I move toward the agency, toward the areas in life where the free will meter reads the highest. The deterministic, the military, the industrial, the complex: from these I move away. To what? There is agency in love, in movement, in writing. Some of this might be complex, but when it feels simpler, I move. The taste of an afternoon blueberry muffin and pourover iced coffee after an hour drive and releasing extra water and coffee from earlier in the day; can I move any closer to this? Only if I were writing, which, here we are. Five pink flowers bounce in a row, a fifth wilts forward, leaning toward the concrete. Bikes roll by and up. Prepositions, a bright yellow broom, and an orange hose are still life. I’m under the wired up shades and the sun is warming everything around me. It’s afternoon. It’s June. The air is crisp. If a little industrial. There is a chunk of a tree on a stool with a bike on top. I would have liked to have biked here, rather than automotivated. After brushing muffin crumbs from my pants, I take three deep breaths. Here we are, you and I. A fourth. Where did the coffee go? The seagulls point toward the river and the lake. The other birds point less. I wonder at the tastes, the smells. I’d like to use my sense of smell more vigorously. This requires trust and memory. Trust in the air and memory to breathe deep. What game does agency play? It’s a distributor of direction, a middleman. So I’ll breathe, move in my chair, love the feeling in my body. It’s Sunday. I’m feeling moderately rested. But the day is not of rest. There is a warehouse window across the way that is shattered in a way that might be art, it might be a map. I might be art, I might be a map. Agency points toward art but is not a map. When aphorisms stack up in a single paragraph, one wonders about spacing, pacing, and time. What’s the difference?
When it’s sunny and perfect, I have to remember that it’s always perfect and the sun will outlive me. A memory motivated by the long warehouse roof with the sun warming any raccoons who might be living underneath. I hope they’re in the woods by the river, rather. These bandits don’t worry about production, they just open a trash can and eat. A mammal that has it figured out. In a city of feasts, dexterous beasts.
Am I a going concern? What does my balance sheet look like? Assets? Liabilities? Shareholders’ equity? I think it’s a wash, that my concern isn’t going anymore. Corporate personhood was not all it might have been cracked up to be. The corporate eggs might crack in a predictable way, but give me cage-free eggs and I’ll pick the shells out of the omelet (turns out I don’t know how to spell omelet). I’d rather get my eggs out in the wild, stealing from a nest, but not all of them. Or maybe just eat wild mushrooms and see how many onenesses I see. As I’ve left the C corp personhood behind, I don’t have to think about Delaware, Bermuda, or commas as much as I was used to. Semicolons are not welcome in the company of companies. And now, I can use them with abandon; it’s open semicolon season; hunt away; public lands. My Financial Times subscription ends in September and the only thing I’ll miss is my favorite editorial writer. It’s not just that he gave me recommendations for cocktail bars and restaurants in London (turns out crushed pistachios are extraordinary in a drink), it’s that he seems mostly unconcerned. His is a financially timely life, so that’s part of it. But also a moderately hedonistic existence punctuated by articles about how the world is upside down and sideways in ways that are unexpected. To explode one’s perspective in small, wordy fireworks shows with the subjective at play and writing a lot fewer words than Hunter S. Thompson (and possibly a lot fewer wild mushrooms) is a way of being that I’m interested in emulating from time to time; a subjective firewords season. To share a series of paragraphs warmed by the embers of firewords, this is living well. Gather round. There are plenty of plenty-hydrating beverages, an ocean to jump into, and a crackling fire. Also, warehouses and sun.
I’d like to be read, but I think I’d like not to be read widely. At least not for a long time. It’s a wonderful thing to be read closely and lightly. So if you’re reading, keep things to yourself. Maybe when there are paper copies, we can get the word out, but I wouldn’t count on it. It’s very nice to write and write and write, and not be asked what things are about. What I’m writing about. You probably have no idea, even if you’re reading closely. I couldn’t say. I’d like to not say. I might be able to say something, but I don’t think it would be anything close to the mark. I think I’m trying to avoid the mark. Against the mark? More like away from it. The target is one direction and I’m shooting arrows the other way. Away from Delaware, from debts. When one hits a debt with an arrow, one has to pay it backward and forward. David Graeber understood this. Sperm whales seem to get it as well. Macaws, who knows. Animals seem to be wiser about debt, more forgiving. Less balance sheet auditing by firms riddled with conflicts of interest. Macaws just make noise and eat. And represent art by being who they are. Sounds like a life, right there. A sound way to live.
Roman Ryan 