At ten in the evening on Wednesday, my "Teaching Freshman Writing" class finally ended, and my spring break began. Some of my fellow MFA - ers joined me for a soothing pint of uniquely beechwood-aged king of beverages at Tam's, our local divery.

After slaking my initial thirst with that incomparable first draught, I relaxed a bit and found myself having a serious conversation with a woman from my teaching class.

We were talking about friendships evolving into relationships, and relationships devolving into friendships. I was somewhat surprised to find myself participating in this conversation--not because I successfully avoid such conversations in general (in fact, I believe I have an unethical monopoly on such blather), but because I was talking to this woman on a non-academic level.

I'm learning that once you begin to transgress upon social boundaries, there is no end to what tomfoolery you can accomplish.

For the sake of practicality, let's say this is the fifth conversation about "friendships versus relationships" that I've held in approximately six weeks.

The first conversation about relationships, naturally, set off the cacaphony of other events, other talks, and each subsequent conversation flowed very naturally from this first transgression. This transgression took place with a woman I've known for a very long time--let's say she's a very good friend; it was a transgression, too, though any and all transgressions were of the verbal and emotional variety. Nevertheless.

The second conversation took place between my girlfriend and myself as a direct and immediate result of the first; though this particular conversation has been more or less continual--or at least cyclical--for the better part of the last two years.

The third conversation was a sad, heart-to-heart I had with my old friend's long-time partner--he happened to be one of my best friends.

The fourth conversation--a conversation about friendship conversations--spanned approximately three days: My brother and I discussed "friendship versus relationship" conversations as they take place within many contexts of time and place and responsibility. He pointed out that "honest" and "fair," when added together, do not always equal the value of "right." I was still stewing on this idea when I found myself involved in the fifth of the five conversations.

While speaking with the woman from my class--and mostly while listening--I began to realize that there is never such a thing as an objective conversation.

I knew this and know it still, and yet the blathering but ever-logical Taboo Tenente is addicted to the idea of defining and isolating different pieces of a puzzle, to the deconstructing of every aspect of an interaction, and to attempting the creation an objective perspective.

Because, of course, if you can define the specific problem, then isolate that problem from other problems, then perhaps you will be able to fix that specific problem. Then, quite simply, you can progress to the next problem and solve it with equal facility. Easy.

But there is always a context.

Why was I having the first conversation? What does it mean that it took place when and where it in fact took place? It could have happened at any of several other moments in time--and yet it took place at this time, at a time when this conversation would create the most excruciating of complications.

Why did the second conversation--so much resembling other conversations I've been having with my girlfriend--feel so differently, now? Did the first conversation really change everything?

Why was I able to have a rational conversation with the partner--my friend--when all the strange, twitching anger I didn't know I felt was beginning to bubble to the surface; when he must have been touching the surface of his own tremendous sense of anger and resentment and betrayal?

Why, when I haven't really spoken with my brother in so long about anything that really matters (except fishing--which, by the way, matters), was I able to have that cathartic, moderately-clarifying talk?

And finally, why did I have this last conversation with this woman, of all the people in the world, in all the places of the world, at this time of all times from eternity until eternity?

The answer is Context.

We can't see the context when we're in it; and afterward, in the next moment, our new contexts prevent us from seeing the WHY of the old context.

Everything in life inexorably moves forward: your thoughts, emotions, health, consciousness, morality, addictions, pizza--everything. And as life moves forward YOU move forward, making you new in every single moment of your life.

Your memory wants you to think of yourself as the same old hunk of meat, so that you can identify the logic to the madness; so you can mine the nugget of "you" truth; so you can locate the reasons for the now of your life; so you can believe that you've written your own story.

But it doesn't work that way.

It may be true, as they say, that a man's character is his character from the beginning until the end. But because of the newness of every moment, you'll never know HOW your character was ultimately defined. No one knows until the entire story is written.

So you must value the impossible, incomprehensible moment. You must understand that every moment means more than you can understand. It is a meaningless addiction to believe that you are stuck in a rut, that you are doomed to circles of sad living. You must try.

"The chipmunk ran into the rocks and a butterfly came out," Kerouac writes. "It was as simple as that."

Source Link: Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac;

Taboo's Ezine Navigator: Article Index
Copyright ©2004, ©2005, ©2006 Joshua Suchman. All rights reserved.
Taboo Tenente: A Thinker's MFA Journey - Home