I couldn't help but smile reading both of their reflections. Maura writes like a poet, the Other writes like a philosopher, and yours truly likes to pretend he is a historian. As you might already notice, my sentence structure is far more blunt than the poetry of Maura and far less dense than the musing of the Other, quite fitting of history.
I suppose then, as the historian (and attempted master of the obvious), I will first go about declaring things the way in which I used to declare them.
1) Both Maura and the Other need me to plan out their lives
2) Despite the fact that I will never actually succeed in planning out their lives, they have become accustomed to shooting me down.
This is how the system worked. This is what Nirenberg would call "the economy of violence" that kept medieval Spanish society at a balance. As Nirenberg tells us, violence is not necessary physical. So despite the fact that Maura has not kicked me, my left testicle, or my laptop in a while, does not necessarily mean that my life requires a kicking.
What it does long for, is a return to the old rhythm of things. How easy it was to stroll into a certain irish cottage in during lunch with a sandwich and cranberry juice. How comforting it was to accidentally reset Maura's clocks by unplugging all her appliances. Is it strange to be nostalgic for a sticky honey-tea stained spot on the floor or to long for that feeling of being called paramilitaristic dictator named Paris?
I suppose it is a bit strange--comforting, but strange. The university really didn't do much to prepare us for this diaspora to happen in our third year. It was probably because we were filled with all these aspirations of entering the real world at the end of the honors program. We could conquer anything. We made it through Kangas' rings of fire (the teacher I think that solidified the ritualism of studying in the cottage), and we knew who we were. It was probably only now that we have finally flew through our clouds of aspiration and dreams of exotic and exciting places.
So the question of home returns. The questions of identity return, and our lives continue to be plagued by this postmodern white noise that fails to give anyone rest. Yet, I think it is ironic that the Other suffers from too much input and that Maura suffers from a white noise that fails to give her room to think. Is it possible for the philosopher to have too many ideas? Is it possible for the poet to have too much noise in her head?
I guess, the simple answer is, yes Narcy, yes. But thats just because our batteries are not recharged yet. We've come to the point where we have acknowledged our lives in Diaspora, forever home bound. And maybe we need to collapse this subject object relationship. Maybe the home that we are looking for, really isn't something that escapes us, but rather, something that is recreated every time one returns to that idea of the little irish cottage with the sticky stain on the floor. And maybe, our longing for home is the only home we have left. Living a positive existence is hard to do in this day and age. It's almost as though relying on the negative is all that we have left. (This is why analytic philosophy gets nowhere).
Despite the fact we we wont ever really find our authentic selves (feel free to contest me on this), we will continue to try and find them. It's like our lives have relapsed into a new form of Romanticism. We're stuck with infinite longing and that IS our home.
So I guess, I'm back to where I was before. Declaring things again. But then, maybe I'll get shot down. Rather, I'm expecting to be shot down, and I'm expecting to dodge a pointy boot flying toward my person, and maybe get a little taste of home
