Author: Brand Smit

Love – personality – consciousness – vocabulary

WEDNESDAY, 5 JANUARY 2005

10:14

Intimate love, and the warm body of another person is not a panacea for all pain, disappointments, and the unbearable boredom that is sometimes part of our daily existence. It can however not be denied that it enables millions of people to endure pain, disappointments and boredom on a daily basis. Is also true that if these things are endured, we don’t always do anything to improve what needs to be improved … which brings us back to the positive aspects of celibacy and being on your own … The point, however, that I wanted to make is about the benefits and value of being with someone else.

12:40

I am full of enthusiasm for this year. Why? Because I am alive … and I know no one makes it out in one piece, but until then I am alive. And that means I can apply every day of my life, every hour, every week and month, and also my hands, my feet, my brain, my eyes and my ears to something, to projects, to things I will be able to look back at and say, “That’s good.”

And as for the inevitably less positive? Well, life is a struggle, and as long as you keep standing, you’re not falling down.

16:45

Can the core of a person’s personality be changed?

I believe not, because it is to a large extent a given genetic disposition. It also depends on how change is defined. I believe the essence of a particular personality can be modified, and that it can be applied in certain ways according to will and choice. But whether or not the core can be changed, that is another question.

[According to Mental Health and Illness, “some facets of our personality are inherited”.]

[What do I mean by “core”? In what way is the core separate from the “rest” of the personality? Is there even something like a core of a particular personality, or are there simply aspects? Or are there more dominant aspects of a personality that can arguably be treated as the core?]

THURSDAY, 6 JANUARY 2005

14:42

Every person is aware of him- or herself.

The question is, is this consciousness good? If not, why not?

Does your current consciousness have to do with given birth data, or with appearing in a particular place? If the former, what can be changed? If the latter, what can be changed? Also, do you absolutely have to appear in that particular place?

21:06

The point is to develop a personal vocabulary that defines your existence, that defines who you are and what you are doing with your life. A large part of my writing over the past few years has been about exactly that: building up a particular vocabulary.

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Stamp collection or sex

TUESDAY, 4 JANUARY 2005

Why do people have sex?

Put another way, why is sex so important to so many people? (I will restrict my question to sex between people who do not love each other, but who are sexually attracted to each other to a bare minimum degree.)

The answer: certainly not to ensure offspring, but for the pleasure of it!

Okay, I know anybody old enough to know what two dogs are doing on the pavement and who know that people occasionally do something similar (hopefully not on the pavement), know about the pleasure aspect. So what is my point? A question of course: why is pleasure so important? Pleasure is so important because it makes life bearable: the pain, disappointment and sometimes unbearable boredom that is part of so many people’s daily lives.

A further point is that if pleasure is the primary motivation behind the whole loveless sex story, it can certainly be said that to a large extent this motivation cannot so much be suppressed as channelled into other activities.

“Like what?” someone may ask.

Stamp collections, to name one possibility. And then of course everyone can fill up their own list with dozens of other personal projects that would make the pain, disappointment and unbearable boredom more bearable.

Personal projects also have the added benefit that it can promote a sense of self-worth, and it can even confirm your identity, as well as your place and relative value in the Greater View of Things.

Sex can certainly do the same things. But stamp collections, or any other personal projects, tend not to interfere unnecessarily with the delicate rhythm of the heart. Plus, your stamp collection will understand if you want to enjoy some breakfast on a Monday morning before you go to work …

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Big Kahuna – bear the consequences – use your brain

SUNDAY, 2 JANUARY 2005

“What Larry means is, if you look at it from the standpoint of why we’re here, what we are is more important than who we are.” ~ Danny de Vito’s character (“Phil”) in The Big Kahuna to “Bob” after “Larry” (Kevin Spacey) noted that there aren’t really people at the convention, there are only functions.

[10/01/05: Naturally who we are influences to a large extent and for all practical purposes and appearances what we are, including at conventions.]

“God created women to be mirrors, so a man could see what an ass he is. When you talk to me about souls … a man does not know what his soul looks like … hasn’t any idea … what his soul looks like until he gazes into the eyes of the woman he is married to. And then, if he’s any kind of a decent human being, he spends the next couple of days throwing up. Because no man … no honest man, can stand that image.” ~ “Phil” to “Bob” in The Big Kahuna

* * *

The point of free will is this: you can do anything you want … as long as you are willing to bear the consequences.

MONDAY, 3 JANUARY 2005

To a large extent it comes down to how well you use your brain, not only in general, but for any specific period of, say, fifteen minutes.

If you have used your brain for fifteen minutes to decide how you are going to arrange the living room furniture … then that’s all well and good, but then those fifteen minutes are used up, they’re gone, you can never recover them. The same with the next fifteen minutes, or any other quarter of an hour of your life.

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31 December 2004

Exactly one year ago, I thought it a bright idea in another corner of this apartment to write a last piece of the year rather than to go out and get drunk with other foreign residents. I wrote (and would have written more if I had not decided after all to join the other foreigners for a couple of beers) of plans that had come and gone, and plans yet to come, of literary projects, ideas to make money with … and of the toilet that dripped water into the bucket under the pipe.

It is Friday, 31 December 2004, three minutes after one on a wintery afternoon. The reason why I am starting so early to produce this piece of text is because I am making an appearance tonight at a New Year’s party hosted by my friend N.S. at her residence, and therefore would not be able to sit at my computer around midnight with my fingers solemnly dangling above the keyboard, as I sometimes think it behoves a possessed, or obsessive writer.

This is thus in addition to the list that I have started putting together in my notebook about the things that define who you are or want to be the last text I will produce this year. (Of course there are still a few hours left before I have to go teach my two classes, but I had this crazy idea to drag a broom over the floor here and there, and to brighten up the surfaces where I display ornaments and books. Since this type of activity can be drawn out unnecessarily long with smoke breaks and more notes on definitions and labels of human existence, I reckon my time behind the computer during this particular calendar year … has been counted.)

The year 2004 has been good; and if not always good, mostly conducive for good things.

Next year? Who knows what nobody can know? Earthquakes, disease, war; income generating endeavours, and then endeavours that will help you accomplish good results of a different kind; leaking pipes in the bathroom, new computers, and unforgettable movies; the best pizza I’ve ever had in my entire life, new theories, and more poetry that doesn’t always rhyme; lots of money, little money, laundry, dirty dishes, broken TVs and washing machines on the verge of breaking; CDs that will be listened to over and over, birds chattering outside and bats that are going to wonder how they can break into my kitchen again; bicycle tyres that will go flat at the most inopportune moments, new technological discoveries, medicine that will make people better who thought they were going to die, and long postponed visits to the dentist; coffee with friends, twelve kilograms of fat that are going to disappear almost overnight, and expensive American cigarettes that will wait for days or weeks on the counter at the 7-Eleven for someone else to buy them; days and nights that will be spent in deep contemplation, questions, answers, community, togetherness, love …

May readers and writers, and dentists and engineers and servants and business people, and sisters and brothers and parents and children, and all other family members and friends enjoy a next year that is conducive to a good consciousness, and for mostly good end result of their lives.

May 2005 be a good year. And so also 2006, and 2007, and 2008, and … if you have established a pattern, why mess up a good thing?

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Another year – pipe wrench

FRIDAY, 31 DECEMBER 2004

Notes to round off another year

Observe yourself – collect data – confront what you have been given – define who you want to be, where, with whom, what role you want to play, and what results you want to leave behind of your existence.

* * *

Contribute to the process that will allow other people to lead happy, productive, fulfilling lives, and to strive for good results.

* * *

How much of what we do is really choice, and to what degree are we compelled by forces within us that we cannot wrap up neatly with phrases like “free will”?

* * *

Thought of last night on the way to the Carrefour: Writing has, in the end, outmanoeuvred, outsmarted, outgunned, and outlasted every other possibility of what I had ever wanted to do with my adult life.

Pipe wrench in one hand, pen in the other, I remind myself that if one insists that an old apartment in a working class neighbourhood helps to define who you are and want to be, one should not complain too much if your pipes are getting clogged up, or if they start to crumble.

Since we are on this subject, and since I am planning on making this note the last of the current literary project, what else other than residence defines who you are, or want to be?

I would say the music you listen to; how you earn money; what you do – can I put down the pipe wrench? – what you do when you are not busy earning money; clothing, and any accessories you choose to wear; whether you have a car, and if you do, what type of car; if you don’t have a car, how you move around if your destination is too far to reach by foot; people you socialise with; how often you socialise, where, and what you do at such times (drinking, dancing, fishing, bowling or other possibilities); what you eat and what you don’t eat (pizza, beer and doughnuts every day will say something of who you are and want to be – or who you don’t care to be; a vegetarian lifestyle will say something different); how well you manage to meet your own needs, especially when you compare it to the standards of the community in whose midst you find yourself on a daily basis (for example, eating maize porridge three times a day when all your neighbours are accustomed to three balanced meals per day will besides the health repercussions also have certain implications for your self-perception); if you are so fortunate to be able to go on vacation, where you go, for how long, with whom, and what you do while you are on vacation; your active interests (ties in with what you do when you are not busy making money); whether you smoke or use other tobacco products, and if so, what kind of tobacco products (cigarettes, cigars, pipe) and even which brand; whether you use drugs and if so, what kinds of drugs, where, with whom, how often, and in what quantities; in which town, city or country you live in, how long you have lived there, and how often you move (if at all); (and eventually, after thirteen other items), whether or not you are married, and if so, who your spouse is (and even to some extent, how your partner’s responses to this list compare to your own); whether you have children; if you are unmarried, whether you are currently in an intimate relationship; if not, for how long you have been single; if you are involved with someone, how long you’ve been involved with this person, and even how often you have been in similar relationships during your adult life; whether or not you steal or make yourself guilty of other criminal activities; if you do, what kind of criminal activities and how often; whether you get involved in physical altercations on a regular basis; if you do, with whom, for what reasons, how often, and where; whether you provide assistance to others who need help; if you do, to whom you provide assistance, how often, and what percentage of your time and money is taken up by this assistance; if you spend neither time nor money to provide assistance to your fellow human beings, what reasons would you give for this; (to be continued …)

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