The morning and me, we have a very short meeting. She decides to leave after half an hour. It's almost noon. Let's have breakfast! And then off to the historical center to walk around and take photographs. That center is not big and quite orderly structured; it's a good idea to explore it on foot. I notice that Parliament, Cathedral and Ruins are very close to each other and imagine they constitute three pillars of Mexico: democracy, religion, and history. It's too hot to dig in that deeper. The Mexicans know what constitutes them better anyway.
Showing posts with label Mexico. Show all posts.
June 9. Myriad Intentionality.
The Theory of myriad intentionality. I wrote about this earlier; here I want to be a little bit more precise. But only a little bit. This is not supposed to be a philosophical tractatus and I am not supposed to be a genius to write one. So, then, what is the definition of intentionality? It is definitely some thought: we don't ascribe it to other animals precisely because we assume they don't think. Intentionality means we are headed somewhere: it is a thought about the future. But not just any thought about the future will do. We can have phantasies about future civilizations, the end of the world, international sport events in which we don't participate without having an intention. What we need of course, is active participation in a future event. So, when we think about some event in the future, sa
y walking the beautiful neighbor's dog, in a way that we imagine our active participation in it, does this always mean we have the intention to, in this case, walk the dog? What if we were just dreaming about doing it? So a final criteria seems to be needed: the belief that our participation in the future event is real. Thus we arrive at:
I. A thought about a future event with active participation and the belief that this is real.
...and of course raised some new questions, as real philosophers should. First of all, what is an event? Any occurence, any movement of atoms so you might? No. The belief that a future event is real implies that it must be something like what we preconceive as an event. And this set of occurences is easily defined: anything that can happen can be described with action verbs. When, and only when, we can formulate an action-verbial expression for it, we are talking about an event. Other occurences cannot be events. Still, that definition seems to be too wide: we describe hot lava streams and water falls, the movement of butterflies and elephants with action verbs, but we can never actively participate in it. Still, I make the case that they are events. Here is why. In case of a delirium, we could believe for example that we can pull like gravity itself. We can develop the intention to pull other objects within our "atmosphere". Those intentions perfectly comply with (I). So intentions can be directed towards physically impossible events. Also, intentions need not to be exact. Without a where, when, how, and why it is still possible to have the intention to kill the president. The only requirement is a "that".
II. An event is any occurence that we can describe in terms of action verbs.
...now the notion of belief still has to be clarified. We believe that something is going to happen, for example that we will have lunch in one hour. I have no time to dig much deeper here, so let's resort to ontology. When we belief that an event is going to happen we treat it like a different ontological category than its alternatives.
III. A belief that a certain event E is going to happen exists when and only when we treat it like a different ontological category than all its alternatives.
These are the preliminaries. I'm sure they can be questioned and I encourage you to do that. Once we have a notion of intentionality, we have to ask how we organize more than one intentionality, since our goal here is to establish a distinction between 'normal' intentional behavior and 'myriad' intentional behavior. Now it's straightforward to say that we organize intentions chronologically and causally. We tie them together to chains as you might. A simple daily task like
1. go out
2. take a bus
3. buy groceries
4. cook
5. still appetite
is governed by intentions derived from (5) alone. Is there another way? Yes, of course. We could dream, try to follow multiple 'chains' at once, intertwine them. There has to be a relation, but one that prevents all intentions to be deducted from one überintention. Total randomness doesn't work here because that would result in a multiple personality. What we are after is a single personality with a wider intentional structure.
1. go out
2. enjoy the weather
3. buy groceries
Here the events not all causally connected and hence cannot be derived from (3). Still, they are intentions a single person can combine in his thoughts by means of a more abstract overall intention: that of bodily joy. Now the myriad intentionality knows about this and tries to avoid it - yes, that is its dogma. So the myriad intentionalist tries to avoid the possibility of that abstract overall intention. He is not able to do that: that's his tragic nature, but he is able to postpone it, to stretch the web of intentions as much as possible as it were.
1. go out
2. give to a beggar
3. eat a delicious lunch
4. do a self-invented dance in the park
5. buy groceries
6. feed half of it to the ducks
This 'chain' of events is harder to organize in advance. Yet this is what the myriad intentionalist tries to do. Here's his paradox: in order to broaden the horizon of our intentional behavior he invents a bunch of intentions and then ties them together as tight as possible. This ability to structure them in advance can be trained. The myriad intentionalist invents logical connections between his actions in order to prevent his mind from subsuming them under one abstract imperative. For example:
1. go out
i1. follows from 7 --> imagination of other people's hunger
2. give money to a beggar
i2. follows from i1 --> reminder of your own hunger
3. eat a delicious lunch
i3. follows from i2 --> the discrepancy i1-i2 spark a crazy act
4. do a self-invented dance in the park
i4. follows from i3 --> discharge leads back to normality
5. buy groceries
i5. follows from i4 --> the discrepancy i3-i4 spark another crazy act
6. feed half of it to the ducks
i6. follows from i5 --> discharge leads back to original intention
7. go home and still appetite
Exercise. Think of random actions (like I want to go to Cuba, I want to scuba dive, I want to climb the Everest, I want to marry in Indonesia). Do free association to find out which series you produce and what relationing principles you use.
I spend the day walking around in the beautiful town of San Christobal, taking pictures, having a good cup of coffee at the beautiful central square. Yesterday night, due to all my nonsense, I almost got lost. I just failed to find the door of my hostel and kept walking for about an hour, examining all the streets in the vicinity of the central square. I asked a few people and reconstructed my earlier walk. Nobody seemed to know about that hostel. Was it dissolved in time or something? I couldn't believe that. When I insisted, they said "wait a minute, the people next door do lodging". It turned out to be my hostel! The hosteling sign was taken off the street, and the heavy door tightly locked - nothing reminded of a hostel. I knocked the door and it was opened (very biblical) by the lady I'd seen that afternoon. The anxiety about the disguised hostel entrance escaped my lips only as a dim comment that didn't pass the counter, I forgave (very biblical) and I went to bed.
At night, in the bus to Mexico City, I speak to a kind lady and dream about myriad intentionality (very unbiblical).
y walking the beautiful neighbor's dog, in a way that we imagine our active participation in it, does this always mean we have the intention to, in this case, walk the dog? What if we were just dreaming about doing it? So a final criteria seems to be needed: the belief that our participation in the future event is real. Thus we arrive at:I. A thought about a future event with active participation and the belief that this is real.
...and of course raised some new questions, as real philosophers should. First of all, what is an event? Any occurence, any movement of atoms so you might? No. The belief that a future event is real implies that it must be something like what we preconceive as an event. And this set of occurences is easily defined: anything that can happen can be described with action verbs. When, and only when, we can formulate an action-verbial expression for it, we are talking about an event. Other occurences cannot be events. Still, that definition seems to be too wide: we describe hot lava streams and water falls, the movement of butterflies and elephants with action verbs, but we can never actively participate in it. Still, I make the case that they are events. Here is why. In case of a delirium, we could believe for example that we can pull like gravity itself. We can develop the intention to pull other objects within our "atmosphere". Those intentions perfectly comply with (I). So intentions can be directed towards physically impossible events. Also, intentions need not to be exact. Without a where, when, how, and why it is still possible to have the intention to kill the president. The only requirement is a "that".
II. An event is any occurence that we can describe in terms of action verbs.
...now the notion of belief still has to be clarified. We believe that something is going to happen, for example that we will have lunch in one hour. I have no time to dig much deeper here, so let's resort to ontology. When we belief that an event is going to happen we treat it like a different ontological category than its alternatives.
III. A belief that a certain event E is going to happen exists when and only when we treat it like a different ontological category than all its alternatives.
These are the preliminaries. I'm sure they can be questioned and I encourage you to do that. Once we have a notion of intentionality, we have to ask how we organize more than one intentionality, since our goal here is to establish a distinction between 'normal' intentional behavior and 'myriad' intentional behavior. Now it's straightforward to say that we organize intentions chronologically and causally. We tie them together to chains as you might. A simple daily task like
1. go out
2. take a bus
3. buy groceries
4. cook
5. still appetite
is governed by intentions derived from (5) alone. Is there another way? Yes, of course. We could dream, try to follow multiple 'chains' at once, intertwine them. There has to be a relation, but one that prevents all intentions to be deducted from one überintention. Total randomness doesn't work here because that would result in a multiple personality. What we are after is a single personality with a wider intentional structure.
1. go out
2. enjoy the weather
3. buy groceries
Here the events not all causally connected and hence cannot be derived from (3). Still, they are intentions a single person can combine in his thoughts by means of a more abstract overall intention: that of bodily joy. Now the myriad intentionality knows about this and tries to avoid it - yes, that is its dogma. So the myriad intentionalist tries to avoid the possibility of that abstract overall intention. He is not able to do that: that's his tragic nature, but he is able to postpone it, to stretch the web of intentions as much as possible as it were.
1. go out
2. give to a beggar
3. eat a delicious lunch
4. do a self-invented dance in the park
5. buy groceries
6. feed half of it to the ducks
This 'chain' of events is harder to organize in advance. Yet this is what the myriad intentionalist tries to do. Here's his paradox: in order to broaden the horizon of our intentional behavior he invents a bunch of intentions and then ties them together as tight as possible. This ability to structure them in advance can be trained. The myriad intentionalist invents logical connections between his actions in order to prevent his mind from subsuming them under one abstract imperative. For example:
1. go out
i1. follows from 7 --> imagination of other people's hunger
2. give money to a beggar
i2. follows from i1 --> reminder of your own hunger
3. eat a delicious lunch
i3. follows from i2 --> the discrepancy i1-i2 spark a crazy act
4. do a self-invented dance in the park
i4. follows from i3 --> discharge leads back to normality
5. buy groceries
i5. follows from i4 --> the discrepancy i3-i4 spark another crazy act
6. feed half of it to the ducks
i6. follows from i5 --> discharge leads back to original intention
7. go home and still appetite
Exercise. Think of random actions (like I want to go to Cuba, I want to scuba dive, I want to climb the Everest, I want to marry in Indonesia). Do free association to find out which series you produce and what relationing principles you use.
I spend the day walking around in the beautiful town of San Christobal, taking pictures, having a good cup of coffee at the beautiful central square. Yesterday night, due to all my nonsense, I almost got lost. I just failed to find the door of my hostel and kept walking for about an hour, examining all the streets in the vicinity of the central square. I asked a few people and reconstructed my earlier walk. Nobody seemed to know about that hostel. Was it dissolved in time or something? I couldn't believe that. When I insisted, they said "wait a minute, the people next door do lodging". It turned out to be my hostel! The hosteling sign was taken off the street, and the heavy door tightly locked - nothing reminded of a hostel. I knocked the door and it was opened (very biblical) by the lady I'd seen that afternoon. The anxiety about the disguised hostel entrance escaped my lips only as a dim comment that didn't pass the counter, I forgave (very biblical) and I went to bed.
At night, in the bus to Mexico City, I speak to a kind lady and dream about myriad intentionality (very unbiblical).
June 8. No mushrooms, friends.
In the morning I visit the temple complex of Palenque. It's thirty minute walk down the asphalt road and I'm very sweaty when I enter the site, that lies on a hill. The temples here are amazing, at least on a par with Tikal. When I walk around, I have the feeling I'm in the thriving Mayan city some 1200 years ago. I was right yesterday: don't need the mushrooms. Imagination flows like magic incense - all by itself. There is a tomb of a lady that you can enter (I mean the tomb), a large complex where you can pass through the interior below, and a high temple with a beautiful view of the Gran Plaza, where I will take a picture of a French woman while she jumps on her hands and flips over full-circle in front of the temples.I go back to the same café as yesterday because I left the cable of my computer there, which is quite an essential part of my belongings. Fortunately they still have it. All kinds of scenarios play through my head. Why worry so much? Faith, faith, faith, and then a good cup of coffee - I jump on the bus to San Christobal...
... and on the bus I learn about this region of Mexico from an anthropology student called Biri. She is working with small communities. She will show me a cheap place to stay where I leave my backpack before we hang out at the mean Cathedral square. Yesterday night, I have suggested Myriam and Mario to meet me in front of the Cathedral. My expertise of Catholicism comes in handy at this point: I know that there is at most one cathedral in a city so I suggest do meet right in front of it. And if that's not enough, I suggest him to stick a note to the front door of the cathedral in case I would be delayed so I could find them at their hostel. I don't know if Mario is familiar with Luther, but I thought it is a cool idea. It doesn't work out though. There
's no note on the impressive 20-feet oak door but I meet the group of anthropology students dancing to the boiling rhythms of African drums. It's a nice night on that main square, but I'm tired and go back to my hostel, thinking about some more nonsense I could write just to get the point across."Friends" is very popular. And also, it features the ex-girlfriend of Brad Pitt, who is very popular, too. So I decide to write my own episode of Friends. Enjoy:
Bloom and Marcel are standing in their living room, each on one side of the couch. They are about to leave the house, but something keeps them from doing so. Bloom scratches his head and says
"I think I forgot something."
Marcel looks at him and shakes his characteristic head slowly.
-"Aren't we all doomed to forget the most defining events of our lives? To forget the smell of beloved lips, to forget the unique nocturnal sharing of our deepest truths with the person we love most, to forget the look in the eyes of our mother, to forget the sound of the little birds looking for food on the windowsill in our lofty étage in de Rue de Capuccines, forgetting the taste of a fresh Madeleine in the Deux Maggots, crumbling on our tense lips with infinite serenity, to forget even the forgetting. Yes, aren't we doomed to live our lives in a tragical, sad search of what is forever forgotten, in a maze with black walls we see glowing dimly only because we shine our foolish lights on them?"
"Hahahahahaha!" The laughing comes from the audience. Hey, that's YOU!
Bloom scratches his head again.
-"Good point. We are here to unfold the story that we carry inside us, to unveil the inevitable truth that defines us but is bigger than ourselves. It is our meaningless task on earth. We will arrive at something, at some layer of meaning we can indulge in for a little while, ignorant of the emptyness. For how long? Ten years? Twenty years? And then we'll meet our own emptiness again. It's a relentless vacuum sucking everything with a purpose, an intention, a direction, a 'dream' as you would say, everything behind its odorless jaws"
"Hahahahahaha!" There you go again.
"What did you forget Bloom?"
-"Oh, just the keys of my car. I think I left them at Franz's place."
"Franz's?"
-"Yes, we were there last night, don't you remember?"
"Hahahahahaha!"
"Franz invited us to see some movies together. You were so drunk Bloom, just like every Irishman."
"Hahahahahaha!"
-"I'm not Irish. My family is Irish. I'm Italian."
"Hahahahahaha!"
They still stand each on one side of the couch facing each other.
"You were so drunk Bloom, believe me. I bet you don't even remember what Franz looks like."
-"But I do. Franz has dark hair. I think he is Jewish."
"What does he do for a living?"
-"I think he is a clerk somewhere."
"You remember that? How can that be? You were totally knocked out."
-"I have no idea."
"Let's call him to come over and have a drink or something. You do need your car keys,too."
"Hahahahahaha!"
-"You're right. Without those keys I'm pretty much stuck here. And I don't want to be stuck here next to this couch in this murky living room, believe me."
"Hahahahahaha
!"Bloom calls Franz. Marcel is watching him. The swift and eager movement of his fingers over the keys of Bloom's phone excites him. This is a moment that will remain alive in his thoughts for a very long time. Bloom's fingers are typing Franz's number on that little telephone. They seem to have a kind of magic that Marcel can't resist. He sighs
"This is too beautiful! I could live for this beauty alone, Bloom."
-"I could not."
"Hahahahahaha!"
"So what did Franz say?"
-"He says we're welcome at his place to have some wine and talk. He's having some kind of party."
"Let's do that! Who else will come?"
-"Virginia is for sure, Ernest might show up with a bottle, Samuel is delayed. The rest I don't know."
"Hahahahahaha!"
"Cool. Yes, let's walk there."
-"Walk?"
"Yes, you forgot your car keys. Already forgot about that?"
"Hahahahahaha!"
So Bloom and Marcel walk twenty-seven blocks to Franz's place and knock on his door.
"Come in, come in, make yourselves comfortable, grab a chair, make some coffee. So, Bloom forgot his car keys again?"
"Hahahahahaha!"
-"Yes... We don't want to declare it to the police because the bureaucracy and the paperwork would take years."
"At least. I know that since I've been through some of that myself." Franz says.
"Hahahahahaha!"
-"Good. Where could the keys of Bloom's car be?"
"Maybe here, under the table, or here, in the closet, or - where have you been Bloom?"
-"Maybe in the...eh... bedroom."
"Hahahahahaha!"
"You can go have a look."
Bloom and Marcel tiptoe into the dark bedroom and sees that someone's sleeping there.
-"There's a person in the bed."
"O I forgot, it's Virginia. Don't mind her, she's cool. Just look for the keys where you remember you've left them."
-"I can't remember a thing."
"Hahahahahaha!"
Bloom pulls the sheets off Virginia and sees that she holds his car keys in her closed fist. She winks at him with an intimity Marcel would have written at least a thousand pages about if he would have noticed it.
"Hahahahahaha!"
"Should I wake her up?" he asks Marcel.
-"And I'll make some coffee" Franz mutters in the background. Marcel looks at her small hands holding the keys and says
"Isn't that beautiful? Life is so rewarding if you look at it this way."
-"And if you don't?"
"If you don't look at it?"
"Hahahahahaha!"
-"Yes."
"Then... I don't know. Who can know that anyway?"
"Hahahahahaha!"
-"Take the keys", says Bloom, "I'm going home. I've got some work to do."
"Bloom takes the keys and drives back to his appartment. Marcel stays with Franz.
"This is such a boring day!" Marcel says to Franz.
"Hahahahahaha!"
Meanwhile, Virginia is waking up and tries to remember what happened the night before. She fails at that and sleeps for another hour. Marcel enters her room and asks her if everything is alright. Marcel is the friend she shares her most profound secrets with.
"Hi Marcel, I don't know..."
-"You don't know what?"
"I'm writing this script but I'm stuck."
-"What kind of script is that?"
"It's about two friends having a good time together, even though they are in love with the same woman."
-"Are you the same woman?" Franz asks from the background. "And who wants some coffee?"
"Hahahahahaha!"
"I am the same woman" Virginia says proudly.
-"And I am the same man" Franz laughs heartily, but we are not sure if he has understands everything.
"Hahahahahaha!"
"I'm just too tired. I'm going to sleep now."
-"Your work is not yet finished!"
"I apologize for that. But tomorrow I will be the same woman too."
"Hahahahahaha!"
Virginia goes to bed. Franz lays his hand on Marcel's shoulder and says:
-"She's gone to bed now. And soon the birds will come to eat off her windowsill."
"That's so beautiful. Birds on a windowsill. Birds! A windowsill! What else do we need in life? Isn't all the beauty present in that little scene? What else do we need?"
-"I can't think of anything." says Franz but he thinks of Virginia. He rolls his eyes.
"Hahahahahaha!"
"Neither can I."
-"That is good, then."
June 7. Mexico!
I get up at 5am again, this time to be picked up by a shuttle bus to Palenque, Mexico. It is an eight-hour busride including a long section on a bumpy dirtroad. But the scenery is simply beautiful. Busrides can be a real attraction. This one includes another exciting complication: the border to Mexico. We unload the luggage and embark on a long speedboat. The crossing of takes twenty fantastic minutes, because the Mexicans built the road several kilometers downstream (vexing the Guatemalans?). I peel a starfruit that I picked for breakfast and throw the rotten bits overboard as the boat splits the water bow high up. At the Mexican side, another bus is already waiting and immigration services work quickly. However, a few kilometers into Mexico, the trip is interrupted by the peculiar moaning of the Opisthocomus hoazin turistica. We have to cross a national park and the park official is demanding a 15 peso tax which is obligatory even if you're just passing through. The park reliess on local taxation to pay for helicopters to put out wildfires, they tell me. Some Germans in the back ask if they can camp here because "there is no way we pay this stupid rip-off tax". Other tourists join in and soon the conversation turns into a grumbling tumult with the park official. Over slightly more than one dollar. I think they should rethink their attitude, the tourists that are by definition filthy stinking rich. As for myself, I have another problem. I just left all of my remaining cash at the exit post of Guatemala so I can't pay the 15 pesos though I seem the only one willing to do it. So I step out of the vehicle, tell the park official I'm really willing to pay because I understand the cause being an environmental activist myself. What can I do? Sir, can I work, all I have to offer is what's inside my luggage and my muscular power. Can I do some work for 15 pesos? No. Then I climb resolutely on the roof of the minibus, untie my backpack and start getting out things."Un guia turistica muy buena en ingles. Muy recien."
-"No intiendo ingles."
"Pero senor, puede venderlo despues a otro turista. Tiene que pensar como un hombre de negocios!"
-"Hahaha. Pero no gracias."
"Este cuchara de una marca de alta calidad. Resiste el calor."
-"No necessitamos aqui."
"Crema de sol? Detergente? Camisa? Por favor..."
-"No, no... haha... es loco, haha...hihiahaha. Pffrrrrt..."
I am standing on the roof of the bus selling stuff from my luggage to pay for a Mexican natural reserve tax of 15 pesos and I feel so intensely happy! This is so good! Cool breeze in my hair, decisiveness in my mind and - admittedly - I'm in the center of all the attention. The roof of the bus is the stage and I'm performing.
"Quizas esta bolsa de documentos?"
-"No, haha, aqui en Mexico es diferente. No tenemos eso." He symbolizes his throat being cut by a violent thief robbing the travel wallet.
"Pero para vender a otro turista...?"
-"Ok, ok", another man says. "Compro la billetera para veinte pesos."
"Veinticinco."
A man gives me 25 pesos and I pay my taxes. I ask the park official to write down the name of the municipality so I can find it later, see on google earth if the wildfires have been put out properly. The conjuction of a German hand and a German accent urges me to get off the roof, because we are rolling on. As I get back in the bus, nobody talks with me. They have all paid their taxes because "there is no way around it". The guy next to me says it's not the money but the principle that matters. And do you want to know what I answer the guy?
"Look, I own a f.... PhD in philosophy and that's as close to principles as you can get. But I left that behind me man."
We still have 147 asphalt kilometers to go and I think about principles. All I can come up with is that I find them ugly when they are not capable of adjusting themselves to a different cultural context.
In Palenque, the tourists quickly disappear and I am alone again. I see an American couple in the bus station and decide to talk to them because the man has a pirate appearance like myself. They tell me they're on their way to Tulum (it's supposed to be a marvelous place). You could easily hitchhike in Mexico accordinig to them. I decide to try that on my way to Panchan near the historical Maya site, which is near anyway so I don't have to rely on cars. So I walk down the road and one car after another passes without responding to my stuck out thumb or the question mark I wrote in the air with my fist. I just want to know how far it is to Panchan, but no-one halts. That's good for the singing. It's great for the singing. I march singing everything between Bach and Bob Dylan. I manage more melancholical registers and even have a go at David Bowie's "Space Oddity":
"I'm sitting in my tin can
Driiiiiiving down the road
And the little feller out there
I see him sticking out his thumb
But I don't take him nowhere
Because I'm absolutely numb
Here's ground control to major Tom
Just hold on you're not alone."
Finally a car stops and the grumpy old driver tells me I'm almost there. I explain him he is the only one who pulled over and wish him all of God's love but he's already gone. Panchan is a lodging complex where you can stay in a dorm room for 50 pesos. How grateful I am for the shower! And the calory-loaded Pasta a la Carbonara! And the live music! And the delicious chocolate sold by the guy who made it himself. He has all kinds of flavors: orange, ginger, mint, chili, and pssst (whispering conspiratorially), a new one, a very special one - chocolate with hongos, mushrooms. In this region, magic mushrooms are very common. You need about fifteen for a trip and it costs you about 200 pesos. For the chocolate he used thirteen mushrooms, well ground and blended with the cacao. It's only 100 pesos for almost a full-fledged mushroom trip. Imagine how many crazy ideas you could get out of it. Imagine the hallucinations you fly through the jungle back to Maya times easily run up and down the temples, communicate with the Gods - time to make the priests redundant and wrap them in cotton - peel ripe mangos and avocados sharing them with sacral snakes that have seven head. Imagine the apotheosis of staggering bright watercolors pouring from the sky and ten thousand rainbows - I decide not to take the mushrooms because I think my imagination is doing pretty well anyway.
I can't sleep in the hot cabin and mosquitos bite me. I rub my skin with diclophenac sodium. Then I go drinking with a group of Mexican anthropology students. They are traveling around Yucatan and Tabasco, visiting Maya sites on their way. Myriam and Mario are really fond of their studies and it's good to talk with them and sharing a few 940ml bottles of delicious Corona beer.
I can't sleep still and get some fresh air outside. A strange noise from the cottage next to me. I walk closer. It's a woman screaming in the height of her pleasure. It goes on and on. I go back in my cottage but the noise is too loud. Panting, screaming, wheezing, groaning. For a short while, the man kicks in and produces a few short panting cries and then it's over. A few seconds later excited wows and satisfied wemadeits. So this is what the origin of new life sounds like, I think. And then: as a writer you can pick one little detail out of a vast range of events and mold that detail into a story. You're coiling and folding the general storyline of life you offer to your reader. Perhaps that's an important job. Perhaps this is all rubbish. When one guy decides to enlarge certain details he thinks are important, what's the big deal? Who cares? If he thinks the general storyline of life gets more streamlined, more interesting, more vital from it, good for him. Congratulations. But don't bother your neighbor with it. It's an individualist society where everybody has his or her episode of going to a romantic cottage in some beautiful country to reproduce. And the storyline remains as flat as ever.
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