Simplicity is unbearable

My life feels artificial because I imagine that my ancient ancestors once described their hunting and gathering and the weather around a campfire at the end of the day. But me? What do I have to discuss? I filed sheets of paper by account department and as a receptionist forwarded strangers to people I barely know. The rest of my day included watching Stargate reruns and The Day of the Jackal.

How many of my experiences relate to me? In the "information age" we don't experience, we gather information. However, I also doubt my intuition about the relevance of my forebears' experiences. How much time did they think and talk about spirits, gods, black magic and other things they didn't directly experience.

Hap Hap Happy

"Though philosophers have traditionally been concerned with the pursuit of happiness, far greater wisdom would seem to lie in pursuing ways to be properly and productively unhappy," Alain de Botton said about Proust.

"Are there to be no more opiates? Are you a communist?" shouted a heckler.

Mode operandi

Time: We tell time by dividing it into styles. (More on this later by popular request.)

Keeping time: We’ve chosen to replicate ourselves for the time-being. Or do we stretch ourselves onto the apparatus in the penal colony, then await branding with the word on the street?

Vox Populi: Calvin Klein is but one couturier spelunking the archive of modern humanity. Good sports wear. Bad sports bare.

No style: To be strictly objective and devoid of the affectations of style in terms of word-choice, ideas, political or social trends.

12 Observances:

1. I will wear no more boring clothing.



2. I will be true to myself, moment by moment.



3. My words, thoughts, deeds and appearance will be in perfect alignment and never be the cause for gossip or embarrassment.



4. I will be new.



5. I will not be modern.



6. Anything can be said in the Lingo Franca.



7. Anyone can be anything in the Pax Kapital.



8. I will be one with the Street and will try my best to find the right street.



9. Some things you’ll always get used to.



10. Every time I’m used I will be paid.



11. Make way for intimacy.



12. Recognise that to be seen is to be judged: Judge others, lest I be invisible.

Lowering the sails

Arm in arm and up in arms with passionate merchants, ensuring every home is without a father, we troll waters of discontent while belting out torch jigs and capricious dirges. No spawn unspilled, we drift, waiting steady, hungry, eager to swallow the flames of our lies.

We read our heaps of letters, listlessly collected at innumerable posts restante. Letters from the beloved drown us, crush us. We head home, slumped by sorrows, swags of gifts and touching mementos. When we arrive, we cannot find our way home; the taxi drivers don't recognize the street names, and the streets look unfamiliar to us. By dawn we realize this is not our port. Yet no one can tell us where this port is, or what it is called. They say, "This is a port. It's here. Where else should it be?"

Balloons from an undrawn comic strip

"Hey! Nice hat you got on there."

"I'm not wearing a hat."

"OK. Nice head you got on there."