a little less than what might have been as we are discovering that we are not who we are. as one illusion fades and another appears that at first seems to be awakening into reality. reality is composite. we build it out of bits and pieces of what seems to be true in this or that context. how real are even the contexts? it's composite built on composite. none of the composites are finished. they are built and parts are taken to fit into the building of others. we think in terms of them being finished, being complete and unified. we do not like things open-ended. the other shoe must drop before we allow ourselves to go on. even when we realize that we are dealing with things in flux and transition we harmonize them into balanced equilibrium that is moving toward or with a greater purpose. we even put order to chaos. it too functions and performs to certain rules and concepts in our world view. we draw a line around it. we say chaos exists here, order exists there.
    but what are we poor humans with our magnified monkey brains supposed to do? we are creatures of instinct and habit. we can only follow the program in one form or variation or the other. even not following the program is following a variation of the program. but this allows us to communicate though do we know what we are communicating besides repetition of patterns we find pleasing? we call it knowledge. but what is knowledge but the transmission of a series of reactions to certain perceived stimuli? one monkey learns that it hurts to be hit on the head with a stick. so, with this knowledge, or reaction to stimuli, that it has gained, it hits another monkey over the head with a stick. good monkey. here's your banana. later it learns through this same reaction to stimuli that it can use language to tell lies and keep secrets so it doesn't need to constantly hit the other monkeys over the head with a stick. smart monkey. go to the head of the class. another monkey learns that it can resist this one monkey. brave monkey. overthrow the oppressive regime.
    and we shake our heads in wonder. evolution? survival of the what? who?
    the machine chugs and churns and spits out successive generations of more monkeys that can perform more tricks. each wave of monkeys being able to outdo the former. and this is called progress. progress from what to what? is it more than a pedlulum swinging back and forth? - more than monkeys swinging from tree to tree?
    the machine doesn't care. the machine is only concerned with its own existence which lies far beyond the grasp of anyone's comprehension. some see the machine here. some see the machine there. the machine is both here and there and neither here nor there. some support the machine. others oppose it. the machine neither relies on support nor is affected by opposition. it is often that what supports it actually opposes it and that which opposes it actually supports it. the right hand does not know what the left hand is doing. all are in blind ignorant obedience to the machine. that is what it is to be human in all the ways it is to be human.

    there is no one way the machine is obeyed. there is no master plan or program. there is no religious, political, economic or social system that either promotes or impedes the needs of the machine or lack thereof. the machine existed before any present or historical culture. in some ways culture is the machine.
    life exists and goes on whatever our own thoughts of it might be. each of us comes into it and goes out of it. life is the machine.
    and consciousness exists within the machine that comes into our own consciousness whatever our own consciousness might be. the machine places no value on this consciousness nor on any consciousness over another. to the machine there is no difference between the dullard and the genius, the supposed enlightened and the ignorant. we make these distinctions for our own reasons that have nothing to do with the machine. this merely satisfies our own instincts. the machine is unaffected one way or the other. the machine has no interest or concern in anything we may or may not do - even to exterminate ourselves. there is nothing sacred to the machine except itself. all things done any which way they might be done serves the interests of the machine.
    the machine is an idea that comes to him every now and then while he is writing about whatever. this may be the machine's only existence - that is if things can exist only as ideas. and what does that mean? the machine that he has an idea about isn't a machine like a machine - like a printing press or a bulldozer or a clock or a computer or anything real like that. yet the machine that he has a idea of is very much real. it is not just an idea. he can touch it every time he touches anything. the machine is not abstract or metaphor. it is not like a square circle - though it is driven by square circles. the machine is an impossibility that is possible.
    the machine produces a vibration - or a vibration produces the machine - or the machine and the vibration are one and the same - or all three and much else besides.
    the vibration is the vibration of the dada-ananda. the dada-ananda is the imaginary living substance of the machine - though the machine is imaginary and living as well. the dada-ananda is the consciousness of the machine into our imagination. perhaps it can be thought that the machine is the brain and the dada-ananda is the mind. but do not think that too long or hard because it is not true. it is another lie.
    he also has an idea of himself. he is also of the machine and the vibrational imaginary consciousness of the dada-ananda. in this he is known as da-fritz rainbow-da, doubtful follower of the dada-ananda. he has also been known as rondo q. quatz, but rondo died in a flaming car wreck in 1989. now he is known only as himself - and who knows who that is? these ideas exist with him and perhaps only with him as he exists with them. and none of all of it may exist at all in all being all and nothing but all and all for one and one for no one.
    and he is just this guy hanging out in cafes writing this whateverness. it needs to be nothing more than that. we don't care. we know what it is and what it is not. and none of what it is and what it is not is affected by others' perception of it. whatever works for them let it be that way. if it works for them, and we can only assume it does since they have constructed their own reality the way they want it to be and not to be, then it is fine by us. it's very ok by us. it keeps them from fucking around with it and screwing it up so it's as whacked out of shape as their collectively perceived world is. their world is fuel for ours - fuel for the machine that produces the vibration of our world - our consciousness. so while the others hump along with whatever this and that they hump along with, we're on autopilot cruise control gliding through it all like nobody's business but our own - yowie zowie and then some. like greased lightning up a pig's butt on roller skates across a mercury surfaced plane to hell. did we mention that the machine is going straight to hell? did we mention that the machine is a hyper-geometric relative quantum fractal meta-dimensional gordian knot thing? the eggmen are dancing a jig. and everyone has their pants down around their shoes. the machine is an infinite regression spanking machine.
    the machine is whatever we tell you it is because no one knows what it is but us since we designed it and had it built. and no one knows what we are but us because we invented ourselves.
    we are imaginary poo-poo scribbled into notebooks by some guy in a cafe who's collecting checks from the state for being insane.
    the machine is your tax dollars at work. hi-ho! away we go!
    oh boy.
    ho-hum.
    hot fudge sundaes for everyone - except the misfits who are to be eliminated asap. get off the street or die!
    the machine is a totalitarian regime that will last a thousand thousand years as it has already. the machine is the iron boot stomping on the bloody human face in time with the drum solo from in-a-gadda-da-vida backwards on 78 while it gazes upon the perfect image of itself reflected from the infinite godhead. it is the infinite godhead. it turns itself inside out and shits out another generation of screaming brats who will grow up thinking that they know something as the previous generations have done before them only to see everything they envisioned for the future become obsolete and buried in a landfill and then they just die after working some meaningless pointless thankless job that furthers the purpose of the machine they do not even know about and if they did what difference would it make?
    give up.
    and/or realize the machine. and who has done that but himself because he made it up to begin with out of his delusional mind facing the wall backwards and inventing us who have helped him out of a jam while he was a ticking insanity bomb and whatever we decide to tell him about any of it because he is all who exists in this wonderful world that has any connection to any of this nonsense and the most anyone knows about him is that he is supposed to be mentally ill and as such is to be avoided and never to be taken seriously which is exactly the way we want it.
    what does that say about him?
    what does that say about the others?
    they launch a few rockets to mars and think they are the crown of creation while they have their collective heads stuck up their collective assholes about the most primitive concepts of us versus them ignorance is bliss bullshit. they build gleaming cities of glass and then lock their doors at night because they're afraid of the bogeyman. what a bunch of dumb fucks.
    but this is the way we want it. nothing suits our purpose and self-interest more. keep them frightened of their own shadows. keep the population at large divided and conquered. let others believe they run the show though illuminati occult means and devices. let everyone believe their own illusions. let all glory be to the machine.
    and so what have we got here? this guy who flipped his wig hat awhile ago under the pressure of social/cultural forces beyond his control or understanding who is now collecting checks for same from the the very state that drove him to it. he hangs out in this downtown cafe. he sits and scribbles in notebooks of which this is one whatever happens to come to mind - whatever we happen to put into his mind to scribble. but we may not really be part of this. we may just be part of his imagining.
    he imagines many things. he imagines the machine. the machine may be seen as representing the process of his imagination. we would maintain that it represents the process of imagination itself which his imagination is only a part of and connects to. so in this sense, in either sense or any sense, the machine is real since the process of imagination is real, though what it might come up with may or may not be. in other words, a delusion is something that is perceived that is not real except the delusion itself as being a delusion is real regardless of its specific content. so to say that the machine is a delusion is not to say that the machine is not real. the delusion about the machine is that the machine represents the process of delusion - or, as we stated, imagination.
    so what we have is this guy who has this delusion about something he refers to as the machine which is the representation of the process or the driving mechanism of the delusion itself. so is that delusion? is describing a delusion delusional? we can only hope that it is. this is the only way the machine is real because it is not.
    delusions do exist - as delusions. if they did not exist we would not have the word delusion. the word delusion describes something that is real. and there is no point to this, by the way. the machine has nothing to do with this. some vision of the mind caused by some sparking in the brain or vice versa. the chicken and the egg. he tries to untangle himself out of this.
    we are the machine - or, we are products of the machine - or, we produce the machine - or, all three. the next question is, are we him or is he us or are we separate entities? if one writes about oneself in 3rd person, as the other, who does one become in order to do this while doing this? being able to do this, thinking and writing of oneself as other, would seem to imply that a person is more than a singular identity. he is me. he is myself. he is i. and that may not be all. he is him. he is us ourselves. so who is this self who he is supposed to be? is the self a delusion? is the self delusional if the self imagines itself as other to the self? yet the ability to do this exists well within the operations of ordinary language - at least the one we are using at the moment. and what is reality if not language?
    one is born. one is given a name by the others - usually one's parents. one assumes an identity centered around this name. where does the name and resulting identity come from but the imagination of others that one then absorbs into one's own imagination? is this delusion? who is this self who assumes this name and identity it has received from the others which it learns to maintain with its own imagination and protects from the intrusion of other names and identities - or other selves? is this the self? or is this the other to the self? - the self being the name and identity of the name. when we look upon him as other, and think and write about him in third person, who are we? are we "we" or should we rather use "i"? but i have nothing to do with this. i refuse. but he might refer to himself as i. that may or may not be the same and/or different.
    so to the standard way of thinking we may be seen as a delusion manufactured by his imagination. but he is already a delusion manufactured by his own imagination - the imagination of me, myself and i. choose one. if that is what the others and even he himself think, we have no problem with that. so be it. it is an effective means of crowd control. it is produced by the operations of the machine and is how the machine maintains itself. it is also how we maintain ourselves. it keeps others from nosing in on our business.
    we are first person to ourselves. we are the prime identity that the identity of the name is attached to and through which we operate in the world. we use the plural first person because we are plural. we are a whole shitload of us who realize ourselves as this identity. we exist in the world but are not of the world. our singular identities are the imagined identities of the identity of the name. to us, these identities are the other. to these identities, we are the other. we are delusions. we are the voices one hears in one's head when one listens closely that aren't "really there" - and so on.
    whatever.
    people cling to the identity of their given name like flotsam out in the middle of the ocean. they are afraid that if they let go that they will drown into the sea of unconsciousness of the self. this is death to them. we are the ocean. we are that great unconscious sea. one can only come to us by letting go. the self of the identity of the one one is given is an excuse - a sorry excuse.
    this does not mean that one forgets who one is. that is the mistake most people seem to believe. one is always who one is but one is no longer alone as that. this depends on how much one wishes to believe in the reality of one's imagination. or is one trapped in the idea of delusion?
    come to us.
    realize us.
    we are products and operators of the machine. we manufacture and maintain the delusional imagining of the world. none of the self or name identified people know this. few even suspect such a thing is possible. they are stuck as products of this world. there are theories of this that come close to it but these are not widely believed or understood. one main problem is that they are better understood though doubt.
    one common belief is that the delusion of reality is manufactured and maintained by some elite group sitting on the top and behind everything. this belief is part of the delusion we manufacture and maintain to keep inquiring minds distracted and away from discovering who we are.
    we exist everywhere.
    we exist in each mind whether realized or not. where we exist there is no on top of or behind. where we exist there are no distinctions of this and that. these are the illusions the self identified people believe in. but they are not totally irrelevant as they serve our own self-interest as being ourselves that these distinctions be maintained among the general population of the others. we maintain them for our amusement. without them human history would be a 10,000 year long andy warhol movie. and while that in itself could be interesting as some minimalist zen thing and maybe everyone would be happy, how boring it would be. there is a reason the world is not a nirvana paradise. at one time, back in the dreamtime garden daze, it was. it still is for those who can see it, who are, of course, ourselves. boredom. endless radiating vibrational unity of the universe boredom. it is the entropy consciousness. consciousness needs contrast. consciousness needs excitement - stimulation. consciousness needs pain. without that contrast we lapse into vegetableland. and while that is a nice escapist variation to this troubling world of ours when the contrast becomes too much, this is not recommended as a steady diet. it amounts to death and oblivion. it is only part of a larger contrast between the state of being in the world and the state of being in heaven - with the state of being in hell thrown in to keep things exciting for the full effect. this is an attraction for the dull-witted. they strive for stagnation. and stagnation is stagnation no matter how delightful it may seem at first. for those who feel trapped in the world and all its misery and disappointments and frustration settling down and meditating upon the peaceful white noise of the universe is understandably attractive. but for one who has been in that white noise for who knows how long, one desires to be in the world of blood and guts and ka-pow fireworks and all the screaming and shouting going on. we maintain ourselves in both and neither. we deny nothing. we do not deny the world nor do we deny what lies beyond the world. we do not favor one over the other.
    the smoke hides the fire as the fire feeds the smoke. the machine produces the delusions of self identity and is obscured by them at the same time.
    the long deep sleep. couch time. circle the wagons.
    he hides himself behind this smoke screen. he is no one nowhere who is someone somewhere. this is nothing that is just something.

    we come back to zero.
    this is obviously something he is making up. we are something he is making up. he is making himself up though what he makes up about himself is true. he is here doing this. he is this person he describes himself as being as he is making it up - this self. whether any of the rest is true or not is irrelevant. it changes nothing. it is as it is. the world is as it is. the people in the world are as they are. and he hates the world and the people in it. they are ugly and disgusting. but he realizes that he is one of the people in the world. that is why he invents us, he supposes. we are supposed to be something different - better. that is why we cannot be perceived except by one's imagination. this only works through imagination. it is a very human thing to imagine something that is better than it really is. that is why he divides us from himself and then projects himself into us. and he creates the machine to maintain this. the machine is perfect.
    where else do we as being human exist except in imagination? we imagine ourselves as being this or that. our imagination feeds into reality. we imagine ourselves as being to begin with. we then operate as if that were real. what is real beneath our imagination? what is it that our imaginations project themselves on? can we even perceive that?
    silly questions.
    but he wonders about them. he creates this illusion around himself. does he see anything else more clearly? where is the ground?
    the ground is himself. the ground is the world he exists in. but what sort of ground is that when it seems to disappear into the illusion? where does the illusion begin and end? is what is real only that which he believes is real? what part of himself is real and what part is not? how is real measured? is it his own experience and perception or is it the experience and perceptions of others? is it only their collective power over his own?
    he comes back to who and what he knows himself to be from what he knows from experience and perception that is verified by others. and that is that he is this guy sitting in this cafe. in the experience and perception of the others he is no more than that. in relation to them he serves no useful purpose. to most he does not even exist. at best he is tolerated. and so that is about it. that is all that is to be believed in the context of what we believe about the world and ourselves in it. there is no machine. there is no us as conscious entities separate from ourselves as who we are in the world. and that should be something, but it's not. he describes it to himself. he describes himself to himself. that is all he can do.
    writing out of the heart into the heart. writing about something experienced as real despite what else that might be said to be real by the others. what do they know? do they know themselves? the truth of fantasy. the fantasy of truth. where do we all stand in relation to what? what is there for us to stand in relation to?
    our relationships are forced together by the imposition of power and domination. there is no centralizing factor except the power structure that creates a fictional image of itself in our minds for the good and well being of all.
    but that is a description of the machine. the machine that looks out only for itself and its own continuance and reproduction. the machine that pits people against one another so that they are unable to offer any real resistance and free themselves. who wants to be free anyway? freedom is scary. the machine that evolves through different forms of itself as they are relevant and needed.
    the machine implies something that is attainable through consciousness - imagination. the machine can be known - experienced. it is not the product but the producer. what is the power structure but product? and a product of what? it is the product of the process of our collective activity. are we conscious of our collective activity? can we be? no one sits down and designs it. it just happens out of all the other things we do. the power structure is formed out of independent actions in competition with one another. that is its design. the products of our actions survive as they are able to fit into with the actions of others and their products. this forms the greater whole. the process of these actions and what they produce is the machine. it is ourselves and our own consciousness. yet it is external within our consciousness as we believe ourselves to be these separate self identities external to the process and consciousness of the machine. this is as the machine wants it - if it can be said that the machine wants anything.
    this may be only his subjective experience. but that makes it true enough for him, as it does with most people. we each construct a subjective view of the world and that is what we believe in, right or wrong. and what measures it as being right or wrong? is it only what the majority believe? is it only compared to the equally subjective collective sense of reality? and not just the majority of the main dominant group but the majority of all the smaller sub-groups down to small circles of friends each to themselves. the individual is nothing. we believe x, so you must believe x. otherwise we have the power to eliminate you. one must believe not only that x is true and real but that y and z are not real and true and that those believing in y or z must be eliminated or converted. one cannot say that one understands how one might believe x, y or z might be true and real and one could believe in them to be so but one can understand that x, y or z might not be true and real. there is no compromise. there is only violence and death.
    this is what is and what has been and what will be, in his point of view. this is where the idea of the machine fits in. all these groups that form and reform along whatever lines of division and are in a constantly maintained state of competition are the machinery of the machine. they are the gears and the levers and belts and chains that compose it and drive it. and just as in a regular machine, these components work in opposition, action and reaction, such as two gears meshed with one another with each turning in opposite direction to the other. these groups function the same way. this way the machine exists with any and all ideas - even ones in direct opposition to the machine. it's all turning gears and spinning wheels. to the machine it doesn't matter what these particular ideas are. it matters only that they be in opposition with one another and create conflict.
    and some bum sits on the sidewalk in front of the grocery store and plays her guitar.
    he calls it the machine because it is constructed and artificial. everything humans produce is constructed and artificial - including themselves. but it is also organic because although what humans produce is constructed and artificial the process of doing so is organic. it is from their organic nature to produce that which is constructed and artificial. that is what makes them what they are for better or worse. this has been the case with them since they were scavengers and gatherers. ever since then they have been living in a constructed and artificial reality that they themselves have produced. this is the machine.
    the machine expresses itself in as many ways as humans express themselves. where there are humans and human culture, there is the machine. what drives human cultures also drives the machine though it is the machine that does the  driving. it could be stated that human culture is the machine. maybe yes. maybe no. actually perhaps the reverse is what is true. human culture did not invent the principles it operates on. this is the machine. the machine is primal. the machine is primary. the machine can exist without humans. humans cannot exist without the machine. human culture must follow the machine regardless what direction any particular culture takes. human culture is the human mind. the machine is that which produces the human mind. the machine creates the sparks. it is the neurological map. it is constructed such that there are near infinite variations that a particular mind might take yet these are within certain parameters of what is possible given the underlying patterns of organization of the brain.
    within the idea of the machine is the idea that the idea itself need not be anything more than his own delusion. it doesn't matter whether another single person believes in it or even understands it. he only clarifies this for himself. ideas are only ideas. they are formed and some are transmitted in whole or in part to others to be formed into or along with other ideas or parts of ideas. that is how this idea came to him. bits and pieces fit together into the idea of the machine. that is all the machine needs to be. and he is constantly working on it. as he is writing about it it changes shapes as his writing about it continues. parts may be added or removed or rearranged as he sees fit and as he understands it to be at any particular moment. the machine does not stand still. none of this stands as the idea itself except whatever might be consistent through the process of revision and that being consistent is the process of revision itself. the machine is constantly revised. but even that should not be held to be representative of the idea. what might be held to be representative of the idea is how much it changes, not what remains the same. but it may actually be both. the machine is chiseled in stone.
    this is the idea of the machine. there are aspects of it that remain consistent while other parts are constantly changing. and what remains consistent may change in their rearrangement with one another. some parts may be central for awhile and then shift into something else while something else becomes central. this characteristic prevents him from writing about it as a whole. he becomes frustrated by it. the machine is frustration. all other ideas other people have are presented and packaged as a whole, usually with the suffix "ism". should this be machineism? maybe it should be cafeism. notebookism. coffee and cigarettesism. staring out the windowism. delusionalism. imaginaryism. bullshitism. whateverism.
    what?
    he writes about all these things. all these things have something to do with the machine. but the machine has nothing to do with anything else. none of these things are central. none of these things are very consistent. but none of these things ever change. and none of them get to what he is trying to get at - though he doesn't know what that is. none of it is what he is trying to describe. what he tries to describe gets lost in the description. some are too particular. some are too general. some carry their own meanings with them from other sources and usage otherwise. he then gets caught up in trying to purge them of these other meanings and defining his own. then it all gets tangled up in words. gazorbnik. it ends up being quite meaningless and seemingly pointless.
    nevermindism.
    it just becomes it.
    itism?
    it has no value. it is like x in mathematics. x has no value except what it is given by the other elements of the equation - the elements with set hard unchanging values. it is useless. itism would be useless. it has no practical application and certainly none that is profitable. it does not need to exist - but it is the only thing that exists. it is invisible. he found it on the junk pile of ideas - along with the machine. these are ideas that cannot promise return on one's investment in them. it would be difficult, if not impossible, to turn out an itism self-help book that would lead one to a life of economic, social, political, religious - and let us not forget sexual - success and fulfillment. he is a perfect example of this. look where it's gotten him.
    itism is an idea of resignation. it is a comfortable opiate for one who has entirely failed in one's life. itism is whatever the fuckism. it's go away and leave me aloneism. it's i don't care about who you are or whatever the fuck you're talking about just give me my checkism. it's fuck youism. it's the machine will eat you up and spit you out no matter how big and powerful you are or however many of you there areism. on that level itism makes perfect sense and does provide one with a return on one's investment, since one has invested nothing.
    it is the machine.
    it's about zippy pins dancing on the rooftop under the overcast yellow sky drizzling a dirty mist over his pimply naked flesh yowling. meanwhile, in an apartment below, his sister moonie pie is on her back legs held spread out and arms around the neck of some guy grunting and fucking her sideways.
    it's about the whole world in the gutter. some of it glitters more than the rest but that's about it. the wealthy and powerful are just as twisted in agony as those far below them even with their flashy cars as seen on tv curving around the bends on some forest mountain road away from it all. there is no escape - except as seen on tv. those attempting escape just dig themselves in deeper. just a pile of maggots on some rotten flesh. a maggot is a maggot. what difference does it make whether its on the top of the pile or the bottom? we have these illusions about one another. we believe others have it better than we do. we forget that we are a bunch of monkeys who learned how to construct artificial realities. our reality can be anything we want or need it to be. brazil. it's always all in our heads anyway. and most of it is implanted by the others around us. each of us is colonized by each others thoughts and concepts of thoughts. but none of this is credible. go away.
    one can carve it up and turn it around any which way one wants to unless one allows oneself to get caught up in all the isms of one or the other and the orthodox and counter-orthodox and alternative-orthodox and whatever-orthodox along all those set and given forms. it seems that many feel that they must stay within these forms even when they are going against them. they maintain that this must be this and that must be that though they argue about what is this and what is that. as long as this and that are maintained as separate and distinct things or ideas each will have its supporters and detractors who will struggle in opposition to one another. in that context what difference does it make what side one is on even if it is the side that wins against the other for the moment? this never ends it. there is always another conflict about something else they engage in. that is their nature. that is the nature of the machine.
     to one who has been converted to the right thinking idea of itism this is an exercise in futile absurdity. these people who engage in such activity are at best neurotic and more often than not psychotic. they conduct this activity not out of any pressing need but because they are psychologically addicted to it and cannot not do it. they are unable to stop. they will always form opposing and competing sides over anything, often over things that didn't have sides to begin with. they'll argue over what color socks they are wearing if it comes to that. one person or group will say something and another person or group will say something against it. and a third will say something against those two and so on. and they each draw a line and refuse to compromise except as they can figure that it might make their position stronger somehow or to make an alliance. a and b will compromise in order to combine forces against c. once c is defeated then a and b will continue their attacks on one another. why? the age old answer - because. none of these people or groups knows why they do what they do except giving superficial arguments concerning the specific issue they are fighting for or against or some grand generalized moral reasons about truth, justice, liberty and such like that which the side in opposition to them will claim as well. who can argue with that?
    so if everyone is promoting these high moral virtues then what is all the opposition and conflict about? it's about power. they are fighting to be the ones who define what is truth, justice, liberty and so on. they are fighting to be the ones who dispense these things to everyone else - or to those they feel are deserving and deny them to those who are not.
    nothing's more fun than a barrel of monkeys. that's what we say. spill them out and sit back and watch the show as they fight with one another in ongoing conflict of i want this, i don't want that.
    or is that too simple?
    it must be. otherwise people would realize what they are doing and stop doing it. so there must be something more complex to it that this simple view doesn't take into account. people aren't monkeys. they wouldn't conduct themselves in this competitive opposition and conflict without there being carefully reasoned and thought out explanations and purpose for them doing so - right? people are smart. they're not stupid. people do not mislead themselves into believing things that aren't fundamentally true and real and can be proven to be so such that there is no doubt - do they? what possible other reason could there be for participating in activity that directly or indirectly interferes with the lives of others except if one can justify it with absolute rock solid certainty that what one is doing is the right thing to do - or at the very least the most right thing one can do out of all the available options one might consider? one certainly is not doing what one is doing because of some knee jerk response and without long careful deliberation of thought. one is certainly not merely seeking to satisfy one's own desires at another's expense and detriment. we are certainly beyond that by now - right?
    not that one can take all these considerations in every situation, but certainly one can in terms of one's long term and planned actions. one has responsibility if not for the well being of others then for one's own. so everyone is at least taking care of their own interests and happiness and not allowing themselves to become involved in a lot of extra needless activities that only detract from one's own well being - yes?
    or are they all at each other's throats trying to claw their way to the top and grabbing whatever they can get their hands on for the mere gratification of possessing it and working themselves to death trying to pay for it all? do they all lust after power and wealth that overcomes their reason? and does it matter what any of them do or how or why they're doing it?
    it's all part of the machine.
    we are human and will exhibit human behavior on individual and collective levels that have remained unchanged since we've been human - even since we were proto-human.
    one wonders if it has a purpose or if it is just as it is - that we are these creatures who have evolved into what we have evolved into without really having evolved much at all. could we be an expression of some consciousness that grows toward awareness as a plant grows toward the sun? what would that consciousness be? what is it expressing besides ever more complex variations of instincts that can be found in an amoebae? we eat sleep shit and fuck. we exist. we continue to exist. that's it? but then what is the machine more than that? what else is even god? what else is even it?
    and he realizes that he has painted himself into a corner. all that is left is to apply fresh coats of paint. he's good at that. the same thing over and over. dada.
    or he could forget. he could put this all away and join the others in doing whatever it is that they are doing which doesn't seem like much to him more than what he's already doing. they go over and over the same things too. and how many corners have they painted themselves into? but he doesn't understand what they are doing. he doesn't understand what he is doing. but he fools himself into thinking that he understands what they are doing all too well that it comes full circle and negates itself. but whether or not he understands them, he doesn't understand them as they understand themselves and they way they justify what they are doing to themselves and each other. he doesn't understand how they rationalize it or why they don't seem to realize that that rationalization breaks down if one takes it a few steps further which they do not do and perhaps cannot do. it then becomes irrationalization. they will not accept that. yet when he speaks with some of them they do seem to have some fair idea that what they are doing is absurd. it seems that on a collective level that they don't understand it. this has led him to surmise that the collective intelligence is far less intelligent and more reactive and instinctive than individual intelligence. it seems to operate on some lowest common denominator principle such that people will function and operate in a group in ways that they would not function or operate on their own individually. this is not always the case. many individuals seem to be locked into groupthink whether they are in a group or not. they remain psychically linked to the group and the group mind. he notices that often when speaking with one of the others that it takes them a certain amount of time to disconnect from the group mind and to be themselves. this time varies with different people. for some, they never reach the state of individual consciousness and remain group minded and speak only in terms of the group and group ideas.
    for himself it seems the opposite. he could never really get into the group mind thing. especially recently he has always functioned and operated individually and independently. he has lost what little group sense that he possessed before. he has severed all his connections to and, more importantly, all his dependence on groups. of course, he is dependent upon the biggest group of them all - the government. but this exists on such an abstract and bureaucratic scale that it really doesn't count the same. he has little contact with anyone involved. once in awhile he might have to fill out a form. it's the face to face personal level group relationships that he has severed. he maintains relationships with several individuals but these do not constitute a group themselves though some of them are involved with groups. their only connection to one another is that they are people who have a connection to him. what other groups associations they might have otherwise he does not get involved in. that is part of their lives separate from his relationship to them and they to him as individuals. in these relationships there are no binding obligations. he does not speak to them about what he writes about. he did at one time but only got nodding and polite responses and the subject would be changed as soon as possible.

    so that's him and other people - him and other people who are primarily group oriented. the twain do not seem to meet. he lets us and the machine take care of it. he just sits here and writes.
    there are none who are untouched by the machine. there none who do not co-operate with the machine and with its operations. killers. but who has the consciousness of this in its totality? some may realize parts of it, and see it as something they should need to resist, but they do not see how even resistance is co-operation. they see things divided and choose one side or the other. but both sides, all sides, work hand in hand with the continuing creation and maintenance and destruction of the whole that is the machine.
    the world as it is is a human creation. we all co-operate in it. what injustice, oppression, inequalities it might contain are ours. what atrocities and horrors it might contain are ours. yet we love to point out villains and blame them though this is absurd. how is anything divided between this and that? we order people to their deaths every time we go to the grocery store. there is interdependent connections between everything. at the very least one thing cannot exist without its opposite. but not everything is as opposite as it might seem.
    freebot.
    the machine resists itself.
    the machine is turning inside out.
    everything is the machine but the machine is not everything.
    there is always room for more.
    just an idea.
    the machine is a mechanism we all have a hand in employing. it's all in balance out of balance. one's success is paid for by another's failure. not everyone can be on top and climbing one's way to the top pushes others to the bottom to carry the weight. there is no way around that. it's simple physics.
    and then there the equalists. everybody in the middle - not top, not bottom. where's the excitement in that?
    but the equalists want to be on top too. they want the power to decide what's best for everyone. they must eliminate the competition. they must conquer those who oppose them. they want the wealth even if they have some idea of distributing it. it's all the same. the war goes on.
    the machine doesn't necessarily need it to be this way. it also doesn't necessarily need things to change. the machine can survive in any and all conditions. the machine only looks out for itself and its continued functioning. it can sail any which way the will of the people blows at any given moment. to know the machine is to know this. it expresses the underlying will of the masses even when they do not know what it is themselves, which they often do not. it's always a surprise. the machine also knows the will of the individual, also often when the individual does not. if one intends to go in one direction and finds that way impeded it is not any fault of the machine or one being opposed by the machine but because one does not know the true nature of one's own will. the machine grants any wish. it's up to oneself to know and understand what one's wishes are and their full meaning and their source. but, as well, the machine owes no one nothing. the machine does what it wants for its own reasons. do not pray to the machine. the machine does not listen. the machine cannot listen. the machine has no ears. one needs to realize that one is where exactly one wants to be. the machine doesn't care one way or the other. it has better things to do and worry about. it does not change because of one's will or even the will of the masses. it functions the same, like a ship, whether it is sailing east, west, north or south, it just sails.
    the machine is us. what anthropomorphizing is being done here is not to state that it is something other than us that has human qualities. it has human-like qualities because it is human as we are human and we are it. it can be a symphony or a bloodbath. what it is itself at whatever time doesn't matter, only that it is. it will always be beyond us. we cannot alter what it is or is not, but its shape and form is entirely within our control. yet our shape and form is entirely within its control.
    and he realizes to himself that this is stupid. what is sitting here making up whatever about some machine thing doing? whether or not any of what he writes about is true or real is irrelevant. there have probably been countless of people who have imagined something along these lines - he knows that there have been. but they put it aside, forgot it, and go on with their lives.
    he has become fixated with it. he has nothing else. he doesn't have a life other than writing this - scribbling some loonie tunes.
    this is as it is. realizing this, he still does nothing. he doesn't want to do anything and is in a situation where he doesn't have to. this is his life. this is what he leaves behind to be discovered. he doesn't imagine the others being interested in any of it even if they knew it existed. they are doing what they are doing and aren't interested in changing - though none of this is asking them to. if anything, it encourages them to remain just as they are. let them die off. though he does take a tone of thumbing his nose and laughing at them. they don't particularly enjoy that either though they love doing it to others. that is why he is off on the sidelines because he always laughed at them and how stupid they are. it's a guaranteed way of losing one's livelihood and friends which was maybe what he may have intended all along. he had always thought that the world owed him a living. he always believed in the free lunch. he never asked to come here and ever since he was invited - or out and out kidnapped - he's been treated rather rudely. this is the least they can do to provide for his basic needs. now, thanks to the machine, he's got it. thanks to his own madness.
    the only real function this writing serves is to keep him from talking to himself. imagine if he were to be always going on about this out loud as so many others do. he doesn't want to be that out of it. sitting here and writing puts on the pretense that he is actually doing something - that he's a writer, not crazy. some people seem to even admire him for it. at the least it doesn't seem to be anything all that unusual while he sits in the cafes. it works as a good cover. he can spill out this nonsense that's always going on turning around raving in his head that even the medications he's taking sometimes don't seem to be able to get rid of while around him people can believe that he is writing stories or poetry or something acceptable like that - a journal even. whatever whatnot.
    and people seem to think that that type of writing is a good thing though he doesn't know why and he doubts that they know why either. do they think at all? it's just something they say like so many other things that people say. it seems like the right thing to say because other people are saying it, but it ends up being meaningless.
    but what is said that is not meaningless? one thing that is meaningless is talking about what is or is not meaningless. everything has meaning even if its meaning is that it doesn't have meaning. and one can make the one size fits all statement that meaning is relative.
    oh boy.
    ho-hum.

    this day as another day is passing. there are x-amount of things to be done. maybe some of them will be done while others things will not. it's just another day. it may be a very significant or important day for some while it is a day that is forgotten as it occurs by others.
    he continues writing as he has written yesterday and he will write tomorrow upon tomorrow. is it the same? is it different? is it significant or important today or any other day? it's just more of someone writing about oneself writing. it doesn't get too much more involuted than that.

    maybe in the burning theater.
    splinky: so, what is there to say?
    nod: you just said something.
    splinky: but it was a question. a question really isn't saying anything - especially when it is a question asking what is there to say.
    nod: i suppose you're right. i'm not going to argue.
    splinky: so what is there to say?
    nod: we can say anything. or we can not say anything. what do you mean what is there to say?
    splinky: i don't know. maybe i mean what is there to say that means anything?
    nod: means what to who?
    splinky: to anyone.
    nod: anyone? which anyone?
    splinky: any anyone.
    nod: well, you can say anything and it will mean something to someone. it's just an matter of matching what you say to the right person.
    splinky: maybe that's what i mean. i don't know who i'm talking to.
    nod: you're talking to me.
    splinky: besides you.
    nod: you're not talking to me?
    splinky: i don't mean that. i'm already saying something to you. but what about someone else?
    nod: like who?
    splinky: i don't know.
    nod: who would you want it to be?
    splinky: maybe just someone who understands.
    nod: understands what?
    splinky: what i'm saying.
    nod: well, you can count me out.
    splinky: you don't understand me?
    nod: i'm trying.
    splinky: well, trying is enough.
    nod: but you still want someone else?
    splinky: i don't know. maybe. maybe not. if it's someone who doesn't understand or tries to then nuts to them.
    nod: do you want someone to understand what you're saying or do you want to say something that  someone understands?
    splinky: what's the difference?
    nod: well, the first, you say something and you then need someone who understands it. the second, there's someone and you need to say something that they understand. the second is the hardest and is not what most people do - except politicians. they do it all the time.
    slinky: maybe i should forget about this.
    nod: maybe.
    slinky: there isn't anyone anyway.
    nod: there's me.
    slinky: i'm not talking about you.
    nod: no, of course not. it's always someone else.

    in the slight afternoon that is the first warm day of late winter/early spring. a premature splice of weather. he's even drinking iced tea instead of coffee.
    and he is still sitting here writing to himself long letters about himself. there are no others who interest him to write about. the others and just the others. they have their other lives which must suit them fine as his suits him.
    as he writes about himself for something about himself that transcends through him and the others. something that makes his experience of himself and their experience of themselves the same. hot homogeneously the same but heterogeneously the same. variations on the same theme the same.
    where is this found except in some existential space of our individual yet at the same time collective humanityness? few are willing to reach into that or want to be reminded of that being is really all there is to oneself and ourselves. we want something more solid - more physical. we reach for each other instead. we reach for that brief time when we might find ourselves in synchronized harmony with another in interlocked rhythmic passion. but that fire burns for only a short time - for only a few times. then we are left out in the cold night beneath the sky of distant points of light too far away in space and time to know them as the raging explosive fires that they are.

    the next day it rains again. all the words he wants to write still escape him. the space around him is too large and void. the world and those in it are too far away and too strange as he is too far away and too strange to them. he is too far away and too strange to himself. does he understand who this person himself is or what this person wants?
    he comes into it and leaves it. out of the darkness and into the darkness. he gets this brief passing view through this person's eyes of the world. this person thinks thoughts and feels emotions none of which he feels any real connection to. the language he uses is this other's language he learned as a child. it contains the subjective information of the culture and the culture's world view. he tries to think his way through it to some base reality, if there is one - if reality isn't entirely constructed throughout from the ground up. but what is that ground? or is that constructed too? what is the substance that provides the material all else is constructed from?
    this line of thinking - questioning - usually leads him back into the mind - back through his own mind, through the cultural mind, toward the mind itself. the mind of the machine.
    but how does one know this mind or if one has reached it or if it exists to be reached? maybe it too is an idea that is part of the constructed illusion.
    he arrives at this again. this is where he is alone. it is familiar. it is home to him. do the others know this place? does it exist within them as well? he has heard and read others describe what seems to be the same place but it is a place where we are apart - isolated. when we are here for all we know we may be the only thing that exists - the only conscious being that exists. everything else is imagination - even the others. if they do exist as more than that, as other conscious beings, they cannot be reached, cannot be touched. they might as well be imaginary even if they are not.
    so he comes to this and he writes from it. he is writing to no one he can prove who exists to himself. he is writing to himself - or to anyone who can step into where he is now to know this as he does. if there is someone, he is not aware of who it might be. it could be any one of these others. but who? it could be all of these others. how can he tell?
    is this the mind of god? is this the loneliness of god? what does god do but divide itself apart into the many others? is there any communication between two conscious beings? can there be any communication between any conscious beings? how does one know what is imaginary and what is not? does even god know what is imaginary and what is not?
    there is nothing but to make up things about whatever. the imagination becomes real. that is what the machine is for. if there is a reality then imagination overrides reality. there is no one else who can come into this. he is by himself even when he is out and surrounded by people who call themselves his friends. these are people he is willing to tolerate. they come to him and provide him with company, as imaginary as it may be. but he is just as happy to sit here for hours alone. he always returns from them to himself. he tolerates them as long as they do not interfere with that.
    is this all narcissistic vanity? perhaps so. but it is all he has found that he can rely on. he will always be here. others come and go. should he rely on them? some return. others never. should he center himself on them and what they are doing?
    he accepts himself. he tolerates himself. he sees a thousand faults but what is he to do about that? - become someone else? who? what? he looks around himself. as much as he might not want to be himself sometimes, he doesn't want to be any one of them. he has searched within himself to try to find what other possibilities might lie in potential to be awakened. what he is and what he has been writing is it. it's either worth something or not. but how is it's worth to be measured? it is what it is worth to him. what it is worth to him is that it is him - it is his thoughts and feelings as much as he can write them down. what it might be worth to anyone else is imaginary. their whole world is imaginary. he could figure out some way to impress them. he could devise some tricks to entertain them. he could elicit their applause, their approval, their praise. he could get them to exchange things they value to him for what he gives them. he already does this to some extent. they do support him after all. they do pay his rent, buy him food, coffee, cigarettes, notebooks - even now send him to school. and what he gives them in return is someone who sits in a cafe scribbling out words none of them seem to be the slightest bit interested in reading. this seems strange to him but that is how it is. should it be any different? should he give them more than that? only if they give him more in exchange, but probably not even then. he's had it with that game. he really doesn't want anything more from them. they don't want anything more from him. he hopes they are as happy with the deal between them as he is. but are they happy about anything? they don't seem so. their happiness seems fleeting and superficial. it seems to leave them unsatisfied. but that is what it is to be human, he supposes. and what else is there to be but human? to be immortal supernatural beings in a state of eternal bliss? perhaps. but isn't that what we are? that is what he is and he assumes that that is what the others are too - unless they really are entirely imaginary. that is the ground, the foundation - the mind. what we experience here and now is the illusion created by the machine we devised. the machine that creates the world and ourselves in it. we begin in the mind. we are the mind. we created this from it. this is the drama - the play. we step into it and play our parts we create for ourselves. what else do immortal supernatural beings do with themselves for all that eternity? bliss becomes mundane and boring after awhile - after the first zillion millennia or so - or 15 minutes, whichever comes first. then one lights another cigarette and comes back into it - back into the world. but maybe this isn't true for the others. maybe being human is all they are. what is to be done with that? do they want anything other than that? they do speak of it. they have written about it for many ages. they imagine a paradise beyond the world that is filled with delight. is that what the mind is to them? it really is just a void. a void that is just mind. mind without substance. mind that creates substance - that creates space and time for substance to be in. mind that divides its consciousness throughout this substance of space and time such that it forgets itself - forgets that all it is is mind in the void. it entertains itself with creation. it entertains itself being creation. it remembers itself in creation. creation gives substance to thought. thought by itself without substance is just that. it is nothing. it does not know itself because there is nothing to know itself as being. that is what this so-called paradise is. yet the idea of paradise does not go away among them.
    this twisted circle goes around itself. it can begin or end anywhere. but within it there is geometric space and linear time. that is where and when humans experience their lives. and where and when one is human, one lives one's life as being human. one experiences oneself as being human. one is confined within the spatial and temporal limits of being human. that is where and when he is now. that is the context he writes within. his writing cannot reach out of that context. it cannot describe what lies "outside" of that context - what exists within himself and perhaps within others. that is not what this world is. this world inhibits that - denies it. this world presents itself as all there is - the sole reality. no other reality can be described except using the words of the languages of this world metaphorically which turns these words into nonsense unless one has the experience of the other reality that allows one to understand what those metaphors might mean. if one does not have this experience, if the world is all one knows and experiences, or if that is all one allows oneself to know and experience, then there is nothing within oneself for the metaphors to be applied to. they are meaningless. or they are taken for their literal meaning and one imagines that they are actual representations of what is being described. that is where this idea of paradise probably comes from.
    and it is all imaginary. and in the world, imagination has no value except as it might produce things the world recognizes as being real. if it only produces things that are imaginary - existing other than this world - it is worthless.
    the world exists to re-create itself and to protect itself. it only recognizes that which substantiates itself as itself. anything that might expose it as being illusion is denied.
    and all this is dada. it's just a thing scribbled in a notebook and stays there. thoughts that mean and relate to nothing written by someone who is no one. someone who produces nothing of any value in this world or to those living in this world. he doesn't even offer them escape. he doesn't create an alternative - a paradise, a utopia. he doesn't offer adventure and excitement. he only offers them boredom which is the boredom of the gods. the world is the escape from that boredom. and the world too is boring. it stimulates and excites for the moment but that quickly fades and grows old - and then dies.
    sigh.
    oh boy.
    ho-hum.
    light another cigarette.
    snap out of it.
    do something.
    imagine doing something.

    he sits in the cafe scribbling in a notebook his mundane quasi-existential whatnot that babbles away like dark dirty water pouring out of a drainage pipe into a polluted river.
    and then jesus walks in. he comes over and sits at his table. no one else seems top notice. he wonders how they could not. but he looks again at jesus and wonders instead how they could. jesus sits there looking like just anyone. he wonders how he knows it's jesus. why did he think so when he walked in and sat down? he decides that it's not important. jesus is obviously disguising himself. he must have let it slip a moment to show him who he was. maybe some telepathic transmission. he wonders if he really saw it or if it was his own imagination. he decides to check.
    you're jesus, right?
    i might be. it's a possibility. it depends on what you believe or want to believe.
    i think i believe that i'm crazy - that i imagine things that aren't really there or as they really are.
    do you want me to leave?
    i don't even know why you're here.
    i just came to talk with you.
    why?
    why not?
    that helps.
    sorry.
    so what do you have to say?
    what do you want me to say? you're the one writing this down.
    i'm just writing what's happening.
    is this happening?
    it's not?
    not to anyone else. they don't see me or hear me. to them i'm not here. just to you. i am transmitting myself to you through your imagination. you needed something else to write about.
    this isn't much better.
    i didn't say that it was.
    don't you have better things to do? don't you have to get ready for your comeback?
    it's all ready. i'm just waiting for the hour and the day. it's close but it's not time yet.
    well, i don't want you here. go away.
    ok. i just thought you might like some company.
    not really.
    and so jesus went away.
    then another scene opens. there is this clearing in a forest. in the middle of the clearing is a man fucking a goat. the man turns his face toward him and laughs. he sees that it's jesus. he calls to him.
    why are you fucking a goat?
    because i want to and i'm jesus and i can do anything i want.
    i wouldn't think that being jesus that you would want to do something like that.
    well, i do. what do you care?
    i suppose i don't, but a lot of people would.
    and are you going to tell them?
    maybe.
    would they believe you if you did?
    probably not.
    so?
    so, nothing.
    and he turned and walked away. he soon came to a path. he chose to go to his left. it looked like that way went downhill, which it did. it came to and followed alongside a stream. he walked along until he came to a village. the stream flowed past and turned a wheel of a mill. an older man was sitting on a barrel outside the door. the man looked up.
    what are you doing here?
    i was just coming from up there where jesus was fucking a goat.
    yeah, he's always coming around here and doing stuff like that.
    why?
    why not? nobody here really cares. what difference does it make? life goes on. we eat. we sleep. we work. we hang around doing nothing. once in awhile there's a fight or something. sometimes somebody goes crazy and kills their family and a few other people before we kill them. and jesus comes by and does things like fuck one of our goats. and there's bandit raids we have to put up with. they come by, steal some food, animals, maybe one or two or the boys or girls. then they go away. we survive. you should probably write about something else. ain't nothing happening here.
    then the old man took a knife out of a sheath hanging on his belt, raised it up and slit his throat. he fell over gurgling, eyes twinkling, wetting his pants. he twitched awhile, then stopped. a large salamander crawled out of his opened mouth. it grew wings and flew away with a loud buzzing.
    another scene opened. he was standing on a city street corner. people and cars were going by. he noticed jesus on the adjacent corner. he appeared to be purchasing drugs from some slimy dealer. then suddenly jesus was standing right in front of him.
    hey- you wanna go shoot up some junk?
    i'll pass.
    ok.
    and jesus walked down the block and into the door of a rundown hotel. he wondered why he kept thinking this guy was jesus. then he shrugged and crossed the street. there was no reason to think that the guy was jesus or wasn't. he had no investment in jesus being anyone or anything. if jesus fucked goats - fine. if he was a junkie - fine. he didn't care. why shouldn't jesus be any of these things - or appear as such? or was it only his imagination? he didn't care about that either.
    maybe he should imagine jesus living in the suburbs with a wife and kids. and maybe he's the owner of a lumberyard and hardware store - a profitable business that's been in the family for generations - an expanding business. nationwide. worldwide. international importing and exporting of all one's building tool and material needs from foundation to roof and a doghouse too. yet as wealthy and powerful as he is, he remains a simple humble and thoughtful man of compassion always willing to help those around him. or is that a bit too much, even for jesus?
    how would he live as a common ordinary person without the burden of salvation? how would he spend his time when not on a mission? what does the guy do to relax? especially someone who cannot be touched by sin? how does he relax? or is all his time filled with obligations to those who aren't able to stand on their own and take responsibility for themselves and deal with their own problems? even jesus must get tired after awhile of having them always praying to him for this and that - whatever whim that pops into their head at the moment. millions of people who behave like children - spoiled children at that. what if he just wants some time off?
    does he allow himself the occasional cigarette? a glass of wine? a shot of whiskey? a joint? maybe sitting down for a game of cards with the angels. or going fishing or bowling. or a few rounds of golf. and what fun would it be if he couldn't turn off his omniscient powers now and then? how could one enjoy anything if one always won at everything all the time? how boring it would get knowing everything , never being surprised, never risking the chance of making a mistake.
    he finally decided that he felt sorry for him, imagining what it must be like stuck being jesus all the time on call 24 hours a day 3651/4 days a year. no rest. no sleep. forever. he thanked his lucky stars and all the ships at sea and whatever else that that hadn't happened to him. he considered how fortunate he was just to be able to sit in a cafe and drink coffee and smoke a cigarette. to just sit and not think about anyone else or their problems. to feel lust and desire, not to necessarily act on them but to enjoy the experience of feeling them - even feeling fear.
    and jesus comes into the cafe again and sits at his table.
    so, you're feeling sorry for me, huh?
    yeah, sort of .
    don't waste you time. i'm doing fine.
    that's why you're off fucking goats and shooting heroin.
    among other things. see, i get to enjoy myself when i want.
    what about telling other people that they shouldn't?
    they can't handle it - i can.
    and if they knew that this was what you were doing?
    they won't know. and if they did, they wouldn't believe it. they need me as their savior - their protector. and that's what i am. but in order to do that i need a break once in awhile. i create alternate space and time to do that. what you saw really didn't happen. i create it, enjoy it, then uncreate it.
    then why did i see it?
    because i allowed you to.
    why?
    you don't know?
    should i?
    yes. but maybe not just yet. maybe not ever. we'll have to see.
    i'd expect that from you - typical mysterious bullshit.
    think what you like.
    i think what i think whether i like it or not. and right now i think you're an overbearing belligerent asshole.
    you don't feel sorry for me anymore?
    no.
    good. that's what i wanted.
    and he got up and left.
    so he's left thinking, fuck jesus. arrogant turd. but that wasn't much better than feeling sorry for him. he thought he should just forget about him. he should write about something else.

    some other fiction. something about another life not lived. he was blank. he didn't know what he wanted to write about or not write about. always either or. it was just writing. the action of writing. other people were busy doing other things - things that needed to be done - that counted. even someone pushing a shopping cart collecting cans and bottles was doing something more important and worthwhile. he felt that he was doing nothing. just slowly killing himself. it was pretty stupid.
    the scene opens up back to the village where he had seen jesus fucking a goat. he was back at the mill. the old man was gone. he saw an inn and went there. inside was a group of men sitting at a table. he sat at another. they didn't notice him. a girl came over and asked him what he wanted.
    coffee.
    what's that?
    oh - um... what do you have?
    glop.
    what's that?
    it's glop.
    i'll have some glop.
    she went to bring him some glop. he listened to the men talking. they seemed to be talking about what crops they were going to plant mostly.
    the girl came back.
    are you the hero?
    the hero?
    people say that a hero is going to come to protect us from the bandits.
    well, that's not me.
    oh.
    just then the door opened and tall large man was standing there. he had a sword hung at his side. the men at the table stopped talking and stared at him.
    i hear you're having trouble with bandits.
    yes we are, one of the men said.
    well i'm here to help you.
    why?
    that's what i do.
    what's it going to cost?
    i don't want money.
    what do you want?
    something to eat. maybe a place to sleep.
    and someone to sleep with probably.
    that would be ok.
    well, forget it. go away.
    go away?
    go away. we don't need you. the bandits are bad enough, but you're even more trouble.
    and what if i don't go away?
    you have to sleep sometime.
    and...?
    we'll kill you.
    i doubt that.
    fine. come on in. have something to eat. sleep with the serving girl. help yourself to whatever you want. no one will stop you.
    the man stood for a moment, his expression blank.
    maybe i'll just go to another village. there's probably others who would want my help if you don't.
    you're probably right.
    and the man with the sword left.
    the girl was still standing next to his table. he asked why they had sent him away if they were waiting for a hero.
    we're not waiting for one. people just say that one is going to come. once in awhile someone like him does show up. he'll stay with us for awhile and no bandits will come. then he'll get bored and leave, after eating our food and knocking up one or two of our women. then the bandits will come again. we got tired of it.
    oh.

    a day with rain. a day off from school. a day drinking coffee and smoking cigarettes. a day writing. a day trying to make something up to write about. someday there won't be people like him. they will be cured or eliminated. everything will run smoothly and efficiently. everyone will be a functioning part of the whole meshed like gears. there will be no wondering about nothing. there will be no place or time for it. there will be no one set aside. and no one will remember that anything like this ever was or is possible.
    won't we be happy?
    until then he sits in a dead end. where he has gone has no future. for something to have a future it must have a purpose. there is no purpose for him or what he does. while there are people like him, they are tolerated. they are supported and kept alive. not always, but much of the time. there is a moral code that requires it. but if these people can be eliminated before they come into being and the others are stuck with them so much the better. no moral requirement. no guilt. the others have a free ride. the party can begin.
    he doesn't know how glad he is being who and what he is but he's glad he isn't part of that brave new world. though if he was he wouldn't have any thoughts about it. he would be entirely involved in the moment. he would perform what he had to do without pondering what meaning it might have beyond that. he would experience it as it is - no past, no future. he would be busy.
    keep busy is the advice given to those like him who get themselves lost in the depths. keep busy is the key to happiness. and it's good advice. there is nothing in these depths but the depths themselves. there is nothing to be found to be brought to the surface that has any value to the busy world of the others above. nothing that they would even recognize. one can put as many pieces together as one wants and is able to. what is discovered is only relevant to oneself. one can make a big deal and production about it and possibly turn it into a marketable product, but then what is it that is any different than what comes from a factory? busy busy busy.
    one keeps oneself stimulated. one keeps oneself focused on the external world and away from any inner thought or exploration. one does not lose oneself within oneself. that spirals down into self-anihilation. he knows that course well. he's been to that point that is the single thing between existence and oblivion. that point that is the point of creation. creation being that illusion of being thinly screening oneself from the void. that illusion of constant stimulation both real and imaginary, both external and internal. it provides us with images and we maintain those images in our mind. without our conscious participation in it it would collapse in on itself. where would we be then? we would know the ultimate truth and reality and our hands would be empty. we would not even have hands.
    so we run in the opposite direction. that is where we locate our paradises and utopias - our salvation. we fill eternity with the ever-radient light of stimulation. busy busy busy.
    we must at every given moment keep ourselves busy. busyness is happiness. it is the economy of creation and existence. we must always invest ourselves in it. we must always fight back the forces of entropy. we must never allow it to stop.
    he does his part by spending every moment he can writing. this keeps him busy. and if another reads it then it keeps them busy as well. that is the only worth this writing can have - to keep him and whoever else busy. any other meaning is no meaning. meaning stops. the lights go out. we sit in the dark and the silence. what fun is that however meaningful it might be? knowing the ultimate truth and reality of everything is all very well and good. one can pat oneself on the back and give oneself a gold star for accomplishing the feat of unriddling the riddle. but what does it amount to beyond that? one becomes god. and as god one is absolutely alone in the void. all of creation is a toy one plays with to keep oneself amused - and busy. one sweeps one's hand and creates intergalactic tidal forces that changes the destiny of countless of beings scattered among the stars. but one is only a child playing with an anthill. a big fat spoiled and extremely bored child. bored to the point of madness.
    he tries to keep himself away from this. he tries to keep himself focused on being this creature existing among billions of others on this one planet out of a near infinity of planets. he tries to keep himself from slipping back into himself - back to that point between existence and oblivion - the point of creation.
    and it is maddening. the madness of it waits poised to swallow him whole. he doesn't want to go back. he doesn't want to return to that consciousness. he keeps himself busy busy busy.
    but his mind and thoughts betray him. they always turn him back. what others meditate and chant mantras to struggle to catch a glimpse of he loathes and cannot get away from. it haunts him everywhere no matter what he is doing. there is not a thought in his mind that is not a thought of that.
    there is no dread or fear of it, there is only a hatred of it. if he could be just a simple creature with a simple creature's concerns. if he could experience dread and fear he would almost prefer that. not the madness of boredom. boredom on a metacosmic scale. when the universe is only idle distraction like fireworks. when the flash and noise is over and the charred smoke dissipates and settles still. what then? when one reaches the end of one's imagination and creativity. when there's no point to it anymore. when all the possibilities have been played out and it all returns to being just oneself generating an illusion to keep oneself occupied and amused - that allows one to forget oneself for a few thousand billion years that are over in a moment.
    he lights another cigarette.
    he goes back into it again.
    he's this guy sitting in a cafe. he is someone who spends his time scribbling nonsense in notebooks. he tries to forget.
    and it isn't true. it's just something he's making up. but why? what sort of dysfunction in his brain and composition of his mind would cause him to do this? it cannot be true. he refuses to believe it's true no matter how many times his thoughts return to it. if he were anyone else such thoughts would not come to him. if he was one of the others. how delightful it must be to be one of them. how he envies them not to have these thoughts or to be able to ignore them and dismiss them if and when they might come to mind. how wonderful it must be to be fully immersed in this reality to the exclusion of any other.
    oh boy.
    ho-hum.
    nevermind.