IGNORANCE
Am I nothing more than an ignorant beast? Am I a person who knows nothing? Am I an empty vessel controlled by my lusts? Do any of us know anything? Are we all slaves to our sexual desires?
I am reading a book in Spanish whose title translated is 5000 Years of History. How many empires have come and gone of which we have no apprehension, but who have set the table for us? In the same vein of rummaging through the past, people have often asked, "Have you read the Bible?" I went to parochial school from first through eighth grade. We were introduced to the stories of the Old and New Testaments.Every Sunday at mass the priest would recite excerpts from the epistles and gospels and interpret their moral teachings for the benefit of his congregation, but as I learned later, Catholicism wasn't Biblically oriented. While independent thinkers insisted that reading the Bible and absorbing its message was the pathway to salvation with no need for outside intervention to point the way, the Church dictated that salvation went through the Pope and the Vatican. Those who dared challenge that doctrine were burned at the stake, one of many gruesome executions that the clergy had no problems countenancing. Pedophile priests is now the modern scourge.
Later in life I have turned to the Bible for literature. I perceive the Bible as man's attempt to comprehend the incomprehensible and in this process a Christian mythology has evolved. I have a Bible at my bedside. I am reading Job for the umpteenth time. I am forever amused that Satan was able to lure God into this bet. Job suffered terribly having to prove his faith to God. He lost his wife, his children, all his possession and his health. In the end God didn't win because Satan was playing with house money.
Later in life I have turned to the Bible for literature. I perceive the Bible as man's attempt to comprehend the incomprehensible and in this process a Christian mythology has evolved. I have a Bible at my bedside. I am reading Job for the umpteenth time. I am forever amused that Satan was able to lure God into this bet. Job suffered terribly having to prove his faith to God. He lost his wife, his children, all his possession and his health. In the end God didn't win because Satan was playing with house money.
God, among the many rewards he showered upon Job because the megalomaniac sadist had a pliable masochist at his disposal willing to endure every misery to please his master, gave him a new wife who bore him many children as if the previous wife and brood didn't matter. Job was an ignorant pawn in an metaphysical game beyond his grasp. He stumbled forward blindly. Job's gratitude was no different than the Muslim madmen who die for an unfathomable cause satisfied that they will have virgins waiting in heaven.
It was a mistake that Jesus didn't make as detailed in the gospels. After being baptized by his cousin John, Jesus fasted for 40 days and nights in the Judean Desert where Satan dangled in front of him every temptation that the world could offer, but unlike his father, Jesus chased away the devil as if he were nothing more than a mosquito buzzing in his ear. He returned to civilization and embarked on his ministries. Was Jesus able to escape ignorance because he was asexual and was never unhinged by a ravenous drive? Unlike the Buddha who had to eliminate his desires before he could find peace, Jesus was born in a state of nirvana since he was devoid of materialistic and physical yearnings.
Nevertheless, God, a strange cat with an overweening ego and a violent temper but with a weakness for young girls like his compadre Zeus, was able to manipulate his son by convincing him that he had to die on the cross for all the sins that humanity--God's failed experiment because like Donald Trump he needed an adoring audience and to placate his pride created a defective product--had committed. As we so aptly say in Spanish when the dye has been cast--ni modo.
Unlike Job, I know that I'm ignorant, but like Job and the Islamic fanatics, I can be steered because I am a mindless animal in an insatiable search for release that repeats itself with the rapidity of the sun rising and setting. What do I have to show after 75 years on this infinitesimal planet? Do I have any insights into the meaning of life? I may have a strategy for surviving, but my knowledge doesn't exceed much beyond where am I going to eat my next meal, where am I going to get my next piece of ass and where am I going to find a toilet. We are no different than cattle being led to the slaughterhouse. We solely respond to our senses.
It is six in the afternoon. The daily rain is falling. I walk outside under an overhang and watch the rain drip from the awnings. I appreciate that each day around six I can look forward to the rain. I am relaxed. I can escape my mind that the Buddha describes as a tree full of chattering monkeys. I don't have to think. Thinking brings me anguish. I am a bull snorting in the meadow. Are there any cows in the distance?
Because I am a writer individuals make the false assumption that I must know something. Writing is no different than catching a football. It is a combination of skills and talents. Just because a NFL end is an all-star as a result of his skills and talents, he is as stupid and sexually out-of-control as the rest of us. My writing is nothing more than a show. Does it make a difference? It makes the same difference if you were to call your wife a whore. You can elicit a reaction but watch out! There is nothing substantial in what I do. I am a carpenter who constructs with words in order to find enough worth in himself to confidently anticipate a good meal, a good woman and a good shit.
I believe that part of my lunacy derives from realizing that I am an ignorant animal. Who can be proud of being an ignorant animal? No amount of eating, screwing and shitting can compensate for the fact that I am an ignorant animal. I look back at my past and I see all the mistakes I have made because of my ignorance and sexual escapades. I am repulsed. If you have a conscience, self-hatred can lead to suicide. The perpetrator of perversion must be punished. More revolting, I haven't liberated myself from this dreadful cycle that I have weathered since I first became conscious of my existence. Not even the threat of eternal damnation in a pit of everlasting flames or the love for my children has brought me to my senses.
As I walk the streets of Colonia Jardin Balbuena alone with planes either screaming into the skies or roaring back to earth at the old airport, I envision my second wife Olivia and Dylan together in their home living happily without me. It's not that I'm feeling sorry for myself, but my body and brain rebel against me in repulsion. My body is wracked by nerves. My mind is reeling with circular thoughts. To my credit I haven't surrendered.
It was a mistake that Jesus didn't make as detailed in the gospels. After being baptized by his cousin John, Jesus fasted for 40 days and nights in the Judean Desert where Satan dangled in front of him every temptation that the world could offer, but unlike his father, Jesus chased away the devil as if he were nothing more than a mosquito buzzing in his ear. He returned to civilization and embarked on his ministries. Was Jesus able to escape ignorance because he was asexual and was never unhinged by a ravenous drive? Unlike the Buddha who had to eliminate his desires before he could find peace, Jesus was born in a state of nirvana since he was devoid of materialistic and physical yearnings.
Nevertheless, God, a strange cat with an overweening ego and a violent temper but with a weakness for young girls like his compadre Zeus, was able to manipulate his son by convincing him that he had to die on the cross for all the sins that humanity--God's failed experiment because like Donald Trump he needed an adoring audience and to placate his pride created a defective product--had committed. As we so aptly say in Spanish when the dye has been cast--ni modo.
Unlike Job, I know that I'm ignorant, but like Job and the Islamic fanatics, I can be steered because I am a mindless animal in an insatiable search for release that repeats itself with the rapidity of the sun rising and setting. What do I have to show after 75 years on this infinitesimal planet? Do I have any insights into the meaning of life? I may have a strategy for surviving, but my knowledge doesn't exceed much beyond where am I going to eat my next meal, where am I going to get my next piece of ass and where am I going to find a toilet. We are no different than cattle being led to the slaughterhouse. We solely respond to our senses.
It is six in the afternoon. The daily rain is falling. I walk outside under an overhang and watch the rain drip from the awnings. I appreciate that each day around six I can look forward to the rain. I am relaxed. I can escape my mind that the Buddha describes as a tree full of chattering monkeys. I don't have to think. Thinking brings me anguish. I am a bull snorting in the meadow. Are there any cows in the distance?
Because I am a writer individuals make the false assumption that I must know something. Writing is no different than catching a football. It is a combination of skills and talents. Just because a NFL end is an all-star as a result of his skills and talents, he is as stupid and sexually out-of-control as the rest of us. My writing is nothing more than a show. Does it make a difference? It makes the same difference if you were to call your wife a whore. You can elicit a reaction but watch out! There is nothing substantial in what I do. I am a carpenter who constructs with words in order to find enough worth in himself to confidently anticipate a good meal, a good woman and a good shit.
I believe that part of my lunacy derives from realizing that I am an ignorant animal. Who can be proud of being an ignorant animal? No amount of eating, screwing and shitting can compensate for the fact that I am an ignorant animal. I look back at my past and I see all the mistakes I have made because of my ignorance and sexual escapades. I am repulsed. If you have a conscience, self-hatred can lead to suicide. The perpetrator of perversion must be punished. More revolting, I haven't liberated myself from this dreadful cycle that I have weathered since I first became conscious of my existence. Not even the threat of eternal damnation in a pit of everlasting flames or the love for my children has brought me to my senses.
As I walk the streets of Colonia Jardin Balbuena alone with planes either screaming into the skies or roaring back to earth at the old airport, I envision my second wife Olivia and Dylan together in their home living happily without me. It's not that I'm feeling sorry for myself, but my body and brain rebel against me in repulsion. My body is wracked by nerves. My mind is reeling with circular thoughts. To my credit I haven't surrendered.
I'm making a stand in Mexico City. I have retreated from the battlefield where arrows pour down upon my head. I cannot handle any more wounds. I am trying to heal by exercising every day. I am maintaining a healthy diet although my latest fear is food poisoning, which has to strike sooner or later, but during an afternoon stroll I discovered a doctor's office/pharmacy three blocks from my residence. I asked the price of a consultation and the clerk replied, "Fifty pesos." I shook my head in disbelief--$2.50!!! I have three vials of pills that are running low and I have to refill them. If stomach problems besiege me, I have a doctor and a pharmacy within a frisbee throw.
So goes my life in Mexico City. In Brownsville I seldom leave my apartment except for lunch and dinner at nearby restaurants and rarely do I receive visitors. Since I live within the UT campus, I'll walk downtown to the Palm Lounge or cross the bridge to Garcia's or both. Maybe tomorrow I'll take the metro to Polanco and rub shoulders with the rich along General Masaryk Avenue. Affluent Mexicans have a flair all their own that I find both humorous and amusing.
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