Loneliness

I feel alone. Perhaps I am alone. I wonder if everyone is alone. I’d like to think they are. Maybe those who don’t feel alone arrive at this state of relative comfort by blanketing their loneliness. They disguise it with bodies, voices and various other distractions. Their loneliness lingers underneath a mess of soft quilts and sweet nothings. It’s always there though, never fully subdued, merely muted and briefly forgotten. For a short moment though, every night before each person goes to bed, they plunge into a cold abyss... They drift and there is no one there to catch them (even if they’re sleeping next to someone). They don’t know where they’re going when they fall asleep and no one can tell them that their uncertainty is not to be feared. It is to be feared. They may never wake up. Besides the pain, dying can’t be a vastly different experience. When you’re asleep everyone you know and 'seem to care about' evaporates. They can arise in dreams but they’re not the same. They’re incomparable. They can become corrupted, controlled, or negative space in a matter of seconds. In our waking lives, family and friends are like a soothing sitcom. In excess they dull your mind. Through blanketing your loneliness via family and friends you can also blanket your individuality. That is, cover it up or smother it. You run the risk of burying original thought. You don’t accomplish anything of real value, except of course if you consider blanketing other people’s loneliness valuable. It probably isn’t. ‘Being with people’ cannot be called an accomplishment any more than going to the bathroom can. Humans are fundamentally social. Despite our romantic unwillingness to admit it, we carry on relationships of utility. We’re with each other because we have to be, but we somehow never quite meet. People in love seem to produce fleeting glimpses of pure connection or a spark that triumphs their perennial isolation. The problem with this though is that it never lasts; at least not in its monumental, original form. Perhaps people who blanket their loneliness to the point at which it dulls their mind (or curbs their accomplishments) are inclined to do so partially because when they’re armed with the arsenal of loneliness they simply have no target. That is, they have nothing worth doing while they’re alone. Perhaps that emptiness is so frightening that it becomes the motivation to safely conceal their loneliness. They'd rather lose themselves in a flurry of familiar conversation or physical intimacy than face their hollow selves. So it’s good to be alone. It fosters and signifies depth. Loneliness is like an archer's quiver…but what is a worthy target when people are removed from the picture? Where does the lone archer shoot his arrows? And why?

written by anonymous

Truth at Work

At work it's tough to be certain of anything, except, I guess, of your own uncertainty.  I'm in a Vietnamese kitchen, deveining shrimp, rolling spring rolls and preparing Pad Thai.  These activities, looked at separately, are simple and mundane chores.  However, when you consider all instances of one activity in a series, problems occur.

Every piece of chicken is different, as is every piece of tofu and carrot and broccoli.  This means when it comes time to prepare 5 Pad Thai orders all identical to the last nature is not on your side.

I'm not sure how I build the orders, I usually just grab handfuls of meat or vegetables, then adjust until it looks right.  There is no science, there are no ways of exactly measuring.  It seems to be a matter of taste, an intuitive understanding.

The problem arises with my only co-worker, an elderly Vietnamese woman with a poor grasp of the English language.  She seems very confident in her ability to discern when a portion is too big or small, and never hesitates to let me know when I've given too much or too little of something.

The woman who pays my cheques, the owner of the restaurant, is never to be found in the kitchen.  She learned long ago she would have better luck practicing her English greeting customers.  Normally, when the old Vietnamese lady starts getting animated over a portion I just dolled out, I admit defeat and let her adjust it.  Usually I'm not that certain in my portions anyways.  However, once in a while I nail it, and I know it.  Everything is perfect, but the old lady still has a problem.  I refuse to let her alter my work, and she refuses to let it go unaltered.  When this happens the boss gets involved, being dragged back to the kitchen by the old lady, them conspiratorially talking in their language, saying something about the white boy being stubborn and not letting her fix the portion of chicken.  The boss lady always ends up agreeing with the old lady and every time she does, every time what I was certain of is shown to be incorrect, I realize something; my certainty is not built from a solid foundation.

I know an order is completed like I know when a woman is beautiful.  I set my eyes upon the order or the woman (or the piece of art for that matter) and am told by my senses whether or not complete, whether or not beautiful.  It is not a matter of my analytic faculties establishing a series of reasons for my conviction, but rather a simple conclusion, arising from nothingness. 

I sometimes feel like an artist, trying to find the beautiful proportions hidden in the mass of raw food.  Like I'm following that invisible thread of inspiration while at work, knowing when to add more carrot or less chicken like a painter knows when to add more red or less yellow.

This all would not have mattered but for what happened to me last night.  I was on a date; it was our third time going out together.  We were sitting down in a pub with drink menus.  The waitress was looking at me, waiting for me to place my order.  I was to order for the both of us.  I took a second to contemplate, to figure out what sort of drink she would like, but I drew a blank.  Or rather, a Moosehead would be good, but so would a Caesar and a Martini and a Rye and Coke and a White Russian.  I didn't want to order something she wouldn't like, but I also didn't want to come off as indecisive.  As I sat muddled in my decision I saw the old lady, my co-worker, come in through the front door, glaring at me. She knew I was about to make a mistake, I was about to construct the wrong drink order like so many Pad Thai recipes in the past.  She came over and stood by the waitress, both of them waiting expectantly.  I felt the three sets of eyes on me and froze.  I had no idea what a good thing was to order.  I longed for my boss to intervene, to correct my immanent mistake and save me from the old lady's wrath.  To give me the right drink order, to help me impress my date and satisfy the waitress's need for an order.  But she didn't come, and there I sat, noiselessly lost in my uncertainty, trapped by the eyes of the women surrounding me.

Written by Ben Bousada