by
The Paris Review
(editor)
The Paris Review Issue 232
The Paris Review Issue 232
by
The Paris Review
(editor)
by
The Paris Review
(editor)
The Paris Review Issue 232
by
The Paris Review
(editor)
by
The Paris Review
(editor)
87
Thursday, 17 December.
The cat is sitting by the door. Evidently it wants to go out. I sit by the door also, watching it. It is as if our hostilities (the hostilities of cat and mouse) have already begun. This is a feline that I purchased at a fair. A charismatic man was giving kittens away. You didn’t dare look at him because . . . oh but you looked at him and now he’s calling you over, he’s smiling, he’s touching your arm a bit. He remembers you from somewhere. He’s telling you about kittens and then you’re in the car on the way home and everyone is cooing stupidly and passing the thing around.
When my wife comes home I am still sitting there. The cat is still sitting there. Nothing has changed. At least two hours have passed. I think in some ways I have gained the cat’s respect, although of course the gain in that regard is counterbalanced by my wife’s dismay. What are you doing on the floor? I begin to tell her but think better of it.
the same vibe that i get in kafka, dostoevsky, baudrillard's diaries
Thursday, 17 December.
The cat is sitting by the door. Evidently it wants to go out. I sit by the door also, watching it. It is as if our hostilities (the hostilities of cat and mouse) have already begun. This is a feline that I purchased at a fair. A charismatic man was giving kittens away. You didn’t dare look at him because . . . oh but you looked at him and now he’s calling you over, he’s smiling, he’s touching your arm a bit. He remembers you from somewhere. He’s telling you about kittens and then you’re in the car on the way home and everyone is cooing stupidly and passing the thing around.
When my wife comes home I am still sitting there. The cat is still sitting there. Nothing has changed. At least two hours have passed. I think in some ways I have gained the cat’s respect, although of course the gain in that regard is counterbalanced by my wife’s dismay. What are you doing on the floor? I begin to tell her but think better of it.
the same vibe that i get in kafka, dostoevsky, baudrillard's diaries
89
Monday, 21 December (Day 10).
My wife encourages me to make a list of the things I want to do before I go. The language that she uses to tell me this is strange and uncharacteristic. Only later, while urinating off the back patio, does it occur to me that she is probably operating from a script. They must have given her a script and she is using it to help me. I am convulsed immediately by the totality of her sacrifice: that in the final moments of our shared life she has somehow abnegated her true heart’s speech. These are the thoughts I think as I zip up my pants.
Monday, 21 December (Day 10).
My wife encourages me to make a list of the things I want to do before I go. The language that she uses to tell me this is strange and uncharacteristic. Only later, while urinating off the back patio, does it occur to me that she is probably operating from a script. They must have given her a script and she is using it to help me. I am convulsed immediately by the totality of her sacrifice: that in the final moments of our shared life she has somehow abnegated her true heart’s speech. These are the thoughts I think as I zip up my pants.
92
Perhaps it is because I read that mice do not experience humor, not as such. Joy, yes, sadness, yes, camaraderie, esprit de corps, et cetera, yes, but humor, no. I then began to ask myself, To what degree do humans truly experience humor? To what degree is the experience of laughter real?
Possibly, it seemed to me, at that moment in the night as I lay sleepless beside my dozing wife, possibly humans also do not experience humor. In fact, there is only discomfort at some iniquity or lack-of-fit, and that finds expression in a false-face of joy. And that therefore, since as we know, there is no false-joy, i.e., every smile is a real smile, smile yourself to happiness, et cetera, the false-face of joy becomes joy, and laughter becomes happy. But at its root it was just discomfort.
How then the case of the mouse? Well it seems they simply do not experience discomfort at life’s blunted edges and crooked apertures. Not feeling that discomfort, they have no need to find things funny.
In the notebook by my bed, I made a note to further investigate the subject. I suppose now there is no time. Or to put it differently: soon, all my existence will be an investigation of this very thing. There is no time left for anything else.
Perhaps it is because I read that mice do not experience humor, not as such. Joy, yes, sadness, yes, camaraderie, esprit de corps, et cetera, yes, but humor, no. I then began to ask myself, To what degree do humans truly experience humor? To what degree is the experience of laughter real?
Possibly, it seemed to me, at that moment in the night as I lay sleepless beside my dozing wife, possibly humans also do not experience humor. In fact, there is only discomfort at some iniquity or lack-of-fit, and that finds expression in a false-face of joy. And that therefore, since as we know, there is no false-joy, i.e., every smile is a real smile, smile yourself to happiness, et cetera, the false-face of joy becomes joy, and laughter becomes happy. But at its root it was just discomfort.
How then the case of the mouse? Well it seems they simply do not experience discomfort at life’s blunted edges and crooked apertures. Not feeling that discomfort, they have no need to find things funny.
In the notebook by my bed, I made a note to further investigate the subject. I suppose now there is no time. Or to put it differently: soon, all my existence will be an investigation of this very thing. There is no time left for anything else.