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| QUOTATIONS 2167-2192 |
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| 2167. America is the greatest theater of the absurd, and Canadians are privileged to have the front row seats. 2168. The Universe could never hear us screaming Our cries fall on infinity's deaf ear Through eyes sealed by eternity of dreaming. She doesn't see our faces torn by fear. 2169. Freedom to feel They whip you yet, won't let you cry. While paying homage to the various expressions of freedom–freedom of speech, freedom of thought, freedom of choice–one kind of freedom should be considered the most sacred of them all – freedom of feeling what one feels. For everyone is endowed by nature with inalienable rights to liberty of emotions, whatever they are, wherever and however they come about. The body and mind may be shackled but the heart is forever free. "The heart has its reasons which reason knows nothing of."(Pascal) Do the hungry and thirsty men lost in the desert for 40 years deserve to be slaughtered by the thousands for hankering after the flesh pots of Egypt? Does a woman who lost everything and fleeing into the unknown deserve to be turn into a pillar of salt for looking back in regret at the burning ruins of Sodom? Both Sodom and Egypt may have been the places of affliction and sorrow, but once they were also the places of refuge and joy. And a human heart cannot forget it. Should one condemn his past to justify the present, the memories that last forever, sad or pleasant? It is also worth remembering that these two particular instances of the universal feeling of nostalgia came to us from the national mythology of people who seldom had "a permanent address," and were condemned to wander through most of their history, no doubt experiencing longings, again and again, for cities and countries which were not so far in the past not exactly overly hospitable to them. One can only marvel at bittersweet quality of human memory, of its capacity to remember and forget simultaneously, of poignancy and consolation of Nostalgia. 2170. Rock a boat, make a wave Rock a boat, rock a boat Make a wave, make a wave Clear your throat, clear your throat Dare to say, dare to say What you're thinking, what you're thinking Let them hear, let them hear swear off blinking, swear of blinking shake off fear, shake off fear Don't try to, don't try to Be polite, be polite Fight to, fight to, fight to, fight to For your right, for your right To be human, to be human Above all, above all Man or woman, man or woman Is your goal, is your goal Rock a boat, rock a boat Make a wave, make a wave... 2171. Why ones who have nothing to express should care about "freedom of expression," or those who have nothing to say about "freedom of speech?" And actually they don't. 2172. The decisive test of the truly aesthetic experience is coming of it with enriched awareness of what one sensed before only vaguely or not at all. At its best it may give one a much larger view of Life in all its totality. Anything short of this is just so much wastage of time. 2173. Everyone has to have some outlet from the daily drudgery called "life." Everyone needs to believe, to feel, to know that when all chores are done, all obligations are fulfilled, all dues are paid there will be a time and a place for a soul to be and to do what it longs to be and to do the most to remain sane. And no matter what it is (each one of us has his or hers own preferences) for as long as one is given an occasional opportunity to escape, however briefly, into a world where the mind can forget and the heart can rest, one can continue function more or less normally within the narrow confine of one's family, one's job, one's society. But god forbid when those outlets are closed, those opportunities are taken away, either by accident, or most likely by malice and cruelty of those who begrudge a man even the crumbs of inward freedom, by those who find their greatest pleasure in life in depriving others of any. Then the pressure of trivia, of toil and grind becomes overwhelming and explosion inevitable. And with the strong and the passionate it can take a disastrous form. Therefore, as a rule, letting people to have their little and mostly innocuous outlets of temporary personal sanctuary is by far the best and the easiest way to keep general peace and to have a machinery of society run more or less smoothly and without major breakdowns. 2174. Besides the obvious difference between heterosexuals and homosexuals in their respective choice of sexual partners there is another, even more profound one, in a place sexuality occupies in their lives. In case of heterosexuals the emphases is on hetero, i.e. the sexuality is only one and not necessarily the most important aspect of their existence among various others pursuits and obligations. Not so with homosexuals. In their case the stress is on sexual, i.e. the sexuality is a paramount defining factor of their personalities and way of life – everything else is subordinated to it. The truth of it is revealed by the fact that a heterosexual can still lead a generally fulfilling life with little or no sex at all, while a celibate homosexual is a contradiction in terms. 2175. Here is an example of "chicken and egg" dilemma, of uncertainty what constitutes a cause and what an effect in a pair of interconnected events: do we mistreat people because we believe they are inferior, or do we have to convince ourselves they are inferior to justify their mistreatment at our hands? Let me give you an example. I knew several working couples with small children who employed nannies, invariably women from the third world countries, to take care of the kids and other domestic work. Hearing these young upwardly mobile professionals describing their nannies I have been repeatedly struck by the fact that they always said exactly the same thing: "She is not very bright, but she loves children." I could find no another explanation for such uniformity of opinions but the one that follows: those highly educated and ambitious men and women, especially women, the wife and mothers, dedicated to the fullest possible development of their professional potentials need somebody to take care of "dirty work," i.e. of trivial but necessary tasks of keeping a household going, and they use other people, women from the third world countries, to do it for them. The conscious or subconscious awareness that in the process they deprive these women of possibility to enjoy full lives themselves offends their sense of justice. To restore it, to assuage their conscience, they have to believe that these women are simply incapable of personal development, that they are " not very bright." Similarly, the plantation owners in North and South Americas who used black African slaves to do the back breaking work had to convince themselves and everybody else that the blacks being inherently inferior and therefore incapable of doing anything else but the hard plantation labor, deserve to be exploited in this and any other manner. And in general, whenever the relations between two sides are unequal (and they always are, full equality being but an unattainable ideal) one who is above, occupying a position of authority, has to profess, and often sincerely believes, in inferiority of one who is below as a subordinate. Even Aristotle, the greatest philosopher ever lived, because he lived in a time of institutionalized and accepted by everyone as natural slavery, declared as self-evident truth that some people are slave by nature, born as such, and therefore deserve to be treated as slaves. And many people much less sophisticated than Aristotle, who find themselves at the top, socially, economically, hierarchically, etc. couldn't find any other but the analogous explanation of their elevated status – they must be superior in their natural abilities to those below them. Might is right, if you're so smart how come you have no money, the winner takes it all, and similar gems of conventional wisdom are the products of the same impulse – to convince ourselves that people we mistreat and exploit are inherently inferior to us and therefore fully and justifiably deserve their unenviable fate. 2176. Recently, some behaviorist psychologists suggested that thinking every night of three good things that happened during the day and analyzing why they occurred would increase one's overall happiness. At the first glance such an exercise does make a lot of sense and sounds very promising, until the other possibility is considered. Suppose one spends night after night trying to think about something good which happens during the day and couldn't come up with anything. Wouldn't that make one even more unhappy and depressed than before? Perhaps, remembering, without a particular effort or purpose, things as they are, good or bad, is a better way to deal with life's vicissitudes. One should always keep in mind that artificial, self-induced happiness, like all unnatural remedies, may have potential side effects, some of which could actually make one's conditions worse. 2177. For as long as I remember myself I had never have a complete, "doing absolutely nothing" rest. It has always been a perpetual chain of activities, one following the other, without any interruptions, without a slightest respite. The moment I stop reading, I'd start writing; as soon as I stop writing I'd listen to the radio; I turn radio off and immediately switch on TV; when tired of TV, I'd go and get newspaper; after finishing newspaper I'd go to the store to buy some food; then I'd cook it and eat, and wash the dishes; after that clean my place and do the laundry. And then the whole cycle would be repeated again and again, day after day, month after month, year after year, with sleep providing the only pause. But having reached my 68 birthday I'm beginning, for the first time, to seriously consider the possibility of allowing myself the brief moments during the day of "simply being," without actually doing anything, and see how it goes. So, as soon as I finish typing this, I'd just sit, for as long as I could. As I wrote this, it suddenly occurred to me that if there is such thing as a premonition and an inner voice they're both telling me that unless I learn to rest on my own terms and by own volition my body would impose on me the involuntary rest for a indefinite period by breaking down at the most inconvenient time. 2178. As I was struggling to live within my modest means and trying to save money I didn't realize that all the while I was saving the planet. 2179. Through many years living in Toronto I've heard an utterance "Excuse me!" expressed with such a relish and gusto, in tones so full of annoyance, irritation and imperial impatience, often bordering on anger and sounding like an order to obey or else, from so many people in so many different circumstances, that I'm beginning to believe that the majority of citizens of this great metropolis spend their entire lives waiting for an opportunity to say it, and the nastier the better. 2180. According to Geoffrey Gorer, "Mankind is safer when men seek pleasure than when they seek the power and the glory." If it is true then we all should feel a lot safer, since many more men seek pleasure than power and glory. On the other hand, while the seekers of power and glory destroy men through wars, the seekers of pleasure destroy our planet through overconsumption. Now, looking at it this way, who do you think are more dangerous? 2181.The only absolute truth I know of is that there is no such thing as the absolute truth. Therefore, a seeker of truth, if he is not dogmatic and ideologically beholden, but sincere and unbiased in his pursuit, is bound to arrive at different times at different truths, some wholly contradictory, some more or less complimentary. Yet, this doesn't indicates inconsistency. On the contrary, it bespeaks of intellectual honesty and courage to boldly go where the logic of an argument leads. And as far as consistency is concerned, its virtue, I beleive, is highly overrated. 2182. No matter how intelligent a woman is, to enjoy a conversation with an equally intelligent man she must believe that given an opportunity he would appreciate her body even more than her mind. 2183. The Italian-Americans seems to cover rather well the both sides of "crime and punishment" duality – a side of organized crime and a side of law enforcement – by producing as many cops as robbers. 2184. As someone who has been married for a long, long, long... time, I strongly suspect that the legalization of same-sex marriage is a heterosexual conspiracy to turn gay people into the sad ones. 2185. You want to be ignored? I mean to be totally and utterly disregarded, unnoticed, not paid the slightest attention to, etc., etc., and by people who know you quite well? Then come to Toronto, the world capital of the ignored and, of course, the ignoring, because you can't have the first without the second. What is unique, however, about Toronto is that both are interchangeable – one moment you are "an ignoring," the next "an ignored." And the trick is to ignore before being ignored. A kind of "fast draw" of meanness. Walk on the street, or join some more or less formal gathering, and you'll have plenty of opportunity to observe and to engage in such a contest. As a matter of fact, until you have learn how to do it quickly and automatically, you could never called himself a real Torontonian. But that's understandable. It is an acquired skill and requires a lot of training to master it. So, if you are a newcomer, start practicing right away. There is no time to lose. Your life (in Toronto) may depend on it. 2186. "You don't look Jewish," must be the best compliment one Jew may pay to another. At least, I knew quite a few Jews who thought so. 2187. As hard as it is for most of us nowadays to accept, evidently given freedom to choose, some would prefer unfreedom to freedom. To be honest, I am not sure what the implications of this ostensible paradox are. Though I have no doubt that they are far reaching enough to warrant farther and deeper considerations. Who knows, our future may depend on it. 2188. Everyone is born unique, but some grow up to eventually become more unique than the others. 2189. "A late bloomer" may be a nice concept giving a hope to a perennial underachiever still waiting for his ship to come in, but in the real world of business, politics, law, academe, art, sport, etc., etc. there is this unwritten, unspoken yet unbreakable rule – everything has to come in its proper time. And if by the time you've turned 30 you haven't got to a certain rung on the hierarchical ladder, appropriate for that age, you're finished. And if by the time you've turned 40 you don't occupy the position appropriate for that age, you're finished. And if by the time you've turned 50 you haven't obtain the status appropriate to that age, you're finished. And you need a miracle to override this law. For everything must come in its season. It is like a tree which to produce the ripe, succulent fruits, first has to grow branches in their proper time, and then to spring the leaves in their proper time, and then to burst forth the flowers in their proper time. But if any one of these happenings fails to unfold in its proper time the fruits, if any, this tree would bring shall be green and uneatable And every tree is judged by its fruits. 2190.The essence of any sacrifice is giving up one thing for another. Usually a smaller for a bigger, a less valuable for more so. Like the burnt offering to God to receive his blessings the Christmas presents are given to our friends and relatives to gain their gratitude, good will, and love. For as you give so you shall receive. 2191. It is a sad commentary on human condition when common decency, good behavior and diligence in learning, which the religious schools promise to instill in their charges, the promise they're largely fulfilling , or doing it better, at any rate, than public ones, have to be purchased by the loss of individual freedom and submission to all- leveling authoritarianism. Yet, it is always the case when religion gets involved into management of morals and behavioral modification, which they all invariably do and use as one of the strongest arguments in their favor. When the proponents of religion insist that moral laws have no other foundation and justification but the will of God, and that religion is the only true guarantee of morality what they are saying is that freed from religious guidance and discipline an average person would choose most of the time what is morally wrong. In doing so they equate religion with moral "boot camp" where the elaborate system of rewards and punishments is utilized to shape behavior of inmates/believers. Again, nowhere it is more pronounced nowadays than in the education of the young. The ever increasing number of the worrying parents frightened by the seemingly unstoppable tide of sexual promiscuity, unwanted pregnancies, drug addiction, criminality and general collapse of any norms of conduct among the youth, are ready to surrender their children to the religious fanatics of various denominations to save them from moral depravity. This trend is especially prevalent among the Muslims in the West, which feel compelled to make a terrible choice – to allow a child to turn into a drug addict or to risk him to be brainwashed into becoming a religious zealot, even a potential jihadi. By the way, there is nothing new about this. The similar process of sublimation of chemical dependency into spiritual one was used to convert the black inmates in United State prisons into the devout member of the Nation of Islam, also known as the Black Muslims, to change sinners into saints, and to turn a petty criminal Malcolm Little into Malcolm X, the hero of Black Liberation Movement. Where the present growing fashion of sending the young to the religious schools would lead is hard to tell. But it is a troubling phenomenon pregnant with all kind of unforseen consequences, some more ominous than the others. 2192. Imagine if everyone leaves for N.Y. to become a great American writer, or for L.A. to become a great Hollywood star, or for D.C. to become a great Washington politician, what would happen to America? Fortunately, such a hypothetical total migration can never take place, for if it could the country would fall apart, disintegrate, cease to exist. From big, to average, to small cities and towns and villages some provide more the other less comfortable existence. But none offer the same opportunities as the few worldwide famous metropolises. Yet, people are born, live and die in those seemingly numberless provincial places, generation after generation. And these very people staying where they are, and being, at best, more or less content with the lives they have there, or, at worst, resigned to their fate, no matter how dull and unpromising it is, constitute the glue that keeps a country together. For without such a dogged perseverance, without this almost instinctual commitment to permanence no society could survive. Which must dispel this enduring American myth that it is a nation constantly on the move. In truth, only a tiny fraction of its citizens display such restlessness. The majority, as in any other country, stays put which is absolutely essential to continuity and stability. |
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