madness

Fellow Earthlings!

Thank you for visiting. The more ruminating I do on what it might be like to be Martian, or just alien to this world, the less I am able to make light of the subject. A seriousness about the search for truth and meaning take over. I am beginning to see the elements of propaganda that have for so long remained hidden from view in the science fiction of the past century. Only with distance does the perspective broaden; yet the heart grows fonder, too. It's a bit of a conundrum. Even the most convincing visual picture (here I am thinking of the media of film) of science fiction relies absolutely upon the strange and wonderful world around us, the same planet some of us long so desperately to escape. This wonderful world includes the human in all its aspects, as well, and the visual picture comes to reflect those who produce it and where it is produced. Hence, the bipedal or humanoid-centric universe depicted in Star Trek and many other imagined galaxies.

The space race between the Americans and Soviets of the mid-nineteen hundreds fuelled a collective imagination that, in turn, further fuelled the space race itself, much like the nuclear reactions that take place inside a star. Eventually though, in the case of both the race and the star, entropy takes over. Like the miner trapped by a cave-in whose body can only reuse its own urine so many times before being poisoned, the system breaks down unless something new is brought in, some source of fresh water discovered.

But now I am reducing everything to the simplest terms: the struggle for survival. Why? In a way this is what the space race was about. Am I over-simplifying? By trying to make blanket statements to deal with the "big picture" I cover up the details that the miner is trying to dig up: the new source of fuel. I am sorry. I am not very good at thinking. Or writing, for that matter.

Now for the descent into confusion and self-doubt, the same old excrement. When will I find the hidden streams that will replenish me?

So, I guess that's it for now. The mind plays tricks, the nebulous shadow-self invades like a force from another world. In a way, this writing, unplanned and meandering is evidence of how I break down from positive, ready to take things on, and inspired. The other self tangles it up. But an attention span is only so long. I will come back to write again. What literary character am I reminded of? It's a Dickensian one: the wealthy aunt of the main character helps to care for a man who is forever writing his autobiography, only to become muddled and depressed by the recurring appearance of a mad royal personage in the tale. It's one of David Copperfield's companions. No, not the illusionist, the literary character. The trick was for him to have meaningful occupation and friends. The devil makes playthings of us in our idleness. Isn't that same Satan of the tales depicted as an alien force that descends from the heavens upon the Earth like the darkness upon the mind?

Don't make war on the strangeness, when it lands its craft. Explore the world with it. Feel the mind expand under the alien springs.