Sherry Sees a Shrink (or: A Shrink Gets the Screaming Shit Scared Out of Him/Her)
By Michael J. Sherry
I must apologize, doctor, for the lack of progress we have made since I began this ridiculous adventure. No, don’t take me the wrong way. I know you’re trying to help, and I admit that you are a learned and professional therapist. But you’ve said it yourself. I’m a tough coconut to split. But I have decided to take your advice. Since, on account of my ridiculous mumbling and stammering, we are unable to touch on anything of significance during our sessions, I will now try to write some thoughts down for you and maybe it will be somewhat clearer. Perhaps you will be able to make something – anything – of it.
So now ... by means of profoundly rational processes ... I shall find the explanation for my madness (i.e. nervousness, sleeplessness, and socially unacceptable behavior (i.e. the drinking, the shouting, and the savage aggression wreaked upon inanimate objects):
I'll keep this as simple as possible (and by "simple as possible" I really mean "difficult as hell" but sort of less "difficult as hell" as the undertaking really calls for. Its sort of like saying let's send the space shuttle to Mars as "simply as possible," and then launching into years of mathematically profound complexities of indecipherable nature and finding - aggravatingly of course - that this is the simplest means of reaching such an end). Sameness and so-called "equality" of various things (i.e. personality, philosophy, fuck-sprees, etc.) is a democratic way of paving a tennis-court-society (that is to say a flat, featureless one) where everyone stumbles about - smugly and confidently, of course, while inwardly fearing little crevices and blemishes, shaking at the very thought, terrified that destiny is fucking bullshit and free-will is just as equally bullshit, and that maybe Jean-Paul Sartre was right about a few more things than we'd like to give him credit for - with faces like basketballs and futures (hopefully) like a Meg Ryan movie (puke!) or (more realistically) like something similar to James' "The Beast in the Jungle" - that is to say waiting and waiting, and then ... So that's what we're looking at here. Well, what options have we, doctor? A way out, that's what we have! But how? Okay, well, like, the shortest route between two points A (here) and B (where we're going) is a straight line, right? (Incidentally, that's not what I'm doing here, and maybe I should. Sit here, in silence, in the dark, and say - oh, well, everything is an image of an image of an image, and that's the problem. But no, I'm sitting here, listening to fucking Syd Barrett of all people, sipping a glass of Sherry (yes, I've finally taken that step ... name: Sherry, drink: Sherry - more specifically TAYLOR Dry Sherry (chilled) and its pretty good, though not great (its no whiskey) and trying ... successfully, unsuccessfully, I won't speculate ... trying to explain madness in terms of rational processes, a contradiction right off the bat. So naturally this all sounds a little mad, and then on top of that I'm trying to think lucidly while the mindless Syd Barrett plays his bizarre, equally mindless solo shit in my ear ("Floating, bumping, noses dodge a tooth/the fins a luminous/fangs all 'round the clown/is dark below the boulders hiding all/the sunlight's good for us/'Cause we're the fishes and all we do/the move about is all we do" - Terrapin, from "The Madcap Laughs") and I'm drinking a cold glass of Sherry (18% alc.). You call that a fucking straight line???) So - getting back to it all now - what's the shortest way, the "straight line" as it were? Embrace Sartre? No, it's an extreme, and besides, it’s just another image. The image of "YOU, THE NIHILIST!" Right? So maybe look inward and say "whose really there?" Cliché. And ... yes ... an image. And further ... it's you (presumably something inspired by the "inside" version of you) that's doing the "looking inside" and so it's like trying to see your own face, which, sadly, is something you can never do. You can see an IMAGE of it in a mirror. You can see it electronically reconstructed on film. You can always see the image of the image of the image ... But can you ever look at your own face out of your own fucking eyes? Never. (Yah, shit, I know this may all sound like a lot of deconstruction jargon ... "Sherry, there you go deconstructing all of these constructions!" Sure, but what I'm also doing - more significantly, I think, but that's me - is deconstructing deconstructions with equal profundity and genius unleashed (limping genius, maybe, but something resembling it at any rate. And optimistic genius too, doctor ... genius with wood, if you want). So what's sacred, if anything? Do we look to find something to break out of this cycle? This wheel of "that's all bullshit, and no don't give me that nonsense cause that's all bullshit too" deconstruction of construct... well I'm repeating myself. But I hope I've clarified). So the truth is you can't know the truth, even if there is something like it (which I'm skeptical about, but I'll try and stop with the commentary). That means ... quite possibly ... the wheel keeps spinning and we can't find a positively charged notion to fling us from it. Construction failed. Deconstruction failed. Deconstructing deconstruction will ultimately do the same. So (getting back to it now) maybe the only way to purge yourself from this spinning maelstrom of nonsense is simply to swim with it while facing backwards (WHAT!!??) Let me explain. You CAN'T get out of it. But that doesn't mean you can't give the impression you are trying, right? (Boy, this Sherry is really good, by the way. And now I'm listening to "Piper at the Gates of Dawn" which was Pink Floyd's first album in 1967, when Syd Barrett still had something resembling a brain, and acid hadn't brought a horrifying sort of life-in-death to him just yet. Amazing album, by the by). But the swimming against it (or, rather, pretending to) while really letting the current take you is just another image: the image of you swimming against. Translation - more bullshit. You're only contributing to the maelstrom. So that's not the answer. So here's the crux - I AIN'T GOT IT FIGURED OUT YET!! But as far as I can tell, the best thing to do is embrace the image of your choice, learn it, master it, pray to the image - and burn in your skin making the rest of the goddamn world think it ain't a fucking image. Be an actor. The end. (Post-script: Ultimately, we might find an answer when we can truly understand what is meant by a "straight line" in spatial terms, where everything (distance, time, matter) is bent and really not straight at all (at least not the way we think of what it means to be straight). Put more simply - when you fly a "straight" route from Earth to Mars, you're actually flying in a lot of circles (orbits) because both Spheres are moving. It's not like walking from one fixed point to another. That, I think, is what complicates this whole fucking matter. Either that, or its just a lot more bullshit and I'm guilty of complicating what I propose to (in theory) solve.)
(By the way - if I'm at all correct (which I'm probably not, its probably just more of the noise I can't get out of my head) I think I just scratched the surface of what might be a good definition for "writing." How? A lot of ways (e.g. complexity/over-simplicity, philosophy/madness, general/personal, public/private, etc. etc. etc.) but mostly, I think, by showing what it IS simply and bottom line (viz., tangible/rational/mathematical treatment of a intangible/irrational/non-mathematical object with the ultimate result of complexifying the object's intangible/irrational/non-mathematical nature. In this case, the rational approach to madness and unsocial behavior, creating more (and also exposing inherent) madness).
(But - maybe that long honking paragraph of pompous trash did exactly what I wanted it to do. Not by anything the words mean, but simply by its very existence. In other words - hear that shit in your head and try not to be a cynical/angry/behaviorally-challenged (at times) individual).
Right, doctor?
(And ... then again ... maybe its genius of the highest variety brought about by the fact that I'm drinking an alcoholic beverage that I share a name with (WHAT A FUCKING COSMIC IRONY!!!!))
~~~~~~THE EEEEEEEEEEEEEND~~~~~~~
Irritated and dog-tired, I remain
Patiently yours,
Michael J. Sherry
I must apologize, doctor, for the lack of progress we have made since I began this ridiculous adventure. No, don’t take me the wrong way. I know you’re trying to help, and I admit that you are a learned and professional therapist. But you’ve said it yourself. I’m a tough coconut to split. But I have decided to take your advice. Since, on account of my ridiculous mumbling and stammering, we are unable to touch on anything of significance during our sessions, I will now try to write some thoughts down for you and maybe it will be somewhat clearer. Perhaps you will be able to make something – anything – of it.
So now ... by means of profoundly rational processes ... I shall find the explanation for my madness (i.e. nervousness, sleeplessness, and socially unacceptable behavior (i.e. the drinking, the shouting, and the savage aggression wreaked upon inanimate objects):
I'll keep this as simple as possible (and by "simple as possible" I really mean "difficult as hell" but sort of less "difficult as hell" as the undertaking really calls for. Its sort of like saying let's send the space shuttle to Mars as "simply as possible," and then launching into years of mathematically profound complexities of indecipherable nature and finding - aggravatingly of course - that this is the simplest means of reaching such an end). Sameness and so-called "equality" of various things (i.e. personality, philosophy, fuck-sprees, etc.) is a democratic way of paving a tennis-court-society (that is to say a flat, featureless one) where everyone stumbles about - smugly and confidently, of course, while inwardly fearing little crevices and blemishes, shaking at the very thought, terrified that destiny is fucking bullshit and free-will is just as equally bullshit, and that maybe Jean-Paul Sartre was right about a few more things than we'd like to give him credit for - with faces like basketballs and futures (hopefully) like a Meg Ryan movie (puke!) or (more realistically) like something similar to James' "The Beast in the Jungle" - that is to say waiting and waiting, and then ... So that's what we're looking at here. Well, what options have we, doctor? A way out, that's what we have! But how? Okay, well, like, the shortest route between two points A (here) and B (where we're going) is a straight line, right? (Incidentally, that's not what I'm doing here, and maybe I should. Sit here, in silence, in the dark, and say - oh, well, everything is an image of an image of an image, and that's the problem. But no, I'm sitting here, listening to fucking Syd Barrett of all people, sipping a glass of Sherry (yes, I've finally taken that step ... name: Sherry, drink: Sherry - more specifically TAYLOR Dry Sherry (chilled) and its pretty good, though not great (its no whiskey) and trying ... successfully, unsuccessfully, I won't speculate ... trying to explain madness in terms of rational processes, a contradiction right off the bat. So naturally this all sounds a little mad, and then on top of that I'm trying to think lucidly while the mindless Syd Barrett plays his bizarre, equally mindless solo shit in my ear ("Floating, bumping, noses dodge a tooth/the fins a luminous/fangs all 'round the clown/is dark below the boulders hiding all/the sunlight's good for us/'Cause we're the fishes and all we do/the move about is all we do" - Terrapin, from "The Madcap Laughs") and I'm drinking a cold glass of Sherry (18% alc.). You call that a fucking straight line???) So - getting back to it all now - what's the shortest way, the "straight line" as it were? Embrace Sartre? No, it's an extreme, and besides, it’s just another image. The image of "YOU, THE NIHILIST!" Right? So maybe look inward and say "whose really there?" Cliché. And ... yes ... an image. And further ... it's you (presumably something inspired by the "inside" version of you) that's doing the "looking inside" and so it's like trying to see your own face, which, sadly, is something you can never do. You can see an IMAGE of it in a mirror. You can see it electronically reconstructed on film. You can always see the image of the image of the image ... But can you ever look at your own face out of your own fucking eyes? Never. (Yah, shit, I know this may all sound like a lot of deconstruction jargon ... "Sherry, there you go deconstructing all of these constructions!" Sure, but what I'm also doing - more significantly, I think, but that's me - is deconstructing deconstructions with equal profundity and genius unleashed (limping genius, maybe, but something resembling it at any rate. And optimistic genius too, doctor ... genius with wood, if you want). So what's sacred, if anything? Do we look to find something to break out of this cycle? This wheel of "that's all bullshit, and no don't give me that nonsense cause that's all bullshit too" deconstruction of construct... well I'm repeating myself. But I hope I've clarified). So the truth is you can't know the truth, even if there is something like it (which I'm skeptical about, but I'll try and stop with the commentary). That means ... quite possibly ... the wheel keeps spinning and we can't find a positively charged notion to fling us from it. Construction failed. Deconstruction failed. Deconstructing deconstruction will ultimately do the same. So (getting back to it now) maybe the only way to purge yourself from this spinning maelstrom of nonsense is simply to swim with it while facing backwards (WHAT!!??) Let me explain. You CAN'T get out of it. But that doesn't mean you can't give the impression you are trying, right? (Boy, this Sherry is really good, by the way. And now I'm listening to "Piper at the Gates of Dawn" which was Pink Floyd's first album in 1967, when Syd Barrett still had something resembling a brain, and acid hadn't brought a horrifying sort of life-in-death to him just yet. Amazing album, by the by). But the swimming against it (or, rather, pretending to) while really letting the current take you is just another image: the image of you swimming against. Translation - more bullshit. You're only contributing to the maelstrom. So that's not the answer. So here's the crux - I AIN'T GOT IT FIGURED OUT YET!! But as far as I can tell, the best thing to do is embrace the image of your choice, learn it, master it, pray to the image - and burn in your skin making the rest of the goddamn world think it ain't a fucking image. Be an actor. The end. (Post-script: Ultimately, we might find an answer when we can truly understand what is meant by a "straight line" in spatial terms, where everything (distance, time, matter) is bent and really not straight at all (at least not the way we think of what it means to be straight). Put more simply - when you fly a "straight" route from Earth to Mars, you're actually flying in a lot of circles (orbits) because both Spheres are moving. It's not like walking from one fixed point to another. That, I think, is what complicates this whole fucking matter. Either that, or its just a lot more bullshit and I'm guilty of complicating what I propose to (in theory) solve.)
(By the way - if I'm at all correct (which I'm probably not, its probably just more of the noise I can't get out of my head) I think I just scratched the surface of what might be a good definition for "writing." How? A lot of ways (e.g. complexity/over-simplicity, philosophy/madness, general/personal, public/private, etc. etc. etc.) but mostly, I think, by showing what it IS simply and bottom line (viz., tangible/rational/mathematical treatment of a intangible/irrational/non-mathematical object with the ultimate result of complexifying the object's intangible/irrational/non-mathematical nature. In this case, the rational approach to madness and unsocial behavior, creating more (and also exposing inherent) madness).
(But - maybe that long honking paragraph of pompous trash did exactly what I wanted it to do. Not by anything the words mean, but simply by its very existence. In other words - hear that shit in your head and try not to be a cynical/angry/behaviorally-challenged (at times) individual).
Right, doctor?
(And ... then again ... maybe its genius of the highest variety brought about by the fact that I'm drinking an alcoholic beverage that I share a name with (WHAT A FUCKING COSMIC IRONY!!!!))
~~~~~~THE EEEEEEEEEEEEEND~~~~~~~
Irritated and dog-tired, I remain
Patiently yours,
Michael J. Sherry
posted by Il Pazzo @ 9:49 PM
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