A long ago neighbor of mine who detested the noise the rest of made while going about our daily lives got into a physical altercation at the neighborhood barbecue. He believed that we were intentionally disturbing him and that we owed him quiet, a near impossible expectation when you live in an apartment complex. The police took him away, charged him with assault, and he was evicted from his residence. Only after all of this did we find out that his elderly mother lived with him, a woman of ill health who needed a lot of sleep but had a difficult time sleeping even at normal noise levels. Why he’d never told us about her and her condition remains a mystery.
A woman who I used to work with told me that she doubted the veracity of love, not in those words exactly, but the depth of her expression was profound. No philosopher could have expounded longer or with more passion on the subject than her. At the time, she was sleeping with a married man and trying to convince him to leave his wife for her. I don’t know if she ever succeeded.
In the seventh grade, I attended
a two- hour English/Social studies block class
which was taught by a man nearing his
retirement years. He spent
a not insignificant amount of time
complaining about teenagers
and our annoying qualities.
I don’t believe that
he thought we should exist at all.
That same year
a venerable man tried
to convince me that a fence
stood not twenty feet away from us
despite the fact that any fool
could see that this was
absolutely false.
I have been tempted believe in the unwavering rationality of all people including myself. So, perhaps, the purest acts of humanity contradict one another, like two stones colliding and striking out a spark. The soul is afire because of chaos rather than in spite of it.
Michael S Marsters 