Hi,
Got your mail. in which you say you never hear from me. I send out reams of
stuff almost incessantly. Admittedly, a lot of it's in Spanish, and
increasingly so, as many of the people I send it to don't speak English;
also the subject matter of a lot of it is general. But I do also write
fairly often in English and, if not specifically about myself, at least
about some of the things I'm engaged in. Anyway you ought to revive a bit of
your ailing, or virtually non-existent- Spanish if you're thinking of
travelling to these parts at some point. You might get by with English at
most places, say 4 or 5-star hotels. You could probably get by with sign
language or smoke-signals too, if you put your mind to it, but you'd be
likely to miss out on some of the subtler nuances.
If you'd taken the trouble to peruse some of my missives in Spanish, just
to see if you could extract even a hint of what they were about, you'd have
discovered Mongo died on February 2nd, from eating rat-poison. Very
unpleasant. It was a hellish week, ferrying him to and from the vet's every
day, complete with drips and catheters. Everything was done to save him; but
it was no use. Unfortunately you'll never meet him now. You may be thinking,
So what? There are plenty of dogs around- and so there are; but I doubt very
much there's another like him, attractive not only physically but in
character; intelligent, peace-loving but very brave when necessary, in short
the PERFECT dog. Silly little mutt. People have been offering me
"replacements," but after Mongo I'll find it very hard to get another even
closely like him. He had no descendants as far as I know; and if he did
they'll have been non-descript mongrels. True it is he was engendered in
this country, so the genes MUST be around; but character has nothing to do
with genes, and that was the main part of his charm. Remember I've had other
dogs, and I'm very fond of dogs in general, so I know what I'm talking
about.
Rat-poison is dreadful stuff, producing massive internal haemorrhaging,
practically impossible to stop once it's underway. Perhaps if I'd caught it
earlier the story would've been another, but I presumed it was just another
of his fairly frequent tummy upsets, though worse this time. By the next
morning he was unconscious, and basically stayed that way for most of the
remaining time. When he did seem to come round a little, he recognized no
one. Finally we buried him at Norbert's, who's been making some friendly
approaches after I threw him out several months ago.
After seeing the effects of rat-poison, I think anyone that could knowingly
use it on anything, even a rat, is worse than an animal- and that's being
unfair to animals. I mean, even a child could pick some up and swallow it.
This has been a tremendous blow to me, and it's sort of left me in a kind
of limbo. Remember I've had him at my side constantly since five days after
you left 9 years ago, when he was around 40 days old, so I'm not feeling
very cheerful these days.
Now that we're on the subject, all this business about cloning pets that's
started up lately is nothing but business, American style, not to call it
boilisg or worse. Americans have more than enough, but they're a greedy lot
that don't know what to do to get even more, squeeze everyone dry. I suppose
once anyone's embarked on a career of madness it's very difficult to know
how to stop and revert it.
Though there's a more or less loose relation between physical conformation
and character in most cases, people make the mistake of assuming it's the
genes that determine character, and not vice-versa. It's obvious a certain
character's going to need a suitable body. Supposing a new-born is
"destined" to be a famous rugby player... Well, I don't need to explain
this.
The big mistake everyone makes is to assume that, because there's often a
correspondence between physical traits and character, it's the matter
involved that determines the conformation of the mind. Matter is, to but it
simply and perhaps somewhat inexactly, pretty stupid stuff, however
consistent its behaviour may be. It's the material the mind works upon- part
of it, that is, since the mind can also work on immaterial things such as
ideas, sentiments, etc. It makes an impression on the mind, to be sure, but
it doesn't create the mind. (To be more exact, matter is also a part of the
mind, the most unintelligent and resistant. That its structure follows a
highly intelligent plan doesn't mean its behaviour is intelligent. Its
behaviour is structured, that is, lacking in decision, and thus totally
consistent, predictable. It does what it's programmed to.)
When Mongo was around I often used to wonder what made him tick, whether he
had a separate consciousness, or was just a figment of my imagination. All I
could get out of it is that an animal's character is like our own, that is,
something he's born with and just as much a mystery why. I realise that to
talk about mysteries is not very scientific and would certainly be thrown
out by the more prestigious American institutions.
But I've just finished reading a small book on natural agriculture by
Masanobu Fukuoka, "One Straw Rvolution" [should be stubble, not straw],
which brings it all back once again- I refer to the question of mystery. I
mean, you come across some of these oriental ideas, and it refreshingly and
purifyingly wipes clean all the dung in your mind. Basically orientals (the
true, traditional ones, not your modern Japanese technocrats) accept that
things are allowed to be mysteries and the most you can do is work along
with them. If you try and unravel them it's like peeling the layers off an
onion: once you get to the last layer you discover there's nothing there-
and you've spoilt the pleasure of the mystery in the process.
It's true the Japanese have come round to Western style technology, but
only as an afterthought, though nowadays many of them have become more
occidental than westerners. Still, it doesn't seem to have been entirely
advantageous to them, and they're now at a kind of watershed, perceiving
that their recently adopted way of being is presenting them with
contradictions they don't know how to deal with. Their officialdom is, of
course, as bumbling as any other; and they'd be loth to lose the wealth and
power technology brings in its wake. But they do have a traditional way of
thinking and doing called Zen, which can only feel pity for
shortsightedness. Zen accepts vagueness, i.e. mystery, and contrives to go
along with it. Nature is essentially mysterious. We don't know how it works,
and the more we try and find out, the further the answer recedes. We can,
for instance, establish the necessary conditions for a plant to grow, but we
can't MAKE it grow. We can assist, modify, or even destroy physical life,
but we can't create it. This is part of the natural outlook.
Somewhere in the Bible, don't ask me where, it's supposed to say animals
haven't got a soul. I don't know what a "soul" is, but should such a thing
exist, I think animals most certainly would have one. What do we mean by
soul? Is it that thing that gives inner life, autonomy, impulse and
initiative? Or do we understand it as the part of a being that's immortal
and survives physical death? There's only one thing that's immortal, and
that's the mind, in it's unified, undivided, uncreated aspect. All the rest
is just froth.
To get back to cloning, there's another little detail to take into account.
We're beginning to see it isn't altogether successful, just like heart
by-passes: patients do get a new lease on life, but for a limited period,
usually about ten years. Then they pop it. Why is this? Because material is
taken from one part of the body and made to perform a task it's not suited
for in a wholly different one. Now, my theory is that, besides having a
physical conformation observable under the microscope or with the naked eye,
body parts also have a FUNCTION. A length of artery in the leg has a crural
function, not a cardiac one, to put it that way: and that's the reason it's
there. What would the purpose be for a piece of tissue to exist unless it
had a specific function to fulfil? Change its location, and that artery's
going to feel like a duck out of water, and not function very efficiently.
To give a grosser example: supposing a guy has liver damage. OK, you say,
he's got two kidneys, let's put one of them in place of the liver. Well,
it's not going to work very well, not only because the two organs are very
different in shape, but because, though they have the same genetical
conformation, they've diversified in function and SO in shape and structure.
I don't believe, though I can't prove it, that there isn't a superior
"administrator" directing the process of differentiation and general body
conformation. In other words, there is a PLAN that directs all body
processes, including giving it the shape it has and not something quite
other, like that of a sea-urchin or a blob. According to some, this is the
"etheric" body, which is the one we share with animal and vegetable life.
It, too, ages, in time, becoming less efficient, retreating little by
little. Otherwise how can we explain the aging process? The body would be
immortal. Why shouldn't it be? Yet we have to bear in mind the central theme
of the body: it's vulnerability. If it were capable of immortality, this
would depend on its not being run over by a bus, or getting BSE, or
suchlike. Clearly this is untenable.
When I talk about an "Administrator" I don't mean the usual idea of a
Diety, in its naive, childish aspect of a deliberate, cunning Father. It
would be rather more the "mystery" I mentioned above, like the spontaneous,
essentially unknowable processes of nature. This is why I find the "Zen"
viewpoint far more palatable than western- and other- religious ideas.
Elsewhere these ideas are very often anthropomorphized, as it's difficult to
express them in any other way. But Buddhism (including Zen) accepts the
imposssibility of defining them, so simply gives up trying to. I know this
flies in the face of all our positivist, material outlook, not least the
realm of electronics. Electronics WORK! But they work in their own sphere,
not elsewhere. They certainly do their bit in the functioning of the body-
where apt. Yet they can't do what they're not designed to.
All fuzzy thinking to the contrary is what's inevitably led us to the mess
we're in today, and getting worse. Take it from me, Calum: the world was a
pleasanter and easier place in the past- not a lot, but a little bit
nonetheless. I've often wondered if this feeling might not be merely a sign
of getting on ("Todo tiempo pasado fue mejor") but come to the conclusion it
was actually so, simply because everything was less "developed" and so
offered more possibilities of freedom. (Although born during WWII, a nasty
bit of business if ever there was one, I wasn't touched by it.) The fact
that getting older could give rise to such a feeling is a sure sign there's
something organically wrong with the way society's set up, anyway.
For all these reasons I think it's a good plan to look for some viable
alternative to all this largely, though by no means exclusively,
American-sponsored madness. What we can be sure of is that it doesn't lie in
pursuing the same course even further, this infernal whorl of money and
power grubbing. I don't know if it's possible to get away from these things-
I mean, even the Japanese (a varied lot, just like anyone else) weren't
immune to them and so decided to get into the Western act to make up for
lost position- but the present setup certainly isn't going to make things
any better. Europe is still chugging along, though gradually slipping. Latin
America is in a far more serious state of dereliction, and progressing
rapidly along this road.
Argentina is the spearhead in this plummet from the heights. It would be
too complicated and lengthy to go into the reasons for it. Let's just say
it's because the country's a sham, an invention perhaps well-intended, but
basically unworkable on account of the true attitudes and capacities of the
people. Or, to put it another way, MOST Argentines essentially don't BELIEVE
in democracy and the healthier Western political and moral values. Neither
do most Americans, for that matter. All believe in money and power and
position, that's all. When you adopt that policy, all that can result is
competitiveness, in which some will be "winners," and "others" losers.
You're very young, and perhaps like most young people you imagine it's all
a matter of making a good living and having a good time, without asking too
many questions. I know this is the way young people think here, although
Argentines in general are probably rather shallower in their outlook than
many Europeans. There's nothing wrong with having a good time, which is
perhaps the only valid objective of living at all. Yet when you clearly see
a mess all around you, it's time to look into things in order to ensure
you'll be able to carry ON having good times. Above all, though, one should
first get it very clear in one's mind what having a good time consists in.
I think of Americans nowadays. They're still doing well. Very well- in
terms of money and power. But they make the mistake of thinking they can
live at the expense of others, and that lavishly, in unashamed extravagance.
What they don't seem to realise is that everything is a closed circuit, so
that finally all the results of their actions will come rebounding back on
their own heads. (There's a pertinent quotation from Shakespear which I
can't remember. Something like "...visited upon their authors' heads,"
perhaps.) American wellbeing rests upon a thick layer of faeces.
I realise I'm being a little less than cheerful. Maybe this is the main
reason I've been writing rather little, except the generalities I put out,
which take my mind off other, less pleasant things. Also that this has been
a somewhat rambling sort of letter. Well, so be it.
The situation in the country is the most dramatic I've ever known, and
that's saying something. It's true I went through a pretty bad patch from
the end of 96 to the beginning of 98; but that was my own private situation.
Now it's the MAJORITY that's having serious trouble, even those that were
comfortably off before- and that's the most alarming aspect. There's no work
available. So it makes life extremely difficult. And there doesn't seem to
be any respite in the offing. (There's been an IMF delegation in BA, so
there might be a transfusion of a few billion dollars coming, but if past
performance is anything to go on, this is no guarantee of anything but
politicians lining their pockets.)
We've had I think four different governments since mid-December, and none
seems to have the slightest inkling as to how to deal with the mess, except
to make it worse. The peso has been devaluated- a catastrophe- and it
wouldn't be surprising if we went back to the hyperinflation of yesteryear
before long. (Warning: if you're thinking of visiting, make sure you find
out about banking conditions here, e.g. from Lloyds, ex-BOLSA, who exist
locally. Otherwise you might find your money "frozen," to put it that way.)
Let's get on to something else.
On a more modest front: we resumed our country dance practices on Friday
1st, with no great multitude attending. Even that erstwhile oasis seems to
be creaking under the strain, not only of the general situation, but also
internal tensions that have surfaced. As a consequence, we've lost a couple
of our principal people, so that's also a blow. Fortunately I have nothing
to do with these tensions, but I do have a certain responsibility to defuse
them, if I can discover the elegant way to do it. Nevertheless I haven't
really got back into swing as before, so maybe if and when I do I'll put my
shoulder to the task of refloating the thing good and proper.
I believe I'll be starting up a conversation group on Fridays, just before
the practices. This probably sounds pretty clever to you, you know, just
talking and letting others talk, and getting paid for it. Unfortunately from
the $45 per hour I managed to charge just before you came (for piano lessons
at the person's home which, admittedly, wasn't just round the corner,) fees
and available students have plummeted drastically.
Alasdair
