"If we had a keen vision of all ordinary human life, it would be like hearing the grass grow or the squirrel's heart beat, and we should die of that roar which lies on the other side of silence" (George Eliot in "Middlemarch")

We generally neglect huge chunks of life... and these chunks tend to remain in the gloom of our individual and social blind spots... zones of the unthinkable... like forever locked chambers in a mudcastle... everything takes place as if we need to let life pass us by just to cope with it...

Instead, we compensate... we build beautiful air castles where all chambers are open and clean and the walls are made of glass... and we're generally better of without knowing too much about what is going on on down there on the ground... where we're dirty and finite...

This has been said before... remember Bourdeiu's preaching about the salvation of misrecognition... or Wittgenstein's "Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent" famous postulate. Still I can't help but being attracted to that lethal "roar which lies on the other side of silence". It calls to me! And I feel like I was always here, waiting for its call. Perhaps I find the wide open chambers and glass walls a bit too clean and neat. There's something missing. I need some dirt!

And how magnificent it must be to sigh for the last time while drifting away to the roaring tunes of growing grass.

"If you're gonna try and walk on water make sure you wear your comfortable shoes" (Turner 2011)

There's a tiny yet cunning pinch of deep irony in the consequences of coerced and thus still cowardice acts of bravery. For bravery is a virtue and thus a rather desirable mode of existence for many. So even if we are not very brave, we might still want to be... and thus also attempt to become. And how do we do this? By forcing ourselves into performing the ‘brave’ deeds, of course! So in order to gain social recognition and to improve our self-esteem we go against who we are, moulding ourselves as if we were but clay. We do the impossible.

But then, there seems to be a tiny little thing missing. How are we to perform miracles if we don't believe in the power of our own magic? And even if we should manage to 'perform' the miracle, how are we then to deal with the new worlds that this act opens before us? Are we ready to face the terrifying terra incognita – for bravery is not about the moments but about the sustainable attitudes? Or are we going for head-in-the-sand strategy?

Each act of bravery, each performed miracle, raises the bar of our being-in-the-world, demanding from us to carry on with at least the same level of bravery... and a pocket always full of magic. It just doesn't make sense to act brave one second and then retire the other... once you claim bravery your newly gained status demands that you must stand your ground. All this means that many of our acts of bravery might be more about our continuous work on our identities than they ever are about the social and cultural consequences of its enactment... a kind of self-esteem boost, that is. This means that some martyrs may offer their lives just to get the reward from the gods in return. Not as a rational homo economicus quest for profit nor as simple reciprocity but more as a desperate way of repairing the damaged sense of the self. Well-being of others, in this case, appears as just a chimera – a part of the game that has the potency to grant the performer with high status amongst the mortals. Does this mean that some heroes die just to reach immortality (either by the grace of gods or by mundane celebration of their heroism), rather than to generate the altruistic good for other people?

In any case, it is inherent in the very nature of notion of bravery that it requires to be genuinely heartfelt in order for its enactment to fulfil the sociocultural criteria of what deserves to be called 'bravery'. Therefore, only as such can it generate proper outcomes, i.e. to cause reactions worthy of being associated to acts of bravery. But what if it is performed without being heartfelt but more as a way of meeting the very same criteria, to cowardly claim status and prestige that only true bravery can bring. Well, everything takes place as if there are two possible outcomes:

1. Such an attempt to act brave might fail – since it is not heartfelt it is also bound to be poorly executed and instead of providing the ‘performer' with desired status and prestige it just manages to confine him or her in the cage of total humility.
2. Such an attempt to act brave might succeed – the success might come by accidence of no one noticing that the act was not really heartfelt and genuine.

The latter scenario, however, is still not to be confused with ultimate success since the 'peformer' is by the sheer enactment of the miracle now forced to continuously provide a steady stream of new miracles in order to legitimize his or her new status. He or she is expected to live the life of the brave. Now, if you just aren't this brave, such life can easily transform into a never-ending torment of living up to an impossible ideal.

So, by all means, test your limits, take a leap, conquer and tame your deepest fears, dear Icarus – that's just fine... However, when you do, make sure you prepare yourself for the open-endedness of this battle 'coz it is not bound to end. The sun will not get any colder just because you dare to charge at it armed with the wings of wax. Ambitions can turn into hubris that might be just too hard to handle. And after all, don't forget that the fastest guns were more challenged than they were ever feared.

"[...] there ain't no romance around there [...]" (Turner, Alex D. 2006)

Observing the absence of romance around "there" might be quite dissapointing and prompt a critical stance outbursting in a general expression of cultural critique loaded with moral value towards "those" who apparently have failed to see the value of romance in "their" encounters with other people (with "themselves"?; "us"?; some other "others"?). This seems to be both the source and the target of Turner's disenchantment in ever so brilliant alster "A Certain Romance", a last track on Sheffield greatest 2006 debut album.

So far so good, the critique gets through and makes very much sense - not many people can say that they can't recognize themselves in the main sentiment of the song (save for "those" who are blind for romance, that is). But what if...?

What if "them" is not "them"? What if "them" is "us"? Indeed, Turner does address this issue as well, asserting that also friends can sometimes "overstep the line"... but it's somehow different. It's different because when it comes to real friends we just know that there's romance around "here" and then we're all good. Due to the certainty of the romance we share we cannot possibbly "get angry in the same way... no, not in the same way". Due to our certain romance we understand. Certainly! Still, what if...?

What if we suddenly cought ourselves feeling unease and fear... doubt... that the romance we thought was there actually is not... that its certainty is not so certain any more? What if...? What if it's still here but has become rather uncertain? What if...? What if it is gone? What if...? What if it was never there? And still we keep claiming to know its value, or at least we'd like to think we do. "We"?! But this would be quite a paradox, now wouldn't it! How could such a fear ever exist amongst the ones who truly know the value of romance? If we truly knew it, how could its absence be blamed on our ignorance regarding its value? What can it be, then? Ignorance of ignorance, perhaps? Or maybe blindness caused by a way too self-centered outlook? Finding our friends not worthy of our oh so valuable romance? Pure evil? Something else?

What if...?

What if "no romance" was all along an accepted part of the game that was more ignored than embraced, really... a part of the game handled with denial - a denial that makes the game possible at all? What if the whole friendship - together with its artificially built-in sense of "romance" - was really founded on denial and is forever depending on that same denial for its continued existence? Then, the question is: To deny or not do deny? What if what is denied is suddenly recognized and brought to the fore? Would it just make the entire relationship breakdown and collapse like a house of cards? Or would it prove to ba a result of paranoia turning the fear into a self-fulfilling prophecy... ruining everything we really loved... staining the purity of all things beautiful we shared... killing a certain romance?

What if...?

What if your fear of missing romance is but a mirror of your own errors - something both hard to grasp and even harder to come to grips with.

What if...?

Am I receiving romance?

Am I worthy of romance?

Am I giving away romance?

Am I...?

Am I capable of romance?

Compared to the tormenting thought of the uncertain romance amongst the ones who really matter, absence romance around "there" suddenly seems so trivial.

"'love everybody' is destroying the value of" (Manson 1996)

... and there we are again... assembled... like flies around our own shit... enchanted by collective effervescence in desire to besiege, conquest and dishonour the purity of godliness... we move swiftly and limp graciously through the rooms full of vultures... in search for long awaited salvation from the chains of sensory perceptions... from the pit of insane blindness they bring upon us with their encompassing curtains of eternal darkness... in the end, it metters nothing what we see... or touch... smell... hear... or taste... these are all but disturbances... forgrounded background noise... self-appointed regent of our world... empowered by the sword of reason... faultless... stainless... ruthless... made of glass... perception, chained by false truths of unfaulty faculty of logics is bound to break free and spread its scabbed wings one day... till we see with eyes wide shut, touch with no corporeal connection and smell without even breathing... till the words mean more when unspoken... till the deaf can hear what the mutes are talkin’... till the white crows dance and the black swans talk and... 'coz it metters nothing what we see, what we touch or what we hear... what matters is the way we feel... what we hide and reveal... when we give and why we steal... all that we love... all that we hate...

The world will never let itself be known by us... filthy maggots 'n worms... the closest we can get to percieving the world and one another, therefore, must ultimately be through emotional experience... through feeling...

So, fellow maggots 'n worms... please... feel responsibly!

"We find certain things about seeing puzzling, because we do not find the whole business of seeing puzzling enough" (Wittgenstein 1953: 224)

What's it gonna be?

We percieve the world through our senses.
We believe in what they mediate to us.
Perhaps mostly because they are ours...
... and we seem not so prone to question their validity.
(Or at least we are convinced that doing so wouldn't do us any good.)

So we see things - we see the smooth lick of transparent silver "riverrun", the yellow sword of light as the beacon slashes through the night, the worm eaten flesh of a rotten carcass...

We touch things - sometimes we touch orselves when out of sight of others, the soft, the moist 'n hot fire and the cold, hard and sticky ice, the taut and hungry skin of a lover...

We smell things - we smell the garden of Gardenias, the peaty smoke of the highland's well of life, the arrival of the first winter snow, the pungent stench of sewer beneath all future Mother Cities brought together...

We hear things - we hear the ominous sirenes, the harmony of lies carried by the percussion of granates and embriodered with a howl of little bullets, the infant cries in our morning coffee, the gossip of Apocalypse...

We taste things - we taste the blood, the sweet 'n sour Eden apple, the cunning foam of a countryside real brew...

And we see it our way. And we take it for a fact. And why wouldn't we? It was right there, right!? We saw it!

Still, we can always ask ourselves what the difference between seeing and imagining really is, and if that, in turn, makes any difference? Really?

Imagine the dish really ran away withe the spoon! Now if that was to happen and we saw it, we would've most certainly have recognized it since we already have recieved the idea from Mr Waits - he gave us a wayward dreamy preconception so creatively that we now are predisposed with an imagine of a dish running away with the spoon. Furthermore, since "everything you can think of is true" there is no other limit than what we can imagine to what we also can see. Does this render imagination necessary in order for us to notice changes in the ordinary course of life... the disruptions in the order of things? The extraordinary in the ordinary? (And by noticing I mean seeing!)

Of course, even if we never have heard Mr Waits' profetia, once the dish actually ran away with the spoon before our eyes we would unmistakeably know it. And this does not mean that we have ever really imagined it before - in a sense that we have thought of it or pictured it in our thoughts... in our dreams. So, it seems as if imagination is not necessary in order for us to notice things... to see... but the fact that all that is seen could've been imagined first is. So it is all those unimagined images, the "unthought known", which dwell within, and perhaps even more importantly, between us, that make our 'seeing' possible at all. Question follows: if our seeing depends on such a mysterious and puzzling parts of being human, how come we don't find it puzzling?

Sometimes we see things that just don't make sense. In fact, from where I stand, not much of what I see everyday makes sense. Maybe it's not about things in-and-for-themselves - since I am convinced that the most unrealistic and foolish thing to do would be to expect from things in-and-for-themselves to just planely be full of meaning... to make sense... there is a necessity of 'someone' to whom things may or may not make sense in some way or another... so, whatever I am seeing without grasping it: maybe it's more a matter of my seeing than it is of it's being?!

Does this mean that the world as we see it is but a projection of our preconceptions - never real in and for itself but only in our imaginations... or in our "unthought known" - the almost imaginations... that by almost imagining the world we also create it?

I musty admit - I love this idea! However, I don't believe in it. It just sounds too beautiful. It almost gives a promise to erase all injustice, pain and suffering in the world by the time we wake up... and even if we never wake up, since our whole existence is but a part of same dreaming, it doesn't matter... not at all! Because if all these things are just a bad dream then there is no real injustice, no real pain and suffering. So there is nothing to be worried about. But since we still percieve something by seeing things, irrespective of whether they are the sheer projection of our unnoticed imagination material or not - it is real indeed. And percpetion is always real! Even when it is unjustifiable and unexplainable it is nonetheless real since it is percieved. That's it!

So:
1. Unnoticed imagination material is required for our seeing.
2. Seeing is required for our percieving.
3. Percieving is required for our being.
4. Thus, we can be sure that we exist and that reality is as much a dream as the dream is real(ity).

But this means that all the injustice, pain and suffering in the world is real. So how come so many of us just chooses to fucking pretend like it's not real and to ignore it. Could we stand the weight of our conscious if we should allow such an insight to swallow us? Or are we just so fucking ignorant, stupid and inconsiderate?

I don't know man but sometimes I really wish it was all just a dream... just a dream...

"[...] there are human forces stronger than logic" (Pirsig 2006 [1974]: 21)

What is logic? What is logical? Does it mean anything? What? To whom? Why? Is even logic ever logical? It seems as if the more certain the omnipotence of logic, the less human it gets. Does logic mean inference from given premises to either falsehood or truth? If so, how come we grant so much certainty to this 'truth' when it is arrived at by such meager and fragile means - rules of inference? How can they ever guarantee any certainty about anything? Is it because we invest all our trust in certainty and solidity of given premises? As if there ever was any premises that were really given - cemented as a fact. Don't premises, these deceiving little bastards, multiply ad infinitum as soon as they are acknowledged? Isn't it at the very core of the being of premises that they are trying to fool us already from the beginning, to take them for a fact, an a priori truth in itself. Still, "truth belongs to everybody" (RHCP), I've heard. Everytime we stumble upon the facts of life we ad to them our own subjective perspective. And that's it! Some talk about the "eye of the beholder" phenomenon (Metallica). Some about how truth is but a construction, the purpose of which is no more than to alleviate the burden of being ensnared in deep shit of life: "I heard the truth was built to bend, a mechanism to suspend the guilt" (Arctic Monkeys). Then, it logically follows (I beg you all pardon for my inconsistency - but I'm a walking contradiction and I'm fine with it) that there are no premises that can ever be given as true facts - only perhaps as assumptions for the sake of the philosophical argument, but that's it. It stops right there! And that's the only logical truth about true logic because, logically speaking, with no true premises to take into this absurd equation, the only truth we're left with is that the truth is that the truth is not.

"But no one is willing to give up the truth as he sees it" continues Pirsig (2006 [1974]: 87). The truth is that we kill for our truths. We die for them! No questions asked. We just do it. Because we believe. Perhaps sometimes the belief is logical through and through... other times maybe less so. But it is at all times, in some more or less absurd way, linked to some kind of logic as its defender. Does this mean now that there are as many logics as there are truths - that logic is just as multiple as truth is? Now, what's so logical about that anyway? How can we know anything about anything, really? "This heart inside me I can sense, so I conclude that it exists. This world I can touch, so I conclude that it exists. This is where all my knowledge stops, everything else is a construction" says Camus on the subject adding that "to look for the truth is not the same as to look for what's desirable (1961 [1942]: 27, 44 my translation). Now, how's that for a true fact?

Reason and logic - it seems as if they have been criticized by everybody, forever. A bit of a cliché for a revolt nowadays, really. Let's go reason-bashing - as if no one has ever done that before. And still we kill, lie, cheat, hurt, bleed in vain, cry ourselves to sleep, enjoy the excess of wealth on the others account as if we somehow deserved it, wage wars, propagate hostility and suspicion. And what's worse, we do all these things under the flag of logic and reason - our sacred religion. We refer to them to justify our dirty deeds - for ourselves and for others. What's up with that?

Well, we are human and there ain't nothing logical about that!