Monday, 15 February 1999
To be free and independent, I have written more than once in the past few months, is my great ideal. Superficially considered, it was about not having any financial obligations to any creditors. But it stretched deeper than that: I did not want to have any obligations. My ideal life was that of a bachelor, a “Steppenwolf”. No commitment, no obligations – to anyone.
About a year ago I identified “commitment” and “belonging” as fundamentally sound ideas, even for myself. What I did not realise was that I had two horses in the race. And I tried to ride both. I wanted to belong and commit, but I also wanted to be free and independent. What I did not apparently understand at first was that you cannot commit yourself to something whilst crying “Freedom!”, that you can’t belong somewhere and simultaneously suggest that you are independent.
The idea of a family of my own was never something I could work into my ideal lifestyle of freedom and independence. Now, this wouldn’t have been a problem if I weren’t yearning so much after these basic joys of life.
It dawned on me that to love a woman and to raise children with her would be much more of a restriction on my freedom and independence than the obligation of owing some banks some money.
When I realised this, it was like a weight being lifted off my shoulders. I felt relieved. I could relax because at that moment I knew that total freedom and independence were not what I wanted! If this was what I had wanted to achieve, it was possible! It’s not an illusion. It’s not a dream that can never be fulfilled. It’s a dream I don’t want! It’s a path I would never have wanted to walk to its endpoint, because I wouldn’t have been committed to anything, and I wouldn’t have belonged anywhere. And I want to commit myself to something. I want to dedicate myself to something. I want to strive for something, and I want to feel I belong somewhere.
In Johannesburg I wouldn’t easily have gained this insight because there freedom and independence were concrete short-term ideals, even desires, that I had confused with an ideal life. I needed to come to Taiwan to realise that if I wanted to be free and independent, it is doable; it is an ideal that can be realised. I had to know that it is a life I can pursue and achieve, if that was indeed what I wanted to do. But it is not.
Of course I still want to pay off my debts as soon as possible. I hate living under the sword of debt. I believe that to owe someone money is to be that person’s slave. It’s not the same as loving someone and fulfilling a financial obligation to that person out of love.
In financial terms, I still want to be free and independent. But I also want to achieve a different ideal – I want to belong somewhere. I want a home in the full sense of the word. I want to love a woman and be loved by her.
To finish off this notebook then, which first tasted ink ten months ago in Stellenbosch and that experienced Johannesburg with me, the following: I want to commit myself to an ideal the realisation of which has already begun, namely to be a writer. And I want to love and be loved, and thus belong somewhere.
I am committed. And one day, I will also belong.
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