January 3rd 2019
I've always struggled with the essential Marxist paradox (Groucho, not Karl) that I don't want to be a member of any club that would have me as a member. I want to excite my friends and my friends to excite me, but excitement withers like a tender plant in the blasts of the everyday. With focus and effort, with a commitment to contribution, the club is worth attending, but like all introverted people I find social effort psychically exhausting and I'd rather lose your company than your respect. And at least if I don't join, I can't be kicked out.
The early part of a romance- the first year or couple of years- is dating, and dating is getting dressed up for the club. I understand that, I know how that works, the illusion that this club will be different, this one will never find me out and throw me out. But that was just a misreading, that was me not knowing what I was being offered, how different it was from anything I had before. Sparrow was never interested in the performative self, never expected me to dress for the club or keep up with my subs. She values what I am, not what I can perform or offer or contribute. When I ask her what she wants of me, the answer is always the same and demonstrably true because it's always born out by her behaviour.
For someone who thinks everything, even affection, is earned (and hard-earned at that), this is unsettling. With her, I can't pay for membership, so I can't refuse it. It's given. Everything from Sparrow is just given, from time to objects to caresses to favours to money, there's no expectation of reciprocity. What I need to settle is this notion that when you can't earn it, when you don't pay for it, it isn't yours. I was given membership. I can't be kicked out, because I never paid to join.
"Just stand beside me," she says.
I've always struggled with the essential Marxist paradox (Groucho, not Karl) that I don't want to be a member of any club that would have me as a member. I want to excite my friends and my friends to excite me, but excitement withers like a tender plant in the blasts of the everyday. With focus and effort, with a commitment to contribution, the club is worth attending, but like all introverted people I find social effort psychically exhausting and I'd rather lose your company than your respect. And at least if I don't join, I can't be kicked out.
The early part of a romance- the first year or couple of years- is dating, and dating is getting dressed up for the club. I understand that, I know how that works, the illusion that this club will be different, this one will never find me out and throw me out. But that was just a misreading, that was me not knowing what I was being offered, how different it was from anything I had before. Sparrow was never interested in the performative self, never expected me to dress for the club or keep up with my subs. She values what I am, not what I can perform or offer or contribute. When I ask her what she wants of me, the answer is always the same and demonstrably true because it's always born out by her behaviour.
For someone who thinks everything, even affection, is earned (and hard-earned at that), this is unsettling. With her, I can't pay for membership, so I can't refuse it. It's given. Everything from Sparrow is just given, from time to objects to caresses to favours to money, there's no expectation of reciprocity. What I need to settle is this notion that when you can't earn it, when you don't pay for it, it isn't yours. I was given membership. I can't be kicked out, because I never paid to join.
"Just stand beside me," she says.
Jung says this is the two-fold terror that we all carry over from infancy. What we project, in one of its two forms, on the gods.
ReplyDeleteEither love (mother's or god's) is conditional, and therefore must be earned and we live with the terror of slipping up, losing it, by doing something "wrong."
Or, love (mother's or god's) is unconditional. Which means there is nothing we can do to earn it. But also, there is nothing we can do ourselves to ensure we keep it. And this is, in a way, even more terrifying.
So, we create rituals and sacrifices in an effort to sway the unswayable.
This is what humans do.
Everyone in the midst of great risk, physical or emotional - soldiers, surgeons, prisoners, athletes, fisherfolk, poets, actors, artists, priests, people who jump from great heights trusting their lives to silk or elastic, lovers- becomes superstitious, attempts to get in credit with fortune with sacrifice and ritual.
ReplyDeleteWe so desperately want the universe to treat us well because it loves us especially.
The universe treats everyone fairly. It doesn't love anyone. It doesn't hate anyone either.
I can say this. I don't really accept it. I can't. I'm just a man.