XIV

When I dance, I try purposefully to use the wrong steps. If the music is swing, I try to tango; if the beat signifies a waltz, I attempt to rumba. This involves many sore toes and disgruntled glances on the part of my partner. But from the edges of the dance floor, in that shaded spot where those among us who do not dance gaze longingly upon the fluid forms gliding by, I like to think I bring a moment's reprise for some individual or another: one who, spotting my St. Vitus-like lurching, thinks for a moment that he is not alone.

And yet the spirit of the dance lives on, deified and pure in my mind.

XIII

I have taken to walking around all day wearing earplugs. They are small, and blue, and soft. It is a nice thing to find a quiet space away from the bustle of the busy city, away from the bustle of the busy city dwellers. Sometimes, of course, some of the latter will approach me to mouth empty sentiments, and I'll say, "What?"

They undoubtedly make strange gestures, point to their ears. One can assume they're saying, "You've got earplugs in your ears!"

To which I can simply shrug and say, "I don't follow you, sorry."

Sooner or later they'll leave, and I can return to whatever I was doing: cooking soup over an open fire in Times Square, hammering nails into a watermelon, or chucking Skittles at wild otters. It's nice to have earplugs--so soft, so blue--to have a haven away from it all.

I only remove them at night, when the untamed sounds of the night infest my dreams.

XII

Hilary Putnam once asked, apropos of something to do with representation (which is a word that means a great deal to many people and great deal more to many others but which, it would seem, means a great deal less to me) whether we could, "if we were brains in a vat...say or think that we were"? Now apart from thinking this would make a great name for a band--Brain in a Vat--I like the image it creates. If the brain could see--and of course I know that the argument is precisely that the brain cannot, in fact, see, but I am no philosopher and in any case they do seem to use a lot of, "Let's imagine," so let's imagine a brain that can see--it would see things fuzzily. This, I assume would be a natural fact of being in a vat. Kind of like being underwater. Once, while diving, I took my mask off and was jolted by the sudden change that occurred--to me, to my sense of safety. So I can only imagine that this brain in a vat would feel like this all the time. Let's imagine this brain in a vat had legs, and walked into a bar. What would it see? The brain could clearly make no sensuously provocative movements to a woman at the bar, since I haven't given it a mouth and besides, who would want to date a brain in a vat? ("Mother, I'd like to introduce you to my brain-in-a-vat.") It would, I suppose, move about, bumping into things, its eyes widening in the hopes of bringing into focus a world wavy by its very nature. It would be drunk without drinking, it would be bad at pool. It would have no way to order a drink. All these things would define it, and yet also fail to define it.

Putnam, in any case, says, "No." But me, I often feel like a brain in a vat.

XI

I wonder sometimes if there's a me that everybody knows but me. Occasionally, for example, I look into the mirror and think to myself, "Who the hell is that?" realizing only after a moment that it is me. Then everything returns to normal. But I'm forced to consider that perhaps that person that I see, and don't recognize, is the me that everybody else sees. Is that me, or the me that mistakes the me? Let's consider the facts (this is the kind of empiricism that inspired the pragmatists, but then again, one assumes Dewey's inquiries involved greater benefit to mankind--William James, however, had his own bouts of self doubt and so I suppose it's to him that I nod).

We dress the same, this other me and me. So one cannot critique his style. There are undoubtedly similarities in the facial features--I've been told I look like Ryan Seacrest. I cannot decide whether this is complimentary or disturbing. I see no quick resemblance between that me and the host of American Idol, but people see what they see and these things do not always make sense, so we'll let that one go. This me and me also share similar schedules for the requisite shearing of our heads (to forgo the clear waste of money involved in regular haircuts). In short, the physical manifestations of that me and me seem to match closely enough. So it must be that other side, the inner, self-reflective side, where the me's part. What does that other me, the me that everybody else sees but me, think about before he sleeps, what does he do with the moment in the Slapchop commercial when the salesman says "You'll love my nuts." Does he become both humored and a little disturbed? Does he dream of people long missing, and those for whom he's searching, perhaps in vain? Does he fear large dogs and crowds? I wonder sometimes about that me. I wonder what he sees, looking in from the other side of the mirror.

And I wonder, who's paying the checks? If it's me, I sense a freeloader.

X

I have heard that in India, people trap monkeys by putting food into a jar with an opening through which one can pass an open hand, but once that hand is clenched, can't pull it out. The monkeys won't let go of the food, and villagers come up and bludgeon it upon the head at will. Buddhists use this as a parable for desire. If it were true, it seems to me that, from an evolutionary perspective, monkeys would be born with smaller hands, and in a few hundred years, could live a mixture of desire and safety. They could have their cake and eat it, too. But it would be strange to put cake in a monkey trap. For some reason I am also reminded of Little Bunny Foo Foo, who, if I remember, had a penchant for hopping through the forest and bopping field mice on the head. He was turned into a goon, which I guess raised his chances for guest appearances on the Sopranos. It strikes me that there are two sides to the story—if the monkeys represent the mind in the clutch of desire, those that take advantage of the monkeys by bopping them on the head are in their own way, goons. The desire may be sin, but where is the empathy for those who cling too deeply to what they desire. In any case, the idea of only getting what you don't really want seems counterintuitive to me, a Catch-22 that makes life seem sadder, emptier, rather than happier, but perhaps that's because I always have my fists clenched.

Anyway, I do seem to have a lot of headaches and distinct shortage of good fairies.

IX

Skinks shed their tails. Not all the time of course. It's not, so far as I know, the common ending of drunken evenings among skinks, although it might be. Not being aware of what skinks drink, it's impossible to tell. But if a predator is chasing them, they let the tails drop off, abandon them wriggling in the background. This seems like a nifty trick. I wonder sometimes how much easier it would be if humans had access to this mechanism. Apart from redefining such English phrasing as “giving somebody a hand” or “losing one's head” it seems that sometimes it would be a useful thing to leave parts of the body in the site of danger and escape to regrow them another day. It would be good for broken hearts, of course, but even for that strange person who tries to grab you on the subway or as a way to have a bit of fun with a clingy child. And how freeing. One doesn't realize how much limbs weigh. I once dislocated a shoulder and couldn't stand. The extra pounds were a mystery to the brain: hidden yet ever-present.

I once convinced a girl in high school that men's penises could be removed. I suggested that it was often an inconvenience that we left them in the bathroom. She doubted me, but was not sure. She later asked a classmate who, not in on the gag but sensing one afoot, concurred without blinking that yes, this was true. She seemed, according to what he told me later, appalled and frightened. As if a boy might one day leave one hidden in her room. I don't know whether her ignorance can be blamed on her parents or the school sex education curriculum, but I look back upon it with some sadness.

She later discovered the truth. I never found out to whom she had to go to get things straight.

VIII

In my second drawer, I have seven mismatched socks.  I have no idea what became of their mates.  This is compounded by the fact that none of the remaining socks look remotely alike, robbing me of the ability to surreptitiously wear a mismatched pair.  What are the chances of this? I feel if I should go to buy more that there is a guarantee that they too shall be lost and I will be left with yet another pairless item of footwear.  Scientists are busy calculating the fabric of space and time with superfluous accuracy, and I have no idea what became of my beige sock.  This means that I have been unable to wear brown pants in a fortnight.  A fortnight, for no reason I am aware of, is two weeks.  I could, I suppose, one morning, before work, go buy more, but while scientists are discussing the birth of the universe to a fraction of a second, the local Rite Aid cannot assure me of its opening time.  Eight.  Maybe seven.  "Perhaps if you came around nine...."  As we draw close to the order of the ultimate, the pragmatic world grows more chaotic.  It is a reverse ration--much like the texture of fruity pebbles to the sugar content of the milk.  We live on the razor's edge of anarchy, and yet if I walk out my front door wearing nothing but a wool scarf, someone is sure to call the police.  I am boggled by the inconsistency of the real.  I am exhausted by the entropy around me.  I am also desperately short on socks.

VII

A paean to misanthropy! What exactly is a "misanthrope"? For that matter, what is a "paean". I'm thinking a poem, a supportive one, although, I might be thinking a Spanish seafood dish with saffron rice. (The mussels are especially nice.) I probably mean "manifesto" anyhow.

For most of us, I suppose, misanthropy refers to the condition of an individual who hates pretty much everyone and who eventually becomes an op-ed columnist. But I disagree. The word nods at "anthropos", Greek for "man". If we look to formations like "anthropology", it's also, in its own way, "culture". To be "mis-anthropos" is not to hate mankind; it is simply not to understand it, the culture in which one lives. I don't know why this or that joke is funny, although I might wish I did since everyone else is laughing. I don't quite know how to enter into a conversation about the Yankee's chances in the post-season, although I'd like to. (I can name the starting line-up, which is a start.) I don't know quite why gossip is supposed to be entertaining, but I would play the game if I could. (I've tried to watch TMZ but really just can't.) We misanthropists don't hate other people; we mostly just don't know how to play the game, and are tired of being looked at blankly in crowded places where we cannot hide. Even when there's perfectly good reason. And there usually is.

The misanthropist is the one standing in her window, looking out to the sky, or the brick, or the sidewalk, looking for clues. He is the ruler of a kingdom to which no one bears fealty, even himself. They are the ones lurking in the dark, waiting for an invitation to bear witness to the sunshine. They are players in search of the rules. Of course, I'm talking mostly about the people in the window who are wearing clothes; although, for my part, I make no promises.

VI

On a first date, once, I found a large stone in a creek bed. I kept it as a memento, these findings we save during moments of joy in the hopes of one day lifting them and setting time backwards in our minds. I discovered recently that this particular stone fits flawlessly into the palm of my left hand. Literally, it is as if I had molded it myself in my fist in a soft state and it had hardened, reflecting the contours of my palm and fingers, pressing equally at every space of the flesh. If the affair had ended better, I might have seen this as suggestive, as hinting at something hopeful, but now it seems to be more of a coincidence. Perhaps my brain, scanning through the water and rocks, quickly diagnosed its resemblance to the outline of a part of the body that belonged to it and signaled the arm quickly to recover it. Perhaps there is no reasoning behind it. That seems most likely.

There's something human to attaching value to the inanimate—to see forms, to see meaning where there is none: the Virgin Mary in a grapefruit, Frank Sinatra in the sole of an old shoe. By the same logic, nestled in my hand, the rock occasionally resembles the shape of a human heart. Sometimes, lying in bed, I'll hold it and consider it this way, rubbing my thumb across it, urging it to begin beating. "Come alive," I'll whisper. "You're safe here." But it can only be what it is: smooth, and cold, and ancient as the waterway from whence it came.