Quotidiana Is My Homestead: A Fiction of Philosophy

8/3/2019 Quotidiana Is My Homestead: A Fiction of Philosophy

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Fiasco Press www.fiascopress.org Journal of Swarm Scholarship

Quotidiana Is My Homestead

A Fiction of Philosophy by Alex Broudy


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I.

Yesterday I made Aliyah, today will bring me home.

-Aldo

It wasnt until fortune struck chance that glee could have ever renewed my soul within me.

Nesting within what I thought I was without, my Land of Milk and Honey nourished Her gentry

on the spirit of needlessness. And from this brewed a magnificence I could not have seen.

As brilliance of the self radiates unto others dissolutely, ones selfhood is tarnished as

jealousy sets in on the behalf of the admirer - its affect concealed beneath an exterior image.

And so, I was uniquely envious of those religious ones I also hated.


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II.

The present is big with the future.

- Gottfried WilhelmLeibniz

Yesterday I embarked on a backwards journey. In search of my spiritual innards I moved

in palintropes, rolling back fixed philosophies one by one .1 See gloss (below)now!

Moved to feel I tried to explain what was beyond meaning, This backwards journey

seems to walk the same walk that elliptical thinking does. Afterthought snapped, Are you off

your rocker, or has the poet got your tongue? I paused, No, lather up that idea some more

If ellipses were to walk, how might their innards travel? This was the pulp of a new frontier.

Gloss

1. Imagine something hypothetical: If mind and body were physically separated such that each

was contained in its own glass jar, how would shattering one jar affect the other? Now: shake your head so

your brain rattles. Really startle yourself.

Done? Good, so what was it you were thinking immediatelyafteryour brain settled? Try

to elucidate this thought by re-reading and repeating the paragraphs instructions.

Whatever you conclude is arbitrary. The significant thing is that you went back

to the beginningandbeganagain. This is a semblance of palintropic thinking, an

especially deconstructive method for stepping back, remarking and remixing into the

future. You may now resume your journey.


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III.

And, no matter how fleeting the imagery, I remain steadfast that last night I glimpsed beyond, I

saw the unseeable.

-Noam

I spent lifetimes in meditation untangling that knotted mix, my selfdom. Seldom did I

not feel. Experience found me, urging a new vocabulary to surface along with a new context for

lifes cynical wonder. Hate is a word I have since dispelled from my vocabulary.


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IV.

Nothing is built on stone; all is built on sand, but we must build as if the sand were stone.

-Jorge Lus Borges

Later I pondered something remarkable about elliptical thoughts walking, This remix is

an anecdote for my religious mix-up. Unsure of my own construction, I decided to dive its

strange depths.

My primary attempts to reach into hindsight appeared defunct. Enshrouded by thick

murk, I could only envisage hindsights exterior shell. My worn recollective memory made it

appear as if everything was wrapped in some self-obfuscating blanket.2

Little by little I began to taste the inner-fruit of reflection. It was succulent, savory. And

while I could never fully see inside my wobbly walking thoughts, I could imagine. Wonder

displaced confusion, passion grew from nothing I was reflecting my way towards the answer.

Gloss

2. What was your first recollective memory - a memory so indelible that you can manifestly feel,

taste, smell, hear, see right now? Try to transport your self to this scene, grip it and hold on.

When I did this I saw my 1st-person self (from the 3rd-person perspective) acting goofy.

When I (1st person) imagined myself acting this way, I laughed. Now I can recollect laughing

about being goofy from either perspective. The process is wonderfully elliptical, quickening at

times while in slow motion for others. Can you imagine peeling back each layer of your

recollective memory in order to retrieve a transitory thought?


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V.

Intellectual man had become an explaining creature. Fathers to children, wives to husbands,

lecturers to listeners, experts to laymen, colleagues to colleagues, doctors to patients, man to his

own soul, explained.

-Saul Bellow

I, man, was trying to explain the soul away. Whats worse, I did it as a justified raison

d'tre. How could I wade in daftness at such costs?

For an unknown period there had been a bystander gazing on this, apersonalconflict.

All at once her presence belittled and aggrandized my sense of self. More than anything it

perplexed: how could she have read my mind?

Non impensabile, she responded, lei pensa a voce alta. Questo normale per tutti

gli italiani; inanzitutto, di noi chi non siamo pazzi!3

Gloss

3. It is not unfathomable, sir; you think aloud. This is normal for all Italians; at least, for those

of us who arent crazy!


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VI.

Fate: A lusus so brutish it stirred and confused us. Creed: A line so straight it timed my fate.

-Aldo

With swift words she caught my heart and yanked out my tongue. I was muted by

exactitude. On the precipice of achieving clarity, my minds own Sisyphus buckled. I would

have to start the ascent again.4

I felt compelled to crack Sisyphuss spell. Since far finer acuity would be needed, I

administered a hearty dose of rigorous self-honesty.

Splicing certainty with curiosity spun me round, down, up and through many older

abstractions. Each was necessary to pontificate, but few conclusions were on point. I asked, In

death, do we lose that 1st person consciousness we possess in life? If so, is there an omniscient

view we can attain in life, perhaps through study and intense introspection? Would this view

ultimately lead to happiness? Is any happiness sustainable? What is infinite perspective?

Forse. S. Forse. Solo un po - non pu averlo pur sempre. Non lo so, una fantasia?

said the onlooker.5

She answered each question with a certain surgical exactness. The little Italian girl, this


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peeper of my spoken thoughts, observed my quandary with clairvoyance beyond my own.

Gloss

4. Lets play connect the dots. Suppose you are gazing from your beach chair far off into the

Mediterranean Sea. Where sea meets sky lays the horizon, a place you can only jump to intheory. Jump to

it and look straight up. Now raise yourself to a point just slightly above the final telic height of your last

glance; shift your gaze downward. Congratulations, youve theoretically peered beyondthe horizon.

This game in perception represents more than just navel gazing; it also illustrates the type

of mental exercise needed to press past the precipice when thinking palintropically. We can see

beyond conceptual horizons when we apply this model to our own thought processes.

5. Reader, again I will translate to save time: Maybe. Yes. Maybe. Only a bit -

you cannot have it forever. I dont know, a fantasy?


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VII.

Your battles inspired me - not the obvious material battles but those that were fought and won

behind your forehead.

-James Joyce

Between her small hands stretched a small book. Taught as it was and pointing

downward I could hardly catch sight of the title. Even still, I couldmake out its English

lettering. Curious, I engaged.

You know, switching between languages like that is quite the talent; how did you come

about polyglottery with such youth?

English! His tongues are vast! she said with great snark. I took you for confused and

babbling, not American! What brings you to Jerusalem?

Bedazzled, flabbergasted, I tilted my gaze upward. As if there were someone up there

going to feed me the answer. Alas, glint caught my pupils; swelling like sponges to water they

twisted and turned and Alas, foiled. Damn you, Sisyphus!!.

I inflected, Turning points that reveal something new are transient overall, but What

blasphemous jazz, what fecund garbage I tell you! What dastard made me think such sinful

thought? What will will lead me rightly.


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VIII.

Preserve your memories, theyre all thats left you.

-Simon and Garfunkel

As the questions bubbled up through and out of my skull - soaring skyward - something

popped. Aha!

Che sucesso? Aldo, tutto bene? ForseALDO! Can you hear me?, she asked out of

concern but her questions were so piercing I could cry.

Yes, yes. Can you lower your voice? My head split just then. Like another cleft tool is

your voice to my ears right now. I was internally garbled, mixing and mincing.

This is the story of calm, Aldo; see if you can remember. It wasnt long ago that you

first told me this tale; in fact, it was only several months back. Do you remember where we

were?

No, is it relevant? Because I just dont see how it could be at this moment, my head is

splitting and

Nonsense. Listen good.


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And then there was calm. This little girl, my precious daughter, was singing the rich

notes of seraphim. Hearing her voice assuaged me, and my fits of second guessing, over-

thinking, and under-appreciating dissipated. Quotidiana became my homestead, a benevolent

place of perennial synchronicity, a grateful place where today I continue to dwell.


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Quotidiana Is My Homestead: A Fiction of Philosophy

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