the part you are most embarrassed about because you don't know it—haven't dealt with it—be seen, touched, and explored. There is a chance to let the forbidden space that you don't know how to access be revealed to another person. There is a chance to explore the concealed depths of mortality. There is a chance to surpass the words in order to communicate in a way that is not normal.
And, yes, that is what I want. I want to communicate. Yes, I want to communicate so well that I do not exist, and you do not either. I want to communicate so well that there is an in-distinguish-ability that renders our normal way of being mute. I want to communicate so well that you and I are mute. That is my goal. That is what my desire hinges upon.
How to do that? Well, it seems not with the words. The words can't help us here. Words are for this world. Words denote the everyday. We need the words, but here, we need something different. The way I want to communicate won't work with the words.
Yes, I want to communicate apart from the words--with means--in channels--via pathways--and inacessible secrets--in places unseen and unmentioned--spaces surrounded by fear and taboo--rings of filth mixed with a pain that is pleasurable--where the cut of time has incised unforgettably, but not ineluctably--where I don't know, but you can find--where you won't go, but will let me explore--where there are no words . . . where there is a deep, insatiable reach for continuity--for union--for the ability to transform, tweak, and distort bodies and words and thoughts and feelings and perceptions and images. I want to disappear from the world into a place that does not exist. I want to leave the world for a non-place untouched by space and time.
Of course, of course--this requires risk. It requires vulnerability. And most of all, it requires obscenity.
If we are communicate ourselves into silence, there will have to be some discomfort and some risk. Stripping naked can be a bit tenuous. For some, it is no big deal; they want to speak the silent words we are speaking of here. I don't know if they know the secrets pent up in the criss-crossed channels that lead from their pores to the endless space that makes up the little room where the words come from in the first place. I know, I know. Not all nakedness is about this quest to find the silent words. I know that it is not always about communicating without speaking; I know we can't always render the words mute through a meeting--an encounter--that dispossesses us. But, shouldn't it be most of the time? Sometimes? Is it unreasonable to search for the sacred in the obscene? To find something--something extraordinary--in the terror and vulnerability of nakedness? Or have we given up on that idea, amidst the plethora of stretched, augmented, and displayed bodies in our space and cyberspace? Have we let that go in lieu of the commodified ease of voyerurism? Have we given up on obscenity--sacred obscenity--in order to feed ourselves a constant diet of spectacle, shine, technique, gossip, and mechanics?
Dancing is easier than this. Dancing is safer than nakedness. You can fuck and dance at the same time. You can fuck and dance with your clothes on and off. Yes, back to the dancing. There is always dancing in these instances--it is an easy way to try halfheartedly. Let's move. Let's shake. But, no, let's not dare strip naked--let's not dare show ourselves into the ugly, awful, nauseating, limitless soup of atoms that constitute the space behind the words--the place that is untouched--the place where separation gives way to the rupture of the nameless disquiet.
We are one flesh--for moments or seconds or hours or days--but, I know, I know . . . . . . . I am naive . . . endlessly naive . . . always stars--always separate--always discontinuous.
I know. You don't have to tell me. I know the quest--this one of communication, silence, and nakedness--is impossible--I know it leads nowhere but to a frustrating, fatal cliff--I know it ends in the world re-appearing--with us re-appearing in the palce where we are visible, temporal, and slaves to the words. But, it's worth a try. Sometimes at least. It's not even that she didn't want to try. She didn't have the capacity to understand any of this in order to try.
The Old Man returned from the bathroom with a small, but noticeable wetspot on his cotton, cream-colored old man shorts.
"What you lookin at?"
"Nothing, nothing at all. You okay?"
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