High Tide (10 page)

Under Shifting Skies

 

 

“Have
you ever been outside of yourself?”

“Outside myself? Sounds like an illness to me.”

“What kind?”

“Schizophrenia. Like one minute you're one person, but someone else the next.”

 

“That's not what I mean. It's not an illness. It's… Alright. Imagine you're you. You're with yourself at all times. You're inside yourself, somewhere. I mean… Well… I don't know where people normally
go
when they're inside themselves.”

“Probably not to their feet.”

“But maybe there are people who do go into their feet.”

“Could be.”

“Of course. Nothing but the feet. A person could be in their big toe, too.”

“Or somewhere bigger—the knees, the hips, the ribs.”

“Higher.”

“The heart, then.”

 

“Sometimes the heart… Yeah. But for the most part I think people are within themselves around the eyes.”

“Not the ears?”

“It's pretty much the same thing. On the border between the eyes and ears. At the temples. You've been there, somewhere, within yourself the whole time. The whole time you'd call your life. For a while I used to be in my fingertips. When I was a baby, before I could walk.”

“Yeah. That was a long time ago.”

“But we were talking about how I'm outside myself.”

“So talk.”

“I used to be very much inside myself. Inseparable. I was one with my actions.”

“Remember that time you slit your wrists?”

“I do. It was pretty bad.”

“Pretty bad? That's putting it mildly—it was horrifying. It was pouring that night and the water blacked out the windows, the streetlights, and the roads. Mom brought you to the hospital… It was a nightmare.”

“I was completely inside myself then. But now it's even worse.”

“What's worse than a car full of blood?”

“There are things. Trust me.”

“Like?”

 

“Like… I'm not sure how to explain it.”

“Try putting it simply.”

“There's nothing simple about it.”

“Then try details.”

“Details… So you know what it's like right before it rains?”

“Like now?”

“Like now. And hear that bird cry? We're in the city but we can still hear it. A rainbird. The trees are rustling, the treetops shifting. You don't want to touch anything because it's all sort of muggy. Painful.”

“Right, so anyway! Now you're talking about the weather and some bird, but you wanted to talk about you.”

 

“But it's all the same. It's about that feeling, some kind of out-of-body feeling.”

“Experience—the right word is experience.”

“I don't care which one's right.”

“Then you risk saying what you don't mean.”

“I often wonder if it's even possible for others to understand.”

“Explain.”

“See, it's as if I'm always somewhere outside myself. Watching myself from the sidelines. Take love, for example. Watch how love takes over your body. It kisses, hugs, makes others happy, makes them sad. Your body changes shape, you'll have a kid, then more kids, or maybe none at all. You'll have a home somewhere, warm nights under a melting sky. Arguments, fear, gentleness. But none of it happens to you—it happens to a body you call yourself. The body you're watching from the sidelines.”

 

“You're sick.”

“Maybe, yeah.”

“Your forehead's hot.”

“It's always hot.”

“So what are you saying—that even now, while we're talking, you're… So that's why you're looking at me so sadly? I noticed that strange look in your eyes a long time ago.”

“And you're not worried?”

“I thought it was like the calm before the storm. I'm not sure if I should be worried or not. Maybe I should be.”

“How do I look? Describe it!”

“Like… Like you're trying to absorb everything around you… Through your eyes. Yeah, like you're trying to come back, into one piece. It's in your eyes. Like you need to anchor yourself to something. That's what you look like—like despair.”

“And there you have it.”

 

“Maybe you need to see a doctor.”

“What for?”

“Because you feel split in two, even around me.”

“Split in two! My god, don't be ridiculous!”

“What? You're the one who said you were split in two.”

“I never said that, Pāvils! You weren't listening.”

“Sorry, but–”

“I'm not split in two! I'm outside of myself, alright? Outside myself. It's not so bad when I'm talking with someone. When I'm talking with someone it's always… detached.”

“What do you mean?”

“When two or more people are talking, they contemplate, speak, discuss. They're someplace slightly outside themselves. Like in a shroud of thoughts. People tend to use phrases like ‘Remember when… !' or ‘Next summer I'd like to go to…' They converse. They're detached, see? They're back in that memory, or they're in next summer. You can see it in their eyes, or how they twirl their hair around their finger as they daydream. They're traveling. They're outside themselves and there's nothing strange about it.”

 

“I'll be honest—it gets harder and harder to talk to you as the years go on. You make people uncomfortable. For example—no, don't get offended—but I even feel uncomfortable talking to you. The look in your eyes is so tense. So heavy. You're wrong, you know. When you and I talk, I tell myself life isn't like that. Life is about life, not useless and continual concentration. It's bad to be so serious! Why do you want so badly to get back into your eyes when talking to me?”

 

“Because I can't anymore.”

“Can't what?”

“Get back inside myself. When we're done talking, Laura will toddle over with a ball and say ‘Daddy, let's play!'”

“And I'll go.”

“And you'll go and you'll be you—Pāvils. Pāvils who's kicking a ball, who's Laura's father, who loves Vita, who's writing his doctorate.”

“And you?”

“I'll wait somewhere far outside myself, until everything calms down.”

“You're afraid of responsibility.”

“Oh fantastic! What else—any more genius insight?”

“Well what do you want me to say?”

“Did I ask you to say anything in the first place?”

“If we're having a conversation I have to say something.”

“Oh please. The problem is you don't believe me.”

 

“It's not a matter of believing or not. It just comes off sounding stupid. And even offensive.”

“Offensive how? Are you offended? If you are I'm sorry, I've never wanted to offend you.”

“But you did. And in a really strange way, too. Everyone is inside themselves, in their bodies, but you, you're outside yourself. Like you're a princess, something special. It's terrible. And so weird—like
Pulp Fiction
or something.”

“I didn't mean for it to sound like that. But you're right to say it, thanks.”

“So now I'm capable of saying something right after all!”

“Don't patronize me.”

“I'm not! Did I say something wrong? The way I see it, you have to live free and easy, in a single breath. And if you're having thoughts like these there's a glitch in your system. Something's gone wrong. I don't get you.”

 

“Fine, you don't get me. I can't force you to understand if you don't have the capacity to in the first place.”

“So, what will you do?”

“Well finally! The king of questions!
What will you do?
Amazing! Think about these words. What. Will. You. Do. They're like the salt of the earth, but at the same time so simple.”

“Hey, don't overanalyze everything—be it breathing or language. It's not productive, it's an obstacle. It was a serious question, pragmatic and realistic—what will you do? Are you going to pine away like this forever?”

“But hold up, these words! Listen—
what will you do?
In that specific order, with that hierarchy, and not the other way around. Not
what do you will
? The will always comes first and the doing always follows. If you look at it the right way, you could pave paths to a better world.”

“Great. And what kind of world do you want to discover? One without pain?”

“When Monta was little, her favorite story was about the Golden City. In the Golden City, wolves and sheep are friends. The Golden City doesn't need night to understand what day is. It doesn't need death to value life. It's a world without contrast. You know, Monta almost had me convinced. ‘You're sad,' she told me. And I knew then that she'd be perfectly willing to trade knowledge for ignorance if only she could be in a world without pain.”

“Without joy and hate? Without sorrow and passion, without desire?”

“That would be a boring place, bored-to-death boring… and useless. I said this to her. She argued with me that death is something grown-ups invented so they wouldn't be bored. Grown-ups are sad, grown-ups do all kinds of stupid things just so they can understand something.”

“A dead boring world is a paradise.”

“Paradise?”

“Or a hell.”

“Something solitary is dead boring?”

“Something solitary is death itself.”

 

“And so listen, my little deity, who just a minute ago wanted to create a world sans the shadows of evil—listen! The mind of man is small and his dreams are within reason. They're only the safe, good, and painless ones. It's not worth wasting any energy.”

“Evil takes care of itself.”

“Wasting energy for evil is even dumber.”

“Then what's left? Watching how life lives my body?”

“Yeah, better to chase after events like a bloodhound. This endless clash of black and white is colorful.”

 

“Why did you say that being outside yourself was worse than slitting your wrists?”

“Back then, when I was with Aksels, love justified everything we did. Even the most horrible and incomprehensible things.”

“You needed justification? Who were you trying to justify yourself to?”

“Not like that. That's not what I meant. The sense, y'know? The sense.”

“Sense. Strange word.”

“Well yeah. Now I do everything with consideration, I try to be precise and guided by experience, but all that sensibility goes to waste. It's a calculation! Correctly calculated empty accomplishments and losses. It's all trivial. Once it was high tide. Now it's low tide. I've been washed away from myself.”

 

“I've started a path, but I don't know if it's for my benefit or not. But I can't stop or turn back. It'll be a test, hey!—it'll be an interesting experiment—will I be able to take my idea and create a path? You can write your final dissertation on it! I'm in two. It's the only thing that fascinates me and keeps me alive! Me and my body.”

“Maybe it is the onset of some kind of psychological disease. Maybe we can still do something about it.”

“You could, but only if the goals of both of
me
line up.”

“What's your body's goal?”

“Love, laugh, stay sane, be as strong as a mighty oak for myself and for others.”

“And what's your goal?”

“To not be here.”

“Maybe you're confused. Maybe your goal is to observe.”

“Observe?”

“Observe. If you're destined to be outside yourself anyway. Maybe your joy comes from observing your physical body and the physical bodies of others, to observe life, fate, how they come together and part, and come together again. Observe and believe you understand something when something becomes clear; that it might be the answer to at least one question.”

“Thanks, brother. You've got some highly flattering opinions of me.”

“You look that arrogant, by the way. You would be the one to come up with something like that.”

“When the essence of things reveals itself, you stop doing them automatically. That's what I meant. But maybe something else, though, I don't know. No one is themselves in conversation. It's what does exist that talks through us. A million mouths, a million eyes.”

 

“Don't get mad, but seems to me you can't love.”

“That's it?”

“Only love.”

“That's almost too simple.”

“But it's true. Everything else is trivial and made-up.”

“Why?”

“Love isn't in your control. It comes to you. There's no other way. You're whole again. You don't question anything.”

“But I
do
have questions! Okay, so it turns out I
don't
have love. And I can't answer any other way in the face of a logical confession. And here we are.”

 

“And so you want me to pity you?”

“No. No need to pity, to be sad for me, to express your opinion, nothing. I'm glad that you met me for lunch today, that you sat here, drank black tea. Thank you for carefully picking the bones from your trout and putting them on the fish bone plate. Thank you for convincing me to order this delicious cod. Fish contains phosphorus, which promotes thinking. Thank you for not talking. Thank you for saying a few things that I can spend a lifetime thinking about if I wanted to. Want is at the center of everything. Simple, straightforward want. So everything happens because we want it to. It's the world we live in. It's so important! You know… Sometimes I need this more than anything, for you to be sitting there, across from me, drinking tea. It's like your eyes are a chair I can sit and rest in for a while. Thank you.”